This question has jack-diggly to do with current Pit rules brouhaha; I am bored with that subject and mention it mainly to have an excuse to use the words jack-diggly and brouhaha. It is, rather, something that’s been kicking around in my head for a little while now.
I make a conscious and deliberate effort to be polite to salespeople, waiters, cashiers, and so forth. It’s not a reflexive thing for me; I’d be acting much more in accord with my basic nature if I were a consistent jackass to everyone I met. But I have a vision of myself, or rather the self I wish to create, which requires that I behave nicely even to people who don’t deserve it.
Since I began this policy, I’ve found myself less bothered by the rudeness of others; or, more precisely, my threshold of annoyance has been raised. Possibly that’s because I’m aware of Miss Manners’ dictum that one may not repay discourtesy with discourtesy, and partly because, since I am conscious of the effort it takes to be nice to people, I am prepared to give a busy cashier slack.
What about the rest of you? Would you call yourself polite by inclination, by habit, or by effort, or not polite at all? How much does real-life discourtesy in others vex you, and what sorts of discourtesy most raise your ire?
Polite by inclination. Nothing vexes me more than watching someone be rude to another person. I don’t think it need only apply in ‘‘real life.’’ One of the hardest adjustments for me when I started posting here was dealing with the rudeness. Many seem to feel that rudeness online is okay because civility doesn’t apply to the internet. I politely disagree.
I emphasized “real world” because I did not wish this thread to be seen as a stealth attempt to revisit the Pit rule changes. I’d specify who I would expect to do that, but it wouldn’t be polite.
Being in complete accord with your digglejackedness of the current garboil, my swooning adoration of the Miss’ dictum informs you that I am polite by inclination, habit and effort.
Also had it caned into me as a lad.
This describes me to a “T”. However, I don’t find that my threshold for rudeness is raising; if anything, I’m finding it lowering. Not that I mention it out loud - I wait until I’m alone then I bitch. To myself.
I consider myself to be very polite by inclination. I hold doors for strangers, I give up my seat to women and the elderly on public transportation, I try to greet everyone with a smile.
I’m just not one of those people who lets things get to me unless it’s really important. Guy cuts me off on the road? No big deal. Someone in the express lane at the grocery store has twelve items instead of ten? Who cares? Insult my wife? Now we have a problem.
Unforunately, it seems that some people these days mistake politeness for weakness. That ain’t so.
A friend of mine gave me a piece of advice years ago, that still sticks with me: “Don’t sweat the petty stuff, pet the sweaty stuff.”
Politeness is important to me, but has become more so since I live in a small town and it might come back to bite me if I am rude to anyone. So I guess it is societally imposed but I do feel good that I am being pressured to be polite.
I do expect some sort of reciprocation. Like if I say Thank You to the bagger at the supermarket, it would be nice if they didn’t just stare off into space like I don’t exist. I swear next time I’m just going to stand looking at them until they respond. /pet peeve
But bitching to yourself in private is not impolite. Bitching to yourself in private is the very height of politness.
Here’s what I mean when I say my threshold is rising. Say I’m in line at Walgreen’s and the cashier only grunts or is actively rude in her/his manner of speaking. I naturally wish to rip the cashier a new one, verbally of course. But since I’m trying to be polite I don’t follow the first impulse, which gives me time to think, “Hey, look, it’s probably the end of her shift, I bet her feet hurt, she’s been dealing with idiots all day, and the person in front of me just made the cashier wait for well over a minute while he counted and recounted the pennies with which he was making a $6 purchase.” By the time I’ve thought all this, I’m less annoyed with the cashier and am feeling sympathetic.
I always try to be especially nice to cashiers, waiters, etc, because they have hard jobs and deal with idiots. But naturally I’m rather blunt and direct and I expect others to treat me the same way (not rude, just not necessarily using please and thank you for every request. That sort of thing.) I must come off as nicer than I feel, since everybody thinks I’m a sweet young thing.
I’ve worked those retail jobs, fast food jobs and restaurant jobs.
I know what it’s like to be griped at by people all day, and then there is that one customer that is polite and cheerful. Guess who gets their glass of water refilled the fastest?
On top of that, as I’ve gotten older, I’ve also gotten over myself. It’s not going to negatively impact me if I let yet another car in front of me on the freeway. Laying on the horn, in stopped freeway traffic, isn’t going to get me home any faster. Politely waiting, and then smiling, as the woman with 2 kids stands in front of the grocery store shelf I want at, isn’t going to ruin my day, and it just might make hers.
This. Being a naturally shy yet cynical lad, I am polite on the outside and yet filled with unspeakably cruel horrors on the inside.
My housemates are decent, mouthy and extroverted and, after getting appropriately comfortable with it, have begun using my genteel manner as a thing to walk over and wipe their feet on before trying to boss me around.
I have actually had to start deliberately being nasty and petty at regular-ish intervals to keep them reminded that actually, no thank you very much
eta: I worked as a labourer for many years. From this, I learned not to expect politeness from most people, but I also learned the incredible value of a friendly manner on a rainy day.
Courtesy can go a long way. I try to be courteous in all my dealings. Although I am a reserved man and so I have sometimes been told that I am arrogant where in truth I am simply at a loss for words. Small talk with checkout people often eludes me.
But a friend of mine has a saying that I like: The measure of a man is not in how he treats his boss, it is how he treats the help. (When he says it, it will depend on where we are, it can be the wait-staff at a restaurant/bar, the cleaning people or anyone else who isn’t going to further a man’s career.)
Rude people annoy me and it’s a big turnoff to me. If someone is rude to restaurant staff or store clerks it’s the last time that I’ll be eating out or shopping with them, and I think that it’s probably a symptom of some ugly personality traits that I don’t want to get to know more about. When people are rude to me for no reason I usually stop and ask them what’s upsetting them in a perfectly polite tone. It will either cause them to smile and apologize or it will embarrass them and piss them off. Either works for me. Doing it to someone who is behaving badly in a meeting is very effective. You never have to do it more than once.
It’s very important to me. I am careful to be polite to others and notice when people are not polite to me or around me. It’s one of the major ways I judge someone’s character, like Karyn and Khadaji said: it’s easy to be polite to those who have power over you, what’s more revealing is how polite you are to those over whom you have power. My ex was rude to waiters, shop assistants and my friends - one of the reasons he’s my ex.
I’m also determined that my daughter learns to be polite. Since she could talk (she’s two now, and chatters constantly) she’s been taught to say ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ (it started at ‘ta’ until she could use the proper words) and we don’t allow any exceptions. I don’t care that it’s blatantly just habit and she has no real understanding of what she’s doing or why, what’s important is that she behaves politely to other humans around her, whether they’re adults or children. It’s kind of funny that she even says ‘please’ when she’s telling our labrador to get on his bed, though!
Being polite is important to me. Don’t know if it’s ingrained, exactly. . .but I do believe that what goes around comes around, and I try hard to practice the Golden Rule.
People being polite to me? Well, it doesn’t matter so much, as long as they’re not actively rude. THAT bothers me.
When I used to work customer service at a call center, my protocol for dealing with people who were actively rude was to just get nicer and nicer as they got nastier and nastier. Sooner or later, if you do this, the asshole generally realizes they’re being an asshole. Sometimes they apologize, sometimes not. But I always hoped it would make them think twice before treating the next person that way.
Beyond a simple pleasantry like the aforementioned “You’re Welcome”, I too don’t worry too much about people being crazy-polite to me. Lack of rudeness will suffice, and it better since plenty of folks around here are terse Yankees who won’t get into a lot of niceties. I don’t find that offensive at all.
I’m very polite to strangers. I am that way simply because my parents are that way. I like being polite to people I don’t know and I find it bizarre when others aren’t polite to each other (or to me). Although I am polite, I have a low tolerance for someone being rude / cruel / inconsiderate, and I could potentially turn mean.
My fiancee, on the other hand, is all business with strangers. She made a point to ask me why I feel the need to get out of oncoming peoples’ ways when walking on the sidewalk the other day.
