Pry, Pry Again
Bob Morris takes on nosy people in The New York Times:
The guy behind the counter at the household and gardening supplies store in Kingston, N.Y., was being very friendly. I had a question about lawn sprinklers. He had one for me, too, when Ira, my boyfriend, came over to join me. "Hey, are you two brothers?" he asked. Other than salt and pepper hair, we don't look much alike. But since we have been asked before, Ira had a ready answer. "Of a sort," he said, hoping that would end it.No such luck. "Hey, don't these guys look like brothers?" the man said to a colleague. "You two really aren't brothers?" he asked.
You would think that in a world of "Will and Grace" and "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy," he might have been able to do the math. Or maybe he had and was toying with us. I wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt and a direct answer, too. But I'm sorry ó I didn't feel liking getting into Gay Politics 101.
But then, who doesn't face intrusive questions from strangers in summer, when city folk meander out to the greener boonies, and all kinds of Americans traipse around Europe, upgrading their cultural experiences?
"You're American?" I was asked more than once while visiting Spain. I should have said, "Of a sort," but instead quietly answered that I was. Then I was interrogated about my country's role in Iraq and Israel and my feelings about the Bush administration.
Not that things are much better even in cosmopolitan New York. Kate Spade, who recently wrote a book about manners, often faces New Yorkers trying to guess where she is from. "When I tell them Kansas City," she said with her subtle twang, "they ask me what in the world I did there" ó as if nothing Midwestern could possibly engage a New Yorker's interest.
Inquiring minds also want to know: Have you had work done? Do you rent or own? Why don't you have children? What kind of surgery was it, exactly? Did he suffer long?
Tama Janowitz, the writer, has a daughter who was born in China. "People have asked if it was me or my husband who couldn't have a baby," she said ruefully.
So many probing questions in innocent drag. In Victorian times, which were perhaps too well mannered, arbiters suggested that questions be avoided in conversation entirely. Instead of putting someone on the spot by asking, "How is your sister?" you would say, "I trust your sister is well," leaving it up to the other person to run with the topic.
Bob rounds out his piece by quoting PJ Forni, whose book, Choosing Civility (given to me by Lena), is quite good. Speaking of which, my latest pet peeve is total strangers who come up to me in a cafÈ and paw my iBook, the lid of which I've covered with a groovy Macskinz.com zebra print pattern. (Macskinz doesn't have iBook covers now, but scroll down here to see my zebra print cover on the iPod, and the hot pink leopard print next to it.)
I'm always especially shocked when people reach over and grab one of the top corners of my screen while I'm typing feverishly, with headphones on, clearly extremely engaged in what I'm doing. It never seems to occur to them to wait until I take a break to come over and get grabby; nor, perish forbid, to ask before touching.
Once, when I was sitting at neighborhood coffee joint, deep in conversation with Lena, I was so startled by a guy who grabbed my screen with his big dirty fingers that I reflexively shot back "Barbarian!" (Hmmm...perhaps this is why Lena bought me Forni's book?)
At the recent alternative newspaper conference, a news photographer grabbed my screen without feeling compelled to ask. I shooed his hand away (more politely than he deserved), asking him if he would be comfortable if some total stranger just reached over and felt up his Hasselblad. "Um, no," he muttered. "Good point." Please, somebody tell me: Why is it that this would be a strange and difficult thing for anybody to conceive of on their own?
"who doesn't face intrusive questions from strangers in summer, when city folk meander out to the greener boonies, and all kinds of Americans traipse around Europe"
That passage gets at the heart of the problem. It's not only in summertime that we find ourselves face-to-face with people who're very different from ourselves. What comes across as rudeness is just a poorly handled attempt to reduce social discomfort by "getting it all out in the open."
The underlying message of most instructions on manners and civility seems to be, "Grown-ups have to conceal the discomfort they feel in strange situations." Artifice is something to be valued and cultivated. For example, the advice of another great Amy (ie, Vanderbilt):
"If you start to shake hands with someone who has lost an arm, shake his other hand. If he has lost both arms, shake the tip of his artificial hand (be quick and unembarrassed about it)."
It's funny to imagine someone trying to quickly apply a decision-making algorithm as detailed as that one (it has TWO "if-then's"!), but the effort to make the other person comfortable -- even if they have some kind of disability or deformity -- seems like the very essence of kindness to me.
Lena Post at August 4, 2004 9:22 AM
It's a thin line between mere curiosity and thoughtless rudeness. While I had grown up with a more stringent set of boundaries in place, I watched as the 60's and 70's gave over to erased boundaries in the name of freedom. The sing-song free to be you and me comes to mind making me wince. Free speech, free love, free ride. The rigidity of the 50's splintered like glass. On the whole, a healthy thing. But the backwash has left us with lots of people with brash questions and grabbing fingers. There could be that social discomfort angle, too. Once I was complimented by a friend who admired that I could just walk into a classroom and sit quietly thinking. Whereas he felt compelled to interact with any and all persons in the room to ease his discomfort.
allan at August 4, 2004 9:19 PM
"It's a thin line between mere curiosity and thoughtless rudeness."
Even when there's a parking lot between mere curiousity and rudeness, some people still don't get it. I know women who've said that their pregnancies were seen by socially incompetent strangers as an invitation to touch their bellies and ask whether they throw up much in the mornings.
Lena at August 4, 2004 9:53 PM