Mind Your Manners

Greetings everyone, tonight I present to you a question that has probably passed through your minds before:

Have people forgotten their manners?

I’m sure most of you were taught manners such as waiting your turn, saying please and thank you, not being a jerk, and many others.  Every day I see people disregarding these manners and adding to the rudeness of our society. I notice this everywhere in places like casinos, arcades, malls, supermarkets, and many others. While I know I occasionally slip up on my manners, I still stick to them because it’s how I was raised. Manners are a polite way of showing people that you’re a respectful person.

But as I venture from place to place, I see manners are quickly being cast aside. People are forgetting everything they were brought up with. Others simply just don’t care, which effects how strangers view them. Some people may not care what people think of them, but I kind of do. I like to leave a good impression on people because I’m an overall nice person.

Based on what I have seen, I've compiled a list of the top five manners that I believe need to be reinforced in today’s society.

     1)      The Golden Rule – do unto others as they would do to you or in simpler terms: treat others as you would like to be treated. Treat people with kindness, respect, and fairness.They are your fellow man (and woman) after all. However, if they treat you like the scum of the Earth, then feel free to take part in a few options:  (A) Be a bigger person and ignore it (B) Allow karma to destroy them (C) Treat them like dirt as well. Personally, I always use choices A and B whenever I am presented with that type of situation. That way, no fights or attitudes emerge by choosing option C.

      2)      Knocking – this is important especially when using the bathroom. As opposed to knocking, people have proceeded to tear open the door like a kid ripping off a candy wrapper. They don’t ask who’s in there or do anything of the sort. They just barge in with the only explanation of: I need to relieve myself in this public oval office. Sometimes when they see someone inside the bathroom they don’t even apologize. They just briefly look at the person’s junk and leave, expecting them to close the door while they use the throne. Not only is it creepy and strange, it’s just overall rude.

      3)      Waiting your turn – I understand that we live in a ‘gotta have it right now’ society. We have been molded by technology that hands us everything in the blink of an eye. Therefore, we take on this quality and expect everyone to be robots that get the job done in a flash. This is not the case because we are not robots, we are humans. We can only perform so many tasks before asking someone to kindly wait a few moments. Sometimes when we ask for just a few seconds to spare, we are met with kind understanding or attitude. More kind understanding, less attitude please. We’re just being polite and doing things the proper way.

      4)      Putting  the phone down – this is the one thing that grinds my gears, so to speak. When you are trying to aid someone or communicate with them and they focus on their phone conversation. Instead of putting the person on the other line on hold for a few moments, they attempt to multi-task. While multi-tasking is praised in society, in this situation it is not. It is considered impolite and needs to be stopped.

      5)      Never assume – when we assume, we immediately draw conclusions which could be false. We do not know a person’s history or if someone did something that needed to be done.  Because of our little to no knowledge of that specific person, we cannot judge them and allow possibly distorted assumptions to fill our heads. When those assumptions arise, we are misjudging them and by doing so, we are assuming they are something that they really aren’t. They could be a fantastic person who happens to love rainbow colored kittens or adores chocolate filled marshmallows. If you are uncertain if someone completed a task, there is no harm in asking. Feel free to question them; they will only give you a yes or no response.