To ask if you consider eating with your fork in the 'wrong' hand to be bad manners?

[Whatsername17]

Just that really. My right hand is my dominant hand, although for some tasks (like painting and cleaning) I tend to swap between my right and left hands. I eat with my fork in the right hand and knife in the left. Today someone was complaining that their kids eat the 'wrong way around' and that they were worried and felt it should be corrected. It made me feel a little self conscious tbh. Do people really care about which hand you have your fork in?

[MrsMushrooms]

I don't think it's bad manners but I definitely notice it. To me, it's the same as using the incorrect cutlery or putting the whole soup spoon in your mouth - I don't care if you do it, but it does make you seem a bit out of place in a nice restaurant.

[Careforadrink]

There is no right or wrong hand.

It's simply whatever hand is comfortable to you. Your dominant hand. It's a natural inclination. The way your brain is wired.

Would you insist a gay person be straight?

It is however the absolute height of bad manners to insist that people should go against their natural instincts and make them feel uncomfortable.

[kali110]

OhTheRoses maybe not everybody lays the cutlery on the dining table, or even has one?
I don't even eat spaghetti with a spoon. I use a knife and fork

Lol at people silently judging others for not holding their cutlery 'the right way'.
I'd rather be with the people doing it 'the wrong way' .

[MissKatieVictoria]

I'm left handed and eat with my fork in my left hand. I also can only use right handed scissors, but in my left hand. funny, considering an accident as a child saw the tips of the fingers on my left hand amputated and i was never supposed ot have feeling in the ends of my fingers.

[Toadinthehole]

I'm left handed but I eat with fork in the left, knife in the right as that's normal. I don't want to burden anyone with remembering to lay the table a special way just for me.

Same reason applies to (right handed) DD, who tended to put her fork in the right hand as she'd held her spoon in that hand when younger.

I find the American way of eating odd because I would think it would spoil my enjoyment of the food. Cutting up a steak into bite size lumps before eating it? Not for me.

Very British and tiresome to bring class into it.

[Toadinthehole]

Lol at comparing cutlery use with sexual orientation.

[Magstermay]

DH uses cutlery the 'wrong' way round which doesn't bother me in itself, but it's because his family never properly ate together so the table was never laid out. He consequently has no idea how to place cutlery in a setting correctly or what to use when in a 'posh' restaurant. I think it's more important to teach this side of it - what you do with the cutlery once you've picked it up is up to you!

[Hidingtonothing]

I eat the 'wrong' way round too, I think because my older brother is left handed and I probably copied him when learning how to eat with a knife and fork. Strangely my SF also eats that way (he's right handed) but wouldn't have been around when I was learning. The 'unbearable snobs' would have a field day with my family

[enchantmentandlove]

I'm left handed and eat the 'wrong way' too. To be honest before reading this thread I had no idea people would ever think it was rude of me, I personally never notice or care which hand people's knife and fork are in. It's a little odd to me that anyone would care about this.

Saying that - I do remember my grandad trying to teach me to write with my right hand instead of my left when I was about 11 or 12, as writing with your left hand apparently means you're stupid. I never did get the hang of it though!

[LikeDylanInTheMovies]

Another left here who uses knife and fork the right handed way. I use a pudding spoon left handed though (no idea why, I'm dead wacky me).

I wouldn't think twice about a person using a knife and fork in opposite hands, but can't bear the American practice of chopping up the good into bite size chunks, putting the knife down and using the fork like a shovel. It looks like a child playing with their food and screams I can't manipulate cutlery properly.

[Huldra]

I wouldn't notice which hand someone was holding their knife and fork in

Must admit I mainly use the American fork method at home. In restaurants it depends on the dish. Colleagues, friends and family seem to do the same. Chilli and rice would need an upturned fork in the main hand. Trying to push it onto the back of a fork would look uptight. Steak and chips would lend itself the knife in dominant hand and fork stabbing individual bits of food.

[Lucyccfc]

I hate all this 'eating the wrong way'.

I am right handed and so is my DS and we eat the way our brains tell us is most comfortable. We both have our fork in our right hand and knife in our left. It's the right way (for us). Most people have good manners and don't cmoment.

A very traditional Head teacher at my primary school used to make me try and eat the wrong way round and I just couldn't grasp it. He made me very anxious to,the point that I would end up not eating in the end. My Mum soon had some strong words for him and he stopped.

As long as people aren't shovelling food in, slopping loudly or cramming food in with their hands, leave people to eat their own 'correct' way.

[Hrafnkel]

Anyone who cares about this sort of shit or judges others that eat the non-standard way is pathetic.

It's just another example of how the minority are suppressed/demonised. Obviously at the very thin end of the wedge!

[forceslover]

I hold my fork in my right and knife in my left, always have and always will. Judge away I couldn't give a flying fuck what you think!

[LouBlue1507]

Parents have a responsibility to teach their children to eat properly. Using their cutlery correctly is a part of that. It can be very important on a date or at dinner with a boss/client you're trying to impress. Unless they weren't taught table manners either, they will notice and it is offputting

What a ridiculous comment. Yes parents have a responsibility to teach children how to eat properly but that involves ensuring children take their time to chew their food properly so that they don't choke not which hand they hold their cutlery in ...
Parents also have a responsibility to teach their children to not let pathetic, judgey people to get them down and that's there's more to life than how to hold cutlery!
If someone judges you based on how you hold your cutlery then they're not worth being in your lives!

[Careforadrink]

Toad

It's just an example that demonstrates how ridiculous it is for people to insist others should eat in a manner that is alien to them simply to conform.

We wouldn't dream of passing comment on sexual orientation as people recognise that that is personal preference. Yet a (thankfully) few ill mannered individuals still insist that people, mostly lefties, should eat in a way that goes against what their brain is telling them to do.

Years back kids used have their left hands tied behind their back to force them to write with their right. Insistence on etiquette when really etiquette arose simply as it's the way the majority (right handed) do it is an extension of that and wholly pathetic.

[Annabel11]

Honestly, I wouldn't even notice. If the person is capable enough to hit their mouth with whatever hand they are using for the fork/knife/spoon/whatever, then it wouldn't matter at all.

[Toadinthehole]

That's two laughably poor comparisons you've drawn.

[LikeDylanInTheMovies]

Yeah Huldra turning your fork upside down for very liquid foods is fair enough so long as a knife is used to get the food onnd into the fork properly that doesn't bother me.

It's just another example of how the minority are suppressed/demonised. Obviously at the very thin end of the wedge!

Jesus Christ, genuinely one of the most absurd things I read on here (and that's saying something) why not give Amnesty international a call? That you somehow equate being unable or unwilling to bother to use cutlery properly is akin to racism, sexism or homophobia on any level is absurd and offensive. There's galaxies worth of difference to discriminating against someone because of what they are (black, gay, a woman) and making a judgement based on how someone acts in public.

Yes I would come to negative judgement about someone who ate a formal meal in public with their hands, mashed it up in a pile, chewed with their mouths open or conducted a conversation whilst chewing and then proceeded to pick stray food put of their teeth, then yes I would form a judgement about them based on that behaviour. That judgement being that they were rude, arrogant and dismissive of their fellow diners.

[nonline]

I'm the same as MrsMushrooms: notice, but that's about it.
I draw the line at licking your knife, whichever hand it's in.

I was taught the 'correct' way and had it reinforced through childhood so it's just there in my head now.

[limitedperiodonly]

I eat the wrong way round. It was a conscious decision I made at about 8 after objecting to the deeply ingrained patriarchy and class hatred of our society as demonstrated in the Oxo adverts.

Katie was showing her son how to lay the table while hubby Philip did something in the shed.

'Forks go on the left, David,' she said. Rather sharply, I thought. My mum never spoke to me like that. David meekly complied, but I resolved to be a rebel and instantly swapped hands next dinner time. Even though I eat like a monkey, even in the best restaurants, I am secure in the knowledge that I am a rugged individual.

I was a very serious child.

[Toadinthehole]

All politically correct persons favour the left!!

[Careforadrink]

Fortunately most people are capable of understanding them.

[NapoleonsNose]

I eat the 'right' way and am right handed
DH swaps, so fork in right, knife in left, and is right handed
DD is the same as DH
DS eats the 'right' way and is left handed.

My parents and grandparents were all insistent on proper table manners when I was growing up so the first time DH came to eat with us all I felt I had to 'prime' them first about his different way of holding cutlery. Sounds ridiculous now as provided people can eat nicely, I don't care which hand they hold their fork in!

[Magicpaintbrush]

I'm right handed but eat with my knife and fork 'the wrong way around'. I'm sorry but anyone getting worked up about which hand somebody holds their fork with has too much time on theirs hands and frankly it's none of their business. In fact I think pointing out that somebody eats the 'wrong' way around would be much more bad mannered than the thing they are drawing attention to. If somebody said that to me they would be asked to jog on in no uncertain terms. Plus I literally couldn't swap my knife and fork, it wouldn't work for me.