General Etiquette > Life...in general

Curious about your views about etiquette and today's daily life

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tendereyes:
Been browsing through the threads (and even experiencing a train wreck myself) and was just curious about everyone's opinion and views about etiquette today.

Do you feel that people today are less tuned in with etiquette, and feeling more self-entitled and that they are above any forms of etiquette or you do feel that it's just a reflection of a lack of parenting over the decade in various forms to even common everyday etiquette?

It just really surprising to me how people my age and younger it seems, really lack the social etiquette that my parents had and taught us growing up...everything from just saying please and thank you to just dealing with people in everyday circumstances.

Interest was perked (and forgive me deeply if this is the wrong forum) in light  of needing a forum such as this and the fact it's no longer common place it seems to learn etiquette...do you feel this reflects a growing lack of good etiquette in our daily lives?

This was also perked from reading a quote from a woman who gave manner lessons during the filming of "Titanic" and how she was  overwhelmed by the huge interest of people wanting to learn how to well..interact by what should be considered normal things learned at home.

Chartreuse:
I believe that the entitlement generation grew up, raised entitlement brats, and those brats are now attempting to raise their own kids.  I do think that there are a greater number of self-entitled people who are absolutely ignorant about general etiquette because they were never taught anything about it.

My parents weren't big on the entitlement thing... they refused to raise kids like that, but I still had to learn a lot about etiquette that I feel like I should have been taught from day one.  I'm not entirely certain that a lot of people see etiquette as important enough to learn and practice.  As such, why would they teach a "worthless" series of skills to their offspring?

Of course, it's hard to know what was typical a few generations ago.

Ulla dances in a silly way:
"Etiquette" means, to most people, things like which fork to use, how to address a letter, and how to properly meet the Queen. Those things have grown outdated in modern life. When was the last time you sat at a table with more than two forks? Unfortunately, etiquette rules resist change and do not grow with popular thought. No one writes letters, so how does one properly write an email? What are the etiquette rules of a drive through? How do you address your boss without demeaning yourself but still respecting her? Many of these things are being taught through example and most people know them.

Things "today" seem so much more rude because old etiquette breaches seem less heinous to us. Maybe we read about someone who ate their dinner with a salad fork or failed to address a superior correctly. Those were just as bizarre and wrong as the etiquette violations we see today.

It's a stretch to say that kids are ruder, people are meaner, everything is tackier today. Kids are rude in a different way, people are mean in a different way, and things are tacky in a different way now than they were 80 years ago. We see more people than our parents did, we encounter more situations because we live faster. There are new social problems because old ones are no longer applicable. Yes, kids in inner city schools are rude and wild, but what social problems do they face that kids 60 years ago didn't? Just look at how much more freedom kids are given and at how much more they are expected to grow up to be. Our grandparents' parents just wanted their kids to have an honest job and a good life, my parents want me to go to college and be a successful career woman.

A lot of the idea that "things today" are going down the tube come from blissfull ideas of the "old days." Crime rates are actually going down, literacy is going up, the world is allways just the same but people remember the time of their youth as the best time because of that wonderful principle known as the ignorance of youth.

-Ulla

audrey1962:
We're not the first ones to think this. There have been documented times throughout history when society thought the younger generation was worse than the one before:

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C05E4DD143AF931A2575AC0A96F958260

Oxymoroness:

--- Quote from: tendereyes on January 18, 2007, 11:50:24 AM ---Do you feel that people today are less tuned in with etiquette, and feeling more self-entitled and that they are above any forms of etiquette or you do feel that it's just a reflection of a lack of parenting over the decade in various forms to even common everyday etiquette?
--- End quote ---

The following is a true story:

There was a woman who was married and had 2 daughters. But a day came when she realized that she missed her younger, single days and left her husband and daughters. The oldest daughter (then about 6 or 7) became the "mother" to the younger daughter.

Time passed and the mother had another child. But this one was "cute" so she kept it, estranging her family even more... (RCL anyone?)

More time passes and the older daughter has been in the role of a mother for many years. Eventually she grows up, gets married and becomes the mother to many children, stressing and emphasizing manners (among other things.) Her children grow up, some more etiquettly inclined than others, but all more faithful and polite than their grandmother.

So when does this story begin? In the 1920's. The older daughter is my grandmother, and heaven help you if you're rude, mean or inconsiderate!

My point is that people are no better and no worse than they've ever been. Human nature really hasn't changed much. The difference is that the past few decades there's been such an explosion of information that we're just more aware now about our collective behavior than ever before. Will even that change us? I doubt it.

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