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Sunday, September 13, 2009
Are the British really more polite?
On my two-week trip to the UK, this is a question that I really wanted to have answered. Why? Because some of my British friends often harp me about the problem with Canada and the US being, that we are not polite--in the British sense.
Having been here for two weeks, I have come to the conclusion that British politeness has very little in common with American or Canadian politeness.
Australians and Britishers complain about the lack of respect for personal space in America and Canada. Which, in some weird way, I suppose we do have a lack thereof. I mean, I do notice that people maintain greater personal distance when standing in lines here. But the politeness ends there.
If you get distracted by an email whilst standing in line at a café, and yank out your iPhone or Blackberry, then fail to notice the line in front of you advancing, people will literally just walk around you. Seriously.
In the US or Canada, when this has happened to me, almost 100% of the time, the person behind me courteously tapped me on the shoulders to draw my attention to the advancing line.
I suppose it’s the fact I’m not paying attention for a brief moment that the British feel is the impolite act, and so cutting in front of me in line is some sort of justifiable act. But I don’t know. Which do you consider more impolite?
The other aspect of British rudeness I want to talk about -- which isn’t really an aspect of politeness -- is a matter of accommodation -- British people are not accommodating of children. It’s not hard to imagine why this society has such a dwindling birthrate: this country hates children. And I mean that.
Show up with a stroller (or "pushchair" as they call it) at a fancy restaurant in the UK, and a good amount of the time they do not want your business. We are greeted with the shaking head and a “sorry, we don’t want children here”. Polite I suppose. A polite “fuck off, with that baby”.
We have never experienced this with our baby at fancy restaurants anywhere in the US or Canada. If anything, in the US or Canada, we get better treatment when we have a baby. At Morton’s Steakhouse in Yorkville, there was a 45 minute wait for a table, and they pushed us up to the front of the line! We didn’t wait at all.
This never happens in the UK. And if they do let you in, they’re very upset and uncomfortable about the whole thing.
That being said, if you go to more “ethnic” restaurants like Indian or Chinese, you find that they are much more accommodating of children. But not the Brits. The always children-friendly McDonald’s is also another option if you want to eat deep-fried food.
Perhaps had I come here on my own, I would have had a better impression of the UK. But coming here with a baby, I am leaving with the impression that this society is the most un-accommodating bunch of pricks, that hate children. You can almost understand why all the Muslim youth in this country are so angry. Combine the general lack of love for children with a scoop of racism, and who knows what you’ll get?
I’ve found that well-to-do people still ship their children off to boarding school here at the age of six, only to see their children several times a year until they graduate high school. Like… wow! Yes, boarding-f'ing-school. I thought board schools were at myth that parents threaten their misbehaving children with. But no. People who do want children here, want someone else to take care of them, and then want nothing to do with them until they are adults.
I can’t for the life of me understand why the Brits consider us Americans and Canadians so “rude” and “crass”. At least we like children.
Addendum: I also witnessed a form of classism on three distinct occasions that really took me aback. You see, I'm an engineer. And even though I'm one of those "top 5% income earners", I don't tend to look it. On a bad day I can really look unkept, despite my income. In the UK I have noticed a trend of really "upper-class" people simply talking over me when I was giving an order at a Starbucks, or some other cafe. On several different occasions.
I would be in the middle of describing my order, and some guy in a suit and a prim and proper English accent would just speak over me, interrupt the person serving me and demand that their drink be made again with "no foam" or some other complaint. As if I was of no importance in his world, and his time was far more valuable. British politeness, my ass.
British politeness seems to exist within a hierarchy of social standing. Children receive no respect, but are demanded to give it to their elders. High-class people demand respect, but give none to apparently low-class people, etc. This is a phenomenon that I know once existed in North America, but seems to be long since gone. In the UK, especially in London, it's something that is very much alive. It's one I find very disconcerting for some reason.
Posted by Mike Brock on September 13, 2009 | Permalink
Comments
Are the British really more polite?
Posted by Mike Brock on September 13, 2009
Were you in Scotland, Wales and N.I. as well? If you weren't you can't answer your own story title. As you yourself admit, you are a foul smelling know it all slob. It's no wonder Londoners don't like you either. I go to the UK three or four times a year and rarely if ever find what Brock describes. You should move back to North Carolina with the hill-billies that's where you fit in.
Posted by: The Stig | 2009-09-13 10:38:13 AM
I don't think I admitted to being foul smelling or a slob. But I am merely a t-shirt and jeans type guy... as are most engineering types. And I don't always comb my hair. But I shower twice daily :)
I've also never heard someone describe Charlotte, NC or Raleigh-Durham as hill-billie-type places. Considering that they are two of the biggest financial and technology centres in the US, respectively.
I think I admitted that my experience might have been somewhat different if we didn't have a baby with us all the time. I wonder if you travel with a baby to the UK three to four times a year.
I'm sure that people who do, or even people who have lived in the UK can corroborate the fact that many restaurants do not admit young children.
I should note that we're visiting friends here, and their attitude is that--they're surprised we can take our baby to nice places in Canada and the US.
There's a very big sense that nice restaurants are "adult time". And the response some British people have given me to my criticism is that these policies allow "adults to let down their hair" -- which to me, is another way of saying: "children are annoying".
So I'm surprised you haven't encountered this, because as a father with a young baby, I can tell you: it's pervasive and annoying.
Even British parents have noticed this moving to Canada and the United States. I perused the forums at britishexpats.com, to find a lot of British parents often pointing out that Canada and the US are both more "children friendly". And I have to say that it's hard to disagree given my experience.
When Sarah and I want to go out for a bite to eat at a restaurant in downtown Toronto, where we live, I don't have to think twice about what restaurants have "no kids policies" and the ones that do. If I lived here, I almost would certainly end up at McDonald's half the time.
This is a cultural critique. And I don't think the fact that Canada and the US having comparatively higher birthrates than the UK is disconnected from this.
The higher the barrier a society places on having children, by limiting things as simple as restaurants for young parents, the more and more children seem like a burden and not worth the effort.
After all, we didn't come to eat dinner in our hotel restaurant ever night or go to McDonald's. So this one little thing, qualified as a culture shock to me.
Posted by: Mike Brock | 2009-09-13 11:07:47 AM
I've never been, but if the hundreds of British immigrants I've met are any indication, I suspect they're polite enough. Their mannerisms are certainly different.
They seem more sociable than (western)Canadians. I suppose crowding that many people onto a small island requires building a workable social structure.
I'm training a young Brit right now, and some of his little mannerisms are quite entertaining. Every time I give him a drink from the water bottle, he say's "cheers". Even if he's bleeding, exhausted, and concussed, he says "cheers". How do you not like that?
Posted by: dp | 2009-09-13 11:18:53 AM
Mike,
You seem to have had a bad experience with the English, there might have been some lost in translation moments that made the situation worse. There is, unfortunately, an element of truth in what you say. The British have given up their empire and much of their liberty, but their obsession with class and Victorian attitudes about children persist.
Remember boarding school is an upper class thing. The more typical middle class Briton has more child friendly attitudes. I'm guessing you spent much of your time in Central London. That's not the whole country.
Posted by: Publius | 2009-09-13 11:19:04 AM
A baby? Is it, by chance, your first? I have some bad news for you. You're going to face discrimination everywhere you go. When my kids were little, I learned to avoid so many places I used to frequent. It got to the point where I'd assault people, at the drop of a hat, when they were rude to my kids.
Imagine the shock when a couple of middle aged lesbians asked me to keep my kids quiet, only to have their table flipped over, on top of them. I once emptied a small food court when some people complained about my son crying. An old lady, with a young gigalo stepped in front of my 2 year old at McDs once, and both were ejected.
To this day, my sons are nervous when we go to a restaurant, but they're always polite to people with kids. After all, kids are our reason for existing, right?
Posted by: dp | 2009-09-13 11:39:09 AM
dp,
The thing is, we've had really good experience in Toronto and our travels since we've had the baby. We're both really busy people, and so we eat out a lot. We've probably literally taken our baby to restaurants literally 100 times since she's been born.
We've never really had a negative experience, to be quite honest with you. Which is why our trip to the UK was such a shock.
We have really only taken our baby to a few places in the US, and we've only been in Ontario within Canada, so perhaps my milage would vary throughout Canada.
Posted by: Mike Brock | 2009-09-13 11:50:39 AM
dp, cheers means thanks in this context.
From personal experience London is not the UK, although I know Londoners often think they are just as Torontonians often think they are Canada. In France it is the same when people visit Paris and come away thinking the French are like Parisians, who can be hard to take. Still I find that in Europe Latin countries are much more children and family oriented. When our children were small we also found that Canadian airlines were not that friendly to small children, which is why I made a point of only taking JAL when travelling to Japan. The contrast was astounding.
Different cultures have different views of polite behaviour. Many find the North American habit of addressing everyone by their first name very impolite, and I admit that I do not like it when a salesman, doctor et cetera immediately address me that way, since they are not personal friends. Still I remind myself they mean no offence and leave it at that.
What does all this mean? For me I think it makes the world a much more interesting and enjoyable place. There would be no point in visiting other places if we were all the same.
Posted by: Alain | 2009-09-13 11:51:00 AM
I've been living in Ireland (the Republic) for the past two years, and have traveled around the UK and Europe a fair bit. We have a one year old and the Irish can't seem to get enough of children. We haven't been to the London much with our son, and I know the culture is different there. We did go to Edinburgh and Paris with the baby, and people in both places were lovely.
Sorry to hear that the experience in London has been hard, you might find Dublin more to your liking.
On a side note, there's a difference between manners and politeness. Brits have wit, which cuts both ways - they can charm or mock you with perfect manners.
Posted by: Jesse | 2009-09-13 12:43:35 PM
You mentioned Morton's. I remember a few years ago being in a Morton's in Anaheim with a couple of clients. A guy with his wife came in with a baby and were seated next to us. The baby screamed and cried the whole time, then to top it off the baby puked. We got up and left. Much the same thing happened at a Ruth Chris in Coral Gables. When I'm paying $150 a person for a meal I don't have to put up with that. To take a baby into a higher quality restaurant shows a complete lack of respect for the other patrons.
Posted by: The Stig | 2009-09-13 1:01:06 PM
And even though I'm one of those "top 5% income earners",
Posted by Mike Brock on September 13, 2009
Advertising ones salary is a particular American trait reserved for those who crave attention.
Posted by: The Stig | 2009-09-13 3:55:56 PM
lol, @ this talk about how much canadians respect and evidently value parents with children.
the canadian birthrate is amongst the lowest in the world (even lower than the UK's) so something is plainly amiss. my guess is that, like so many things canadian, this is all just feigned tolerance; kids aren't really well-regarded in this nation or we'd have more of them. Frankly, I'd rather be in a nation that actually has children as opposed to one that pretends to care about them.
Posted by: bk | 2009-09-13 4:44:37 PM
You can almost understand why all the Muslim youth in this country are so angry. Combine the general lack of love for children with a scoop of racism, and who knows what you’ll get?
Posted by Mike Brock on September 13, 2009
If that was even remotely true you would also have Hindu, Sikh, Buddhists and a host of others bombing the Tube and planning to blow up planes over the Atlantic. You don't. What you have in London and everywhere else muslims move to in the West is their inability to reconcile a 8th century view of the world with the 21st. As usual you can't see the forest for the trees.
Posted by: The Stig | 2009-09-13 4:50:44 PM
There's a very big sense that nice restaurants are "adult time". And the response some British people have given me to my criticism is that these policies allow "adults to let down their hair"
Posted by: Mike Brock | 2009-09-13 11:07:47 AM
The average Brit, whether they be English, Scottish, Welsh or Irish lets their hair down in a pub not a restaurant. British restaurants worth going to are usually expensive and most people aren't going to pay ₤30 or ₤40 for a childrens meal. Sounds like you should be going to Chuckie Cheese.
Posted by: The Stig | 2009-09-13 5:01:26 PM
Stig- Sounds like you'd be more comfortable in a bath house. Why are gay men so bitchy around kids?
Bk- What the fuck is feigned tolerance? I always thought tolerance was an act, not a feeling.
Posted by: dp | 2009-09-13 5:20:21 PM
Why are gay men so bitchy around kids?
Posted by: dp | 2009-09-13 5:20:21 PM
I have no idea. I did read today that Elton John was hoping to adopt a kid. Maybe you should can ask him.
Posted by: The Stig | 2009-09-13 5:29:30 PM
Mike,
Off topic but what going on with "The Hot Room"?
Is it kaput or on hiatus?
Posted by: daveinguelph | 2009-09-13 10:40:11 PM
I think that Americans are superficially more polite than the British. This is mainly because those in the service industries earn very low wages and rely on tips to make a decent wage. Therefore it pays for them to treat customers well. The British are much more reserved and to tend to hide their manners and can appear stand-offish.
Posted by: bluetooth car kit | 2009-09-14 6:55:08 AM
I don't know what it is about you, Mike, that drives conservatives like Stig and co. to such frothing, mindless lunacy ... but keep up the good work ;)
Posted by: Charles | 2009-09-14 8:51:19 AM
The sound of babies crying doesn't bother me that much anymore. I figure it's just their way of getting a bit of exercise. Certainly better than the nonsense piped over the radio in many businesses.
Posted by: Timothy | 2009-09-14 12:32:56 PM
Are the British really more polite?
No.
Posted by: The original JC | 2009-09-14 1:49:19 PM
Timothy- I wish I could listen to more children, and fewer dogs. My neighbourhood is unbearable. People don't spend any time in their yards, because the barking is just too annoying. The sound of children playing, crying, or simply talking would be a wonderful relief.
Charles- Stig's a conservative? Who knew?
Bluetooth- Americans are more polite, because they have guns.
Posted by: dp | 2009-09-14 2:44:05 PM
I don't know what it is about you, Mike, that drives conservatives like Stig and co. to such frothing, mindless lunacy ... but keep up the good work ;)
I think the funniest part of it all, is the caricature they have painted of me: angry, spiteful, enraged and petulant.
I'm inclined to think it's a textbook case of the need to dehumanize someone in order to hate them. Like when conservatives and socialists imagine each other as the meanest, unreasonable and incompetent people on a regular basis; the way they talk about each other almost suggests they don't think the other group is human.
Many people here have met me in real life, and I think many could attest to the fact that I'm rarely angry or petulant. If anything, I'm sarcastic, less than serious and a little bit cocky most of the time. I have a little bit of Larry David in me, actually; I get fixated on the most inane things in life, and often say the absolute wrong thing at the wrong time, but not with malicious intent.
I also talk very openly about my personal life. Always have. Even when it was in the shitter, I talk openly about the bad choices I made. And I will talk openly about the good choices I made. Some people interpret this as egocentric bragging, and the truth is, I'm definitely introverted. But most engineers are.
There is another side to me which is a lot more focused and intellectual, though. That's how I holdover a job and career.
This piece was sort of supposed to be delivered and interpreted in a sarcastic tone. But those who hate me, will read it in a "petulant" and "spiteful" tone, because that is what best fits their existing narrative of me that best suits their worldview.
I say all this, only because I find it all so funny. And I really do enjoy getting a rise out of them.
Posted by: Mike Brock | 2009-09-14 4:51:16 PM
Frankly, I'd rather be in a nation that actually has children as opposed to one that pretends to care about them.
Posted by: bk | 2009-09-13 4:44:37 PM
Deer in the woods don't have offspring when they can't meet their needs either. My guess is that we are so limited in freedom to do business and create...and so over taxed, that people don't feel thay can raise children at the standards they would like. We care "more" and are "more" responsible. (mostly)
Posted by: The original JC | 2009-09-14 7:49:24 PM
dp...I had occasion recently to see an 84 year old gunsmith in Nanton. He fought in WW11 and was as sharp, spry and observant a man as I've ever known. I had never met him before so when he spoke to me I addressed him as "Sir". Apparently I did this on several occasions because he eventually asked me how long I'd been "up here".
I said I'm from "up here" He said "I figured you must be an American because you're polite and respectful." Then I told him I'm a duel citizen raised on US naval bases...he figured that explained it.
Posted by: The original JC | 2009-09-14 7:55:41 PM
It's extremely rude and inconsiderate to take a baby to a, as you put it, "fancy restaurant". People going there are going for a special occasion or a nice, intimate dinner. They certainly aren't going there to hear your kid scream or wander around or make baby noises or whatever. And that is unavoidable with a baby or child. Although there aren't rules against it in the states, most people are polite enough to not bring their children to really nice restaurants. There are plenty of family style restaurants for that.
Posted by: Angela Hill | 2009-10-27 12:33:59 PM
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