Last month I was walking with a friend at a busy town center during a busy weekend when a group of young adults met up with another group of friends about 50 feet away from us. They were loud, profane and obviously happy to see each other. Lots of F-bombs plus every other word that in my young adulthood were considered inappropriate in public. Not the euphemistic heck, crap, dang or screw. The real deal cuss words along with crude descriptions of their anatomy and the real N-word used affectionately between them. We blinked.
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Times have changed.
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My friend sighed. “I miss the days of civility. I wish people wouldn’t talk like that where everyone can hear it.” I smiled remembering my Mom, Dad, Granma and my sisters forever telling me to watch my language and tone. The worst words I ever said back then were heck, dang, crap or the occasional “Screw it”, but never in front of Grandma. As to tone, it wasn’t until years later that I understood the nuance of tone. I replied, “I’m going to exercise our “Public” manner set. The F-Bomb and the N-word sure do have a colorful history. Times have changed. George Carlin’s bit about the “7 words” would be lost on them . ... mostly because those 7 words are said every day on cable TV, morning, noon and night. In their mind they are casually polite, exercising their right to free speech and being authentic to their friends. We are cringing while watching the history of polite society change.” My friend disagreed. I understood what she meant.
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Polite society is different today than it was when I was a child. It was different for me than it was for my grandmother growing up during the last decade of the 19th century and the 20th century aughts. What was forbidden for my grandmother is normal day-to-day activities for my daughter born 100 years later. Humor in 1910 and the radio serials of the 1930s and 40s is nothing like humor today. In the 19th century language and relationships were very formal. Interpersonal Relationships were highly constrained. “Polite” society was at that time very sexist and very racist. Entertainment of the day reflected the racist and sexist norms of the times.
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Today is far more easy going than it was for me a a child. A good example is in how we set our dinner table. Grandma told me to set the table as if “the Queen” was coming to dinner. In our house that meant each place setting had a dinner plate, 1 knife, 1 spoon — set to the right of the dinner plate in that order, maybe a soup spoon to the right of the teaspoon, 2 forks — set to the left with the shorter, salad fork on the outside, a folded napkin was placed to the left of the outer fork. One glass set 1 inch above the knife. The dinner plate was centered, a perfect 1/2” from the edge of the table; (however, I was allowed to use my fingers to measure it and I think at the palace they actually use a ruler for the spacing). I then waited for my mother to tell me to call everyone to dinner, which required me to go to my father and grandmother and tell them personally. Go upstairs to tell my brothers and sisters and go outside and ring the dinner bell for my bothers and sisters who were outside. If we were at the Lake house, I just rang the bell. NO YELLING was permitted. Everyone washed their hands and got to the table. No one ate a bite until all were served. There would be another lecture if I messed these basic tasks up. This may be observed to some degree in households today, but probably not to the level I describe here.
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Today, I look at what I’m serving and I open the flatware drawer and dish cabinet. I call the diners to dinner from the center of the house, “Dinner’s up!”. Each diner has their personal responsibility to get their hands washed without me saying anything about it. They take the flatware they want, a bowl or plate they want, a napkin (fabric or paper or a paper towel), the food they want and head to the table to wait for everyone else to be seated before eating (or not — Hey! That dinner might be so good, no one wants to wait). At restaurants I invite my fellow diners to not wait for me to get my food, they should dig in. High holidays are a little more formal, I will delegate setting the table to someone else and I won’t complain no matter how it is done, cuz I didn’t have to do it. We’re there for the conversation and the food. Modern day, public manners.
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Times have changed.
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Polite language rules have changed along with our staggeringly slow march toward inclusivity and diversity. I work healthcare and at work sharing a meal with nurses and doctors can lead to some conversations that I can’t have with people who don’t regularly work with blood and guts. The bottom line is politeness is considering the feelings of the people you are talking with and talking with respect and care that everyone present feels included. When I was a child, there was a clear boundary between acceptable dinner table talk and conversations held in the living room or private conversations in our bedrooms. I was expected to remain silent unless spoken to. My replies were to be circumspect. My opinions were a source of amusement. I learned to keep my opinions to myself. I didn’t like being laughed at and I didn’t like being dressed down. My daughter was reared to call out wrong when she saw it. Tell us what she was feeling. If it was better to keep silent at the time, fine; but talk to Dad or me about it as soon as possible. Don’t stuff it in. Well, she didn’t stuff it in and we did have a few cringy ad lib moments. We also headed off a lot of stress with this approach. Not overreacting is most people’s approach to polite society today.
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I have several stories about the “F-bomb”. Why that word? Cuz George Carlin was right. It’s a source of humor at the “right” moment and horror when it’s spewed at what we may think of as an inappropriate moment.
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The first, my friend wanted to know what “Public” manners mean. I laughed, and said it means ignoring other people’s behavior in public if it is possible, which in this case, it was. She looked at me and we both laughed over (in our opinion) the excessive F-bombing as well as the use of the N-word at the city center. It was not our business.
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Chuckling, “I think their parents are like us in that when our kids used “bad” words, we took the parenting advice of the day and didn’t overreact. Remember when one of the kids told me to “Go eff yourself”? Only she used the actual F-bomb.” My friend did remember, “As I remember, you laughed at her. She was confused because she meant you to react differently. I observed she used the word correctly as a verb, which confused her more. And, then your daughter got upset, because she correctly deduced that the real F-word wasn’t “Fart”. BTW, how did you ever get her to believe that! “
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“I got into a lot of trouble for using the words fart, flatulence and gas…. gassy or pass gas to be exact.” By then we were headed toward a restaurant. “Why were you not allowed to use those words?” Our husbands were with us and mine, knew why, “Your British Grandmother”. Yep, Grandma was big on “proper”. She was about 70 years old when I was born. Her manners were very formal all the time IMO. Fart was not acceptable, but flatulence and passing gas were ok as long as they were mentioned away from the dinner table and it was with people you knew and had a proper, but casual relationship. “I didn’t follow the rules. I had a teacher who picked on me in class. He was a bully. I always took it personally, because he made it personal. About 6 months into the school year, I asked him if he’d feel better if he would use the restroom to pass some gas. That went over as well as you’d expect. Later that day (cuz there was a phone call to my mother), my grandmother told me the proper word to use with a teacher was flatulence and never to use it when other people were present. So, the next time he picked on me; I flauted the private rule and asked him if he was picking on me because he was feeling flatulent. Also, a fail. Another phone call and another lecture. By then, I knew picking back at this teacher in public was a losing game, but man, was it satisfying to tee him off.
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In retrospect, this really had nothing to do with this teacher. I was not dealing well with a situation I should never have had to deal with as a child. I was acting out and the adult in my life responsible stayed quiet while the others were clueless. This teacher was young, 29 years old. He had a disfiguring injury to his right, dominant hand that happened a few years earlier. Along with losing his fiancé, he also lost 2 fingers and what was left of his right hand was “frozen” in a stiff, bent way. He was in chronic pain due to the nerve damage. He was bitter. He didn’t like women or girls in general. He didn’t like good looking boys. He took his issues out on his students and no one stopped him. Not exactly what you would hire for a teacher by today’s standards. My grandmother, a polio survivor, lived with us after she had broken her hip. She lived in chronic pain due to the fracture of her right hip and the repetitive movement injuries due to the paralysis of her left leg. My Grandma was tough. She was a single mother in the 1930s who worked for the Remington Rand as a quality control supervisor. And, she did wear Army boots instead of wearing a leg brace — so that childhood insult was simply lost on me. Her biggest fault was she was a worrier. She was not bitter then (she was when dealing with post-polio syndrome 15 years from then but that’s another story). She was proper. This teacher was a bitter, snowflake. I have more compassion for him today, than I did back then, but he came up wanting compared to Grandma.
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Back to the story. The third time I called him out “was the charm”, it had been going on 7 months since September. He spewed one insult, too many. I asked him why he needed to behave like an old, stinky, FART. That did it. Fart was the F-bomb. Back then school teachers were permitted to paddle students and he was intent on doing that to me, but that didn’t happen because I barfed up my lunch all over his shoes and pant legs. I got sent to the principal instead while he cleaned up. I was a mess in the principal’s office. I cried. I wailed. I demanded to know why Mr. [not doxxing this asshat teacher who is dead] could dish it out, but couldn’t take it. I wanted to know why he could pick on all of us until we cried, but we couldn’t give as good as we got! Then, I had the mother of all asthma attacks and my inhaler was at home. A call to my mother, an emergency trip to my gruffy old doctor who got really jacked as he listened to me tell him what happened since the beginning of the school year. He took my Mom out of the exam room, the nurse came in and gave me a shot. I didn’t go to school for the rest of the week while my Mom under doctor’s orders went to war with my school.
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It turned out I also had a stomach ulcer — it was really stress related IBS. No one could figure out why I was feeling so much stress and I stuffed too much in. Oh, I got crap from my parents about respecting my teacher, but they were silent when I said he provoked me to wrath. I didn’t have an adult I trusted, let alone confide my secrets. I got good at body language. You know that look your Pootie/Woozle gives you when you screw up? I learned that from the family cat I was allergic to. My current Woozle has a version of that look. For the rest of the school year it was an uneasy truce. When ever Mr. [Asshat Teacher] picked on me or any other student I gave him that Pootie/Woozle look. It did the trick every time.
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“You told Chibi that story to get her to believe the F-word was Fart”? That was an added “bonus”. I told her that story [made age appropriate] to let her know that it was unacceptable to me if she ever had a teacher who singled her out for humiliation, ostracization or repression. I wanted her to tell me about it the day it happened and not stuff it in. But, more to the point; yep, I did, and it would have worked for a few more years, too; if it weren’t for those pesky kids.
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As parental lies go, letting your kid believe Fart is the F-word isn’t too bad as long as you come clean before they turn 10 years old, or so I told myself back then. These days I say you could keep that up until they turn 7… maybe. Today, I’d say it’s better to tell the kid there are several F-words and you’ll add to the list as they grow. Start with Fart.
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So, the pesky kids let loose the real F-word and that leads to my second story. My daughter was eager to pursue my lie about Fart vs. Fornication Under Consent of the [English] King, which is the basis for the acronym we know as the F-bomb. I told her that we don’t use the acronym because of it’s crude connotation and the fact that fornication is a religious issue that has been used to shame women since the beginning of time. The fact that it is Under the Consent of the King is paternalistic and doesn’t take into the account of the consent of both participating parties. Plus, consent wasn’t universal, it was only granted to some people, not all in an unfair manner. Also, using the word was normalizing the idea that you only need a male King’s consent to have sex. It doesn’t really address LGBTQ intercourse and then, another consideration is……
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I cut it to, “Please don’t say the word in public, Girl Scouts, Karate class or at school, because people will give you a ration of sh!t for it if you do. Just use “screw it” instead. My daughter said, “OK”, then immediately pivoted. “We are spelling it wrong. England now has a Queen, so it should be spelled, FUCQ”. Not the lesson I was aiming for, but she did use screw, screw it, get screwed, got screwed and that sucks. Things were cheerfully “screwed”, “it sucked” or “that sucks for you” at our house until she turned 18. Things have been FUCQed Up ever since. And, that’s ok for me in the house. She doesn’t see what the big deal is, after all, it’s “Under the Consent of the [English] Queen”. Except, I don’t think Queen Elizabeth II approves fornication and neither did Queen Victoria for multiple reasons too numerous to go into here. I took the win such as it was.
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My next story is really a twofer. The fact is Fornication Under the Consent of the [English] King, now FUCQ at our house has been around for centuries. I grew up in a super observant Christian home. ...or, well, at least we put forth the impression that we were a super observant Christian home. Language was to be polite at all times in front of Grandma. If you said something colorful, she’d start with “Well I never….” and you’d be there for a while she told you why you should have never said what you said. It was easier to keep to what she saw as a polite way to communicate. My Dad, her son, ran foul of this when ever he used the term, asshole. ...which was often, but not in church or in front of mixed company other than immediate family and definitely not in front of Grandma.
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My Dad never said “FUBAR” in front of Grandma, either. He used it when fixing things around the house — a lot. I asked him what the word meant and without missing a beat he said it was an acronym for Fouled Up Beyond All Recognition. I believed him for about 5 years. He used that word a lot being a WWII vet, just not in front of Grandma. My friends (another set of pesky kids) set me straight on the F part of FUBAR. The next time I carried his tools for him as he went about fixing stuff and he used FUBAR I told him he was wrong about the F-word and gave him the right one. He sighed. He said, “Yeah, I was hoping you wouldn’t know that for a few years from now. You probably don’t want your mother to know you know the F-word and don’t say it in front of your grandmother, because then I’d have to explain it to her.” Well, I could understand his reluctance on that score and kept to the script. He took the win, such as it was.
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Some years later, my younger brother went sideways or maybe I should say he made a FUBAR on Dad. My brother asked about FUBAR and got the same foul definition. I was there. Dad caught my eye and I knew I was not to tell him anything different. So I rolled my eyes and figured his friends would tell him at their first opportunity. That happened in no time. I guess boys are fixated on the F-bomb at a younger age. He was about 9 at the time. One evening while watching TV as a family and I was sort of reading a book for homework, my brother asked Dad, “What’s Fuck mean?” That was bad enough, but it was worse. He asked that in front of Grandma. I was feigning total concentration on my book, but I could see my grandmother was watching. Oh, boy. “Son, come with me,” and they went out of sight, but not out of my earshot. In a harsh whisper, “Son, you know what that means if you know the word. I know your friends told you what that word means when they used it with you. You should never use that word in front of your mother, sisters and especially your grandmother!” My brother tried, “Dad, you always say we should check out what my friends tell me to make sure it’s right!” Dad wasn’t having it and, somehow, he managed to shout in a whisper, “IN PRIVATE!” My brother went up to his room. I was reading the same paragraph in my book for the 5th time. Oh, and it got worse. Dad came back to the living room. Grandma asked, “Son, what does fuck mean?” I excused myself to the kitchen table. That was his nightmare come true and I didn’t want to witness it. A definite loss.
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The difference between my relationship with my Dad and my daughter’s relationship with me has nearly no daylight between them. I still am careful when I use crude language. I generally don’t use colorful terms in front of people who don’t like it, strangers or in public places. I will use “Nuckin Futz” and “Cluster of Love” upon rare occasion in public, which I use to generally lighten the mood within the vicinity. I don’t like my husband or daughter cussing in public, but they are cheerfully profane anywhere much like the groups of people we overheard at the top of this story. I choose my battles and only object when there are young children or very old people nearby. They both know they can tell me anything. It’s not perfect, but no one had stress related IBS in my immediate family. Not perfect, but workable.
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We developed 4 “good” manners sets, one for public (ignore what you can and be polite within our group -leave if it is prudent to do so), one for extended family (leave when we are uncomfortable if and when they get too critical, too drunk or too insulting), one for us alone (whatever, just love each other, roll with it), and the highest level we called “Tea with the Queen” manners. They knew when I called for Tea with the Queen manners, that means 1. formal (ceremonies, funerals, solemn events and now I have to add at Award ceremonies like the Oscars — I never felt the need to put this in the list before, not that I’ll ever attend the Oscars) other quiet public spaces like sanctuaries, cemeteries, temples, museums and libraries, 2. Don’t call out anything as improper in the moment 3. Save questions and comments for when we were alone in the car or at home 4. If in danger of melting down or getting sick come to me and I’ll get you out of there. 5. If Mom appears to be in danger of a melt down or is getting sick, get her out of there. 6. Make sure no one feels embarrassed. 7. The goal is to be a pleasant, comforting presence and avoid fall out from our behavior. They took the win such as it was. I took the win as such as it was. This has worked for us quite well for years.
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So, back to the 2 groups of friends meeting up and speaking off the cuff with colorful language? In short, my public manners told me it was ignorable and it wasn’t any of my business. If you ask me about the slap heard ‘round the world? Gee, whiz, that could have gone better. That looked like Smith was calling Rock out to a duel. I didn’t need to see that. I can’t unsee it. Life is messy.
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The goal is to be a pleasant, comforting presence and avoid fall out from our behavior.
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Good manners get better with practice.
Mistakes (now Screw ups) happen.
Try not to make the same mistake, twice.
Apologize with sincerity.
Make amends.
Practice love, not hate.
Move on.
Do better.
I know you can do better.
I miss my Grandma.