To think it doesn’t really matter how I hold my cutlery.

[Frosty2894]

With all the things going on in the world right now, I’m writing a post about how we hold cutlery.

I remember being told I’m cack handed by my grandmother when I was a child 🤨 she didn’t say it in a nasty way but said she was similar.

I’m right handed. I hold my fork in my right hand and knife in left. This is the way I’ve always done it and felt comfortable, was never told or taught the correct way.

For years my partner has joked about how I can’t hold a knife and fork properly and even mentioned trying it the other way. I’ve tried - it doesn’t feel right to me. He told me that his mother would probably tell me to switch hands as it’s her ‘pet gate’. We’ve been together for 9 years. He’s not mentioned it for a while (until tonight) and I’ve avoided eating in front of his mother as much as possible else I feel paranoid. Feel like I’m being watched!

Generally my table manners are okay I think. I’m not a complete slob when It comes to eating or anything!

Aibu to think it really doesn’t matter? Partner has mentioned it tonight and does it really bleddy matter?!

@madcatladyforever

It does matter in certain circumstances, you will be judged for it. I think correct manners are important socially. By all means do what you want at home but everyone needs to know how to eat when you are out and what forks and spoons to use when.

Precisely.

No one is yet to explain how they manage to elbow other people when eating.

Why on earth do people think they have the right to comment on stuff like how you hold your knife and fork. Next time someone does it, I'd tell them they were being rude.

Nor how they only move one of their elbows when using an item of cutlery but not the other one when using the complementary item.

It does matter in certain circumstances, you will be judged for it

Are we just talking about hoding your knife in your left hand, which for those who do so it is their dominant hand?

I, and many other posters, still want to know why it is bad manners to do so. .

The argument about jostling elbows is irrelevant as most people don't sit at trestle tables to dine, but the left handed knife holder is to be castigated - why?

However, I agree that holding cutlery like a pen looks odd. My mum said is was a faux affectation from people trying to look posh (as is saying "I" when people mean "me" when I am the objectof a sentence).

@Pinkfreesias

Why on earth do people think they have the right to comment on stuff like how you hold your knife and fork. Next time someone does it, I'd tell them they were being rude.

People who do not adhere to proper table manners are the one who are being rude.

How many more times? 🙄

People who are left handed are not being castigated. Please do stop wittering about “the dominant hand.”

@Ginfordinner

It does matter in certain circumstances, you will be judged for it

Are we just talking about hoding your knife in your left hand, which for those who do so it is their dominant hand?

I, and many other posters, still want to know why it is bad manners to do so. .

The argument about jostling elbows is irrelevant as most people don't sit at trestle tables to dine, but the left handed knife holder is to be castigated - why?

However, I agree that holding cutlery like a pen looks odd. My mum said is was a faux affectation from people trying to look posh (as is saying "I" when people mean "me" when I am the objectof a sentence).

My mum said is was a faux affectation from people trying to look posh (as is saying "I" when people mean "me" when I am the objectof a sentence).

Yes, in a sort of can’t do the right thing for trying to do the right thing type of way.

Correction:

People who do not adhere to proper table manners are the ones who are being rude.

No one is yet to explain how they manage to elbow other people when eating.

Maybe they're playing violin between courses?

It does matter in certain circumstances, you will be judged for it

Which circumstances?

@iklboo

No one is yet to explain how they manage to elbow other people when eating.

Maybe they're playing violin between courses?

It does matter in certain circumstances, you will be judged for it

Which circumstances?

I hope they’re playing it right handed 🤣

I think it's barbaric to have knives at the table. Chopsticks are all you need to eat your food.

@Janegrey333

How many more times? 🙄

People who are left handed are not being castigated. Please do stop wittering about “the dominant hand.”

If I tried to use my cutlery in the 'proper' hands I'd make a mess. But I suppose that matters less to you that following some arbitrary 'rules'.

I hope you never have disabled kids, for their sake.

* Like another poster, I didn't know elbows on the table was considered rude until I read about it.*

I was told that as a very young child. It used to be considered to be of the height of bad table manners to put your elbows on the table,

You are already being judged for not holding cutlery properly.

You are also already being judged for eating with your elbows on the table.

You are always being judged.

"It used to be considered to be of the height of bad table manners to put your elbows on the table"

Surely it still is? Although most people eat all hunched over with elbows out these days. Such an anti-social scene.

What I mean is that it was noticed if someone was putting their elbow on the table, as the majority of people did actually employ good table manners. Now bad manners are far more common, it stands out less than it used to. If someone is talking with their mouth full, which is gross, I’m less likely to notice if they have an elbow on the table.

I can’t say I notice whether they have their knife in their right or left hand, however. What does annoy me is if they put their knife in their mouth.

@Sharonspoisonedpud and @Janegrey333 (and some others)

Table manners and etiquette are NOT the same thing. Holding cutlery in the "wrong" hands has nothing to do with table manners, it just comes under etiquette. Table manners in the UK includes things like burping, licking the knife, reaching over someone instead of asking them to pass whatever, and so on.

The idea that it's about avoiding bashing someone else with their elbows is ludicrous. I've been watching family eating this last day or two, and I can honestly say that their elbows poked out about the same distance either side regardless of which hand held the knife.

And etiquette evolves, it's always evolving. Although the first rule of etiquette is that you don't embarrass someone in public for not following the rules of etiquette.

Although the first rule of etiquette is that you don't embarrass someone in public for not following the rules of etiquette

Luckily this is an anonymous forum 😉

I wonder how many important business meals take place where everyone is so crammed onto a trestle table they have to synchronise cutlery use, and afterwards a lucrative contract is turned down because an eagle-eyed self-appointed judge noticed someone from the other side didn't hold their bouillon spoon correctly?

Probably never in the past 50 years.

There must be an awful lot of people out there who are never able to actually enjoy eating, because they're far too busy fixating on watching other diners' hands and elbows to be able to concentrate on their own gustatory pleasure.

The Queen never eats spaghetti or garlic when eating in public, as the former is obviously not the easiest to eat elegantly and she doesn't want to knock out foreign dignitaries with pongy breath. I wonder if the cutlery police similarly eschew such culinary disasters-in-waiting at all meals, deeming their very consumption common, rude, antisocial, offensive, upsetting and/or demonstrating an astonishing lack of breeding?

Yes, I would judge you, in the same way that I judge people who cannot lay a table correctly. I would not say anything but I would wonder why you had not been taught to use cutlery.

Part of the pre-selection of partners for accountancy and legal firms was the knife and fork test, when they were invited to a dinner and they were observed on how they ate, whether they could hold their drink and if they could hold a decent non work conversation. Whether you like it or not, it still matters.

Part of the pre-selection of partners for accountancy and legal firms was the knife and fork test, when they were invited to a dinner and they were observed on how they ate, whether they could hold their drink and if they could hold a decent non work conversation.

Sounds an excellent way of ensuring the continuation of the Old Boys' Network and excluding all of those troublesome working class, non-neurotypical, disabled, foreign people (and those from different cultures) from using their in-depth, job-specific skills and experiences and making their valuable contributions to society and humanity in general, if there's an old Harrovian buffoon in the queue who happens to know what some book says about how you must hold your cutlery and that you have to rip your bread roll instead of cutting it, but not much else. Certainly helps to get rid of all these ghastly women with their insistence on being smaller than a 'proper' person and less able to handle as many pints. Quite right that they were never allowed into any of the top 'decent' schools in the first place. Not to mention anybody left-handed, of course - they can just get stuffed right at the outset, savage disgraces to the world that they are.

....whether they could hold their drink

Just excluded all those pesky Muslims as well.

@sbhydrogen

Although the first rule of etiquette is that you don't embarrass someone in public for not following the rules of etiquette

Luckily this is an anonymous forum 😉

That comment wasn't really intended about what they posted, but more about if they, or anyone else, are judging people in public.