Sweet-Talking a Male-Basher
When Women Complain About The Opposite Sex, Plus Missing Thank You Notes And Hat Hints.
I’m a man who works in a store, and a number of female customers have complained to me about men as a group – their insensitivity, obliviousness, uncouthness, and general uselessness. This can be grating, but as the mantra goes, “The customer is always right.” Any man who went off about women to my female co-workers would get the censure he deserved. Yet it seems the other way around is somehow OK. Is there a polite way to extricate myself from this sort of conversation?
E.M. in Hyannis
Addressing the various reasons why, at this moment in history, it is acceptable for women to denigrate men in public but not the other way around is a task beyond the scope of this column, though I’m sure we could have a fascinating conversation on the topic over a drink sometime. Let’s try to solve your problem instead.
As you say, you can’t correct a man-bashing customer – but you can assert your own humanity in the face of someone who’s denying it. How? By being human. Try to listen to the meaning behind what a customer is saying and respond to that. Perhaps she’s just making a clumsy joke of the Mars-Venus variety. In that case, you could respond with a deadpan “Yes, I’m glad I’m not a man.” Or perhaps the woman seems genuinely bitter; if so, acknowledge it: “Wow, you seem kind of down on men today. I’m sorry for whatever happened.”
With any luck, a little direct human contact might be enough to jolt these women out of their inappropriate behavior. Even if it doesn’t, you’ll at least have the satisfaction of knowing that you’ve been true to yourself and behaved with dignity and kindness.
My brother got married in August 2004, and no one has received a thank you note from him or his bride. When I mentioned it to him, he stated that the thank you notes were on the table at the reception. These were generic notes thanking everyone in advance for their gifts and attendance and were not signed by the bride or groom. Is this extremely tacky, or is it just me?
E.C. in Cambridge
That’s not only rude, it’s stupid. Despite my professional affiliation with the side of Righteous Goodness and Propriety, I do have some sneaking sympathy for the efficaciously rude. They only do, after all, what all of us are tempted to: treat the world as their trash can and humanity as their admiring audience. Publicly, I condemn the cellphone yakkers, movie disrupters, and baby profferers. Yet a secret envy lurks – envy of such folks’ unselfconscious ability to barrel into any situation unencumbered with ethics, their gaze fixed firmly on themselves.
That’s because those people, while rude, aren’t being stupid about it. They really are looking out for their own self-interest. They’re getting business done while in line at the coffee shop, having more fun at the movie than you are, and unloading their child on whoever’s handy.
But the handling of the thank you notes was both self-serving and incompetent. The official function of thank you notes is to express one’s gratitude for the wholly unexpected and unearned generosity of others. The equally important unofficial function, however, is to let the guests know that their gifts were received. Gifts get misplaced, tags fall off, all sorts of things can go awry at a wedding; if a giver doesn’t receive a thank you note, then he or she knows to make a call and sort things out. So your brother and sister-in-law, in a foolish and mean-spirited pursuit of convenience, wound up getting rid of a useful backup gift-inventory system. They’ve also guaranteed themselves a listless showing at any future baby showers or housewarmings. I hope they put the time they saved by not having to write thank you cards to good use.
I have a 7-year-old boy, and there is some debate in my household about when it is appropriate for a man or boy to wear a hat indoors. I was raised believing that polite men and boys always took off their hats indoors. But if you look around most public places, not every male follows this practice. What is the current etiquette?
B.W. in Newton
The current etiquette is the same as the old etiquette: Polite men and boys do not wear hats indoors. (Unless they are polite men of one of the headgear-wearing religions.) However, the old etiquette is much rarer than it used to be, and because of elementary principles of economics, that means it is much more valuable. Twenty years ago, taking off your hat indoors would only have certified you as marginally civilized. Today, the same action can make you look like a distinguished statesman. With that kind of valuation, you’d be crazy not to invest in the behavior.
Miss Conduct is Robin Abrahams, a Cambridge-based writer with a PhD in psychology. 