Manners - are there any you didn't know about until you were older?

[CheeseToastieLove]

Is there anything you didn't realise was bad manners until you were an adult. Things you weren't told when you were young? I didn't realise it was good manners to leave your alcohol at a party when you were leaving until I was in my late 20s. Always took my half full bottle home with me! Cringe. My friend was never taught it was bad manners to start eating before everyone's meals had arrived until she was in her 30s. She was always half finished before everyone had been served.

Just saying "what" would be seen as rude in most of the US. But no one says "pardon" either. We usually say, "sorry, I didn't hear you."

On the other hand, it can be viewed as patronizing to constantly say please and thank you in the workplace for people just doing their jobs.

@ApplePenPineapplePen

I have utter confidence in my knowledge of table manners and ability to speak 'correctly' etc after being drilled relentlessly by my aspirational mother. But I do wish she'd taught me more about social interactions than how to eat soup or which knife to use. I still can't work out 'the rules'. I don't know when to send cards, when it is overkill, what is considered an appropriate present, who sends anniversary cards...let alone how to make friends, small talk...I try and act with generosity and kindness but I often feel like there's a whole set of stuff that I just don't know and that I may be judged for. At nearly 50 it is probably too late to learn.

Gosh, you could be me. I think I was taught (or have learned) about cards and presents etc - basically cards are bday and christmas and otherwise unnecessary. I'd say these days a new home or new baby card is nice but it probably was non-U back in the day. If someone dies you should write a brief letter but maybe a card if you weren't close would be OK these days....?

But my social skills and small talk have always been dreadful! I was so gauche as a teenager and my DM was amazing but subscribed to the 'let them do as they please' school of upbringing, so other than manners, I was clueless! When I started secondary school my hair had no parting and my clothes clashed or were awful, because she just let me do my own thing. I was teased hugely for a couple of years until I realised there were 'rules'.....

@SavingsQuestions

I learnt double dipping very late. I must have done that so much!

Not quite manners but onky today did I realise others judged if you hadnt opened your curtains fully. I had no idea. We often dont go in the living room in the morning so Im fine just leaving it!

The curtains open or closed....

I remember being told when I was a child that the curtains closed during the day usually meant that there had been a bereavement in that household.☹️

We are talking of 50+ years ago though. 🤔

I was brought up that eating in the street was an absolute no no.Also taught how to hold knife and fork properly-my granddaughter who is 7 was showing me the other day how she was taught by my DM( she passed away 2 years ago) to hold her knife and fork as well 😂 It was lovely to hear her saying that’s what she remembered about my mum!

@LittleBunnyTail

^ (And obviously, it doesn't make sense to butter the whole bun and then try to break a bite-sized piece off as that would make your hands greasy. The first thing to do is take an appropriate sized knob of butter from the communal butter dish and put it on your side plate. You then use that as your personal butter source to last you the whole bread roll, you don't double-dip, so it's tough if you misjudge the amount to take.

You get better at judging how much butter to take - a quick scan of the numbers around the table and number of butter dishes and butter in it tells you in a flash if you can be lean or hearty with your butter amount to take. Obviously it's very rude to take a hearty amount like 1/3 of the butter dish content if it's meant to serve 6 people round the table.

Then, it's break a small dainty piece off that won't ruin your lipstick and butter it individually from your own butter knob on your side plate

No - this isn't right. You take a blob of butter and put it on your side plate. And marmalade or jam. You then pick up the whole roll (or piece of toast, or the ciabatta with your pate etc) and butter one mouthful sized bit on the edge, add marmalade or pate, and take that bite. And repeat.

You don't break off little bits and then faff about!

Tomas Yes, when I was little, all the curtains were only kept closed if there had been a bereavement in the family. A neighbour did this whose husband of many years had died. It seemed shocking to me as a child that curtains were kept closed in the daytime, especially downstairs ones and all curtains at once too.

Teenage with the greatest of respect, that's incorrect. You break off an individual piece at a time and butter it. I am speaking specifically about bread rolls at the start of a formal dinner though, not ciabatta and marmalade

@OwlIsBeingAnOwl I suppose you’re right.

However I’m sure our own dear Queen would never be so crass as to seat people so close they were rubbing elbows

This thread is making me hungry for bread and butter.

@IHaveBrilloHair

I was taught all of these things, Im glad I know should I ever need to but lots are fairly ridiculous. Eating soup by spooning it from the far side of the bowl, and towards the edge? Why exactly?

So you don't spill it in your lap of course, and can see what you are eating! lol. Just common sense. As for the other comments, a lot of these things are common sense. Eating in the street I still think of as uncommonly vulgar. How can you digest your food properly if walking at the same time? Eating the nose of the cheese at a party really selfish. You want to be left with the custy rind? double dipping - think of the bacteria you are putting in the dip people! Take a portion of butter when eating a roll, don't put your crumbs back into the butter. Come on, where were your parents, and if they didn't teach you, just think about what you are doing for goodness sake. If you think about it

My boss was never taught to say please. Twat.

@NursePye

I think that the left handed thing is a bit of a red herring. I am left handed and from a predominantly left handed family. We were all brought up to hold our cutlery correctly ie fork in left hand, knife in the right. It's never been a problem.

I would find it peculiar and quite embarrassing if someone has laid the table the other way round for me and would try, discreetly, to rearrange it without offending them.

We left handers learn to live in a right handed world so have to make adjustments in many ways. Restaurants always lay the correct way so we are quite capable of eating correctly.

Far more annoying in my experience was those wretched flip over desks that we had at university which are a royal pain if you are left handed. See also, sitting to the right of a right handed person at school and constantly banging elbows when writing!!!

Yes, yes ,yes - fellow leftie

I think I have fairly good manners, am definitely not focussed on the laws of etiquette.

However, life is too short - and peas are far too blooming tasty - for me to be stabbing them with tines or smooshing them into tiny pea cow pats on the back of my fork. I want a decent (but polite-sized) scoop of them on my fork!

To me, what also sounds rude. I tend to say “sorry?”

The whole taking alcohol to a party thing is a minefield in some ways. I think it totally depends on the circumstances of both host and guests. Hosting can be expensive! So it may be that host is happy/able to cover the cost of providing dinner, but providing alcohol for everyone Is beyond their means - so everyone bringing something means it mostly gets used. I’d definitely encourage people to take remaining bottles home with them - saves on clearing up and storage space!

I don’t have children - what age is acceptable for them to no longer ask for permission to leave the table?

I can’t remember the pp who said it, but I really agree with the distinction between manners and etiquette. Good manners cost nothing and should benefit everyone present. Etiquette can be a minefield and can be used as a divisive tool - which in my eyes is a sign of bad manners.

@Giantrooster good idea. I just dont have seconds!!

@tinkyywinky

Drinking the milk at the end of a bowl of cereal!

That's compulsory!! Although I dont do it if we have company!!

I never heard the white dress at a wedding thing until MN, I went to dozens of weddings in the 00s with guests in cream and white and no-one batting an eyelid about it. Some of my friends wore cream and white to mine in 2004 and they look lovely -they clearly aren't wearing a bridal gown. I wore a cream trouser suit and black shirt and hat to a friend's wedding before. I will continue to ignore that one.

This paranoid obsession definitely appears to exist in a state completey unrepresentative of real life on MN from everything ive seen.
White and cream dresses with particularly floral patterns in n have been a wedding guest wear for so long, now MN seems to say if the backgtound us white you ate going to he masquerding as the bride, or bridesmaid at least.
It was a very strong rude that you were considered dered very badly for however if you worexanuthing black to a wedding. Some peoole who ate yeaditioalists still feel this. Theys ld lve a white pale floral dress. Black theyd be mortified and teally upset. Its considered to be a colour only for funerals and by many us still considered to bring bad luck at weddings. It should be avoided. (Black tie evening weddings clearly dont count as there is a different rule set completely)
Ehen my best friend got married we were chatting aboutcwhat i should wear to her wedding, she told me to get wither a ling red or lng white /ivory one as she thought id look nce in them. I got an ornate ivory silk midi dress, she was delighted i wore something that colour, she had afyer all told me to in advance.

That it is etiquette to start as soon as your food arrives if it is something hot

@RampantIvy

Can anyone enlighten me as to why it is rude to butter an entire bread roll please?

It isn't. I simply cannot find anything to be offended about in that.

@Starling85

If you have pate and toast for a starter you don't put the pate all over the toast in one go, you add it as you eat it.

I wish more people knew it was rude to pick your teeth... I have a colleague who has a packet of Walkers crisps every day, and every day she picks her teeth, looks at it, then eats it. Really slowly and deliberately. It's absolutely vile. We hot desk and the thought of her and me sharing a keyboard makes me want to throw up 🤢

I used to have a manager that licked each crisp, put it down, then at the end ate them

I honestly want to be sick just thinking about it

I told him how disgusting it was and he got really annoyed.. but I couldn't just sit there and say nothing! It was repulsive

i am quite well acquainted with most of these, whether i choose to follow them or not.
i am baffled that any grown-up would not understand not to do double dipping. i don't see that as manners or etiquette but basic hygiene !
as to the pardon/what issue. at every school i attended, including a quite posh one, we would have been told off for saying what instead of pardon. so that one is a real puzzle. i thought only hooray henry types said what, in a braying tone, like a donkey. i thought it was a kind of comic stereotype.
nor in any workplace would it have made a good impression to say what.
i am not going to adopt it.

@EssentialHummus

As a young adult I was invited to a friend's family home and replied with "Yes I'd love that, can I bring [new boyfriend] too?"

At the time what was going through my head was that the dinner (a religious festival) was a really special and important one and I wanted my then-BF/now DH to experience it, but I think about that now and go five shades of red.

The host agreed but never invited me again.

i don't see what's so wrong with that. if you saw yourself as part of a couple, it was natural to want your partner to escort you. maybe they did not know you had a partner ? i'm not sure what you did wrong really. was it your friend or their parents who invited you, would that make a difference ? i guess if you see it as tantamount to inviting yourself, you might feel a bit embarrassed, but not much. does the religious aspect make a difference. i think you are being too hard on yourself. if you are now older, and might be the host in such a setting, would you look down on someone who asked if their partner could come ?

@BigSandyBalls2015

You shouldn’t cut a bread roll with a knife, you should break it open with your hands.

i know this but i don't care what people do with their roll or butter. that is not the essence of manners. how does it affect me or anyone if they choose to cut it with a knife, butter it all in one go, then cut it into pieces, or even, shock horror, bite it? as long as they don't bite my roll, i don't care.

i seem to be the only one up. sorry.
will now go try to sleep. is a problem.
very interesting thread. thanks.

Also add: entering a covered space such as a doorway or bus stop where non-smokers are sheltering from the rain and light up/vape.

@Bvop

I knew about not eating in the street from a young age but didn’t know about double dipping until a couple of years ago.

When I was in my early 20s I didn’t know the etiquette for buying rounds in the pub. I still fail to do social kissing properly as I can never predict whether it’ll be one or two.

Or three

I fail at this too