Etiquette and “Dirty Words”

Remember the old “I'll wash your mouth out with soap” routine? The double standard should be eliminated in families.

Unfortunately, there’s double standard in the use of dirty words. Men can freely use words which are considered improper for women. Some parents use “dirty words” in front of their children, then spank the kids when they use the same words themselves. Remember the old “I'll wash your mouth out with soap” routine? The double standard should be eliminated in families. If a word is O.K. for dad to use, then it should be O.K. for mom and the kids, too.

The use of dirty words when outsiders are present is a trickier etiquette problem. What if a certain word is permitted in your house, but a neighbor finds it repulsive? It’s a basic question of rights: your freedom to use certain words conflicts with the neighbor’s right not to be offended by words he or she doesn't like. My instinct is to let the neighbor have his peace and not use your swear words in front of him. Children might be instructed that families have different standards regarding language just as they have different standards regarding religion. Just as it's not polite to force one’s religion down someone’s throat, it's not polite to stuff offensive words in someone’s ear trumpet.

Special problems occur in big groups, where some people find the language disturbing and others don’t. Solutions for the host or hostess include changing the subject and drawing the person aside to mention that the talk is bothering somebody. You might take note of Carl Reiner’s formula for obscenity. If you say something and one person walks out, what you said is not vulgar. But “if the whole party walks out, that's vulgar.” — The New Etiquette, Maureen Elena Reardon, San Bernardino Sun, 1974

🍽️Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber of The RSVP Institute of Etiquette, is the Site Editor of the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Good Manners Found in Happy Homes

“It is the greatest help to a girl when she goes out in the world to be able to feel at ease in society, to enter and leave a room gracefully and to find the right thing to say when her mother's friends speak to her.”

 

Happy Homes and Good Manners

 

It is the greatest mistake to think that manners are only for society and are to be set aside with our outdoor garments when we come home. If manners are meant to bide the unsightly side of human nature, to clothe the nakedness which shocks our highly cultivated sense of what is fitting, it is surely at home that this primitive aspect is most likely to obtrude, and it is just as shocking when displayed at our own fireside as to the world at large. 

If parents taught the sons of the house to be polite to their sisters and if they themselves were polite to each other, there would be fewer unhappy homes. Boys often think that manners are only meant for girls. but, they would be none the worse or less manly for knowing how to behave. While it is the greatest help to a girl when she goes out in the world to be able to feel at ease in society, to enter and leave a room gracefully and to find the right thing to say when her mother's friends speak to her. – From “Good Form,” 1911

 

🍽Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Stuffing One’s Mouth When Dining

Only the cute cheeks of chipmunks, squirrels, hamsters and such are allowed to be stuffed! — Etiquipedia is no “Dear Abby,” but after having taught etiquette since 1990, I can confidently say that this mother missed a great teaching opportunity in this instance. It’s never allowable to comment on someone’s poor manners in their home unless you’ve been asked for a critique by the ‘cheek stuffers’ themselves. Based on the ages of her parents in 1982, I’d guess they grew up during the Great Depression, when food and money were in scare supply for many. It’s possible their rushed and stuffed mouths were the result of those days. With a little understanding, a history lesson, and a dose of good manners on her part, Heavyhearted could have taught her children the fine art of ignoring the poor manners of her parents while a guest in their home and offering up their behavior as great examples of “what not to do” at the dining table, before their arrival, and again, after their departure. 

Full Mouth Causes Table Tantrum

DEAR ABBY; My parents are loving, kindhearted people in their 60s, but they have the worst table manners I have ever seen. Other family members have hinted to them over the years with no success. Now we either exclude them from dinner or surround them with people who know what to expect. 

My husband and I and our two small children drive 300 miles a couple of times a year to visit them. We were there for Thanksgiving dinner, and my father once again filled his mouth so full his cheeks were bulging, then he started to talk. Abby, I couldn’t understand a word he was saying, so I asked him to please not talk with food in his mouth. He got so angry he refused to speak to me the rest of the visit. 

When we left there was a lot of tension. It spoiled the whole trip for me. I feel so bad. I wasn’t mean or disrespectful. Abby, I just told him not to talk with his mouth full. Was I wrong to say anything? Should adult children never correct their parents no matter what? We try to teach our youngsters proper table manners, and parents like mine really make it rough. —Heavyhearted 

DEAR HEAVY: Some parents accept criticism gracefully, and some do not. Unfortunately yours do not, so if you want to keep the peace, grit your teeth and hold your tongue. — From Dear Abby, in The Desert Sun, 1982

🍽Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Parents’ Manners and Character

“… no hired governess, no relative, no servant, can or does have the interest in training a child or the understanding of the task that a mother has” and may Etiquipedia add, “or that a father has?” as families and the sexes have changed quite a bit since this article was first written!
– Image source, Etiquipedia private library

Marital Error Brings Problem Into Home Life

WHEN YOU HAVE given your children the wrong kind of father the least atonement you can make is to, yourself, train them, even at a sacrifice of things you feel you had rather do. Those of you who read “Careers Limited” do. 

Those of you who read “Careers Limited” in Scribner's magazine must realize that no hired governess, no relative, no servant, can or does have the interest in training a child or the understanding of the task that a mother has.

Especially is this true if children have been given a bad heredity or have lived their tender years with the example or have lived their tender years with the example of an irresponsible or disloyal father before them.

It is important that their mother be at home to watch their development and see that their emotional reactions are curbed and wisely directed, their manners are what the manners of well bred people should be, that they learn habits of punctuality, application to the task in hand, that they are taught pride in truth and in meeting responsibility.

Character does not just happen. It is built in by education, example and environment. A child whose father has run off or shirked the duty he assumed when he became a father, has set a very bad emotional pattern before his children. He has left much for the mother to undo, if the misery caused by the father is not be to repeated in the homes of the sons.

That being so, the best service you can by any possibility give them is your personal association and guidance during their formative years Don’t welch. You made a foolish mistake when you married. Don't make a worse one now.– From “The Log Of Life” San Pedro Pilot, 1938

🍽Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Leisure Time Pursuits and Manners

Children possessed of good manners have more poise and self-respect. We try in our school to find frequent occasions when our boys and girls can practice these gracious social arts.

“Every year we have to fight to retain in our schools the experiences most valuable for our children,” a mother writes. “If the school helps my boy and my girl fill their leisure time full of worthwhile recreational activity, then I know they're not going to turn to crime or debauchery for adventure or excitement.”

 Thank you, mother. I think you’re absolutely right. Our children must know how to play if they are to express their best selves. But there are many people who feel that an education consists of a quart or so of facts about arithmetic, history, language and the other conventional school subjects.

But I believe that teaching children social etiquette is more valuable than the multiplication tables. To reduce feelings of inferiority and build self-assurance through the knowledge that one knows and practices good manners is more important than knowing when Columbus arrived in America or where Madagascar is located.

Children possessed of good manners have more poise and self-respect. We try in our school to find frequent occasions when our boys and girls can practice these gracious social arts.

And we feel that training in personal care, hygiene, cleanliness, neatness and proper dress should be emphasized just as much as rules of grammar.

Tells Vital Lessons

I think I’m talking today about vital lessons. We must have a chance in our schools to guide our youngsters into appreciation of the best in literature, art, music, drama, rhythm and human relationships.

We must help them to have eyes to see, ears to hear, hearts to understand the beauty, color, harmonies, truth and goodness that surround us.

Art and morality go hand in hand; they emancipate our children from the bondage of sensuality and enable them to take hold upon things unseen and eternal.

Emotions Ennobled

Music, art, literature bring uplift, joy and beauty into many dreary, drab days. They ennoble and spiritualize our emotions. They lift us out of the commonplace into the mysterious, spiritual, eternal world that surrounds us. – James Samuel Lacy, 1937

🍽Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Etiquette, Parenting and a Pick-Pocket

                                                                                         

It just isn’t possible to be Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde parents. We can’t make one code for ourselves and another for our children. They will insist upon sharing our code. Mother can never hope to teach her child honesty and openly practice dishonesty in her presence. 

Little Lady Pick-Pocket

I know a mother who severely chastised her child for taking money from her purse without permission, and expending it to suit her childish fancy. She punished her, berated her act, and named it theft. And then discoursed on the terrible disgrace of being a thief. She asked the teacher to keep an eye on her to see that she did not appear in school with the fruits of petit larceny about her. How do you suppose this child evolved the notion of appropriating another’s property? I could not but wonder, since she came from a home where funds were ample and the opportunities of a generous allowance were provided her. 

X encouraged the child to make a confidant of me and sought to have her elucidate the problem we were to help her overcome. She explained that she didn't think she was stealing at all since mother took money from father’s pocket-book when he didn’t know it. “And mother,” she suggested, “gets a lot more allowance than I do.” I tried to explain that mother was father’s partner, and that they probably had an understanding regarding the family funds, but the child remained firm and finally said, “Well, just the same they have lots of fights about it, but mother doesn’t stop it.” 

The father confirmed the truth of the child’s statement. This mother was objecting to her own pattern. Where do you suppose she expected her child to get her notion of respect for the property of others? She not only failed to play the game squarely financially herself but subjected the child to the sordid discussions that followed when she picked father’s pockets. It just isn’t possible to be Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde parents. We can’t make one code for ourselves and another for our children. They will insist upon sharing our code. Mother can never hope to teach her child honesty and openly practice dishonesty in her presence. 

Better begin now, mother, to set your child an honest example or you will be shocked in a few years to hear your young daughter say or infer by her attitude that her mother is a hypocrite whose advice she can't afford to take seriously. There is a cure for little lady pick-pocket, mother, and I think it consists in a frank explanation on your part that it is unfair and unwise to take or appropriate the property of another. It doesn’t matter if that person is a member of your own family, and responsible for your care. Why not agree that you will both refrain from a habit that you know leads to unfairness and dishonesty. There’s no disgrace in admitting you were wrong. I think your daughter will respect you all the more if you are sincere and live up to your agreement. – James Samuel Lacy, 1929

 🍽Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

The Mask of Manners

Child specialists agree that manners are more than the facade — the curtsy, the bow, table decorum and social niceties. Underlying them in any situation must be a consideration for others, and this consideration stems from a sense of inner security and dignity. 

— Photo source, Etiquipedia private library

Mere “Mask” Of Manners Is Assailed

“EVENTUALLY,” Amy Vanderbilt, author and authority on etiquette, said recently, “good manners will be almost the only status symbol left — but only if these manners are second nature.”


Child specialists agree that manners are more than the facade — the curtsy, the bow, table decorum and social niceties. Underlying them in any situation must be a consideration for others, and this consideration stems from a sense of inner security and dignity.


To judge a person’s character by his manners can be misleading, these authorities point out: Manners can mask true feelings.


“The child who is ‘too good’ is a child about whom you worry,” said Mrs Lucille Stein, director of parent counseling for the Child Study Association of America. “This applies to adults as well. The whole facade of manners can keep an individual from having real contact with people — sort of like never getting your hands dirty. It may be a symptom of emotional illness.”

Learn Rewards

The problem for parents is one of steering between rigidity, which may produce a stifled personality, and permissiveness, which may leave a child unprepared for social communication, anxious and selfish.


Children are born self-centered. However, they can learn at an early age that to, “do unto others” brings rewards. They also discover that manners can be fun — as, for example, the little girl who enjoys playing hostess at a tea party. The child thus develops self-confidence and the ability, according to Mrs Stein, “to detach from his mother, and find his place in the family and his age group and to move out into the world.”


No parent, however, can expect his child to learn all the desirable manners at once; age must be taken into account. Nor can the parent expect perfect adherence at all times; lapses must be expected. Nor should the parent be a stickler for a particular form of expression — “What a swell gift!” May be one child's way of saying, “Thank you.”


“Sometimes parents get upset by poor manners or lack of sharing,” Mrs Stein noted. “Their standards are beyond those which the child is able to work with. A child of 4 can understand the concept of sharing, but not until he is 5 or 6 can he appreciate the purpose of trying to behave at the dinner table with adults. The ability grows with the child.”

Special Challenge

Often, parents of the pre-adolescent — the child in the 7 to 11 age group —must overlook a great deal of negligence and manners. It is normal during this stage of growth to see children bolting out of the door to join their friends, leaving all semblance of manners behind.


The teenager, however, offers a special challenge to the parent. This time in life is one of rebellion, or even anti-social behavior. This is a time when parents must find a compromise between continual nagging and total permissiveness. The most important stimulant to good manners, authorities agree, is the example set by parents.


And it is in this area that parents often are at fault. Parents who are concerned about their child's poor manners, would be wise to examine their own.


“Manners come best,” said Mrs Aline B. Auerbach, director of parent-group education for the Child Study Association, “in families where the feeling of consideration for one another is part of daily life. The form isn't so important —it's the feeling.” — The New York Times, 1960

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber, is the Site Editor for Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Instill Manners Early at Home

Children usually do not intend to be rude, but the very novelty of a situation sometimes embarrasses and so surprises them that they do not know what to do. Consequently “acting smart” is their refuge, and too often it appears at the table. A little home practice would save all this humiliation for both mother and child.

“Making Manners”

“Mary, Betty has such nice manners. I wish my children would behave like her when we go out to dine!” How often we hear a mother comment thus on some little girl who is “conspicuous” for her ladylike ways. Indeed, manners are to be valued as much in children as in grown people. These very little ones are later to be the grown people, and if their manners are to become a part of their everyday life, these graces and little courtesies must be encouraged to grow up with them, so they will reach perfection in later years. 

I have in mind a mother who has made a special point of good manners in bringing up her six-year-old daughter. This does not mean that she wants the little one to have an affected society suavity, but that she wants her to reflect the charm and refinement of the household. The mother demands company manners every day in the week. She serves the dinner each night in the dining room rather than amid the informality of the breakfast room or kitchen nook, although she does her own work and it means extra household tasks. 

This may seem a trivial step in manner making, but children respond more quickly to example and surroundings than they do to preaching and instructions. Dinner in the dining room, in this case, means that extra pains are taken to have the meal pleasant and attractive, and everyone is expected to help maintain this atmosphere. The mother may still wear her house dress, but it is sure to be spick and span and the little six-year-old is dressed late in the afternoon after her nap, ready for the evening meal. Her manners are practiced with the rest of the family, and she learns that politeness is not to be put on when going out to dine or having company, but is to be worn on all occasions.

Children usually do not intend to be rude, but the very novelty of a situation sometimes embarrasses and so surprises them that they do not know what to do. Consequently “acting smart” is their refuge, and too often it appears at the table. A little home practice would save all this humiliation for both mother and child. Eating in the dining room is just one means of teaching children that certain conventions help to make things pleasantly and that good breeding makes people welcome. As mothers train their children, so will they reflect that training as they go out into the world, and when they meet praise because of their conduct and manners, they will be grateful to her for the trouble she has taken. —Mill Valley Record, 1926

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Neglect in Teaching Manners

Oh dear... playing with one’s food is not on the menu! —“In any case, they show the most profound indifference to the forms of good breeding as established by long custom And the most unmitigated contempt for their mother’s visitors.”

On Young People’s Manners... 

and Parental Neglect of the Gracious Art ot Good Breeding

In some homes the belief in the ability of youth to guide itself aright is carried to the extent of forbearing to teach the very rudiments of good manners. It is assumed that contact with their fellows and the self education resulting from social attrition will turn the young people out at length as finished ladies and gentlemen Meanwhile they are allowed to be as objectionable as it pleases them to be, and no one lifts hand or voice in warning, in correction, in teaching. The boys slouch into the room, their grubby hands in their pockets, their caps on their unkempt heads. Perhaps they whistle; perhaps they shout, two or three in chorus. They are not checked, not taught better manners, not interfered with in any way. The girls, maybe at the awkward age when it is difficult to make them well bred with the greatest pains one can take, come ramping in with their brothers, giving the impression of a babel of voices, a forest of heads, a maddening group of windmills, whereof the sails are arms. 

If of the more studious kind, they “flump” themselves down in an easy chair doubled up in a half hoop and bury themselves in a book laid on their crossed knees. They take no notice of their mother’s guests, not even to say the usual formula, “How do you do?” or to answer “Quite well, thank you.” If frivolous, they snicker and giggle and talk in whispers one to the other; if quarrelsome, shout and wrangle. In any case, they show the most profound indifference to the forms of good breeding as established by long custom And the most unmitigated contempt for their mother’s visitors. How should they not? From the earliest days when they came in to the “5 o’clock,” where they demanded all they saw, yelled for cake, interrupted the conversation, were soothed when they ought to have been snubbed and indulged when they ought to have been expelled—from that time to now they have been suffered to do as they like. They have been taught nothing better, poor things, and the mistakes they make are due to ignorance rather than to direct intention and to thoughtlessness rather than design. 

Cognate with these rude forms, this high treason against that thing we call manners, is a certain kind of impoliteness, of negligence to which the young are prone unless made to do better and taught the more gracious way. They do not acknowledge the kindnesses done them, as those who have been duly taught that gracious art of good breeding know they ought to do. Chary of letter writing, they accept tickets for a ball or a theater, with thanks galore doubtless in their hearts, but never a word on paper. They spend a charming time at a friend’s house, then let weeks elapse before writing their thanks and expressing their pleasure, after which they wonder at the coolness which springs up between them and their quondam hostess and think themselves hardly used, being very sure they have done no wrong. — San Jose Herald, 1893

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia©️ Etiquette Encyclopedia 

Fostering Good Manners in Children

The old ideal of training in behavior was based largely upon the principle of the child’s consideration for its elders; the modern principle demands also the elders’ consideration for the child. -1915

Have you better manners than your children?

In the course of a very interesting article, entitled “Your Children’s Manners” in the Woman’s Home Companion, appears the following wise commentary: 

“Good company manners depend upon good home manners. As for table manners, the active child, who from his earliest years has been accustomed to regular meals of simple food with sufficient variety for his health and pleasure, will be hungry enough at mealtime to eat anything that is put before him. If, from the beginning, he has been encouraged by example, then good table manners will be as natural as breathing. They will be a part of him, and he will make use of them wherever he is.  

“The place for a parent to begin training the manners of her child is with her own manners. Whenever a mother complains of the bad manners of her child, she is unconsciously lodging a complaint against herself as a mother. The old ideal of training in behavior was based largely upon the principle of the child’s consideration for its elders; the modern principle demands also the elders’ consideration for the child.” — San Pedro News, 1915

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia©️Etiquette Encyclopedia

Teaching Respect and Courtesy

Children should be helped to discover that loveliness toward others gets for them what they want. In other words they get what they give. They make the discovery that more pleasures and satisfactions accrue to them if they give pleasure and satisfaction to others. We may cultivate in the hearts of our children this feeling or desire, this urge to please others. It is a spiritual asset, caught as well as taught. 

Tuning in with Our Children

YESTERDAY – I had no desire to preach a sermon on the desirability of parents practicing courtesy toward each other because of the effect on their children. It isn’t necessary to sermonize because everyone appreciates the charm and beauty and desirability of such behavior. Courtesy and respect for each other reflect a fine sweet spirit; they are the product of harmony and love. How to produce this inner harmony is the problem for parents and teachers. That inner desire, that feeling of harmony and love and desire to be courteous to the other fellow is a product of stimulation. The discovery that courtesy pays big dividends stimulates one to feel that way.

CHILDREN PAID IN KIND – Children should be helped to discover that loveliness toward others gets for them what they want. In other words they get what they give. They make the discovery that more pleasures and satisfactions accrue to them if they give pleasure and satisfaction to others. We may cultivate in the hearts of our children this feeling or desire, this urge to please others. It is a spiritual asset, caught as well as taught. 

RESERVE OF LOVELINESS – Our children may catch loveliness by exposure to others who practice it. And they build up a great reserve of loveliness by continually practicing thoughtfulness for others. Every parent and teacher should know that it is not enough merely to create a desire in the heart of a child to practice courtesy. Many a child finds it extremely difficult to act the way he should act, or the way he would like to act. The child tries and fails. Becomes discouraged. Our turn is to stand-by and see that his efforts to practice courtesy are crowned with success.

UNDERSTANDING NEEDED – We must help the child to a definite understanding of his problem. He must be aware of the habit he wishes to break and the new habit he wishes to form. We must help the child define these habits in terms of specific behavior situations. We must help him to determine exactly what to do and what not to do. And keep the following admonitions in mind at all times: Treat the child with the same courtesy and respect that you desire from him.

PRAISE FOR COURTESY – When the child does an especially courteous act, remember to make him happy about it. Give him a thrill. Make the good popular; give it a good reputation. In other words advertise goodness in an attractive way. – By James Samuel Lacy, 1933

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

America’s Youth Lack Manners Abroad

Why does this 1930’s American ad depict a mother looking on delightedly, as her children make a mess with tools and toys, just inches from her feet? All while she attempts to prepare dinner? Was this depicting the American norm of the era? Either this mom, or the advertisement’s artist, could have used some help in the child-rearing department! – “Observation of the current code in one’s surroundings ought to be a part of a child’s preparation for living. Our children, must live with other people. They will invariably get farther in life and be happier if they know the rules of etiquette that will provide the least friction and give the greatest pleasure to their associates.”

Tuning in with Our Children

By James Samuel Lacy

Are American children the most discourteous in the world? I don’t think so. But I had dinner recently with a European hotel proprietor who challenged our teaching of courtesy with the statement that “We dread to see Americans with children come to our hotel. The children do as they please, consider no one’s right but their own. They behave so badly that we consider them nuisances.” I am inclined to think that, in part, this idea was prompted by national differences in the concept of what constitutes freedom for youth. It takes very little foreign travel to convince one that what is courteous in one country may be quite the opposite in another. 

Sorry for Timid Children 

What we style “self-reliance in free play,” may be mistaken for impudence or lack of obedience in countries permitting less freedom of choice to children. However, if a few of our children have gone abroad running up and down flights of stairs, playing hide-and-seek when other guests were trying to sleep, we can still say that generally children are as courteous as they are trained to be. I have often felt as sorry for their timid, thumb-screwed children who were afraid to make any decisions for themselves as they could possibly have felt shocked at our unrestrained youth. 

Need Training in Country

But all argument aside, there is no asset in life so highly productive of social dividends as excellent training in courtesy. And observation of the current code in one’s surroundings ought to be a part of a child’s preparation for living. Our children, must live with other people. They will invariably get farther in life and be happier if they know the rules of etiquette that will provide the least friction and give the greatest pleasure to their associates. A charming, gracious manner is an irresistible asset that we can afford to cultivate, but to do so successfully, we must begin by being courteous with our children and insisting upon their practice of courtesy and consideration in their association with each other. –From the Journal of the National Education Association, 1932

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Importance of Polite Children

We cannot expect all little children, indeed, to be little Lord Fauntleroys or Eva St.Clairs, but they can be taught to be thoughtful, unselfish, respectful and courteous. 

It seems to me that too many mothers neglect an important element in the training of their children. In fact, do young folks at any time have the manners that distinguished those of two generations ago? There has been a sad decadence of manners generally within the last forty years, and unfortunately children have been affected by it more visibly than others. Gone is the oldtime courtesy which children showed to their elders, especially to the aged. I remember when boys were taught to raise their hats to teachers and the girls to courtesy. In reply to all questions it was the rule rather than the exception to answer, “Yes, sir,” or “No, sir,” to a gentleman, and “Yes, ma'am,” and “No, ma’am,” to a lady. The change is to be regretted.

And yet we cannot blame the children. The fault lies with their parents, principally their mothers. We cannot expect all little children, indeed, to be little Lord Fauntleroys or Eva St. Clairs, but they can be taught to be thoughtful of others, unselfish, respectful and courteous. Especially should they know how to behave politely in the dining-room. If there is one thing more than another that shows our bringing up, to use a common expression, it is our manners at table. The way we eat. Yet how often is one’s whole meal made unpleasant by some unruly or misbehaved child. Mothers cannot be oblivious to the misdemeanors of their children in this respect Possibly, however, they may not realise that the responsibility of their behavior or misbehavior rests upon them; but it is as necessary to teach them good manners as that they must not eat too much.

In the first place, are not children petted too much and allowed too many privileges in these days? In many books the children are the real managers. They monopolize the conversation and continually interrupt older ones while talking. This is all wrong. Such a mode, or, rather, lack of training, fosters their selfishness and vanity, and renders them real nuisances of fault-finding and discourtesy.

Only the other day I was greatly shocked while visiting at a friend's house by the ill-manners of her little boy, who was not quite 10 years old. Before we were all fairly seated at the table, he leaned forward upon the table, knife and fork in hand, and exclaimed: “I want some of the plum pudding, but I won't have any cake.” “You must wait, Carl.” said the father. Afterward he was helped three times to the plum pudding, though several of the older ones had a much smaller amount in consequence. I imagined that his mother might feel ashamed of his want of breeding, but the little fellow afterward remarked to me confidentially: “Mamma always says that I may have the lion’s share of anything.” 

A faultless toilet, quietness of demeanor and a willingness to wait for others, the use of the fork instead of the knife, the absence of fault-finding, the proper use of the napkin, eating and drinking without making any uncouth noise, these are all to be equally observed as a part of table etiquette, and the youngest boy or girl can easily practice them. Nor should they forget the “please” and “thank you” that have so much to do toward making children attractive. I hope that mothers will see to this matter and make it a duty to educate their children in this, as well as other elements of true politeness, so that the next generation will rise up and call them blessed.—Mrs. J. M. Colby, in the Housekeeper, 1896

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia 

Parenting Etiquette Advice

POINTS FOR PARENTS

By Edyth Thomas Wallace 

An important factor in teaching children to be non-Interrupting listeners is giving them the opportunity to live with adults who are, themselves, this sort of person.

• Mother (Interrupting): “Say ‘he’ not ‘him’, Son . . . Don’t talk so fast . . . You said that before ...”
• Mother: “You told the story of the movie so well, I almost feel as though I had seen the picture, too.”

Both parents and children grow mentally when they continue to learn.

• Mother: “I don’t see why grown ups ever want to go to school again. When I finished college I was glad enough to put my books away for keeps.” 

• Mother: “I have decided to lake one of these courses in art. You are growing up so fast, I'll want something to do after you leave.”
  
  
  
  

Both children and parents are happier when parents recognise and accept Individual differences.

• Mother: “I don’t see why you always have to be on the go or have a gang here. Why can’t you settle down and read or play happily alone as your brother does?”

• Mother: “This is Tom, who likes active play with his gang and this is Jim who likes quieter things. They are very different and it’s interesting to have them so.”

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia 

Miss Manners on Parenting

“The easy-going parent may well be remembered as uncaring, and the demonstrative one as suffocating. There is hardly a parental instinct that cannot be perverted into a grievance by the efforts of a thoughtful child, especially if aided by an enthusiastic therapist. It is a mistake, therefore, to guide one’s parental behavior with the risky business of reputation in mind.” 

Reminiscences of Childhood

“Be kind to your biographer,” Miss Manners’ dear father used to say when carefully dating his letters, diaries and memorabilia. It is an idea that takes on a whole new meaning when you consider that your most likely biographer is your own child. That few parents will end up as the leading characters in films or books written by their children is probably just as well. But there is a natural and not unreasonable human hope that one will be remembered as a supporting character when that child comes to bore his descendants with his reminiscences. What the overall judgment will be on the parents performance is a gamble. The easy-going parent may well be remembered as uncaring, and the demonstrative one as suffocating. There is hardly a parental instinct that cannot be perverted into a grievance by the efforts of a thoughtful child, especially if aided by an enthusiastic therapist. It is a mistake, therefore, to guide one’s parental behavior with the risky business of reputation in mind. 

The rule is to do the best you can, in what you believe to be the child's ultimate interests, and be prepared to suffer through the child’s later explanation of how he (by that time a childless young adult who knows everything) would have done it better. Nature has its own revenge, in that these people usually eventually have children of their own. But there are certain factors that can enhance childhood in a memorable way. (Miss Manners feels that this is a more acceptable way of putting it than suggesting that the parent work on the image.) The most effective of all, according to Miss Manners’ dear mother (and you can see what a success Miss Manners’ parents were at figuring favorably in their child’s memory), is the simplest. A teacher, she often heard the parental lamentation of “But we give him everything” from those whose children confided to their teacher, separately, how much they cheerfully hated their parents. The parental complaint was followed by a list itemizing valuable goods given. “I could never find a correlation between the parents’ generosity and the child’s feeling about them,” noted Miss Manners' mother. “Then I began to notice a connection between the child's feelings and the parents’ facial expressions when they came to pick him up at school, or even when they just talked about him. The parent who beamed at the child had a loving child, and the one who didn't, didn't. After that, it didn't seem to matter what else the parents did or didn't do.” 

Miss Manners is happy to present such unmaterialistic news, although she does not deny that many people’s fondest childhood memories have to do with toys or other presents. But then again, it is the way the thing is presented. The parent who gives whatever is asked, when it is asked, seems to get no return except increased expectation. The generally sensible parent, who restricts giving to fixed occasions and the choice of presents to items that are educational, useful or apt to be of lasting, rather than fleeting, enjoyment, will give enormous pleasure by a rare wild deviation from this policy. A gentleman of Miss Manners’ acquaintance once, while out to lunch with his teenaged daughter, impulsively stopped in a jewelry store and bought her diamond stud earrings. Miss Manners’ own father achieved the same effect, at somewhat less cost, when she was 11 and on an educational sightseeing trip by suddenly, without apparent cause or warning, buying flowers and pinning them on her coat. It is of such that memories are made and, incidentally, standards for future entrance into the family. A young lady who has experienced spontaneous romanticism is unlikely to fall in love with someone of grudging manners. – Miss Manners, 1984

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Etiquette and Life's Advantages

Certain lessons, like dancing and deportment lessons, will be to one's advantage in later years. 

Parents who are overindulgent with their children should adopt a firmer attitude toward their growing offspring and make them take certain lessons which will be to their advantage in later years. 

One young man whose sisters are more accomplished in dancing and drawing room behavior than he is said the other day that he wished he had been made to go to dancing school regularly, because it would save him many unpleasant hours now and would make him a more eligible partner at dances.

His sisters, he explained, liked their dancing and deportment lessons, and therefore they got ahead, while he now has to study the things he should have learned a few years earlier. — San Francisco Call, 1912

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Moderator and Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia