So I noticed something today about how I address people:
My actual “elders” and “superiors” who I’m familiar with, for the most part, strongly insist that I don’t call them “ma’am” or “sir.”
Friends are called maybe 70% firstname, 15% lastname, 5% firstname lastname, and 5% any other title (often an honorific) when it’s clear who I’m talking to.
I call strangers “sir” (“ma’am”) because that’s what’s polite to do. But the majority of strangers I talk to have mundane positions like cashier or waitress. Nobody really bristles at it, probably because we’re just interacting for a minute or less, probably because most people were also taught that it’s polite.
My hunch is that people dislike being called “Mr. Doe” or “Sir” because it’s stilted and overly formal, and that it’s a heavily generational thing which has begun to become societal default (to not prefer hearing “Sir” from someone you actually know or work with).
Is this cyclical? Have other honorifics gone in and out of (and back in, etc.) favor before?
Is there an “honorific treadmill” like the euphemism treadmill whereby signs of respect predictably rotate into usage?
Is this also observed (or not?) in other societies?
I don’t much like being addressed as “sir”; mostly because I don’t believe that the person saying it is really offering respect. Either it’s a commercial transaction (in which case I don’t care) or it’s a younger adult of whose motives I am generally suspicious.
Being addressed that way also makes me feel like there is an unwanted divide between me and the other person. There is one young lady that I work with who insists on calling me “Mr.” I have asked her to call me by my first name, as everyone else does no matter what their age, but she says that is the way she was raised and she really can’t do otherwise. It just makes me feel like I’m some remote authority figure whose humanity is not being recognized. Probably not entirely rational on my part, but there it is.
Roddy
Of course you’re going to call your friends by their first name, because you’re “on a first name basis” with them.
And being an adult in a peer relationship (either business or socially) with other adults, puts you on the same level, so you’d use a first name with anyone to whom you’ve been introduced. I’ve worked with people who are younger than my adult children, and I expect to use my first name in the workplace, because everyone is called by their first name in my workplace.
About the only place left for sir and ma’am in adult relationships is when you’re addressing someone in a clear position of authority (the President of the United States, a police officer, a minister, etc.) where it’s acknowledged to be a superior/subordinate relationship.
However, it’s still polite to address someone by an honorific (Mr/Mrs/Ms/Dr) until they say “call me X.”
Nowadays, I hear “sir” and “ma’am” being used sarcastically more than anything. Something akin to the Southern “Bless your heart. . .” if you know what I mean.
Because they’re often mostly from the hippie generation or were ex-establishment loonies. Then one day reality slapped them in the face and they decided to fall in line like the rest of the adult world.
They only dislike “sir” and “maam” cause it makes them think somehow they’re giving into the system of normality and decency and a morally accountable society …
Having said that, I do know people that dislike"sir" or “maam” simply because they see it as a title that’s undeserved.
English boys try to call me “madam” a lot, and I’m like “do I look like a a brothel owner?”
I have zero patience for people who get offended by “sir” or “ma’am.” It’s a form of polite address, but some people seem to be so insecure that they think other people must be secretly making fun of them by addressing them as such. Either that, or they can’t accept that they’re adults now and that being addressed as one isn’t equivalent to “Eww, you’re old!” Absolutely ridiculous.
When I worked as a grocery store, I would always address customers as sir as ma’am (mostly when I was trying to get their attention, e.g., “I can help you over here, ma’am”). I don’t think I ever had a man give me a problem, and most women were fine, but I would get the occasional seventy-year-old who would give me attitude: “Do I like like a ‘ma’am’ to you?” Uh, yes? I sincerely hope that when I’m seventy, no one calls me “miss” or “young lady.” I hate that condescending crap.
If you ask me to call you by your first name, I’ll certainly do so. But until then, I’ll use the commonly accepted form of polite address and hope that you’re grown-up enough to handle it.
I like sirs and ma’ams. And I’ve worked with a few ladies who are given the ‘miz’ title in front of their name, and I’ve been given that honorific myself. Miz, not ‘miss’. I think that’s a southern thing.
Anyway, I like it sometimes, but I’ve never thought it was a negative thing, ever. It’s polite. If I were trying to get the attention of a lady in front of me, whose back was turned, I’d say “Ma’am?” to get her attention, not ‘Hey lady!!’. 'cause that’s just rude.
If you are trying to get the attention of a stranger, what should you call them? Hey you? I must be missing something in this thread.
I was once served by a waitress in a NY restaurant who had, it turned out, moved from France with her husband only a short time before and whose English was…poorer than my French, which is pretty poor. But one thing I noticed was she addressed my wife as “Mrs.” (Can I take your order, Mrs?) Since I was by that time helping her, I explained that that is just not English usage, but she was mentally translating the French “Madame”. She asked me what she should say and I said that “madam” or “ma’am” was fine and I don’t know another answer.
