.. to wonder what happened to manners?

It not just the younger generation , it's the older generation too . I just think people have become so selfish and they only think of them selfs . People seemed to demand respect these days . You can't demand respect you have to earn it . My daughter works in a supermarket and the older generation speak to the staff , like there something there scraped of there shoes . I think this country needs to take a good look at itself .

Hear, hear, Buster. I have an acquantance who decided that at 80 he was entitled to be as rude and obnoxious as he fancied! he is horrible!

Can’t stand rude ppl. No need for it.

Some years ago I was just leaving my house and nearly bumped into my neighbour's two sons, aged about 10 and 12. "Hello," I said. They just looked at me and went on, So I ran in front of them and said loudly "I SAID HELLO!" They looked a bit scared and sheepishly said "Hello."

She sounded so rude and entitled.......an odd remark surely!

Not all children are rude. I know a lot of young children and some not so young who have beautiful manners. My own DGC have lovely manners so please do not generalise. You should have reprimanded the children if they bumped into you.

Well, I brought my children up so that manners were second nature to them. My son, who still stays at home, always says thank you when he gets his dinner etc. and please if he asks for anything.

My 4 year old grandson also always says please and thank you. Funnily enough my daughter was just telling me, that at his other grandparents’ house last week, his nana asked him to go and get something without saying please. He had turned to her and said “manners nana, you should say please”. I did laugh, although despite being correct, if I had spoken to my grandparents like that I would have received a slap!

When someone fails to say thank you, when I (or my grandsons) hold the door open for them, I find my own age group and above to be the worst culprits

I'm also someone who calls out bad manners, very loudly..... if I'm barged (especially as I walk with a stick) I will say 'just bash into me, its absolutely fine, don't worry about it ' or similar. 'Do you mind' often works too. At the moment my home town is MOBBED with tourists. I have tried to avoid it but I took dgd out there yesterday. I know I've had enough when I start growling at people.

Not just the young folk, old folk too. Maybe we have less in the way of polite pleasantries, but thank heavens that we don't have the dreadful racism and sexism we used to have now that was bad manners on steroids, no blacks, no Irish, people refusing to work with Pepe of a different race, being dreadfully rude about Catholics or poor people.
Certainly being pleasant to people makes life better for all. My grandfather in-law was shockingly badmannered, to me and also to others, he sometimes used to tell anecdotes meant to amuse about things he'd done or said to people in the past, shocking some things, he said. His daughter inherited the self-centred selfish and thoughtless streak. Dreadfully ill-mannered and it made visits or visiting very unpleasant. Difficult to know what to do in such a situation as I was brought up to treat people politely but in fairness had never come across people so personally rude, supposed I was just not prepared with how to deal with people like that. But people on the outside thought him a sweet old man
I knew someone who said of manners that the best way of describing good manners was behaving in a way that didn't upset people or make them feel uncomfortable, to treat them as you'd wish to be treated
As for the manners if the youth of today it was ever thus, there are some very contemporary quotations from previous centuries here
historyhustle.com/2500-years-of-people-complaining-about-the-younger-generation/

I am reading this thread and it is making me smile. Some of the posts are realistic, others less so.

I totally disagree that manners is an age or generation problem, it is down to individuals. I am 50, have children in their mid twenties and my youngest is nearly 13. Nowadays I am in a wheelchair when out of the house.

During school holidays, it means that if my 12 year old DD and I go out, she will be pushing me in a wheelchair. Now that really does give you an eye-opener into manners. She politely says "Excuse me" if she is trying to get past people and will wait for others to come through a door before attempting to push me through. However, the number of people who totally ignore her is astounding. She is quite accepting of it, whereas I get far more wound up by the ignorance of some.

However, it is not consistent with any age group, just dependent on whether a person is paying attention to what is going on or whether they are too wrapped up in their own world to be aware of their surroundings. I have had people ask my DD if she needs any help and I have seen others, when we are waiting to view something, stand right in front of the wheelchair, so I can neither see or be moved. Either way, age does not seem to be a factor in the thoughtfulness of people.

On a different note, my 24 year old DD gets frustrated by the attitude, usually by the "elder" generation, that the younger generation are rude and lack manners. All four of my children have been brought up with manners and yet, however polite they are, people will still blame the "younger generation" for everything, when it is not the case at all.

I'm memorising Felice's brilliant response!!

gonegirlI think it's very unfair to say it's generational I know some very polite younger people and some very rude older one. You get rude and polite people in all ages.

I agree Tonkatol

any age , any generation, any circumstances, we can`t label

but I wonder if responding in an abrupt/rude manner really sets the tone....? though I can be guilty of that..

and car manners! it goes on!

Yes - and if you are having a 'fragile' day - rudeness - even though it is rarely targeted and is just the inadequacy of the person being rude - can feel personal and upsetting. I've had days when someone chucking my change on the counter rather than putting it in my outstretched hand has made me almost weepy (I'm not a weeper). I do think the best response often is to be even more polite. A friend once said to me - keep your own standards whatever else is happening.
Sometimes it doesn't work. I was once walking down the street (no one ever seems to give way to me on the pavement and I am the one who ends up dodging and swerving - I ended up shoved into a wall because three men taking up the pavement walking towards me just didn't give an inch. I asked the guy who shouldered me, where on earth he thought I was going to go if he didn't move. He looked at the wall and me as if he were looking at an alien. One of this friends apologised for him!!!

Last Sunday on a London bus sitting in the seats marked for those less able to stand. As I got up to leave a woman told her son, who was about 11-12 years old, to sit down. I smiled at the woman and asked if I could ask a question. She said OK so I asked her why she had told him to sit there while she and other sdults were standing. She smiled and said that he was clumsy. The said boy was happily leaning in the departure area playing on his phone. Now this habit of mother putting her child on the seats while she stands really bugs me. At least she could sit and put a small child on her knee. Mothers do not seem to do this anymore. When I was a child on tram or bus children always gave their seats up to older people. This lack of thought has lead to me having to ask politely if I can sit down when it is occupied by young people who ignore the icons about the seats being for old, pregnant women or disabled people. Consideration and manners seem to have disappeared on London Transport. I always feel good when I can help others and I always thank people who help me.

Really bad manners do stay with you. Years ago I saw an older lady in a till queue knock over a display. A little boy nearby immediately started to help her pick them up, and she was very grateful. Cue (rough as owt) mum stomping round the corner, shouting at him for picking them up, when he didn't drop them. He looked so bewildered.

All sorts of retorts came to mind well after the event. I wish I'd said I was glad he went to a good school, where they obviously taught him to be kind. Perhaps he had a nice grandma, who knows?

How about table manners? I saw a girl eating a steak in a nice restaurant while holding her phone in one hand. She speared the steak, held it aloft and began chewing the end. It put me off my meal.

Oh I love that felice very apposite

grandMattie I'd see that as kindness and compassion - underrated qualities. They go along with consideration for others. Call it manners if you will, but manners implies something expected of us whereas kindness and compassion, I feel, come from within, from the heart.
We need more of all of it.

Table manners don't worry me at all but I curb my Neanderthal tendencies in order not to upset others in restaurants - and give the GC a good example. It doesn't bother me though if I see others spearing their food, though I'd prefer it was a carrot and not a steak.

Paperbackwriter
All my sympathy is with you!

I once dared to complain on another social media opening about a child of around 8yrs who was left to run around in the restaurant area of the pub while I was trying to eat. She was with a large group which I guessed was parents and granny and possibly aunty and uncle. They were oblivious to the fact that every time she dashed past me she jogged my little table and I had to hold my plate and glass to prevent everything being spilled on me or the floor. She was very noisy too. Eventually the gray haired person in her group told her to be careful when she went past "that lady's table" to which she said "She's only an old lady" and a discussion began among them as to whether old ladies should be ignored when out alone and that children come first.

On the other social media place I was crushed for being so "anti-child" by complaining about how children appear not to be taught to think of others.

I sometimes wonder why I am depressed. I think these changes in society have a lot to do with it.

BUT I must say, to balance this, yesterday I was in receipt of a very great kindness that still jogs tears to my eyes. Having had a terrible migraine which does affect me quite a lot, I went to Tesco to get some essentials. I found I had left the right card by my computer. I tried another one but it didn't work. I looked for my little purse so I could just buy the milk, and the purse wasn't in my bag either. The lady behind me, young, pretty and by the looks of her shopping trolly possibly a mum, immediately told the Cashier to put my milk on her bill. She said, "At least you can have a cup of tea". I was overcome. Such kindness and so gently and thoughtfully done! There are good people in the world. It's just the odd bad ones do have an impact. But when they do I must try to hold on to the fact that there are so many good people who outnumber them by a lot.

Oh dear, I have a confession to make...on the subject of table manners...I live alone now and often eat while watching tv. I eat with my fingers!

My poor daughter is nine months pregnant and with quite a huge bump. People are quite happy to let her stand back in doorways and for her to give way to them .In the whole of her pregnancy only two people have offered her a seat, another mother at the airport and a man at her son's football club. She often says she feels invisible. Fast forward to a local NT property, as I was coming out of the cafe loaded to the gunnels with a tray full of food. I stood to give way to a mother, two children and a husband. They did thank me but at the end of the day I felt the husband could have let me though. Some thoughtless individuals out there I think.

MissFoodLove, I blame her parents or guardians. Good manners have to be taught, often deliberately taught. Your sixteen year old niece is probably ignorant, not her fault. She can't be expected to know if she has not been taught.

4allweknow, stranger children and youths have often offered good manners or actual assistance to me.
When I am in the park on my mobility scooter youths on bikes will ride on the grass so I don't have to keep to keep to one side and when I say thank you they tend to sheepishly grin.

Three little girls helped to get me and my scooter out of some brambles although I did n't seek help.

This not saying thanks for presents I have experienced. I don't quite understand it.

Cheekychops, I hope next time you will hold your ground and not give way.