Some wealthy Manhattan moms have figured out a way to cut the long lines at Disney World — by hiring disabled people to pose as family members so they and their kids can jump to the front. By hiring non-Disney disabled tour guides, otherwise able bodied families benefit by jumping to the head of lines because handicapped guests in scooters or wheelchairs and up to six family members are often sent straight to an auxiliary entrance at the front of each attraction.
I use a scooter when I go to theme parks because my hip would never survive an entire day of walking. I last visited EPCOT in 2011, rented a three wheeled scooter but I don’t recall being shuttled to the head of the line. There were special gates for easier access by wheelchairs and scooters to the attraction and some rides require a cast member to move the scooter/wheelchair from the entrance area to a totally different exit area. However I recall waiting in line just like everyone else until we reached the head of the line. Particularly at Living Seas where I wound my way through the long lines with the rest of the waiting guests. Ditto for Test Track, the water ride in the Mexican pavilion and Norway’s Maelstrom. It may be different at the Magic Kingdom but 2 years ago at EPCOT I did not experience any benefit of being in a scooter other than the obvious one of sitting through most of my visit as opposed to standing. Considering that the article contains an obvious rant against the “1%”, I question whether this story is even accurate based on the bias being demonstrated instead of straight, factual reporting.
Several readers sent me a link to the following story from the UK in which a prominent stepmother sent a scathing email to her future daughter-in-law blasting her for her apparent lack of manners. The recipient of the email then forwarded it to a few friends who in turn forwarded it and the email went viral. News articles here and here.
My first reaction after reading this was, “Good grief, have we, as a culture, become so enamored of reality television that this would be considered newsworthy?” Second thought, “What kind of pathetic news outlet would deem this to be newsworthy?” Didn’t anyone else feel somewhat sullied just reading about this? It’s like we communally all decided to debase ourselves by being crass voyeurs.
I decided to not post the full text of the email because I do not want to perpetuate the idea that publishing what should have been private is somehow OK. I’m not going to delve into the content of the email either since it is clearly a case of different and dueling perspectives and we’ll never know the truth of what really happened. I will, however, address the matter of writing such a missive and how one receives it.
This story really demonstrates, in quite spectacular clarity, the old adage that one should never write in an email what you would never want to see published on the front page of your local newspaper. We’ve all done it however. Everyone of us has written something in a chat, letter or an email that probably would have been better said in person or not at all. We all have a hope that private communication stays private between the sender and recipient but the reality is that once it leaves your hand, you no longer have control over its dispersal.
Confronting someone about their ill manners should be done face to face, in person and only as a last recourse. Particularly with family and future in-laws, only the most egregious, long patterned behavior should be addressed. Everything else should be overlooked as a practical expression of the belief that “love covers a multitude of sins”. The key motivation should be to encourage them to see how certain behaviors are actually detrimental to themselves and their relationships. Confronting someone merely to assuage your own sense of discomfort or offense often will not have the desired effect of actually influencing someone to change.
Receiving a scathing email or letter will certainly tempt one to share the contents with co-workers, family, and friends. Why? To receive validation from others that we really are not as bad as the letter writer claims we are. We want our damaged ego stroked back to normalcy by people telling us how evil that email/letter writer is and how we didn’t deserve to be treated this way.
But what of the consequences? The bride’s father encouraged her to take the “moral high ground” and ignore the email from her future mother-in-law. Sending the email displayed a lack of discretion, unkindness and selfishness by the MIL but the bride confirms to the world that she is just as unkind, selfish and devoid of discretion as her future MIL is. She held the power to choose whether this debacle ended in her In Box or whether it was perpetuated beyond her immediate family. It’s retaliatory rudeness at its stupidest because while MIL’s email was private, the bride’s actions exposed everyone in the family to international ridicule and shame. Both women displayed a profound lack of foresight to see how their actions would affect the family relationships. In other words, in order to preserve the hope of better relationships in the future, sometimes the best response in the here and now is to do NOTHING.
Years ago when my husband and I were first married, he received a long letter from a then young adult relative who bitterly complained that after marrying me, my husband now had very little time to spend with him. It was a letter written with a lot of angst, jealousy and selfishness. My husband wisely filed away the letter never showing it to me or anyone else. It would surface years later during a decluttering project but by this time, the author had matured, gotten married and promptly started having children (thus experiencing firsthand how time consuming it can be) and the relationship between us and him had strengthened and solidified into something positive and productive. His family is a great blessing to us.
For the Withers/Bourne families, there are now a huge, nearly insurmountable barrier to familial harmony and the children born into this family dynamic are to be pitied. Such a shame.
Yes, I can hear some of you groaning even as I type. Not *that* topic again! But we are about to explore more in-depth several themes of body image, privacy and gracious living.
It was amazing how many commenters to yesterday’s post felt that Megan Gale has a right to avoid criticism of the very thing she uses to make a living, i.e. her public image. But let’s take a look at an interview she gave with Andrew Denton about her image:
“The thing is well you know what I think because modeling is very much so much is concentrated on the exterior and the outside part of yourself that I’ve really, you know acknowledged that is just such a small facet of it and you can’t take it too seriously, and you can’t because every time is always especially in the beginning whenever you didn’t I or I didn’t get a modeling job, it was because something about me physically wasn’t right, whether it was I too tall, too short, wrong hair color, wrong eye color, not thin enough. What ever it was. I knew that I wasn’t the prettiest girl, I knew I wasn’t the skinniest girl and I was aware of that but I thought no I’ve got a lot more to offer as a person and with how professional I am and I just wanted someone else to see that and give me a go.”
Gale choose a modeling career in which critiques of her appearance are an integral part of the job. She has been criticized and alternately accepted and rejected by an industry that thrives on measuring physical attractiveness. Gale’s face can sell magazines or not sell magazines or clothing lines or TV ad space depending on consumer preferences. When you put out any product for consumer consumption, be it your body, your face, your artwork, your opinions, your political position, your services, your integrity/character, you lose all rights to be exempt from criticism of the product you are trying to convince others to either like or buy. This is not an issue of invasion of privacy when the thing being critiqued is the very thing *you* put out into the public domain. It only becomes an invasion of privacy when private areas not offered for public consumption become public information through no fault of the original owner of that information. A good example of this are the miscreants who expose the children of public figures to derision or harassment merely for being the offspring of someone they dislike.
Although I am no celebrity, I am, in legal terms, a “public figure” and with that comes a whole different set of criteria governing how I can react to disparaging statements about myself. Assuming the statements in question are damaging and untrue, a public figure must prove there was actual malice (an intent to harm) when legally addressing the falsity. The attorney who advises me on the legalities of this site has commented often that some people who are routine submitters to the site can be viewed as “limited purpose public figures” — someone who has intentionally placed themselves into prominence, such as a vocal activist on a given issue–and therefore in limited cases, held to a higher standard of response to any criticism they may receive.
The point is that given the greater legal burden on public figures to prove malice when addressing slander or libel, they also have a greater burden to accept the slings and arrows of poor opinions others may hold of them as part of the responsibility of being a public figure. Public figures, especially those in higher positions, are role models, that is they have a profound influence on the behavior, lifestyles and culture of the general population and therefore cannot be immune from criticism. Megan Gale wasn’t slandered. Two teenaged girls were overheard expressing their opinion of the product Megan Gale put forth for public consumption in a magazine. Gale feels she should be exempt from the burdens of public life while apparently enjoying the many benefits. Perhaps it’s time for Gale to step away from the public limelight.
Years ago, a wedding photographer posted the link to his professional site asking for input. I accepted the invitation and told him his web page background (garish Pepto Bismol pink and candy apple green) clashed with the “art” he was displaying and that passing off poorly focused photos as “art” was deceptive marketing. He threw an epic tantrum because I did not validate his product. If you put a product on the market for consumer consumption (and that includes your face/body), you cannot expect only sweet validations of your perhaps overly inflated opinion of your product.
For those who thought the girls were speaking so loudly to be overheard in a restaurant or that they knew Gale was there, read Gale’s own account here. Gale was less than a “meter” from them and when confronted, by Gale’s own testimony, they reacted in shock and surprise, obviously not realizing she was sitting right behind them. Given that Gale has been a model and in the public eye for over a decade, she is quite used to negative critiques of her looks so why should she now care what two teenagers have to say about a magazine photo. Regardless of the reason, Gale’s recent action contradicts her statements to Andrew Denton that one really can’t take outward appearance that seriously and her desire to be judged on her professionalism and “herself” was wounded by her own overreaction to hearing two teens say she’s unattractive.
As one reader noted so well, the classy and professional way of handling overhearing criticism was to have left quietly and then arranged to have their bills paid for “courtesy of Megan Gale”. And then not twittered to the world about it.
You are sitting in a restaurant when you suddenly you hear your name being discussed by diners at a nearby table and the topical content isn’t exactly flattering. What do you do?
If you are Australian supermodel and TV host Megan Gale you listen in and then tweet to all your “tweeps” to, “Stand by tweeps for what happens next!”, and then you confront the miscreants with a chastisement of their alleged etiquette blunder.
“I just kind of lifted my head and made eye contact and said ‘Hi girls, you should be a little bit more careful.’ I laughed and I could tell they were shocked, poor things,” she said.
Megan, Megan, Megan. Didn’t anyone warn you about the cost of fame and being a public figure? Miss Manners has something to say on that….
“An individual who has marketed normally private aspects of his or her life for financial or psychological profit is not, in Miss Manners’ opinion, entitled to run around grousing about how rude people are being curious to know more…. Miss Manners does not presume to judge people who chose to expose themselves; she merely refuses to allow them to condemn others who point, stare or request details.”
Megan, you market your appearance for financial profit and are therefore not entitled to grouse when others critique the very product you are marketing.
“I don’t think me choosing a public job means that I should be up for criticism more than anyone or have to learn to deal with it. We’re raised, if we’ve got good parents, [to not] say nasty things about people and I’m still a person regardless of my job, so I don’t think that I should be more susceptible to being picked on than anyone else.”
Obviously your good parents neglected to tell you that while accidentally overhearing others’ private conversations about you may not be avoidable, letting it be known that you have eavesdropped on their conversation was quite rude. Taking their private discussion beyond the realm of their tiny, two person conversation and publicizing it over Twitter to thousands of total strangers was beyond rude. How do you like that critique?
Sweetwater Superintendent Jesus Gandara hosted a bridal shower for his daughter at a Bonita restaurant this month, inviting contractors who stood to benefit from his decision-making on district business.
The invitation, which indicated a money tree would be available, was also extended to employees who work for Gandara.
Gandara, along with three Sweetwater Union High School District board members who attended the March 5 event, said they saw nothing wrong with inviting district contractors to such an occasion.
When asked about the solicitation of gifts or cash for his daughter, who lives in Texas, Gandara said he was sharing a personal moment with the community he represents.
“Many of them may not know my daughter personally, but they have come to support my family’s happiness,” Gandara said.
A reader sent me the link to this news article because it’s such a good example of Etiquette In the News and the public faux pas of the famous. The quoted experts in business ethics explain the dilemma quite well from a political viewpoint, i.e. wow, this was really dumb because of the perceptions vendors and those in the community can come to. It has that taint of political graft by only inviting those who stand to gain some favor in exchange for their “gifts”.
From an etiquette perspective, it is beyond gauche to put “Money Tree Available” on the shower invitation but hey, once the line was crossed with Dad hosting his own daughter’s bridal shower, Dad’s conscience was seared so badly that justifying his begging for money was the next step down the road to Ehell perdition.
Gandara should be mortified that he advertised his inability to financially undertake his daughter’s wedding by hosting a shower for her. Instead he deceives himself into thinking “this is for the community” so they can “share” in his family’s happiness. It appears this “community” consisted of vendors who do business with the district of Sweetwater and was not open to any old taxpaying resident. And of course we here at Ehell aren’t fooled one iota by that dissembling claim that guests will be all atwitter with the anticipation of plugging into some “shared joy” by means of coughing up some cash and material goods for someone they have never met.
Oh, there was some joy happening at that “shower” but it wasn’t what one would expect from the usual bridal shower. One construction company owner was quite transparent as to why he accepted the invitation….he wanted to network with “other important people there” and as an afterthought said, “… and I went for the daughter.” Uh huh…sure you did.
The comments section of this news article is filled with statements from people, obviously not members of the community that were invited to attend this lovely shower, who aren’t buying the justifications and actions of their elected officials. As well they should. The next election cycle could very well see a few politicians displaced solely for being tacky beyond belief.