Being Nice -- The Psychosis of Politeness

Great Debates
1

There are people who make it a point to be polite when it is obvious that they feel annoyed or attacked personally. Of course it depends on the situation wheather it might be wise to be polite even if the other person is a real asshole, but I personally consider it useless to hide behind politeness when it is obvious that your words don’t really reflect what you mean.

But everything is context.

In worldly affairs, “politeness” has more to do with efficiency than with mere decorum (not our decorum!), or being “nice” for the sake of being nice. Sometimes being polite is the most efficient way to control the situation, whether it is getting the other person to give you what you want, or just get them to leave.

There are occasions where you don’t really want to be friends, but cannot be enemies for whatever reason. There are other occasions where there is nothing useful or productive that can come from engaging in argument or conflict with the person.

On other occasions it is perfectly appropriate to take the person down a notch and tell them to “fuck the fuck off.”

Especially in business, you often deal with people you really don’t like, but it pays to keep them well disposed. On some level it is “phony,” but on a real level it is practical.

Doing business and being social are two different contexts.

Why, on God’s dead earth, would someone be polite, or “civil” to those who do not deserve it, nor offer anything useful for it?

Is this just a liberal PC thing to do (there, I tied it in with Issues), or a biologically derived mess?

Perky people should be systematically exterminated (this is the joke part, guys):

http://server4.uploadit.org/files/241103-189317-carol.jpg

If you simply don’t see such cases, then this question is not for you to answer.

I can assure you, they do exist. Rampantly.

I will even provide you with one:

Person A insults Person B with a passive aggressive attack on Person B’s reading level. Person B decideds that Person A is an educated fool, incapable of understanding anything outside of a textbook - thus Person B is annoyed with Person A. Person A’s understanding of Person B is (on any level) is of no consequence to Person B. Person B concludes that it is their best interest to be polite.

My question is “why”?

2

> Why, on God’s dead earth, would someone be polite, or “civil”
> to those who do not deserve it, nor offer anything useful for it?

Mainly because you just never know.

At this specific moment, you may think that the stupid fool that you are conversing with has nothing useful for you. But, you should never take that for granted, since you probably don’t know everything.

What if that person happens to have a gun with him and would think nothing of shooting you for almost no reason? Or maybe he’s the type who would stalk you or slash your tires. In retrospect, as you are lying in the street, bleeding, you suddenly realize that having this guy remain calm would have been very useful to you.

> On other occasions it is perfectly appropriate to take the
> person down a notch and tell them to “fuck the fuck off.”

And what do you accomplish with that? How many people have you ever met who benefited from being taken down a notch? Have you ever met anyone that reacted well to being told to fuck off?

How many times have you ever benefited from taking down someone else a notch? What do you gain from it? Do the girls swarm all over you, rubbing your chest, and cooing about your victory?

More likely than not, you win a very tiny victory and set the stage for a much bigger confrontation somewhere down the road.

And once again, you find yourself lying in the street, bleeding.

3

Originally posted by ExecutiveJesus:

Simply because the toes you step on today might be connected to the ass you have to kiss tomorrow. :wink:

4

**

This is a good point.

But is such a point remarkable enough to justify such a compulsive behavior?

One never knows, for instance, if they will die in the bathtub.

Should this mean that the individual should want to take baths in a pool?

Chance becomes so obsolete that the reward becomes greater.

Reward is what I’ll get into here:

> On other occasions it is perfectly appropriate to take the
> person down a notch and tell them to “fuck the fuck off.”

And what do you accomplish with that? How many people have you ever met who benefited from being taken down a notch? Have you ever met anyone that reacted well to being told to fuck off?
[/quote]
**

I find that vengence is a substantive human want. To the point of little or no consequence - it should not be inhibited.

**

I have benefited countless times.

I gain the satisfaction of squelching an irk.

**

I fail to see the likeliness of this. Please provide an explaination.

I suppose I’ll make full certainty that I am in Canada at the time, then.

:stuck_out_tongue:

5

There is a certain moral superiority to be felt by remaining polite and composed while an ass makes insinuations just shy of open insult. Acting as though you missed the implication entirely or, worse, asking for clarification.

In addition, reasoned response to irrational behavior denies the jerk after-the-fact justification for his or her behavior.

Besides, it isn’t worth wasting emotion or energy getting upset with such an individual. Why extend the conversation by ripping in to them. In a professional context their idiocy will eventually catch up to them and in a non professional context it is usually easy enough to move on.

6

What a fucking moronic thing to say ExecutiveJesus!

:wink: see, rudeness puts you on the defensive, and makes me look arrogant, stupid, uneducated, or a mixture of all three.

The fact is you have a very good point that politeness can border on hypocrisy. I think that you need tread a fine line between being nasty to others (which is seldom if ever called for) and hiding your regards for someone from them (which can be conniving, manipulative, …)
I think the ‘Social Grace’ type people have the idea, you see, correct etiquette doesn’t necessarily mean being nice. You can pointedly ignore someone, or give them short shrift, without resorting to rudeness. Rudeness then is reserved for when you lose your composure, and the fact that you are not a rude person makes the rudeness in those rare occasions so much more effective.
A polite person can silence a building with a word that would just get a rude person ignored.

7

[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Bippy the Beardless *
**What a fucking moronic thing to say ExecutiveJesus!

:wink: see, rudeness puts you on the defensive, and makes me look arrogant, stupid, uneducated, or a mixture of all three.[/uuote]**

Fair point; but I am not talking about rudeness. I’m only referring to “not being polite” as opposed to “being polite”.

I believe we agree on the most substantive level.

Good Post!

8

I should probably start using the “preview” button, eh?

9

Sounds good to me, I was reading too much into your “fuck the fuck off.” quote.

10

Civility is good, but politeness often borders on snobbishness. When people point out the bad manners of others, I consider that ruder (in most cases) than whatever the supposed transgression was.

11

Why should I be polite to someone who doesn’t deserve it? Because I want to be a polite person. Whether or not the person deserves it is not the question; whether or not I want to let other people change how I behave is. I try to be, in myself, a civil person who treats everyone with the same amount of respect no matter who they are. (I do not always succeed in that.) I don’t want to let others dictate how I will act.

I’m not saying it very well. Oh well.

{b]Eli**, politeness is not snobbishness. Pointing out others’ mistakes is the height of bad manners, not good ones. You may enjoy a good session with a Miss Manners book, if you haven’t read her before…

12

From my own experience: There is a woman that comes into our store that is so rude nobody wants to wait on her. Well, I decided to kill her with kindness. No matter how rude she was I gave her the best service and stayed calm and polite at all times. Now she is one of the nicest customers to wait on. So that is one case where being nice even though I did not want to served a purpose.

13

I quote Death: “It’s just as easy to be nice as to be creepy” (or somesuch)

Politeness…that control that means you respect others…should carry it’s own reward.

If someone is intentionally rude I prefer to avoid them. If they ask why I tell them.

I prefer to think of it as ‘setting a good example’.

14

I think this is really a very important question.

I’m not sure why Person B decides to be polite – that’s their decision. My question in this case is, “why not”? What does Person B gain by being impolite? Does Person A then regard them with more respect? Does Person A realize they were a fool and apologize, leading to a close friendship? Does Person A now acknowledge Person B’s point in their argument?

Or does Person A, deciding that Person B is not only illiterate but rude, go from being passive-aggressive to just being aggressive?

Although I expected to read a lot of responses that gave some sort of moral or religious basis for politeness, I see that most of them are based on some form of practicality.

Well, there are many, many angles on practicality.

I tend to fall on the side of not making unnecessary enemies.

Trying to change others’ behavior can lead to making enemies. If you tell people exactly what you think on SDMB, your enemies are generally harmless. But if you do it in real space, you never know…

Also, I like the idea of providing feedback to others. Some people are rude or annoying and don’ t realize it. But how can you let them know in a way they are willing to accept? There are lots of cases of someone who came to a life-altering realization because someone else cared to confront them in a gentle way.

Of course, what paved the way to that realization? Probably, the rude/annoying person got thousands of rejections over the years, many of them “polite” and many of them “direct”. As a result, little wheels have been turning in their head. Usually, that person will tend at first to deny and externalize blame. But over time, especially if they experience additional consequences, an alternative explanation may simmer within.

If someone applies gentle feedback after just the right amount of simmering, that person could have an “aha” moment and move on to significant change.

The pragmatic question, for me, is this: Is “hard” feedback (direct and no-gloves) required to get an obnoxious/annoying person to the point of accepting some responsibility for their own actions? Maybe it is. And is it okay for me to give it? Hmm… I’ll have to think about that.

Obviously, there are many methods of effecting change in others. Nobody’s Fool’s story illustrates another one, but I wonder how much change happened in other aspects of the customer’s life?

Beyond all that, what do you do with people who do or say stupid things (as you see it)? If they aren’t being mean or rude, what’s wrong with a polite inquiry or a polite response pointing out what might be wrong? After all, behaving in a mean or rude or harmful manner might be an ingrained habit that requires significant firepower to change (see above). But we all make mistakes, and often these are not mistakes of habit - so we can readily benefit from some gentle feedback.

So, ExecutiveJesus, I think your approach has its place. But where would you draw the line on your own behavior? Maybe you could give some more examples of what you think is undeserving of politeness, and explain what value a “not-polite” response has.

15

I find the equation of “liberal PC” to civility rather humorous as it has, traditionally, been the more conservative groups in our culture who have insisted on civility while purported liberals were insisting upon the right to be rude in the name of (their perception of) honesty.

Similarly, the notion that politeness or civility should ever include dishonesty or the notion of being “phony” seems to indicate a misunderstanding of the meaning of politeness and civility.

Certainly, the harried sales clerk faced with an overbearing customer (particularly when the sale is important) may be called upon to dissemble. That, however, is sales technique, not politeness. Politeness and civility require only that one not attack another person. One can be quite honest in one’s expression, even while expressing complete disagreement on a topic, and remain civil about it. As noted above, attacking the person in an argument tends to weaken one’s own position from the perspective of other observers, so it might be the case that remaining civil is always a good tactic in an argument.

Beyond that, of course, many of us are called to behave in a manner in which we should not do unto others what we would not have done to ourselves (or, if we follow a separate tradition, "What is hateful to you, do not do to others.”). Even if you reject the moral position as irrelevant or inapplicable, I would propose that there is sufficient aggression in the world and that I see no purpose in adding to the general level of aggression.

16

It’s not just that you might offend someone who might be useful to you later in life. That’s a pragmatic, cynical view.

Some people are polite because that’s the way they’ve been raised and because they’re striving for the ideal of a civilized society. A gentleman remains a gentleman even when the situation might provoke other emotions.

17

Grace under pressure.

18

If everyone were polite, we’d have a nicer society. Isn’t that enough reason? Politeness and niceness are, of course, related but different concepts. But the bottom line is that good manners help the world run more smoothly.

And what’s the value in honesty? A lot of the posts above seem to imply that being honest with ones emotions is a great virtue. It isn’t. Politeness most certainly requires one to lie on occasion - as when a friend gives birth to a hideous child (aren’t all babies hideous?) No one would claim that the moral imperative is to honestly appraise the baby’s looks. This applies in a lot of situations. There are times when it’s called for to politely decline a desired second piece of pie, claiming that you couldn’t eat any more, so that someone else may have it. Upon seeing an acquaintance who you haven’t seen in a long time, should you say, “My, Gertrude, how fat you’ve become since college!”?

Honesty is overrated.

19

Because they have been inculcated by foggy religious teaching and poor parental guidance.

Being polite is about showing respect - society seems to think that everyone deserves respect, but I think it is something that is earned.

However as you say its a good practical policy to be polite most of the time.

20

As an attorney, I deal with this issue a lot. When two parties to an argument are incivil, the situation can degenerate pretty quickly into something really ugly. Attorneys need to be able to assess things objectively and when you make things personal, you can do the client a disservice. Besides, if you are rude to your adversary, he or she will probably find a way to retaliate.