11 rules for the new modern manners
In an age of Trump and trolls, being polite to each other is a radical act, says . But there is hope in this brave, new world: we just need to be a little nicer to each other — and follow the ‘new modern manners’.
THE world is a ghastly place and we can’t just blame Millennials with their avocado toast and self-absorption when it’s the old people who are setting such horrific examples of how to behave. Or how not to.
Graydon Carter, outgoing editor of Vanity Fair, writes of 2017’s toxic dominators, Donald Trump and Harvey Weinstein — aged 71 and 65 — how “these two monsters have further coarsened the culture with words like ‘pussy’ and ‘masturbation’ cropping up in the pages of family newspapers.”
Quite. And that’s before you ever venture south to the lower half of the internet where the trolls live, spewing bile under the cover of anonymity.
Even polite people are made ruder by the speed and facelessness of online interaction. It has never been faster or easier to treat people appallingly and get away with it.
Is this the kind of world in which we want to live? Or can we register our defiance via niceness?
In the age of Trump and trolls, showing good manners is a radical act.
Lovely people let’s raise the bar for 2018, both online and in real life. Let’s revolt against the revolting, and elevate politeness in a world gone rude.
Online outrage is different from real-life outrage in that it’s lazier yet more combustible.
Wading into an online slanging match is never cool or clever; by all means argue your point vociferously, but the moment it becomes personally abusive, you’ve lost. Simmer down, and post facts instead of fury.
Never drunk tweet, or drunk post.
You could end up starting a war with North Korea.
Put your phone away during sex or during dinner, or while you’re at the cinema or theatre.
Even if it’s on silent, the light on your phone is annoying during a movie or live performance.
As for leaving your phone next to the bed during moments of passion — there are no words.
Well there are, but they would be impolite, which would undermine the intention of this article.
Also, put your phone away during gigs.
You came to see and hear a band, not to film them and upload it to tell people you are here.
Nobody cares that you’re at a gig, except the band, who are performing for you. Put the phone away. Now.
If someone dies, don’t send a sad face.
Although increasingly run as small business models, Airbnb very often still involves you going into someone else’s actual home, and sleeping in their spare room.
Key words here are ‘someone else’s’ and ‘home’ — you are not paying for a hotel experience, and your host/ess is not a concierge.
Play nice. Don’t leave semen on the walls, as did some guests who stayed at my friend’s house, and don’t complain that the crockery doesn’t match or the towels aren’t fluffy enough.
If you are feeling dreadful or have been befallen by misfortune or are having a romantic crisis of untold horror, phone someone, or message them privately. Doing an emotional striptease on social media will get you a load of U-ok-huns, but will remain there forever and ever, along with every other digital indiscretion you ever posted.
Good manners apply to yourself as well as others. You deserve better than your own drunken outpourings haunting you to the grave.
Equally, don’t blab your entire private life into your phone on a crowded bus or train carriage. It’s excruciating for the rest of us.
Just because everyone in the whole world is doing it doesn’t make it right.
Walking with your chin facing down towards the pavement at an angle, your eyes glued to your phone as your thumbs fiddle furiously with the screen, is deeply impolite to all the people who have to manoeuvre out of your way.
It’s even rude to lampposts.
Remember — it’s not your private pavement.
Also, eating while walking is gruesome and unnecessary.
Online dating offers a smorgasbord of infinite variety, which is why we are now all dating snackers and grazers, meandering from one meet-up to the next in the sincere belief that the ideal person is just around the corner.
Meanwhile, if you’ve arranged to meet Jazzfunk Enthusiast, 45, for coffee, then do them the courtesy of turning up.
If Jazzfunk Enthusiast does not fill you with enthusiasm, be gracious and stay for the coffee, rather than scanning the room, pretending you don’t see them, and legging it. This is not good manners, no matter how awful they are.
It’s easy, it’s bloodless, it’s drama free, and there are no repercussions. It requires zero effort, unlike the excruciating moment of telling someone to their face that you are no longer keen on being romantically entwined.
By ghosting someone — that is, by suddenly disappearing from their lives without telling them — you will avoid possible tears, recriminations, and all such related unpleasantness. You will also be the rudest twat on the planet.
Wo/man up, and break up with them properly, you snivelling coward.
Everyone is offended by everything all the time, and it’s exhausting.
Only block people online or drop them in real life if they are actual Nazis, rather than just a bit irritating as their views differ slightly from yours.
Build bridges, not walls.
If you are any/all of the above, you will have told your dinner host in advance.
If your host looks blank and asks you if that means you’d like a cheese omelette on toast, it’s probably best to offer to bring something yourself. Own it. Same for restaurants. Don’t go to a steakhouse with your friends, and freak out when the menu is no good for your requirements — check it out in advance.
We are all more punctual now thanks to smartphones, but flipping off arrangements with friends has never been easier.
Unless you have typhoid, do not cancel within 24 hours of a social engagement. If you must cancel, then be upfront and apologetic rather than evasive or vague.
Writing thank you notes, allowing people to go ahead of you in the queue, offering to buy a homeless person a coffee rather than ignoring them, giving up your seat on public transport, helping people with their bags or push chairs, asking people how they are rather than telling them how you are, smiling and saying thank you — all of these tiny things are good manners.
