MY brother graduated from Md-CP two weeks ago, and the small theater we were in for his college was very similar to a HS auditorium. We were sitting on the end because my father is 6'5" with grasshopper legs, and needs all the space he can get to be marginally comfortable in cramped spaces. This Russian women comes down the side aisle, locates her party in the middle of our row, and without even waiting barges down the aisle, walking all my poor father, and stepping on all of us. My father tries to move before the people she was with follow suit. Her husband/male companion apologizes that she doesn't speak any english, and then proceeds to walk all over us before we had a chance to stand/adjust to let them past, as do the rest of their party.
[Stephanie Tanner] How Rude! [/Stephanie Tanner]

I agree. I really do not like being called ma'am. Maybe it's the thing to do in the south, but up here, it implies that you are elderly and many people find it offensive.

YES! When I was 25, I was called Ma'am for the first time. I asked the waitress not to, but she said that her boss required all the staff to call the people they served sir or ma'am. Now quite a few years later I am used to being called ma'am, but I still don't like it. It's much better than when I say "Thank you" and the response is "Uh huh." What happened to "You're welcome" as an appropriate response?

ACLU,
dont touch Kids, Teachers or Parents or you will go to jail. All a kid has to do is call the Police and they will incarcerate you no questions asked.

Is that answer enough for you?

ACLU had a good thought and like most I want to Be A Do Gooder get out of hand! They are the PETA of The Human World.

Give the Hyper Kids Drugs instead of a boot in the ass to correct them.

Dont talk and try to reason with them when they are little S*ITS!

Did you get your Ass Spanked or talked to? IS that why you are what you are?:confused:

Dont call me Mr. or Sir, That is My Father.

Call Me asswhole or MF Joe Bro!

I dont use "Tide" I use Store Brands! I am not Mr. Clean so dont confuse Me with some You act like you give a damn about! My Jockey Shorts are mostly clean some of the time!

I'm from way down deep south Georgia. I can't help but say m'am. I even say it to people my own age. I used to get smacked if I didn't use my manners as a kid.

Because they think I am being rude/sarcastic. Older (50-ish) men will say "don't call me sir!" One of my other bartenders also calls everyone sir/maam, and when yelled at she always replied with "Excuse me, but I was raised right!"

REALLY, You take Your self to seriousally, dont you or Knot?

Re- Dickilous, is upon the Eye Ball Of the beholder isnt it?
Oh Ye of little faith, get your Law Shingle and become a member of the snakes or ACLU!

When you get it from your third world Law school as you flipitnsley call it, then go to the ACLU!

Stay in college while you can, the real world is a Biotch.

The Drudge of putting up with the Drecks of Lif3e Who You have to be nice to as they do spend their .60 cents buying thier dope cigars.

God, are you going to really get an eye full if if you are in Real world if you are getting into Prosecution which I doubt.:)

Does corp. pr anyother Law sound good?

Good Luck, Stay as long as You can, The Real World is A Biotch:)

I've just skimmed this thread, so I may repeat a few things...

One of my pet peeves is parents who let their kids run wild and just do whatever they want. It's called discipline. Kids want to run around and have fun, but there's a time and a place for that, and it's not when you're in a nice restaurant or in the corridors of a hotel when it's 11pm and people are trying to sleep - and parents should enforce that, or not place their children in the situation in the first place - not sit around and get drunk while their kids run crazy.

Performances... please please PLEASE turn off your cell phone. Don't applaud between movements; if you're not sure if it's the "right" time to applaud, refer to your program or listen to see if others applaud. And PLEASE dress appropriately for an opera, ballet, Broadway show, or classical concert. Jeans and t-shirts and sneakers and unkempt hair is not appropriate.

I second the people who have said to give up your seat on the subway/train/bus/restaurant waiting area/doctor's waiting room if (a) you are a child and an adult is looking for a seat, or (b) you are an able-bodied young adult and someone who is elderly, pregnant, etc is looking for a seat.

GREAT comeback!! :)

IMHO, one of the reasons a lot of children are running amok is because adults are too busy trying to be their friends and not their elders. Children should not be calling adults by their first names, unless it's Mr. Josh or Ms. Pam - and adults should quit being so frightened of sounding old that they put up with poor behavior!

Same way in Arkansas. :D Seriously, in the South, you use ma'am/sir out of respect/courtesy. I never realized it was seen as rude elsewhere...interesting!

When should a woman become a "Ms"? I have Charlotte Ford's 21st Century Etiquette, and she says that "older" unmarried women are never to be "Miss". What is "older"? Personally, I use "Ms." for all professional correspondence, and Miss for young girls and unmarried women who are my age or want to be addressed as "Miss" (my high school addresses all my alumnae mail to Miss Cynthia LASTNAME '98). Many older unmarried women, especially those who were brought up before the 1960s prefer "Miss" over "Ms" .

I think a woman should become a "Ms." whenever she decides that's how she'd prefer to be addressed. I'm still a "Ms." and I'm married... my marital status is none of my professional contacts' business.

My feeling on this matter is that, if you know how someone prefers to be addressed, you respect that (within reason - if someone says "Call me Dr." and they're not a doctor, that's just silly). Otherwise you have a default... I'm sure there are some etiquette rules about this, but my default is that a man is "Mr." and a woman is "Ms." unless they request otherwise.

I agree. It's easy enough to ask someone how she prefers to be addressed. Whether I'm married or not, I'll always be Ms. and I'd be offended if someone called me Miss or Mrs. However, I'm always very careful to call a woman Mrs. Husband's First Husband's Last if that's what she prefers.

Charlotte Ford's full of poo. I have no problem with Miss. But like valkyrie said - she dislikes it intensely. To me, it would seem easier to use Ms - especially on written correspondence since it's shorter. At any rate, I believe people who are married are less offended by being called "Miss" or "Ms" than unmarried people are by being called "Mrs." Assuming someone is married is hurtful if they're not - it's like buying something and the clerk saying "oh, is that for your mom?" when your mom's been dead for years.

I know I sound like I'm being supersensitive, but until my mom died I never realized how much people assume things and say things that can really upset others.

Here, the use of "Miss Mary" does NOT have anything to do with the marital status of the older woman. At least in my area, the most revered women are "Miss INSERT FIRST NAME" whether they are married or not. This status is especially reserved for older women with power and grace to whom you do not have a family connection (i.e. Aunt, etc.)
Silver

Absolutely! My mother always says that she knew she "arrived" in the business world when she universally became "Miss Dixie"!

Keep in mind that she started a business that is mostly for women who would not have had an opportunity to work otherwise. That was 27 years ago, and it's the largest of its kind in several counties!

I think reading too many long ass posts are ANNOYING! Especially if they don't have paragraph breaks.

Honey, do any of the "Miss INSERT FIRST NAME" women that you know also...
own a 10-carat diamond bracelet, have a "purse dog," and discreetly place a sterling silver flask of good gin on their person????
:)
Silver

yes!

Silver, my dear, of course some do! But some of the ladies prefer bourbon or cordials... ;)

Question for southern gals: Do men have a similar status? I have long heard about the Miss FIRST NAME designation for women, but I have not heard anything about men. Are men still Mr. LAST NAME no matter what?

Thanks :)

introductions
 

- YES, this is so important!

Also, according to etiquette (though you did it right), a lady is always supposed to offer her hand to a gentleman, not the other way around. Though this is not as important as grip. ;)


- I hate when I am around people I don't know, and no one introduces us. It is so awkward to find a pause in the conversation (without interrupting) to introduce myself.

I'm bumping an old thread but I saw this story and couldn't help but laugh and applaud this movie theater. Going to movies can be a pain since a lot of people spend more time on their damn cell phones texting instead of watching the movie they just forked over $10 for and most of the time, those cell phones are not on silent or vibrate.

Movie theater kicks out obnoxious texter.

That just confirms that Ann Richards was totally badass.

I JUST saw this! So funny!

I just saw this, too. I wish EVERY theater did this!

LOVE it.

I will say that the last time I went to a movie (this weekend) I noticed that the person a seat down from me was texting but had turned the screen brightness all the way down. I wouldn't have noticed if they hadn't knocked over their popcorn and dropped the phone in surprise. Don't text. But if you have to at least put it on silent and turn your screen on the lowest setting.

Great thread! And seeing some of these names makes me wonder where they went.

I'm amazed at the number of people who think nothing of leaving in the middle of a performance...or coming in after something has started.
Plays, concerts, church service...I watched one woman come and go three times during a sermon. It wouldn't be so bad if she had sat in the back couple of rows but no, she was on the third row from the front.

I do not understand why people do this. If you have to go to the bathroom a lot, are expecting an important call, have a child that might need to be taken out...sit in the back.

At the movies, I am a terrible talker all through the previews. I can't help it, I have to comment on whether the movie in the preview looks good, ask where I know that one actor from, etc.

I'm really good once the real deal starts, but I wonder how much I annoy the other theatergoers.

I don't care if people talk during the previews. I'm kind of disappointed if people don't make fun of at least one of them, actually. But once the movie that I paid for starts, man, STFU.

Just saw this. If you do not know the man personally, it is Mr. LAST NAME. If you have a long relationship with the man in question, it is Mr. FIRST NAME.

As an aside, I laugh every time I see the name of this thread. I took a 1 hour credit etiquette course in college to push me into Junior status when I was a first semester Sophomore (I don't know why I cared...I just did.) Anyway, a sister took the course with me and never came to class. She ended up with a "D" in the course and complained to me that she didn't understand how she made a "D" in "etiKWette"! I figured if you couldn't even pronounce the subject you probably deserved an "F"!

May I suggest that two gentlemen unknown to each other are always Mr. Surname. If they are well known to each other they are John and Peter without the Mr. prefix.
A neice or nephew will address the older relative as Uncle John.
A gentleman never addresses anyone as Mr. John.
Mr. John is a form of address, dieing out (in the US but not so much in the UK) for the last twenty years or so, used only by family servants to younger males or in some cases by an old family servant to a grown man who was addressed in that manner by that servant when the man was a boy.
This was a charming custom which is now hopelessly obsolete and actually inappropriate unless the person using the "Mr. John" form of address is more comfortable with it than the "Mr. Smith" form.

Look at the context of the question:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Taualumna (Post 930107) Question for southern gals: Do men have a similar status? I have long heard about the Miss FIRST NAME designation for women, but I have not heard anything about men. Are men still Mr. LAST NAME no matter what?

AOII Angel is answering the question specifically in the Southern context. In my (Southern) experience, Mr. First Name is a very common way for children (up to about15 or 16) to address the adult male friends of their parents and perhaps certain other men. I rarely hear an adult use it.

It doesn't work quite the same way as Miss First Name though. Miss First Name has always been a common way for a person of any age to refer to or address an older woman. (Miss, in this context by the way, has nothing to do with marital status. My grandmother and her sister, one married and one widowed, were widely known as Miss Mary and Miss Suzie 'til the day they died.) I have to say, though, that it is dying out.

I still call the men I knew as a child as Mr. First Name. It's the culture of the portion of the South where I was raised. I even call my FIL Mr. FN and my husband calls my father the same. We do the same with women...Ms. FN. It's a sign of respect that never goes out of style like "ma'am" and "sir".

Thanks for this. It's a reminder that the South isn't monolithic, even as to things like this. Around here, Mr. FN would, as I said, be limited mostly to friends of one's parents (or perhaps men in a particular setting, like church), and somewhere in the 13-15 year-old-range, the "Mr." part tends to get dropped. I don't think I've ever heard anyone address their in-laws that way -- people here tend to either simply use first names or something like "mom" and "dad." (That's what my parents did; their own parents were "Mother" and "Daddy.")

And I totally agree about "ma'am" and "sir."

Yeah, it's funny how different things can be state to state or even town to town. I'm trying to think what my parent's called my grandparents. I think it was Mr. and Ms. LN! I can't recall my mother EVER calling my grandmother by her FN.

It took me a good 3 years before I could call my MIL by her FN. She had been encouraging it since I met her, but it felt really odd.

Funny story...

We have two sets of neighbors that moved here from the Pacific Northwest. The first set has been here for about 3 years and the other since July. The two families were friends prior to their moves.

We were all over at another neighbor’s, when the 5-y.o. of the first family came in. She went straight to the food table. The mom of the second family asked if she would like something to eat. The child replied, “Yes, ma’am, Miss Mary. May I please have a hotdog?” The woman’s eyes got as large as beach balls and proceeded to drop the serving spoon and her jaw. The child’s mom smiled proudly and said, “Yes, my daughter is now a ‘Belle’.” It was the funniest thing that I had seen in a long time.

Actually, I was answering the posting from a very SOUTHERN point of view. The practice under discussion is in my experience all but extinct in other areas of the USA. It survives largely in the UK and among the traditional families in the deep South. The 'rules' to which I referred are those in use in New Orleans and other tradition minded Southern localities with which I have had direct experience.
Any male past the age of ten or eleven would not address an adult male not related to him as Mr. John - ever. If related or (rarely) if a family friend of many years standing and great closeness one might use the honorific 'Uncle John' or 'Aunt Alice'. Girls might use the honorific Uncle or Aunt a bit longer but that also is rapidly dieing out except in really die hard families or groups.
Overall, this form of address is strictly bound by 'rules' and not generally bestowed on everyone lest it become a parody of "The Old South" or an affectation.

Then I have to say (1) it was a Southern point of fairly unrecognizable to this Southerner (but see disclaimer below), and (2) it's interesting that in answering from a "very Southern" point of view, you mentioned the UK and the US in general but didn't ever mention the South. Frankly, it came across to me as reflecting a more English and/or a self-consciously aristocratic perspective. References to "servants" and phrases like "traditional families" reinforce that perception for me.

And while I'd never deny that New Orleans is indeed Southern, it and the surrounding Gulf Coast have a unique Southern culture that doesn't necessarily correspond to broader Southern culture. Disclaimer: But, as we've said, Southern culture is not the monolithic thing some like to make it, so the experience of two Southerners can vary widely.

I know more than a few males past the age of ten or eleven (one is in college) who address me as Mr My-First-Name. I know many olders boys who address their Scoutmasters or men they know at church this way, so I think you're shooting too broadly to say that that it would not happen "ever."

As for "Aunt" (and to a lesser exent, "Uncle"). One still hears "Aunt" used for family friends this way around here with some frequency -- my children know my wife's best friend as "Aunt FN." (Actually, my son often calls her "Aunt-FN-Who's-Not-Our-Real-Aunt.") It's also a common way to address godparents around here.

Again, my experience of 50 years in my particular corner of the South differs from your experience.