Manners - The NY Times gets it

[B. F. Socaspi]

Actually, I think for a lot of people this is exactly what they mean when they say they'd prefer the "simpler life" of the Era. Not the poverty and the frustration that was so common, certainly, but just less of an emphasis on pointless irrelevant *stuff.*

There was certainly the first inklings of a consumerist culture rising up in the twenties, but even at its worst it was nothing like today -- and the Depression and then the war pretty much halted its development in its tracks until the fifties came along. Before that, people were simply *not as defined by their posessions* as cultural pressures insists that they be now.

If we live in a culture that defines the good life by how fashion-coordinated your telephone is with your pocketbook, and which tries to tell us that there really is a meaningful and substantive difference between the forty-seven different kinds of bread at the grocery store, and which constantly bombards us with the idea that we must spend our entire lives locked into the mindset of acquisitive sex-obsessed adolescents or somehow we're missing out on all that life has to offer, then frankly, it's amazing to me that there aren't more people looking to drop out of it all.

This is pretty much precisely how I feel.

My Pop Pop's mother and father were Italian immigrants who didn't speak a lick of English. My great-grandfather was a milkman, my great-grandmother didn't work. The most expensive thing they owned was the horse my great-grandfather delivered milk with. Yet they raised a son who was accepted into medical school at age 16, and who - had he chosen to - could have just as easily become a concert pianist.

They had nothing, but that was okay. He was brought up in a much different way than my siblings and I have been. It was more of a communal upbringing. Whereas I don't know the name of any of my neighbors (except a really nice couple in their 70's or so) because they're stuck up enough to call the cops on us for playing baseball in the road, my Pop-pop was brought up by the entire neighborhood. Everyone was family, for better or for worse, and everyone looked out for one another.

When I yearn for the simplicity of those times, it is not without acknowledging the hardships; in fact, these brought out precisely what I wish I could experience. Human solidarity was tangible, not a pipe dream, and I think a lot of that is owed to the fact that they did not have SUVS, backyard pools, 3 car garages and a TV in every room.

 

[B. F. Socaspi]

B.F.Socaspi.
Whacha gonna do?

Ghost Busters!

 

[Foofoogal]

Ghost Busters!
__________________

lol lol lol
recently in Houston when the hurricane swept thru people met their neighbors for first time and really pulled together. They helped each other with bbqs and all kinds of nice stuff. As soon as the electricity came back on they went back in and shut the doors. Sad, very sad.

Anyone who is still in high school and can sense what you are sensing or missing and convey this as you have will never be a loser. Harness this power and you will be able to succeed. Maybe one day you can be a successful architect or something and create this neighborhood again.

 

[Mrs. Merl]

I just want to finish by saying that I guess my point was much better made by LizzieMaine. I guess I meant to point out that times are always hard (even now) for someone - somewhere - it isn't just in the past and that perhaps somethings in some peoples opinions make it seem like a more wholesome or better time in eras past. And to attach it to the original point of the thread (for no apparent reason), perhaps for some people it is the belief that maybe people were a little more aware of how they acted when in the presence of others. Okay, I am done.

 

[Mrs. Merl]

P.S. Thanks for the concern Foofoogal! I am sure we will make it to our goals - through sheer determination (or is that desperation...) if nothing else!

 

[B. F. Socaspi]

lol lol lol
recently in Houston when the hurricane swept thru people met their neighbors for first time and really pulled together. They helped each other with bbqs and all kinds of nice stuff. As soon as the electricity came back on they went back in and shut the doors. Sad, very sad.

Anyone who is still in high school and can sense what you are sensing or missing and convey this as you have will never be a loser. Harness this power and you will be able to succeed. Maybe one day you can be a successful architect or something and create this neighborhood again.

Thank you for your kindness. And to relate it all back to manners -- simple human acts of kindness and decency will ever mean more to me than a hurried, automatic "Thanks", "Please, or "Sorry".

The journalist lacked this basic level of decency. He determined himself above all others and, in a self-fulfilling prophecy, found no one to disprove as much. So what did he do? He donned a mask of manners and went masquerading about as someone of class, when he really was a condescending snob all along.

 

[Feraud]

Each of you is an island of civilization, and it has been a privilege to know you, a privilege I hope I have not abused.

No abuse noted at all Fletch.
I did not want those who have never visted NYC to take away a bad image. While some New Yorkers might push to get past you, another guy will be there to help you along. Just another day in the city.

 

[Lincsong]

But back to the original essay, and to support Jack and Baron Kurz a bit here.

I agree with most of you that the writer was at least somewhat pretentious and self-righteous.

I agree with those of you who suspect that public manners were probably better before a certain generation came to the fore. I certainly try to stay very mannerful at all times.

I agree with Jack and Baron that sometimes people are rude and when you have been polite from the get-go, at times you have force your way through, use an element of force, or intimidate them, and there is no way around it.

The ONLY method I have found that works in the town where I unfortunately live is to cultivate a slightly intimidating persona. This cuts out 95% of the rudeness that I see. People just don't want to ____ with me. This involves the occasional elbow a la our friend in Long Island. A bit of the steeling of the upper arm like Baron. And an occasional verbal challenge like Jack.

I do not live in NY nor am I from there. The only faint analogy I can provide is my own. I grew up in a part of LA wherein boys fought all the time. Up here in the Bay Area, it still astounds me to hear the kind of words I hear between people, words that would call for a fistfight if spoken in the milieu in which I grew up. People up here insult Los Angelenos for being superficial; but Los Angelenos are also more polite. The Bay Areans may be more "real" (whatever that means), and definitely are more political, and seem generally to read more, but they are also, in general, more rude, more willing to push their beliefs down your throat, to get in your face and challenge you, and are less generally considerate. Things fly here that would never fly in most other places.

I constantly find myself having to hold myself back when someone acts like a rude idiot here. I was having a coffee at Peets this morning and a homeless-ish guy comes in and tells everyone he will give them $3 if they will let him use their cell phone to "ask one question" and then hang up. Naturally no one wanted to do this. He then started cussing and using racial epithets upon us. I came VERY CLOSE to standing up and telling him to either leave or else I'd put him in the hospital, and it would have truly amused me to do this (that is, to knock the ___ out of him). However, I saw that he was already missing many teeth and the shame I would have felt at making his dental situation worse caused me to just give him a glare and leave it at that.

I agree with Jack. People need some intimidation sometimes. When I see idiots talking smack I simply think that they grew up amongst people that tolerated WAY too much guff.

End of rant.

As a Bay Area native, I can say there is a big difference between the Bay Area and Los Angeles that is for sure. L.A. gets all the good looking gals from across the country looking for sun and Hollywood fame. While we get the Birkenstock, clipped haired, mean faced girls. That in and of itself causes people to be rude. Negativity begets negativity.