(Social Oddities) Pt. 1 of ?

The Social Oddity of Not Being Able To Say No:

In our culture it has kind of become impossible to oppose anyone by saying no to requests or by asking someone to change what they're doing if you're aiming to be polite. It practically defeats the purpose of asking someone a yes or no question in some cases, but would be altogether more rude if you didn't give them the option at all in some more cases. All of this can be avoided if you're someone who doesn't care if you're rude or not.

Example 1:
You're in class and whoever is speaking asks if the crowd minds if they talk and extra 5 minutes into your lunch time. Since it would be rude for anyone to say "No, I'd really like to get to lunch on time," the speaker only hears the random one or two people who yell "Yeah, go ahead!"

Example 2:
You've made plans to hang out with a friend later and are going to his place to watch a movie and play some games. When a second friend asks if he or she can come as well, you would be rude to deny them, but you tell them it's not up to you because it's not at your house, so you proceed to call your first friend and ask if your second friend can come with you. Naturally, since the host really doesn't have any solid excuse not to let your second friend come, he would be obliged to say yes, even if he didn't really like the second friend or would rather just have you over.

Example 3:
You're in a car with some friends, not good friends, but people you're comfortable around. Someone puts on some music that you don't really like. It's not that it's bad music or that it's particularly obnoxious, it's just really mediocre (See The Killers). You can't just ask them to turn it off because you don't like it without sounding rude.