It’s unfortunate you have that impression of my life because I have known hundreds if not thousands of wonderful, kind, caring people in my life time who are an absolute joy to be around. I’ve known plenty of bad, evil people whose deaths I won’t mourn. And I have meet lots and lots of people that swing between the two extremes.
Well, it might be nice if you could talk about those once in a while, too.
Anyway, I guess it’s the cornflakes thing, then.
I actually don’t think that’s what goes on very much at all. I don’t see very many people mocking her culture here or elsewhere. What I see is her adopting a position that I, in a previous search, was unable to find any Roma going on record adopting, and then adopting similarly unreasonable positions that have very little to do with culture and everything to do with an individual approach to other people, an approach full of hostility, mistrust, and contempt.
It’s that individual approach that meets such disapproval here, not Roma culture. If a woman tells me, “I prefer not to shake hands,” of course I won’t mock her for it.
FWIW (not that anyone asked me specifically), if we all voted to get rid of handshakes tomorrow, I couldn’t be happier. The idea of physically touching people I don’t know (and, to be honest, many people I do know) is very uncomfortable to me. And it seems strange: We have this concept of bodily autonomy, and of no one having the right to touch you without your permission. And yet, people keep sticking their hands out to me, expecting me to shake them, and if I don’t want to, I’m somehow the weirdo. If there was some polite and socially acceptable way for me to decline, without having people look at me funny for it, I would do that every time. I don’t think I’ve ever, in my life, initiated a handshake. With a man, with a woman, makes no difference.
This is *not *about any love for handshakes, on my part. Fuck handshakes.
ZPG holds tenaciously to a form of etiquette that has long been made obsolete by the advancement of women in business and society. Essentially, it demands that respect be shown to women by treating them differently than you would a man, as if they uniquely have a reputation that must be protected. Everything she says about etiquette was true 50 years ago, but thankfully she seems to be the lone holdout I’ve ever met that thinks this mindset is correct and appropriate these days.
I have zero basis for judging what is Roma vs. an individual characteristic so I’m not sure how to evaluate that argument. ZPG Zealot is the only person I have ever encountered who I am aware identifies as Roma. Sometimes I wish we had more active Roma posters here so that ignorant people like me might get a clue as to the variation within this culture.
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This is not about any love for handshakes, on my part. Fuck handshakes.
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I’m not a super outgoing person and I have fairly reserved personal physical boundaries for the majority of people. Handshakes I don’t mind, and consider standard behavior in business transactions (I offered my hand to the guy at Sears who sold me my freezer, it never crossed my mind that might make him uncomfortable.) Unsolicited hugs are not my favorite, but having to kiss 100 people in twenty minutes is super unpleasant. I jokingly call it, and these formal events associated with it, the ‘nepotism tax.’
I have sympathy for you, if handshakes make you uncomfortable, it makes you look like an ass if you don’t take their hand, and that’s not fair. At the same time, I feel like the way I shake someone’s hand can make all the difference in the world for first impressions and how I am treated. It is the cultural norm where I’m from, especially in business contexts.
I used to work at a Jewish retirement facility and became very good friends with the rabbi. On my last day of work, I shook his hand, having no clue whatsoever it was taboo for him to touch women. He seemed a little put off but was otherwise completely gracious. I didn’t find out it was a cultural taboo until my husband told me later (he did a lot of work in the Orthodox Jewish community.) I felt bad for putting such a nice man in that position of discomfort but I was doing what was culturally appropriate for me. If I had known I wouldn’t have done it.
Part of cross-cultural communication/accomodation is compromise. Where and how people should draw that line is open to debate. If I were from a culture that considered shaking women’s hands taboo, and I went to a job interview with a male, I might say, ‘‘I’m not comfortable shaking hands, but it is an absolute pleasure to meet you.’’ Yeah they might hold it against me, but I would still do my best to make it clear I understood I was the odd one out. And yeah, if I told someone that and he shook my hand anyway, he’d be the jackass.
ZPG - You have had an eventful life.
Roma education? Italy, Latin?
When living in a new place, do you try to adapt to the region, and what is accepted by the local culture?
Oh god don’t say adopting…
No, women were shaking hands long before that. In fact, in the 19th century a woman would offer her hand to be kissed.
So, no 50, not 100, not even 150.
Even a Roma woman?
And you work as a fortune teller?
ZPG doesn’t personally shake hands with men, and because of that she believes that we should stick to the old etiquette that a man should only shake a woman’s had if she offers it first. Which IS the old form of etiquette that was taught in my mother’s generation.
Yes, that’s true- and certainly not a WASP custom there, eh?
I meant to comment on this before. This type of driving is incredibly common in the part of Ohio I’m from. Absolutely maddening. People complain about drivers in Los Angeles, but I was so glad to find that this mistaken “nice” driving was not an issue there, most of the time.
Now in Maryland, I’d take either LA drivers OR OHIO DRIVERS. Gah. (Generalities coming) LA drivers are aggressive but good. Ohio drivers are passive and bad. Maryland drivers are aggressive and bad.
I mean, isn’t that what most men do? I find I usually have to offer my hand to get a handshake, whereas between two men it’s the default.
Sure I have; being cliquish and shunning / scorning outsiders. But I’ve never heard such idiocy as saying that “congratulations” to a bride could bring ridicule and permanent estrangement to a future union. At least, not since before the frigging turn of the century. It’s all bullshit and there’s only one place it’s going on… the colorful and fanciful fiction of these pages. That’s it.
Further, when anyone I’ve ever known of that behaved even remotely like you swear happens all the time, most folks consider them assholes unworthy of valuing their opinions. Certainly not acting like we should kowtow to such lunacy and fear that their gossipy crap about inconsequential first world problems will somehow get their spouses fired or some such. All of this is nothing but hoped-for fantasy. And why anyone would want that (or pretend to) is beyond me.
I’m an academic librarian. But that’s not a high-paying career though it is very rewarding and I love it enough to put in around 45 hours a week. Fortune-telling and selling spiritual paraphernalia brings in more money. A lot more morning.
Yes, in my experience, but ZPG leads a much more exciting life than the average person.
Gonna have to tell my Wife to not shake the hand of our contractor, and I’m going to have to stop giving him a back slap and buddy hug.
Roma is an ethnic minority that originated in India. We have a culture, a language, and in my opinion (though plenty those plenty of argument over this) a religion all our own. We adapt as necessary to survive. I usually adapt within reason. I am not going to do something I consider immoral however just to get along.