Manners Maketh the Man?

Broken Man sent me a blog for today, in which he (apparently) tells you that I will be guest blogging tomorrow. Unfortunately he sent it to my work email and as I haven't been at work today, you will have to put up with me guest blogging twice! Sorry about that.

With Broken Man's "learning difficulties" (I'm still not sure why they call it that - he has no problem learning at all; in fact he's rather skilled at it, it's just the vaguaries of the education system which cause problems!) I am now used to living in a highly logical house. I always think the easiest way to describe the difficulties Broken Man has to new people is to suggest that until they know him better they treat him as a Vulcan. It seems to work, both for them and for him.

Anyway, today's topic of debate was "please" and "thank you". The fact that these are social niceties which oil the wheels of conversation is not enough for Broken Man. "Thank you" was pretty easily dealt with - his conclusion is that we are grateful for someone doing something for us, and "thank you" expresses that to them. But "why does the use of one word ("please") mean that someone has manners? Particularly since the word is clearly constructed *just* to show that someone has manners" That was an altogether trickier concept for us.

I had to agree - "please" really doesn't *mean* anything. It really is just something we have made up to show that we have manners. On the other hand, always with one eye on bringing up baby, I was getting more and more uneasy at the prospect of having to justify having a "rude" child because Broken Man was able to explain away the use of a social norm!

Eventually, after a long conversation with himself (and me, but I really didn't submit anything useful to the mix!) Broken Man came up with a way of making it work. "Please" offers an element of choice. It recognises that someone has the right to say "no", and is therefore a request, not a command. It's purpose is to differentiate between a request and a command.

I breathed a sigh of relief. We have an explanation we can offer the baby when it gets as far as talking. We have a reason for saying "please" and "thank you", because in our house, EVERYTHING must have a reason. I have some concerns about other people's "inconsistances" with this theory - quite how I am going to explain that when the teacher says "please put on your coat", she is actually issuing a command, not making a request, is something to worry about for the future.

For now, though, social disaster has been averted, and actually I quite like the idea of saying to a child something like "are you happy that X has given you/done this for you? If you are, the short way we say that is thank you" I think it's far better than the usual prompt of "what do you say?", which seems to require no understanding of the principle behind the word.

I have no doubt that we will come on to "sorry" another day - that's a whole new can of worms!

Broken Man's Wife

Your all lovely

Just reading through the comments from you all over the last few days..well long than that even...just wanted to say thank you.

I know i am not getting to your blogs enough at pressent, and i dont always reply to your lovely comments, but they do mean the world to me. Well obviously not the whole world. If i had a choice between your comments and owning the whole world, well i would pick the world. Would be stupid not to. Or comments v's a small country. Or a house without mortgage. Hmm okay..let me try again.. i am fairly sure that if i had to choose between your comments or a cake,i would pick your comments. Not all cake ever note..we are talking about a particular specific cake. I dont want to raise your hopes. Right so to clarify your comments mean more to me than a cake. Okay that might not sound big but it is. I am not being stingy hear just wanted to be honest about quantifying things. When down cake can be good..cake does make you happy..good comfort food. But also makes me fat. You are better for me than cake. Well most of you. One of you..you know who you are..you send sweets. Okay not to me..to the wife...but of course i eat them... I will stop now.


Thank you. Thats what i was trying to say

Yours as ever

The Broken Man