Extreme Etiquette (cont.)

Petiquette Even the dogs practice the
polite art at the Institute.

I learned all that from a seminar Anna gave that evening, not from her grimaces during the meal. To illustrate just how polite Anna is, she told me later that I hadn’t broken any really important rules—just esoteric ones that don’t mean that much today. How kind of her to say so. You can tell who’s truly polite by how they handle unruly types like me. Still, some rules—what to do with an oyster fork, for example—make me want to eat with my hands. I think it’s possible to be polite to the point of rudeness. The Posts would doubtless agree. Anna tells a story that the Institute received on its website. “A man who was new to the office called men by their first names and women ‘Mrs. Jones.’ He said his mother taught him that,” Anna says. This old-school approach understandably upset some of his officemates. “In strange situations, it’s best to err on the formal side,” she says. “But when you do know people’s preferences, their wishes should be respected.”

It’s the rules that make people buy etiquette books, and the rules that make people ridicule etiquette. In the 1980s, the wonderfully snarky writer P.J. O’Rourke wrote a book making fun of the whole topic. Modern Manners: An Etiquette Book for Rude People asserts that etiquette is “a combination of intelligence, education, taste, and style mixed together so that you don’t need any of those things.” His book contains handy tips like these:

“Never do anything to your partner with your teeth that you wouldn’t do to an expensive waterproof wristwatch.”
“If your drink runs up your nose, you may be lying on the floor.”
“Most men do not look trustworthy with their pants off.”
“Never wear anything that panics the cat.”
“A hat should be taken off when you greet a lady and left off for the rest of your life.”

One might think that the Posts would feel insulted by the book, but the person who put me onto it was Anna Post herself.

Nonetheless, etiquette instruction remains in high demand. That’s because we have rules for a reason. If we didn’t have them, then people would walk around doing clueless things. “Look at cellphones,” Anna said. “A few years ago, they were out of control. That’s because there weren’t any standards for behavior. Now things are far from perfect, but I think it’s gotten a little better.”

The rules also remain important for young people aspiring to employment. Anna often teaches proper comportment to executive wannabes. I got to see her in action during a rare event near her office. The University of Vermont holds intensive two-week seminars to prepare liberal arts majors for the business world. Besides resume work, job hunting strategies, and field trips to nearby companies, the students spend an evening with Anna.

She appeared in a tailored jacket in a hot, spare meeting room on campus. The students—some 20 of them—arrived five minutes early, a feat that may be unprecedented in the history of academia and one that pleased Anna. “It’s not good to be fashionably late,” she said to the students later.

Like a good executive, she showed PowerPoint slides. One said, “Etiquette = Manners + Principles.” She illustrated the importance of rules that everyone follows by having a student stand up. Anna extended her hand and told the student not to shake. Her hand lingered in space, and an awkward silence ensued. “There’s a tension out there,” she said, and the students nodded. Anna showed another slide, this one of a 2005 poll asking Americans if they frequently saw people using their cell phones rudely. Fifty-five percent said yes. (The other 45 percent clearly don’t use mass transportation.) But only 8 percent admitted to being rude with their cell phones themselves.

“Etiquette gives us a code for how to behave so we can focus on more important things,” Anna said. It’s like being an experienced driver. “We drive everyday, so we don’t have to think about it, letting us think and use the radio, hopefully without crashing into one another.” Etiquette also helps us avoid looking like pigs. “When you think about it, eating is gross,” she continued. “Etiquette keeps us from grossing each other out.”

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