See, but I didn’t say that the host HAD done a good job…I’m just talking about taking the high road. I don’t think asking 3 times is rude. Continuing to ask ad infinitum and rummaging through the refrigerator to find new things to offer is a little much. At some point, it’s probably best for the guest to just say yes to SOMETHING, if only to relieve the tension that is clearly being caused by the host.
TV is not to blame for the “epidemic” of obesity, apparently. Neither is our essentially slothful lifestyle. It’s these damned people, shoving food down our throats constantly.
Seems to me that this boils down to “put up with people who push food because every culture pushes food in some way.”
No, thanks–I’m not playing that game. If I’m supposed to recognize and respect another culture’s approach to food and hospitality, why aren’t they held accountable for respecting mine? I’m not in Korea. I’m not in Sicily. I’m in Chicago, and if I say no thank you, it means no thank you. My MIL is American, born and bred. Don’t tell me she doesn’t know about the 2 refusal game. She does–she’s more into control and crap like that. Believe me, if you take what she offers and don’t eat it–she will talk about you like a dog for months afterwards. It’s RUDE. It’s overbearing. It is NOT good hospitality.
My MIL is the only person who does this on a consistent basis to people in her house. The mothers in my friend’s houses would offer, but take no thank you for an answer. Ditto college, and my adult life. I can’t stand my MIL for many reasons, but this is in the top 10. For 30 years I’ve been saying no thank you to this woman. I don’t find it sweet or funny or eccentric or droll. It’s annoying. (plus, the fact that she’s a lousy cook may have a great deal to do with it-meat isn’t “safe” until it’s gray, for starters).
I don’t understand why I’m supposed to want to be annoyed and gain weight just to please someone else. That truly baffles me.
jsgoddess–can you imagine being the other person on the other end of that phone call? Who wants to here about what someone else is eating for god’s sake? Jesus wept. I am very grateful I grew up in a house where dinner table conversation was NOT about the food and who was eating what. That sounds like its own special hell to me.
Pshaw.
My MIL: Well, even so, a little bacon isn’t going to hurt you.
These are the people who were still offering my husband food options through the door of the bathroom while he was vomiting on Thanksgiving Day.
Husband: Brrraaack boof aaaaaaargh.
MIL through door: How about some sausage and biscuits?
Husband: whimper
Me: I don’t think he wants anything right now. Really. Nothing right now.
MIL: I could defrost something.
Me: Really. Nothing. He’s really sick.
MIL: He likes beans and cornbread.
Me: He doesn’t like anything when he’s barfing.
MIL: I could make a hamburger.
This is a little paraphrased, but not much.
Probably, these well meaning Lutheran church ladies think you “don’t know any better” - not that you are being intentionally rude, but that someone didn’t teach you the “right way.”
The bitchy ones will think you are being intentionally rude - but they are bitchy to start with. That relationship is going to fall apart over more than a cookie.
Christ, js!-my MIL has more sisters than I thought… That’s her, right there. And she’ll wrap it for you and shove it in your hands as you leave. Maybe you wouldn’t have so many leftovers if you didn’t buy a 20 pound ham for 6 people. Or 3 extra large pizzas for 7–2 of them kids under the age of 9 and one infant. Maybe she should think about the needs of her guests instead of just putting on a show to “win” some game.
I make Christmas cookies–the kind you frost and decorate. Time was (before 3 kids etc) I devoted much effort to these–they were gifts. I’d buy the tins, personalize the cookies, the works. When we got engaged, I brought a tin of cookies specially made to my MIL’s for Xmas. As I handed her the tin with my good wishes for a happy holiday, she pushed them BACK into my hands and said, “You have to have known that I’ve cooked all day for this.”
Ah yes, hospitality. That was 21 years ago. I don’t hold grudges, but I have never baked a single thing for that woman again.
Sorry for the slight hijack. I loathe Xmas with the inlaws. And it’ll be here again–next week… Joy.
Yep. I think they’re from the same family.
Do I even need to tell you how much I’d rather have you a sister-in-law than the one I have? 
As I’ve said before, you’re not obliged to accept.
Pretty much. In terms of social sins, I don’t think it’s one getting your knickers in a twist about. If your MIL badmouths you after you decline her food, that’s another, separate issue. That is clearly rude and her pushing food can be a sign of passive aggressive behavior, but, as a rule, offering food three times is not indicative of passive aggressiveness in and of itself.
Their house, their rules. If I go into a house where the host asks me to take off my shoes, I take off my shoes. If I go into synagogue or yeshiva (for a newspaper story), and someone asks me to put on a yarmulke, even though I am not Jewish, I do. Also, as I said before, it’s much easier for me to adapt to their cultural expectation rather than the other way around. And asking three times kind of is the cultural expectation in Chicago, depending on what neighborhood you grew up in. And it doesn’t just apply to food. For example, if you find a wallet and return it, if you are offered an award, you refuse it the first time. The person should insist, you refuse again, and then they’ll really insist. This is where you accept if you’ve been planning to accept, or deny and the exchange just ends there. Depending on your age and Chicago upbringing (especially in old world, working class neighborhoods), this is exactly the kind of place where it is a cultural norm.
How odd. I grew up near Chicago and I never had this pushy stuff with food until I met her. Strange how her expectations are ok and mine are freaky. It’s not 3 times. Try 3 times every 15 minutes that my visit lasts. If you say yes, you’re only inviting MORE food–she is messed up when it comes to demonstrating hospitality in this way.
I fully concede that most people will ask 2-3 times and be done with it. No problem, and I will always politely say no, thank you (unless I do want X of course). But there are some people who are a few standard deviations away from normal, to put it nicely. They do not do this stuff for courtesy’s sake.
jsgoddess–we shall be honorary SILs. You can PM me all the horrors that happen to you this holiday season, and I’ll reciprocate. We are family!
Dangerosa–I find this incredible. Or maybe I’m incredulous. So, the Lutheran ladies can judge whomever, (the whole “well, she just doesn’t know any better!” meme) and yet we who are just practicing our own cultural norms are not to judge, not to have opinions on this, not to express frustration/anger/resentment at being treated this way, repeatedly. And why is that?
IMO, it’s them who don’t know “any better.” Gee, someone doesn’t conform to their social set’s expectations, perhaps they could learn to accept limits and be polite about them? The onus should not fall on just one party.
So I am damned if I do and damned if I don’t huh? So if I say ‘no thanks’ after the first asking and then ignore them after that, they will think I wasn’t taught the ‘right way’ as well. Perfect solution!
I have never had anyone do this to me, so I am not sure how I would handle it. Maybe have some fun with it! Maybe I will ask for something that I know they won’t have–send them into a perfect tizzy. Sure nice Lutheran Church Ladies I would love some nice crab enchiladas–now begone and I will wait here for them!
I could handle the three times thing I think. But what the OP has going on sounds more passive agressive bullshit that I would have to address with the inlaws. But then my inlaws and I get along with very well and I remember my first time meeting them at their house. My wife (GF at the time) was chatting away with her mother and my future father-in-law stands up and says "this has been nice, but you should be going now’ 
I mean how can you not love the directness of THAT statement! He was tired and wanted to go bed and we wouldn’t quit yammering!
Not all Lutheran ladies are like this. My family is full of Lutheran ladies (I am no longer christian otherwise I would still be attending a Lutheran church someplace I am sure) and none of them have a neurotic need to force you to eat something. My grandfather’s wife, on the other hand, will leave snack foods all over the house and have food in the oven cooking while she orders you a pizza, etc. She feels like she must feed you no matter what. I am overweight and she always tells me I am too skinny (although I outweigh her by at least 80 lbs) and that I need to eat something. She is Italian and Catholic, FWIW.
Yes, I agree that as a guest you have the responsibility to respect your host. But I thought the reverse would apply, also. Your host has to respect you and your wishes, too. As a host you can assume that the first time an offer is turned down, the guest is being polite. They can assume this with the second time, too. But when an offer has been turned down 3 times, and, as a host, you keep on asking your guest whether they want food or drink, then (IMHO) the host is being very selfish.
In the end, it comes down to common sense and decency, if you ask me. Culture can be invoked to clarify certain behaviour, but it can’t always be used to justify it.
You mention Greek, Italian and Irish culture as examples raised in this thread. When I was talking about European/Western culture, I was talking “in general”. I know generalisations are never completely right, but that is why they are called generalisations.
To get back to the issue the OP raised: the people offering her food and drink are her in-laws. It’s not like they never met her before. It’s not like they to have to show what perfect hosts they are to a perfect stranger. And, crux of the matter is that they do this to everybody. Which seems to imply that they do not really seem to care about their guests, but only (or just more) about how they come across as hosts.
Which in my book is selfish.
(BTW - I live in Ireland and have never come across such hosts. I agree with jjimm that in Ireland’s Far West hospitality is still a big thing, but I think this is more generational thing than a location thing. jjimm, please correct me if i’m wrong)
Which is fine with me, too. I’m just disagreeing with what is literally stated in the OP, which is offering food three times is rude. If your MIL is a rude lady who harangues you with offers of food every five minutes and just does not stop, sure, I agree with you. I’m not talking about these people, and I thought I had made that clear in my responses, when I said it could be a sign of passive agressive behavior, but just offering someone food three times is not a defacto sign of rudeness.
The question stated in the OP is a little different than what is described in the body of the first post: I’m trying to address the literal point in the thread title.
Going along with several other posts, I would also like to point out to the OP that in many cultures, hosts are obligated to offer food multiple times. In India, it will be offered at least three times, because it’s considered rude to accept food until the third offer.
It’s not prevalent enough to be an overwhelming generality, but it’s definitely strong enough in the culture to be obviously different to English (and, from this thread, American) culture. In a decade living in Ireland, I experienced supreme overgenerosity with food and drink in the west of the country, all over Co. Carlow, Co. Meath, and even with a few individuals in Dublin. And not just from the older generation - my sisters-in-law are the same. That said, it’s still in the minority.
Just out of curiousity, do they reign in the hospitality with strangers? I have the impression that in Ireland people seem to be pushier with guests they know, i.e. they will insist you imbibe something if they know you well, but they won’t insist if you’re a complete stranger?
Can’t say that I recall. I suppose I haven’t visited too many places as a stranger. That said, my elderly north Dublin neighbours, spontaneously inviting me in, plied me with biscuits and cakes and the biggest glass of whiskey I’ve ever seen.
You probably have better recent data to go on, given you live there. Are you a recent arrival to their shores?
So what I’m getting out of this thread is that if I’m offered food I don’t want four times in a row, the appropriate response is not “No” but “Screw you and the horse you rode in on!”? 'Cause I have a work dinner to go to, and this is very helpful.
is that how they say “no, thank you” in Arizona?
puly-fair enough. But if you ask me a 4th time, you will get the Look… 
No, you get to judge. What you don’t get to do is resent being treated with hospitality - even if that hospitality is different than yours. (Or you get to, its just if you do, you are a far more rude person than the person offering you food). They don’t either. “What a bitch! She is being nice to me!” is a piss poor attitude. Understand that sometimes people are different and that in SOME CASES this is not passive aggressive food pushing - this is a cultural norm. Just as they should recognize when you don’t offer them food a second time (because you were polite and turned it down the first time, like any well bred person would!) that you are not being a jerk. And don’t expect everyone to jump up and adapt to your cultural norms - particularly in their own homes.
I’ve never heard of this as a cultural practice until this thread. Although I would try to be as gracious as possible about it, I would probably never consider it was a “cultural norm”. Until this thread, I would have thought it was social ineptitude from people who don’t understand that “no” means “no.”
This thread has been a bit of an eye-opener.
Please note: If you visit my house, I will ask you only once because I was taught to speak plainly, honestly, and that “no” means “no” and does not mean “just keep asking and eventually I’ll cave in”.