"Are you alright?" I chimed in a slow, mechanical, absolutely unfeeling response from my bedroom. You see, Ben always has a gripe and complain. He seems to think that his experience of putting in a nose ring is qualified as yet another reason to distract the entire apartment from doing homework, from our own peaceful lives at the moment, and to engage us in his all-important life.Ben now receives the attention of insincere roommates as to not drain us of our sanity and energies that should not be interrupted every two minutes to help him with things, and to ask him to elaborate upon his frequent gripes and complaints about life. Granted, the boy has had a rough life, but the constant request for attention wears on us.
             The insincerity of the response in this situation arose from the fact that the situation was predictable and allowed for a mechanical reaction. The caring reply to Ben's distress cries came from someone that did not care. In this way, insincerity is a serious lie. I did not really want to hear him elaborate upon the situation to tell me that he was not alright and why. I knew Ben was complaining about another of his perceived life crises. I knew what he would say in response to "Are you alright?" he would tell me that indeed, as he had just been yelling, something that he did to himself, perhaps bumped his knee or hit his head, hurt. The insincerity backing my words to Ben allowed for him to do what he wanted to do.
             Insincere responses serve purposes well when the goal of the person eliciting the response is accomplished in the process. Ben only wanted to speak out loud to express his importance and let his existence be known to everyone in the apartment. It let Ben know where everyone in the apartment was located (bedroom, kitchen, and bathroom) and perhaps what they were doing while he was putting his nose ring in. It gave me control because a response would center all action in th
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