To have eaten an unauthorised chip?

[discusstin]

I was at a lunch with external visitors and senior staff in the corporate hospitality suite at work. We were given fish and chips and as we were served a colleague leapt up out of her chair and dashed off, saying she would be 'only a moment.' The colleague has form for disappearing for large periods of time as she is extremely busy.

So, we all sat there looking at the food and waiting for her to come back. Time dragged on the and food got colder and colder. I got hungrier and hungrier. And then....

I surreptitiously took a (cold, manky) chip and ate it. Everyone looked at me. The visitors stared hopefully at the most senior member of staff who said "Let's not wait for X to get back, let's continue."

Everyone started to eat and then the most senior person said:

"The problem with social mobility is that you find people in professional positions who just are not aware of correct social conventions due to their upbringing," as she stared pointedly at me.

AIBU to think that my appallingly working class eating of an unauthorised chip is not as rude as her appalling lack of manners in bringing it to everyone's attention in that way?

Surely the social convention is to wait to eat until all the food has been served. Who cares if someone leaves the table? Their problem.

The rudest was the woman who buggered off without saying "Please, do start without me!" The 2nd rudest was the senior person who commented on 'social mobility'. The 3rd rudest was....nope no one else was rude.

I am always amazed on threads like this how many people miss the point and start but picking about chip etiquette etc. There's no excuse for a comment like that. It's just terrible. No one else's manners are of any consequence in light of it.

" The visitors stared hopefully at the most senior member of staff "

Who were the visitors & why did they look to this person for permission to eat?

All the vair posh people I know would have been on those chips as soon as they hit the table
The Senior person was being a dick

I never got this 'Let's all sit awkwardly and look at our food getting cold' thing. I wouldn't want people to wait for me

Me neither. What's the point of cold food that is supposed to be hot.

And how rude of your colleague, OP.

I don't believe you. Someone would not say that.

Anyone who starts a sentence with 'the problem with social mobility..' needs a spoon shoving up there arse bowl-first. A silver one for poetic justice.

*their arse

Halfwit, I know quite a few middle class people who desperately want to pretend they are upper class and this is the sort of thing I can imagine one or two of them saying.

You were actually shocking rude. She was probably annoyed that you forced her hand. However you were no where near as rude as she was. Maybe she was hangry?

How was she rude? Social convention is that you wait for everyone to be served if it is a small table. If it's not a small table, then you just eat.

Once everyone has been served, you eat. If someone leaves the table, you don't sit and wait. Especially if the food is hot. But some people don't understand etiquette and think they're supposed to wait and let all the food go cold.

I would have told her to stick her middle class social mores where the sun doesn't shine. The working class have better things to do than to let good food go cold.

Somewhere in the Sloane Range Guide to Life (which is glorious in its absurdness) it says that waiting for other people to start is pretentious middle class. Upper classes will only wait for one person - the Queen.

Upper classes will only wait for one person - the Queen.

And as she gets her food first anyway its never an issue, the biggest problem is eating your dinner quicker than her, as everyones food is whisked away when she's finished whether you're done or not!

I don't think you need to do anything extra as the senior manager has made herself look a mean/rude twat all by herself.

I expect everyone else in the room was glad you got the ball rolling on the chip-eating, and thinking that the manager was mean/rude/snobby!

I have experienced this. We all learn different 'manners' (or social conventions) for a variety of reasons. Attempting to publicly humiliate someone because their learned behaviour differs from your own is (IMO) the height of bad maners.

I'd have eaten the chip too.

is this for real! I don't believe it.... what country/planet are you on please?

Vulgar behavior all round.

chipgate

Totally agree with PP, if it is cold food then you wait. If it is hot then you don't.

Cold chips are bloody awful. I would have left them or asked for some more hot ones

Thanks everybody, some amazing responses and some hilarious suggestions. I particularly like the idea that I should have put a chip on her shoulder.

It happened some years ago, in a former workplace, but was on my mind recently when I was reading the various threads about class that have been appearing on here. I remembered this moment where my perceived class was commented on in this way.

" I would have left them or asked for some more hot ones"

Wouldn't it have been rude to ask for more hot ones when these had been served hot & looked at until they went cold?

Good for you OP. I am from a working class background too and frankly find this middle class thing of waiting for your food to go cold until everyone is served and at the table to be utterly stupid. As is the smugness that this is an unbreakable and obvious rule (rather than an arbitrary and pointless one).
Apparently the very upper classes don't wait for everyone to be seated and served either. They just tuck in. Quite right.