Wait, you call other people ‘sir’ but hate being called that yourself?
Myself, frankly I’d rather be “ma’am” than “miss.” I get called “miss” a lot, especially by people who seem a lot younger than me. Geez, way to make me feel small.
No, see the problem there is that there will come a day when “miss” no longer applies. And not because you may or may not marry - “ma’am” is an Old Lady word, “miss” is the Young Lady word.
Which means, unlike boys and men, who can be “sir” at any age, we wimmenfolk have a clear and unmistakable signal as to when a speaker considers us “old”.
Beware the ma’am!
Hate to say it, but that sounds kind of neat. Very distinctive. A gal I went to high school with started going very evenly grey at 18 – that wasn’t so cool.
I can’t decide what’s worse. Whenever I hear “Miss,” I think, “I’m an adult, married woman, not a little girl!” However, when I start hearing “Ma’am,” I’m going to think, “Oh, so now I’m old?”
We can’t win.
M’lady.
Come see the violence inherent in the system!
I remember once when I caught myself saying “These damn kids today…” And I was eighteen. And that was back during the Carter administration!
I got mine when I was 10. And it’s not gray, it’s white, and right in the front over my right eye. I hit my head pretty hard in a bike accident, and it has grown in white there ever since.
Kind of cool, actually. Just not big enough to really stand out, like Colleen Williams’ hair used to (she was a newscaster in LA and had jet black hair with a big, thick white streak in the front- so cool).
That’s not true, the mother wasn’t really expecting him to act as a disciplinarian, just a frighteningly indifferent stranger on whom all sorts of ruthlessly authoritative traits could be projected. I know because I was “the man” once before while walking down the street, and I never expected to follow through on the mother’s promises since I was in their view for only a few seconds.
bubastis - while there may be some larger-scale angst you need to sort out, I wouldn’t sweat it. As a parent of an 8-year-old and a 5-year-old, whenever we are in a store or restaurant and I am trying to get one of my kids to say something to a clerk/waiter/manager/etc., I always say “Ask the man/woman nicely” without regard to the person’s age. So this happens with 16-year-old waitresses and 40-year-old managers. From my kids’ perspective, they get the point I am trying to make and use their Please’s and Thank You’s, which is what I care about…
Reminds me when I was a little younger. I went to the store with my mom. We got to the check out, and I was in front of my mom. My mom bought a six pack of beer, and when the checkout guy saw it he looked up, and saw me. He asked for ID. I pointed out I wasn’t buying it my mom was. He looked at her, and said “Oh, Nevermind”
I swore my mom was going to hit him for that. I had to leave quick before I started laughing. We still tease my mom about that.
-Otanx
That, I can live with. 
Did it make you look like Rogue? Because thats not such a bad thing…
As special as I feel now, it wasn’t really that cool. It was completely hidden when I wore my hair down, and wasn’t all that striking against my natural brown hair that had almost completely grown out (it’s been dyed black for a couple of years). Still, it could have possibly been cool, except that my grandmother started comparing me to her cousin who started going grey at sixteen until her hair was almost entirely grey at a very young age. Then, uh, I got kind of worried. Now I’m wondering if next time I get lazy with my hair coloring I’m going to discover that that grey streak is back with lots of new friends.
Of course, that might just solve my little problem with people always assuming I’m fourteen…
I totally understand… except I remember when my parents would use the same technique… It was jarring to be on the oposite side, I suppose.
This would have been a lot worse if you happened to be female.
I often address people I don’t know as “sir” or “ma’am”, regardless of their age (although generally about my age or older, because I’m 19!). It’s the polite thing to do. That’s what they taught me in the Air Force, anyway.
I wasn’t in the Air Force long, but anyone ranked below you has to refer to you as sir, right? Even if you’re a SSgt, or, hell, maybe even an A1C, you’re in charge of someone or something, aren’t you?
You’re saying you get pissed off at people who don’t think you’re almost ten years younger than your age?
I’ve never understood there to be such a distinction. I couldn’t call anyone “miss”–I’d feel like a New Yorker. It sounds like “Hey, lady!” to me. Anyway, in the military at least, any woman of superior rank to you is “ma’am”, even if they’re 18 years old. (Which is quite feasible, since the Air Force hands out the first three ranks like candy).
It really bothers me that a parent would foist responsibility over their kids to other people, even symbolically. I guess it’s just me; I’ve really never made a bluff in my life. I just feel it’s disingenuous to make threats you can’t follow through on. Anyway, what happens when you claim “the man” will take your kid away, and then the kid challenges “the man”'s authority? You certainly can’t hand your kid over to “the man”, so your only option is to do nothing and watch your authority erode in your children’s eyes. I don’t have kids, but I like to think my parenting style would be more akin to “if I give you an ultimatum, your only two choices are to do what you’re supposed to do or suffer the consequences I’ve stated”.
I have called older drivers Grandma and Grandpa since I started driving. The past 9 years it has taken on a new meaning because I am a grandfather. I am far from being gray but I have wondered if some young buck has called me Grandpa because he did not like the way I drive.
Which is why this is so f-ing disturbing. The goal of the exercise seems to be to make the child uncomfortable, but the antisocial side-effect is that it makes adults squirm too. I wouldn’t be very happy about being held up as a ruthless stranger so some dimwitted mother can take a pass on parental responsibility, and I only hope I’d be able to pick my jaw up off the floor quickly enough to give her a fright of her own.
Like Crumpet the Elf’s response. Open my eyes real wide, stare down at the child menacingly, and explain in horrid detail exactly what I will do to him if he doesn’t behave his mother.
Bah. This sort of parenting tactic is just so far outside of anything I’ve ever experienced, I’m afraid I can’t sort out the cruelty of threatening to hand a child over to a ruthlessly authoritative stranger from the absurdity of using obviously empty threats as a discipline technique.
Don’t take it personally. Kids are humorously bad at determining people’s ages. I have a friend who’s a teacher. Generally, he teaches Jr. High and High School, now, but when he was substituting a lot, he taught many different ages. He decided to ask the students how old they thought he was. At the time, he was probably 23 or so, and he looks on the young side. 8-year olds were just as likely to guess somewhere in the teens as late 30’s to mid 40’s. When he taught kindergarten, he got guesses ranging from 7 to 100.