Being "creeped out" is mostly a function of instinct. It's something you feel in your gut (or wherever instinct lives for you). This means that if you do not have it, it's hard to explain.
The questions you are asking sort of miss the point, there's plenty of ways people can explain their instinct but at the end of the day it's not really a conscious process. If you don't have the same instincts as some people have, I suppose it would be natural to end up with the questions you do. What's important to remember is that they don't have the answers either.
If you really want an explanation that may or may not be true, in my personal experience I can tell that things are simulated or inauthentic unless (as you say) they're being simulated by an extremely competent actor (in the sense that they are acting). Even with people who act very competently, there are always (at least, I've never met an exception) small indicators over time that feel a little wrong. You can't act 24/7, so the longer people interact with you (if you are acting) the more likely it is they'll see you slip up.
This isn't really a problem, as the experience of getting to know someone naturally tends to lead to you seeing them in an entirely different light. The trick is figuring out when to show some authentic drive of yourself and when to present a socially desirable composite. That trick is something you learn by making a lot of mistakes (or if there's some rule to it, I have no idea what it is). If you don't consciously stop acting at some point and people see through it on their own, then it becomes creepy. The ideal is to head that off and figure out together if you are compatible personality types.
> Being creeped out is a feeling or reaction that is valuable for some other reasons as well. A shared sense of what is creepy can make for social bonding, either in the face of a joint threat or annoyance, or just to feel fellow feelings in shared reactions.
Being creeped out as a bonding circle jerk is all fun and games, until what the group is creeped out by are people from some ethnic group.
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