Thursday, March 09, 2006
Can't you just pretend to be nice?
The title for this post comes from a song in the film Josie and the Pussycats. It's a film I rather enjoy even though it's a bit silly and obviously not really aimed at men in their forties.
This post is not about the film. The sentiment for the song is, however, applicable. Essentially the song is about how the singer's partner treats her badly and her world would be a better place if he were nicer to her even if he didn't mean it. An extract from the lyrics sums this up:
Why have I brought this up?
Well, as I mentioned a couple of days ago, I have been listening to the audio version of Lynne Truss's Talk to the Hand. I have subsequently followed this up with reading the full unabridged real print in-your-hands book. I finished it this morning.
Essentially, the book lists highlights (perhaps that should be lowlights) the ways in which Western society as a whole but British society in particular has become ruder over the last few decades. You know the thing: no-one says please or thank-you, everyone swears, no-one accepts responsibility for their actions and are rude to your face if you chastise them for it. We have all encountered this and, if we are honest with ourselves, we have all done it to a certain degree.
Miss Truss explores the reasons for this shift in our collective morality. I'm not going to repeat those here. Buy the book to find out for yourself! What I did want to highlight was her conclusion that despite, the apparently unstoppable downward slide, there is a ray of hope:
Well, I know what happens. Politeness can be contagious. It was for me.
Some years ago, I worked for a time with a man named Nick who was a very nice personable man and a pleasure to work with. As well as being incredibly intelligent, he also took great pains to be polite, to be nice. Whether this came naturally to him or was just a pretence, I will never know as I unfortunately lost contact with him when we both left the company.
The point is, however, whether real or pretence, his manners rubbed off on me. I became politer to people. I made an effort to say please or thank you, to acknowledge the efforts of people, even if they have, in their own eyes, done nothing that they would have done anyway.
I'm not perfect. Not even close and I'm not making a claim to be polite. I can be, and have been, exceedingly rude, as friends will point out to me. I know that and I wish I wasn't. Sometimes, however, it is necessary to be rude otherwise it is very easy to be walked on but it isn't necessary all the time. People can be nice without losing their dignity.
Pretending to be nice does work. As long as it isn't obviously a pretence and doesn't appear to mock, that is. I have a friend who sometimes talks like a character in a Noel Coward play and who also has a horrible false grin he employs when he thinks he ought to look friendly. Manners that are an obvious pretence really don't work and just get people's backs up.
After a time, however, with some effort at the correct sort of pretence, pretend manners actually become ingrained. What is pretend becomes for real. When I say please or if I thank someone, it's real: I do actually mean it.
I ended the book with a real sense of hope. Yes, the world does seem to be a chronically rude place but being nice to people in the right way and in the right place can make a difference. If enough of us do it often enough, who knows what could happen.
It's time to pretend to be nice.
This post is not about the film. The sentiment for the song is, however, applicable. Essentially the song is about how the singer's partner treats her badly and her world would be a better place if he were nicer to her even if he didn't mean it. An extract from the lyrics sums this up:
If you could just pretend to be nice,
Then everything in my life would be alright
Why have I brought this up?
Well, as I mentioned a couple of days ago, I have been listening to the audio version of Lynne Truss's Talk to the Hand. I have subsequently followed this up with reading the full unabridged real print in-your-hands book. I finished it this morning.
Essentially, the book lists highlights (perhaps that should be lowlights) the ways in which Western society as a whole but British society in particular has become ruder over the last few decades. You know the thing: no-one says please or thank-you, everyone swears, no-one accepts responsibility for their actions and are rude to your face if you chastise them for it. We have all encountered this and, if we are honest with ourselves, we have all done it to a certain degree.
Miss Truss explores the reasons for this shift in our collective morality. I'm not going to repeat those here. Buy the book to find out for yourself! What I did want to highlight was her conclusion that despite, the apparently unstoppable downward slide, there is a ray of hope:
Let's try pretending to be nice and see what happens.
Well, I know what happens. Politeness can be contagious. It was for me.
Some years ago, I worked for a time with a man named Nick who was a very nice personable man and a pleasure to work with. As well as being incredibly intelligent, he also took great pains to be polite, to be nice. Whether this came naturally to him or was just a pretence, I will never know as I unfortunately lost contact with him when we both left the company.
The point is, however, whether real or pretence, his manners rubbed off on me. I became politer to people. I made an effort to say please or thank you, to acknowledge the efforts of people, even if they have, in their own eyes, done nothing that they would have done anyway.
I'm not perfect. Not even close and I'm not making a claim to be polite. I can be, and have been, exceedingly rude, as friends will point out to me. I know that and I wish I wasn't. Sometimes, however, it is necessary to be rude otherwise it is very easy to be walked on but it isn't necessary all the time. People can be nice without losing their dignity.
Pretending to be nice does work. As long as it isn't obviously a pretence and doesn't appear to mock, that is. I have a friend who sometimes talks like a character in a Noel Coward play and who also has a horrible false grin he employs when he thinks he ought to look friendly. Manners that are an obvious pretence really don't work and just get people's backs up.
After a time, however, with some effort at the correct sort of pretence, pretend manners actually become ingrained. What is pretend becomes for real. When I say please or if I thank someone, it's real: I do actually mean it.
I ended the book with a real sense of hope. Yes, the world does seem to be a chronically rude place but being nice to people in the right way and in the right place can make a difference. If enough of us do it often enough, who knows what could happen.
It's time to pretend to be nice.
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