I recently learned that 93 percent of all communication is nonverbal. When I heard this, I immediately imagined teabagging someone in Counter Strike: Global Offensive.
For the uninitiated, CS:GO (usually pronounced CS go) is a multiplayer first-person shooter game on PC where the ultimate goal is to piss off your opponents (or if you suck at the game, your teammates.) The easiest way of doing so is teabagging. If you’re unfamiliar with teabagging, envision -- if you will -- a tea bag being dipped into a hot cup of water. Now replace the tea bag with a man’s scrotum, and the cup of water with a helpless noob he just brutally slaughtered. As seen below:
*slap* *slap* *slap*
Now, what does this have to do with communication? Well, I have to admit I’m rather annoyed you asked! I just wanted to talk about teabagging… But here’s the tie in. Teabagging is an intimate form of nonverbal communication. By slamming your character’s pixelated junk into a fresh kill’s face you’re really saying “I respect you.” Nah, you’re saying, “yeah kid get owned -- uninstall the game, you’re trash.” In other cases, when teabagging a friend for example, the sentiment is slightly different. You’re still saying “you’re trash” but without the malignation.
There are countless forms of nonverbal communication just like this in CS:GO. Of course, you can speak directly with teammates (and the opposing team at certain points in any given match) but often times you’ll find that people just don’t talk. Using your mic accounts for only so much of your team’s communication (which is vitally important in CS:GO). And thus, we have the teabag.
But we also have “the nod”. When a teammate is without mic and cannot reply verbally (and is too freaking lazy to type anything into the chat) that player can answer questions with nods or shakes of his character’s head. This translates to wiggling his or her mouse up and down or sideways. This form of communication is also used when teammates give you absolutely useless tips about the current situation (usually one that vitally requires quiet concentration.)
If a player’s incessant yammering causes you to choke and lose a round, it’s well within your rights to smack them with your knife, resulting in their losing a chunk of health and your gaining some peace of mind (after you’ve muted their furious screams, of course.) This, I call, the “love tap”. It mostly comes from a place of pure unadulterated hatred. That’s called irony kids! Other times it really does come from a place of love and consideration for your fellow teammates. A little slice says to them “I’m here.” But don’t love tap too many times, you may end up a very unhappy man without any friends.
