When I was a small boy, my parents drummed into me the importance of saying "please" when I wanted something and "thank you" when I received it. Sometimes I would forget and my mother would snap, "What do you say?"
As far as I know the "please" and "thank you" training goes on in nearly all British homes. We followed the tradition with our own children when they were growing up.
"Have you forgotten something Ian?"
"Oh yeah, please may I leave the table?"
"And Frances. Can you remember those two little words?"
"Errr...mmm... oh - thank you Daddy!"
And now I see our granddaughters getting their "please" and "thank you" training from our daughter and son-in-law.
In a human lifetime, I guess we say "please" and "thank you" a million times each. I will not complicate matters by throwing in all the "excuse mes" and the "pardons" and "sorrys". Let's just stick with the pleases and the thank yous.
Is it just a western thing? Do other cultures have their "please" and "thank you" equivalents - drummed in to the young from an early age? I decided to google the question and this was the AI response:-
No, not all cultures use direct equivalents of "please" and "thank you"; many express politeness, gratitude, and respect through context, tone, gestures, specific grammatical structures, or words for different levels of favour, as the need for explicit niceties often arises from anonymous interactions in individualistic societies, not small, interdependent communities. While essential in some cultures, frequent "thank yous" can be seen as odd or even insulting in others, where kindness is assumed or shown non-verbally.
What use are hollow pleases and thank yous when they are just parroted ritualistic words? Surely they have to mean something and be delivered with genuine consideration for the listener involved.
Is it good manners to keep reminding people - usually young people - of their forgetfulness? What would folk think if the corrected child said, "To tell you the truth, I find your persistent corrections quite unmannerly for I consider the please/thank you ritual to be a cultural affectation that has filtered through generations without question and requires some re-evaluation. So would you please go away and leave me alone. Thank you so much!"
I must have googled the question and received a similar answer a while ago, as I can remember reading the explanation.
ReplyDeleteI couldn't not say those words, so ingrained they are. I think I would even say thank you to police after I was giving a ticket for an offence, but I've never been given one.
I do a 'Thanks anyway', in very sad voice when someone can't supply what I need. What my heart is saying though is, 'Thanks for nothing, ****face'.
I've noticed older mainland Chinese don't seem to say thank you, and older Russians don't seem so keen either.
It is amazing that you have never been given a ticket by a copper. If I were a copper I would be giving you tickets like confetti.
DeleteI was raised to say please and thank you and so were my children. We also say "sir" and "ma'am" with our yes and no. I still do.
ReplyDeleteBut can you say why Kelly? Or it it just "good manners"?
DeleteYour last paragraph gave me a good laugh. Thank you!
ReplyDeleteI hope the stitches didn't bust open.
DeleteThe cook at the childcare place my kids attended drummed into them that they had to say "Thank you, Marie" I had never realised how much extra lovely it sounds if we add a person's name.
ReplyDeleteMy own parents made us ask to be excused from the table but I doubt my kids even know that bit of etiquette exists.
A Chinese convention I learned was to tap the table as a thank you when served, it acknowledges the server but maintains the flow of conversation.
I like that tapping Kylie. I may try it out on the missus.
DeleteI taught my children please and thank you, also excuse me, and that followed through to the first grandchildren via my oldest daughter and I am pleased to report my great grandson is also now learning please and thank you and will later learn excuse me.
ReplyDeleteThe twins also learned and were quite good at first with every "thank you" eliciting a "you're welcome", and an "excuse me", followed by a "thank you". But lately things have been backsliding a bit.
Perhaps the twins deserve a good slippering. That'll teach em some manners.
DeleteWe are a "no smacking" family.
DeleteYou mean you don't snort smack?
DeleteI say thank you all the time. It is an instinctive reflex and I can't stop myself.
ReplyDeleteThanks YP.
Thank you so much for this comment JayCee.
DeleteIn our house they are always the magic words, and are in use by everyone. We don't like sorry, we strive to be kind to eachother.
ReplyDeleteThe magic words we use are "Shazzam!" and "Abracadabra!"
DeleteIt's not just a British thing. German children used to have that same experience, with their parents snapping "what do you say" or reminding one of the "two magic words" when we forgot to say please or thank you. Similarly, we were taught to write thank-you letters when someone sent us a present, or money to my parents to buy a present for us at Christmas or for a birthday. It wasn't meaningless, but meaningful.
ReplyDeleteI may be oldfashioned in that way, but I truly believe that good manners never hurt, and even it they are not always understood the same way in a different culture, one can explain and/or try to adapt.
I wonder if the Nazis remembered to say "thank you" or "danke" when they invaded Poland and the Sudetenland.
DeleteNot sure where that came from, and whether I should feel offended or not. Probably not, since not even my parents were born yet when the Nazis rose to power.
DeleteYou should definitely not feel offended as this remark was not meant that way.
DeletePlease and thank you were drilled into us at a very early age in childhood. Now people say 'see you later' in the shops. This infuriates me because how do they know they will see me later?
ReplyDeleteYou make a good point - for which I thank you with all my being.
DeleteI once worked in a timber yard. Manners were so important. We would help any one who is polite.
ReplyDeleteAnd if they weren't polite did you wallop then with a two by four?
DeleteI was brought up the same. In Germany, there is also a counter phrase. If you say 'danke' the other person responds with 'bitte' which I suppose equates to 'you're welcome'.
ReplyDeleteIt would be nice to swallow a pint of bitte right now.
DeleteCarlos and I were eating in a restaurant once and a family sat at the tables across from us. The children, all under say age eight, were polite as could be, saying Please and Thank you all the time. On the other hand, the parents were heathens, saying things like "Get me more coffee." And "I want more butter."
ReplyDeletePrime example of parents who teach they're children manners but don't practice it themselves!
Were the parents wearing red caps with a well known but sinister saying woven across the front?
DeleteWhen I was in Japan a couple of summers ago, I was amazed at how quiet everyone was on the subways in Tokyo and Osaka. I asked our guide why this was so (thinking of the loud subways here in the USA) and she told me that Japanese society thinks it rude to be loud in public places because the noise is invading the space of others around them. As a pretty quiet person myself, I liked this type of thinking!
ReplyDeleteOh, I wish people behaved like that on public transport here! Instead you get noisy conversations, on or off the phone, music blaring or annoying sounds from games all the time.
DeleteDo you know - it was the same on public transport in Thailand - generally quiet.
DeletePlease and Thank you go a long way.
ReplyDeleteMaybe all the way to Bethlehem.
DeleteWe use please and thank you here, of course. Also, "yes, m'am," "no sir," to our elders. It is the way of the south. But when you think about it, if everyone is expected to repeat these things every time they might be appropriate, they become rather meaningless. And if we don't receive them, we feel offended somehow, as if the only reason we did something for another person was to be recognized for that.
ReplyDeleteI'm making more of this than I should.
I do not agree with your last point because it is good to reflect upon things.
DeleteManners maketh man.
ReplyDeleteOkay but what doeth they to woman?
DeleteWe say please and thank you in our family, too. I think it's nice to show you are polite and grateful.
ReplyDeleteBut do people always mean those words when they say them?
DeleteI was brought up to say please and thank you and heaven help me if I forgot. It's so ingrained I find myself saying to the dog, "what do you say?" when she's waiting for a treat, so she sits down and offers a paw. Ridiculous, I know!
ReplyDeleteThank you for this comment Carol and please call round again.
DeleteThe way a stranger says Thank You can touch the heart.
ReplyDeleteI watched Babette's Feast with my late father, many years ago.
' No one even thanked the woman, after she made them such a magnificent
dinner, ' my father said.
I am sure Isak Dinesen who wrote the story was a gracious lady.
Always something new out of Africa : her famous book.
Nice to see you are back from your period of detention at His Majesty's Pleasure Haggerty. It seems that Karen Christentze von Blixen-Finecke's life was largely ruined by syphilis that she acquired from her husband during the first year of their marriage. I bet she did not say "thank you" to him for that!
DeleteIn Morocco we learned words for please and thank you but found that the locals don't use them much at all!
ReplyDeleteWesterners put so much store on what is probably superficial politeness. Even Trump says "please" and "thank you" occasionally.
DeleteI recall too painfully the scene with Meryl Streep, on YouTube.
ReplyDeleteFor nearly two years I have been without a computer or device or TV.
My new Asus laptop is only up and running tonight.
My local library gave me access to YouTube but the system blocked your blog and Meike's and Tasker's. I tried many times.
It feels like a changed world since last we spoke.
I hope that you and your family are well. I will read all your back blogs.
It's nice to see you back Haggerty. I always found you to be an unusual but well-meaning visitor with intellectual feelers that crept beyond the usual territory of my blog correspondents.So you weren't in Barlinnie after all.
DeleteIn Swedish there is no simple equivalent of the English "please" - we either use "tack" (thank you) for that as well (at the end of a request), or else we have to come up with more complicated paraphrasing, along the lines of "would you be so kind as to..." (Or both combined!) Thinking about it now, English children should be thankful to be able to get away with learning a simple "please"! (lol)
ReplyDeleteIn many Australian aboriginal languages there were no "pleases" or "thank yous" but that certainly does not mean that the speakers were uncivilised or ignorant.
DeleteI have noticed that some young people aren't as forthcoming. Maybe it isn't cool? I will certainly continue to fight the good fight for good manners.
ReplyDelete