I seek the assistance of the teeming millions in my mission to eradicate from society the plague that is the responsive “good morning.”
You know what I’m talking about. You are sitting at a meeting - whether at work, school, or elsewhere - and the speaker begins his/her remarks with a cheery “Good morning.” But instead of simply launching into their speech, they pause for the audience to respond in kind. And worst of all are the speakers who, if the mumbled response is not considered sufficiently hearty, say, “You can do better than that. GOOD MORNING.”
What is this - Ding Dong School? Who is responsible for this practice? Was it Oprah or some other cheery do-gooder or motivational speaker? I can almost imagine the milder form in certain settings. Say in church where they actually want to exhibit that they are welcoming visitors and members and making them part of the congregation. But in business settings, such practice should be met with the severist of measures.
I propose that anyone starting remarks in this manner should be met with uniform silence. And should they follow up with the, “You can do better” routine, the response should be a hearty, “Fuck off and die!” accompanied by the flinging of half eaten muffins or other foodstuffs.
Are you with me folks? Together we can stamp out this creeping scourge of childish, false, good cheer.
That’s ok, whomever decided to put those nutella-filled muffins in the vending machine should be exterminated anyway. Actually, let’s find out who it was and fling him at the speaker…
I want my touch-of-lemon, nutella-free muffins back!
You need to work with surly software engineers. A “good morning” will occasionally cause a laptop to be closed, and maybe get a grunt from the extrovert in the front row. The “you can do better than that” would get nothing but hate-filled glares. None of them would dream of sacrificing a muffin, but a laptop would make an acceptable projectile (then they’d bitch to IT about losing their data).
Cheerful people are not welcome over here - they can go hang around the marketing and HR drones in the other building. So count me in!
When a speaker begins this way, it tells me something. It tells me,
“My material is uninteresting, and I’m too poor a speaker and too uncreative a writer to make it interesting. So instead of grabbing your attention with a well-crafted presentation–which I’m not capable of doing–I’ll resort to a shopworn audience participation gimmick, knowing that you’re captive listeners, prevented by the norms of business decorum from giving me the shit-storm that I so richly deserve.”
I do not believe in ‘Good Morning’ and rarely if ever say it. The name of good should never ever be sullied by combining it with that bane of my existance, morning.
I will say ‘Morning’ to people in the office when I get in but I don’t actually intend it as a greeting but more of a statement of fact. At 745am when I get in, it is indeed to my utter dismay morning.
I will happily join in the fight to eliminate that horrible phrase from being used.
Nutella-filled muffins? As if muffins weren’t deceptively high in calories to begin with, Nutella, all else being equal, is like chugging a bottle of extra-virgin olive oil. It’s no wonder they claim it gives kids energy – at 7 calories per gram, it’s pre-adolescent rocket fuel.
Having said that, and depending on what the muffin part itself was made with, that sounds vaguely interesting. I wouldn’t touch it with a ten foot block of lard, but still…
As for the OP – I have fortunately never been to such a meeting, but I’d probably ignore it if I did. Having been around, and worked in, customer service for a good long time, false platitudes and lame greetings bounce right off my ears.
I second the comments that nobody who has anything interesting to say, in any circumstance other than a political rally, needs to get the audience to spice the show up. That’s what you’re there for, toots.
I was accosted with this BS by the Judge in traffic court the other day!
Like we’re all so freakin’ happy to be in court we should be all cheery at 8:00 AM! Not to mention the fact that each one of us would soon be standing in front of her waiting for her to decide a proper fine for our transgressions. There’s nothing like being forced into false politeness by someone who has power over you. :mad:
I have a story about this, one speaker (who was the CEO) at my previous job had the unfortunate habit of saying “Right?” and “You with me?” throughout his speech. One group got together and decided the next time he said it they would say together “Hell NO!” as a joke.
Except only one of them did it.
Middle of the conference, over 500 people in the room and one loud voice, “Hell NO!”
Slight regional variation - most primary schools here have some version of the good morning greeting. Teacher walks in and says, loudly, “Good morning everyone!” The correct reply, voiced by the kiddies, is singsong and much slower, usually in the form of “Good morning Mr/Ms. Whatever…”
In my science centre, quite often kids begin the parrot-back routine when I first say “good morning, everyone!” Then they trail off, because they don’t know my name. Ha ha.
Some religious schools even add “Good morning Ms. Araminty, and may God bless you.” Or, even longer - yesterday I got “Good morning Ms. Araminty, and may God bless you and keep you forever.” Um, no thanks. Don’t be bringing your deity into my science centre, now, kids.
I’ve never heard of the phenomenon occuring amongst a bunch of adults.
the “good morning!” and the “you all having fun?” followed by either, “I said, ARE YOU HAVING FUN?” “I can’t hear you!” or “awww, come on! you can do better than that!” Maybe we’re not having fun!
I got over the whole idea of the collective “good morning” response when I got to sixth grade. That was when we stopped having to do the class-good morning.
