GENTLE READER:
You, sir, are an anarchist, and Miss Manners is frightened to have anything to do with you. It is true that questioning the table manners of others is rude. But to overthrow the accepted conventions of society, on the flimsy grounds that you have found them silly, inefficient and discomforting, is a dangerous step toward destroying civilization.
Mots clés miss-manners
Nobody believes that the man who says, 'Look, lady, you wanted equality,' to explain why he won't give up his seat to a pregnant woman carrying three grocery bags, a briefcase, and a toddler is seized with the symbolism of idealism.
Judith MartinMots clés equality manners courtesy miss-manners
One reason that the task of inventing manners is so difficult is that etiquette is folk custom, and people have emotional ties to the forms of their youth. That is why there is such hostility between generations in times of rapid change; their manners being different, each feels affronted by the other, taking even the most surface choices for challenges.
Judith MartinMots clés age manners courtesy miss-manners
…women were brought up to have only one set of manners. A woman was either a lady or she wasn't, and we all know what the latter meant. Not even momentary lapses were allowed; there is no female equivalent of the boys-will-be-boys concept.
Judith MartinMots clés gender-equality miss-manners
There was no singles problem until singles got so single-minded that they stopped wasting time with anyone ineligible. Before that, it was understood that one of society's main tasks was matchmaking. People with lifelong friendships and ties to local nonprofessional organizations did not have to fear that isolation would accompany retirement, old age, or losing a spouse. Overburdened householders could count on the assistance not only of their own extended families, but of the American tradition of neighborliness.
Judith MartinMots clés family relationships community aloneness miss-manners
A small wedding is not necessarily one to which very few people are invited. It is one to which the person you are addressing is not invited.
Judith MartinMots clés weddings miss-manners
The invention of the teenager was a mistake. Once you identify a period of life in which people get to stay out late but don't have to pay taxes - naturally, no one wants to live any other way.
Judith MartinMots clés growing-up taxes teenagers
Eating grapes with a knife and fork is not what one would call refined. It is what one would call ludicrous.
Judith MartinMots clés miss-manners
When virtues are pointed out first, flaws seem less insurmountable.
Judith MartinMots clés self-esteem criticism virtues praise
She only maintains that it is possible, under some circumstances, for a lady to murder her husband; but that a woman who wears ankle-strap shoes and smokes on the street corner, though she may be a joy to all who know her and have devoted her life to charity, could never qualify as a lady.
Judith MartinMots clés smoking miss-manners lady
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