When calling somewhere and they leave you on voicemail, especially in a professional setting, please leave your name, your number, and your reason for calling. It makes it easier for anyone who is calling you back and makes it less likely for you to sound like a scam.

If you know the name of the person you are trying to meet, or the department that will make it even easier.

Examples below:

Anger and aggression are not the same thing as strength or power, by the way.

I really mean this, by the way. Not just in some feel-good-but-ultimately-meaningless sort of way.

If you are an angry and aggressive person, you might make other people nervous or scared even, but ultimately people will not genuinely respect you or take you seriously, or see you as a strong or authoritative figure.

Leaders and authority figures who are able to conjure genuine respect from other people (and wield that respect as a form of social power) are rarely overtly angry and aggressive people.

They are calm because they are secure in their power and strength as an individual. Anger is an expression of feeling threatened. Anger evolved with the purpose of protecting us when we are threatened or in danger.

Perpetual anger and aggression will make you look afraid and insecure to other people, even if only subconsciously. With genuine strength and power comes security, and security looks like calmness.

#i think this is also good to remember bc a lot of us with trauma backgrounds (or at least i do)#associate anger with power in some way shape or form#like abusers with authority over you taking out their anger on you#and it can make us fearful of actually having power#because we assuming having power is the same as abusing it or having it makes us “bad people”#(i will not get into power vs privilege in the tags here but please know my intention is not to equate the two here)#but having power isnt inherently a bad thing and as this post says its about how you wield it#also i know this isnt what op is implying with this post but we are on the piss on the poor site so:#being angry isn't inherently a bad thing#feelings are morally neutral#they are tools#it is your response to the feeling tgjat makes it an issue (or not) for the people around you

Oh good points all around, and thank you for clarifying that. As someone with a trauma background as well, it took me almost a decade of therapy to stop feeling ashamed or like I was a bad person for ever feeling angry, and to accept that my anger exists to protect me, and specifically as a nudge (or a shove) to assert my boundaries when I need to.

It depends on how it's used and what you do with it. There are definitely people who will lash out when it's not called for or appropriate, and the people who do this would probably benefit from therapy.

I do know several people who I am convinced perpetually act angry and always find something to be angry about because they think it makes them look stronger, tougher, or smarter even to other people. It's hard to explain why I get this feeling. Maybe it's because I can't talk to them about anything without them turning the conversation into an angry rant (which is exhausting as is) but they always have their angry rants with a tone of smug triumph and superiority, and usually end the story with victory over whoever they were ranting about. ("someone made a dumb comment on Facebook, and then I TOTALLY told that person off and put them in their place because I'm not afraid to be an asshole!").

I think it's one thing if someone is struggling with mental health in a way that they have a lot of pent up rage. But having to turn any and all conversations into an angry rant with a smug tone of superiority and triumph feels like something different, they're desperately trying to look a certain way and give themselves a specific image, and it feels like they think their angry rants make them look strong or smart or something along those lines. Either way it's very exhausting to deal with, and they certainly lack the self awareness of how exhausting it is.

Reminded me of this quote:

i think ppl would be a lot happier and better-adjusted on here if they realized that being online on a website is like being in any other casual public space full of people. if u walk into walmart u dont immediately think to yourself “i have to be friends with everyone in this walmart and if not everyone likes me i’m a failure” and u really shouldn’t feel that way online either. likewise if there’s a guy in the walmart parking lot shouting obscenities u probably wouldn’t answer him and that’s literally an exact equivalent to some of the weird stuff that people on here seem to feel they’re obligated to respond to.

If you see someone accidentally dropping something or leaving something behind, try to get their attention to prevent it from being lost or stolen.

Say for example there is a dad holding a baby in line in front of you at the bank or post office, and his baby throws her toy several meters away, and the dad is distracted by something so he doesn't notice that his baby just threw her toy. Instead of just ignoring this and pretending you didn't see, it would be polite to bring this to the dad's attention, or better yet go get the toy and bring it back to him and the baby.

Or say you're riding the bus home from work, and you see that when another passenger gets up from her seat to get off at her stop, her wallet falls out of her pocket and is left behind on the seat she was sitting on. Instead of just ignoring this, get her attention before she exits so she's not leaving her wallet behind on the bus.

Of course, the most obvious reason for why we should do this is because you are preventing serious consequences for another person. You are sparing the dad from having an inconsolable baby who won't stop crying because her favorite toy is lost, or the passenger on the bus from losing hundred of euros when someone without good intentions finds her wallet on the bus later.

Looking at the bigger picture, small actions like this help to build trust in society and build a social safety net with the people around you in public.

No matter how much you might be convinced that nothing like this could happen to you, we're all susceptible to accidentally dropping something or leaving something behind while we're in public. Actions like this inspire others to do the same, so that when anyone, including yourself, accidentally drops something or leaves something behind in public, the people around you will be looking out for you so that it doesn't become permanently lost or stolen.

“From corporate boardrooms to government chambers, research continues to show that women are interrupted more often than men. A pioneering 1975 study carried out by sociologists Don Zimmerman and Candace West examined overheard 31 conversations between various combinations of people and found that in the 11 conversations between men and women studied, men were behind all but one interruption recorded.

Similarly, a more recent study conducted in 2014 found that a woman was more likely to be interrupted (by both men and women) than a man was. In a separate but more informal study conducted that same year, Kieran Snyder observed 900 minutes of conversations between men and women working in the tech industry. The study found that men interrupted others twice as often as women did and were nearly three times as likely to interrupt a woman as they were a man.”

Occasionally I like to remind people of the overlap between social justice issues (like feminism) and manners, like here showing that women are interrupted more than men.

In general, if you have a lower place in society (being a woman, a person of color, an immigrant, disabled, LGBT+, etc) you will find yourself on the receiving end of more rude and inconsiderate behavior, such as being interrupted more.

In the mid to late 2010’s I do feel like this was discussed more, and maybe it’s just my personal bubble I’m in, but I don’t see people talking about this as much as it was talked about 5-10 years ago.

I also saw it talked about more 5-10 years ago that women generally get bumped into more than men, and men bump into people (especially women) more than women do, because people (especially men) expect women to move out of their way, and generally people are more likely to just move out of a man’s way.

Everyone deserves the basic respect of being able to finish their sentences and have their personal space bubble respected, not just society’s most privileged.

Avoid phrases such as "Now don't get offended by what I'm about to say, but -" or even "Now don't take this the wrong way, but -". These types of phrases may seem on the surface level to be polite phrases to soften the blow of what you're about to say, but in actuality these phrases often have the opposite effect and can make what you're saying sound more upsetting and/or offensive instead of less upsetting and/or offensive.

First and foremost, these phrases signal to your conversational partner that something potentially upsetting and/or offensive is coming, and rather than that softening what they hear, this often puts people on guard, which can lead them to feel / react more defensively.

It can also make some people wonder if they should be upset or offended by what you're saying when you lead with these phrases, but it might not have occurred to them that your words could be taken offensively if you had just not lead with those phrases.

Second of all, phrases like this shift the blame from the speaker to the listener. When you lead with any of these phrases, it's subtly blaming the listener for any way they might be hurt or upset by your words, when the responsibility should actually be on you to speak with tact and not say hurtful things to other people.

Imagine telling someone "Now, don't be hurt by what I'm about to do!" and then punching them in the face. If you can understand why it's unfair to tell someone to not be hurt by being punched in the face, rather than just not punching them in the face, then hopefully you can understand why it's unfair to tell the listener to just not be hurt / upset / offended by your words.

Telling people to just not feel upset or hurt by what you're saying to them can come across as dismissive, or even manipulative. Their feelings are their own and not for you to command.

And finally, phrases like this often come across as patronizing and condescending. Phrases like this can come across as if you think your conversational partner is overly sensitive, irrational, and/or incapable of handling honest conversation, which can definitely make these phrases come across as patronizing and condescending.

So instead of just telling your conversational partner to not be upset or offended by what you're going to say, instead learn to phrase what you want to say tactfully, or ask yourself if it's actually necessary to say in the first place. If you want to say something that could be wrongly interpreted, it's more concise and effective to just clarify that you don't mean it that way rather than just telling the other person to not take it that way.

For example:

Say your friend knows you're going for a solo hike this weekend and asks if she can join. Instead of saying "Don't take this the wrong way, but I'd rather go alone." Try something like "I enjoy your company and love spending time with you, but it's important for me to have my alone time out in nature." In this example, since the way your friend could take you preferring to hiking alone "the wrong way" to mean that you don't want to spend time with them, it would actually be clearer and more effective to just say that you do actually enjoy spending time with them and that's not the problem.

You can also try replacing "don't get offended" and/or "don't take this the wrong way" with:

“I’m saying this with the best intentions”

“I mean this in a constructive way”

"I mean this in the best way possible"

These are phrases that signal good intentions on your end rather than placing responsibility on the other person.

"Men should put the seat down when they're done peeing so that I don't fall into the toilet when I sit down to pee"

"Actually women should be putting the seat back up when they're done peeing as a courtesy so that I don't have to touch it and put the seat up before I pee"

Actually, both the seat AND lid should be down when no one is actively using the toilet, because this prevents things from accidentally falling into / accidentally being dropped into the toilet. Also having the lid down when you're flushing is important because it prevents the toilet from spraying out bacteria.

It's called "toilet plume" or "fecal plume." Here's a video of it.

crazy how much people undermine bullying as a source of trauma and genuine pain that echoes throughout your life and impacts you in very literal ways well into adulthood

I've gotten a few notes on a few different posts where someone in the tags brags about intentionally "body checking" someone else when they're in their way.

For example on a post I made about leaving the way clear for people exiting elevators or public transportation instead of standing right in front of the door blocking it I got a few notes from people saying "haha yeah I always give someone a good body check if they do this and I love seeing the shocked and offended look on their face"

or on a post about leaving room for the flow of traffic I had people in the notes bragging about giving "body checks" to people in their way on a sidewalk or in a hallway.

Do. Not. Ever. Ever. EVER intentionally bump into people aka give them a "body check". Anyone who brags about this kind of behavior in my notes is getting blocked. You are literally physically assaulting someone and then bragging about it. Physically assaulting another person is actually a lot worse than accidentally being in someone's way, and I have no tolerance for it.

The times in my life where someone has intentionally "body checked" me have been when I was disassociating and/or about to pass out from low blood sugar, or quite literally was as far off to the side as possible (literally up against a wall or packed up against other people in a crowded area) and every time this has happened it has ended in me having a full blown panic attack that I need to take emergency meds to come down from due to my PTSD.

You never know why someone could be in your way. They could be visually impaired. They could be disassociating. They could be about to pass out from low blood sugar. They maybe just experienced a disturbing or traumatic event that's shut down their pre-frontal cortext. All sorts of things. So congrats I guess on physically assaulting someone who might be disabled or disassociating or about to faint from low blood sugar. You sure are showing them.

Not only that, but it's unsafe for you too. There are violent and unstable people in this world, and you might "body check" the wrong person one day. I had a friend in secondary school who would brag about this kind of behavior, and when I was talking to my aunt about it one day she said to me "one day your friend is going to do that to the wrong person and find herself cleaning herself up off the floor."

And if you're only "body checking" people you think it's "safe" to, people who you're pretty sure won't be able to fight back? People smaller and weaker looking than you? Congrats, not only are you definitely a bully then, but you're also perpetuating systems of social injustices in this world like ageism and ableism by only going after "the weak".

can also see how this could be dangerous to rollator users . and yes , easy enough to think oh , would never do this to someone with mobility aids - but truth is will not necessarily always see mobility aids before snap decisions like this .

weight of rollator will depend on several factors , but 7 to 9 kg seem like fairly average guess . rollator users , naturally , can weigh 10 or ( many ) more times that . if balance of rollator user is thrown off , that rollator can easily glide ahead . given purpose as mobility aid , very likely for user to have at least one hand on rollator - which means that person will follow , and fall , and possibly get very hurt . this is true even with brakes on - brakes mean very little against full weight of person .

even one small snap decision can seriously hurt someone .

Really important point. When the doors for an elevator or public transportation open, and you see someone standing what you deem too close to the door, you really do only have a second or two to decide between a) saying excuse me or asking them to move b) just squeezing around them if you're really in a hurry and have no time to ask them to move or c) giving them a "body check" to punish them for being in your way.

And yes, you are 100% correct, in the second or two you have to decide between those options, you might not notice a mobility aid, and if you go for option c for a mobility aid user you can seriously hurt them.

Also, not everyone who is physically disabled and at serious risk of being hurt from a "body check" uses a mobility aid. My mom really should be using a mobility aid, she has vertigo so badly she sometimes has to old onto my arm if we go anywhere together in public, and she has really bad arthritis in her feet that make it harder for her to walk at quicker than a shuffling pace. And yet because of her not wanting to look "too old" she refuses to use mobility aids, and insists on running errands by herself on days her vertigo isn't "too bad". But if someone were to get annoyed with my mother, who moves extremely slowly and often wobbles from side to side, and they decide to give her a "body check" due to their impatience, they could seriously hurt her.

Also, my mom often uses accessories like wigs to try to hide her age, so even though she's pushing 70, when she's wearing a wig it's not always obvious. So if you think "Well, I would never do that to an old person" it's not always obvious, some people don't look their age and/or are good at hiding their age.

Hey guys did you know "pushed somebody and they fell and hit their head" is like. One of the most common forms of manslaughter?

#I can think of at least one invisible disability situation where being body checked could cause serious problems.#i'm pretty sure being jolted while having a colostomy bag can't be good.

Quick Overview of this Very Correct Thread (not written by AI, unless I haven't been told something fundamental about myself):

Not everyone causing an inconvenient situation is being rude. Sometimes there's a reason they're just in the way like that, seemingly oblivious, and whatever is happening to them is beyond normal control.

But even if they WERE just being self-centered, that's no excuse to willfully become aggressive toward them. When you do, the only thing you prove is that you're a bully who cannot be trusted, which is far worse than simply being oblivious or self-absorbed.

Also, yes, you can badly hurt or even kill someone if you jostle a person the wrong way, especially if it results in them falling over. In no rational world would your aggravation over a minor annoyance be worth catching a charge over. Grit your teeth, leave them alone, and move on with your life.

I just want to emphasize the point in the second-to-last paragraph above:

Even if someone IS just being rude, that still does nor give you license to physically assault them!

Something I forgot the mention but should, the fact that someone intentionally "body checking" you can be disturbing, potentially triggering PTSD if you have PTSD from physical assault and/or domestic violence etc. is exactly why it's considered polite to apologize when you do accidentally bump into someone.

It is important to let people know in one way or another that you meant no harm, you're not a bully trying to punish them for the crime of being in your way. Giving a quick "sorry!" (or gesturing "sorry" in your local sign language) can be important for defusing the situation. If they have PTSD it could stop them from spiraling into a panic attack to know that nobody just intentionally assaulted them, or if they're someone unstable who might start throwing hands at someone who would intentionally give them a "body check" you're also keeping yourself safe from harm.

#I hope this isn't an off topic thing but I wish people would say excuse me when I'm in their way instead of just staring and waiting#I'm sorry but sometimes I'm too into what cereal I should chose & that can make me unware of my surroundings

It's on topic enough I think. I also prefer when people say excuse me instead of just staring at me. If I'm just standing there trying to decide on what brand of pasta sauce I'd rather someone say "excuse me" then stand there and stare at me. If nothing else because I find a stranger standing and staring at me to be unnerving and uncomfortable, but also it's just easier and gets it all over with quicker to just ask me to step aside for a second.

However, I understand that some people are non-verbal, so sometimes saying "excuse me" isn't a choice, which is why I don't recommend lashing out at someone for standing and staring instead of saying "excuse me". If you really want to say something, you can be polite about it. However, most people I know who do this are capable of verbalizing "excuse me", and if you are capable of saying "excuse me" I do recommend it because plenty of people find it unnerving and uncomfortable to be stared at by a stranger. Plus it saves you time to just say "excuse me" rather than spending all that time staring them down waiting for them to get the hint.

Now, what I really really hate is something I've seen people in my notes call "the German shuffle", except people in Iceland do it too (so presumably in other parts of northern / western Europe) and I cannot emphasize how much I hate it and how rude I think it is. It's where if someone wants to get something you're standing in front of they just slowly shuffle closer and closer to you to basically try to intimidate you away. I hate hate hate standing in the grocery store, trying to decide what kind of bread I want, and suddenly I can feel a perfect stranger's breath on the side of my face because they decided slowly shuffling closer and closer to me is the best method of getting me to move so they can grab whatever I'm standing in front of.

Between being neurodivergent + having PTSD from interpersonal violence I'm not exactly a fan of having strangers intentionally violate my personal space! I get northern Europeans are scared of talking to strangers, but I'd much rather a stranger just uses words rather than violates my personal space to try to intimidate me away from the bread they want to grab.

Important additions I've gotten in the notes on why we don't "body check" people. You *really* can never know a someone else's medical status or why they're in your way.

#there’s this YouTuber who gets told she doesn’t ‘look’ blind#and she’s had people be really rude to her because she was in the way#imagine if one of those people just decided to fucking body check a blind person because she didn’t ‘look’ blind

Sorry @thundercaya I hope you don't mind me taking these out of the tags, but this is another really great point on why we should say "excuse me" instead of just body checking someone, or generally being rude to someone to punish them for "being in the way". You really never can tell for sure who is and isn't blind or visually impaired, so genuinely has no way of knowing they're in your way.

So this video where a young girl was assaulted by an adult woman on Tokyo’s Shibuya crossing has gone viral, and has been discussed enough that I'm assuming most of you have heard about it by now.

For those who haven't, a quick summary of the situation is that a Taiwanese mother and daughter were on vacation in Tokyo, the mother tried to take a picture of her young daughter standing on the famous Shibuya crossing, and while she was posing, an adult woman walks up behind the little girl and physically shoves the girl to the ground.

I've already written this post here about why just shoving or "body checking" someone in your way isn't just rude, it's dangerous. You can seriously injure or kill someone from doing this. I don't care how rude you find it that someone is in your way, that doesn't justify assaulting someone, and in turn potentially injuring or even killing them. It's especially abhorrent when factoring in that this was an adult physically assaulting a young child.

The situation itself has already been talked to death (at least on other social media sites) and how this could be a symptom of shifting cultural norms in Japan, as well as fatigue from all of the tourism.

One thing I haven't seen talked about enough, that I'm glad this article touches on, is the power dynamics behind the alarming rise in behavior like this.

As I mentioned, this is an adult woman assaulting a little girl.

In the comment section for this article, I saw countless comments like "Well I've lived in Japan for over 20 years now and never had an issue with this, but that's probably because I'm over 190cm and have a shaved head so nobody wants to mess with me 😏" or "well I went to Japan and this didn't happen, but then again I'm a large man so I don't think anyone would want to try this with me 😏" etc.

Whenever I see comments like this, or hear rhetoric like this IRL "well I'm a large and imposing person of social privilege so nobody wants to mess with me 😏" it makes my stomach turn. Why does someone need to be large and imposing and of social privilege in order to not be physically assaulted in public? Or just to have basic respect?

Do children, elderly people, disabled people, anyone naturally smaller in stature, etc. deserve to be physically assaulted in public just for not being naturally large and imposing?

It also makes me want to gag seeing someone gloat about not having to worry about being shoved around in public due to something beyond their control (their size, stature, social privilege, etc). When I find out that someone is more likely to be assaulted than me because of reasons beyond my control (size, social privilege, etc) my first instinct isn't to gloat and give myself unearned self congratulations, it's to feel horrified that someone else has to live with a higher risk of assault than I do, and all for reasons beyond their power or control.

This is why I've spoken before about how manners intersect with social justice issues. People with less social power (children, elderly people, disabled people, women, racial / ethnic minorities, immigrants, LGBTQ+ people, etc) are quite often more likely to be on the receiving end of rude and inconsiderate behavior. More likely to be shoved aside instead of given a polite "excuse me", more likely to be cut off / interrupted mid sentence, more likely to have their personal space violated, I could go on.

Everyone deserves basic respect and consideration, not just the most privileged. I don't want to live in a world governed by fear, where the only reason you'd respect a stranger's personal space is because they're large and imposing, or have enough social power to enforce consequences if you shove them. I want to live in a world where you respect another person's personal space because they are a fellow human being whose safety and feelings matters simply because they are a person.

I feel as though what drives most rude / inconsiderate behavior I experience IRL on a day to day basis comes from a place of having this unearned and unnecessary sense of urgency in situations that aren't actually urgent. I think if more people became aware of this completely unnecessary sense of urgency in situations that actually aren't urgent, it might make co-existing and sharing public spaces with other people a lot easier and more tolerable.

That text post that's been making the rounds that goes something like "Omg you made it to the same red light as everyone else but faster and more dangerously and recklessly, should we call nascar? Do you want a medal?" summarizes exactly what I'm trying to talk about.

It's like when I have to change buses at one of the bigger and busier bus stops, and the people who get off the same bus as me shove and elbow past me to get off before me, and then shove and elbow past anyone even slightly in their way on the way to the bus they're switching to, only to end up on the same bus as all the people they shoved and elbowed, with several minutes to spare before it leaves and plenty of open seats left.

I think this unnecessary urgency a lot of people feel in their day to day lives drives a lot of bad behavior. I'm not saying I'm innocent of this (is anyone's?), I've felt it too in plenty of situations that didn't call for it, and regrettably was less kind than I should have been as a result. But I try to be aware of it, and always try to ask myself it it's really as urgent as my lizard brain is trying to tell me it is, and even if it was urgent, does that still justify unkind behavior?

Is shoving or elbowing another person aside going to make the difference between whether or not you make it to the bus before it pulls away? (hint: at least where I live, most of the time that's a no because the drivers usually won't leave if they see people from another bus heading towards their bus). Is shoving and elbowing people aside in a crowded grocery store going to make any real difference in how quickly you get your shopping done?

Does a few extra seconds of time actually justify cruel and unkind behavior towards people you perceive as slightly inconveniencing you?

A few more examples of this phenomenon:

- Waiting in line at the store and the person behind you creeps closer and closer to try to pressure you forward, and ends up violating your personal space and making you uncomfortable, because they think creeping closer and pressuring the person in line in front of them will somehow get them through the line faster (it won't)

- Going through a self-serve buffet, and the person behind you keeps creeping closer and closer to try to pressure you to serve your food faster and get a move on. All it achieves is that you can't scoop your soup without elbowing them, and that's somehow your fault

- Crossing a crosswalk when the car waiting for you to cross creeps closer and closer to you to try to intimidate you into crossing faster (because using a 2 ton metal machine to try to intimidate a fleshy little ape you could easily kill with said 2 ton metal machine isn't acting like a bully at all no sir-ee)

- Honestly a huge heap of the poor treatment of service workers is also rooted in this sense of urgency in things that are not actually urgent

Please do feel free to add more examples if you can think of more examples

#cutting in line at the airport#you are all going on the same flight!

Not just getting on the same flight, but the majority of the time already having assigned seats! The plane isn't going to just pull away while passengers are still boarding, your seat will still be your seat, why the urgency?

People have always been like this in airports, and maybe I'm just noticing it more, but I feel like in the past few years this sense of urgency in airports has gotten worse. I get some people might be running late for their flight due to extenuating circumstances, but that doesn't excuse being rude. It's not fair to punish random strangers at the airport if you're running late for your flight. That's your problem, not theirs.

If it's really urgent and genuinely extenuating circumstances, then use your words ("I'm so sorry but I had a family emergency this morning so now I'm running really late for my flight, do you mind if I go ahead of you?") rather than push / shove / elbow / cut in line / violate other people's person space.

The past several times I've flown I almost had a panic attack going through security because of how much other passengers kept violating my personal space by standing too close (to try to pressure me forward), even though that wouldn't make the line go faster + were getting pushy / shove-y / elbow-y with trying to get their stuff on and off the x-ray belt. Is there really any reason that's called for? We're all just trying to get through and get to our flights, You Are Not The Main Character of Airport Security.

#I think that living I. the United States just drives people insane#legitimately#the societal pressure you feel just makes you batshit#it made me for sure

I have bad news for you (or maybe good news depending on how you look at it) but this is far from a U.S. specific issue. I'm actually in Iceland, so almost all of the experiences I wrote about in this post happened in Iceland. I've visited and lived in a few different countries, and I have a hard time recalling a country I didn't witness this phenomenon. It's the era of instant gratification in many places around the world, and it shows.

Damn forgive me for americentrism. Thank you for documenting this

I mean thinking about this again this absolutely happened in Germany too. People absolutely lost their manners and sense of community good.

My only experience with Germany is a weekend spent in Berlin, but that weekend was stressful because I experienced so much of this in Berlin.

I can recall more than once having to stop and look around because I'd lost sight of my partner, and despite having *several meters* to go around me people would still walk right into me while glaring at me.

I made another post about "body checking" (this exact phenomenon of intentionally walking right into someone as a form of aggression) and someone in the notes also said this kept happening to them in Berlin, they'd stop for just a second to look at their map, and despite having plenty of room to go around people several heads taller than them would aggressively walk right into them and/or clip them.

I can't speak for all of Germany, it's a very large and diverse country after all, but at least Berlin seems to have a problem with aggressive impatience to the point of physically battering strangers who dare to stand still for a second in public spaces.

Important addition:

ableism intersects with this cultural thing.

i don't have an internal sense of time passing due to disabilities. folk often hurry me with all of these behaviors.

learning disabilities, difficulty walking, pain, tremors, etc, many things can impact how one does things. some folk need extra time to do things. be it done well or done at all. some folk "can" go quicker but they risk hurting themselves or being bed-bound later. some folk cannot process at a quicker speed.

and with folk who can do things quicker, even want to do so. that isn't an excuse to be rude. if you have to be quicker, use a brief explanation, give an apology. remove your head from your butt. patience is a virtue.

If someone gives you a gift, if possible, it's nice to use it around the gift giver as a sign that you genuinely appreciate the gift and it's getting good use.

Say for example your grandfather knits you a sweater for Christmas. It would be a really nice gesture to wear the sweater next time you see him. That way he knows you appreciate the sweater and it's getting good use.

Or say one of your work colleagues gifts you a coffee thermos. In that case it would be really nice to bring the thermos to work sometimes and use it so that your co-worker knows you like it and appreciate it.

It's one thing to just say thank you and say you like the gift, but often actions speak louder than words. People love to feel appreciated, and seeing someone enjoy the gift you gave them is a great way to feel appreciated.

can we stop using “being unapologetically loud and taking up space” as the ultimate expression of joy and self-expression? i think the pendulum needs to swing back to maintaining mindful and moderate volume and being spatially considerate of others and being apologetic when necessary. no offense but i think everyone alive rn has the loudness and taking up space thing covered. if this breaks containment, i am sure everyone will be normal about the wording of this post and will have normal and good faith interpretations of it.

I feel as though what drives most rude / inconsiderate behavior I experience IRL on a day to day basis comes from a place of having this unearned and unnecessary sense of urgency in situations that aren't actually urgent. I think if more people became aware of this completely unnecessary sense of urgency in situations that actually aren't urgent, it might make co-existing and sharing public spaces with other people a lot easier and more tolerable.

That text post that's been making the rounds that goes something like "Omg you made it to the same red light as everyone else but faster and more dangerously and recklessly, should we call nascar? Do you want a medal?" summarizes exactly what I'm trying to talk about.

It's like when I have to change buses at one of the bigger and busier bus stops, and the people who get off the same bus as me shove and elbow past me to get off before me, and then shove and elbow past anyone even slightly in their way on the way to the bus they're switching, only to end up on the same bus as all the people they shoved and elbowed with several minutes to spare before it leaves and plenty of open seats left.

I think this unnecessary urgency a lot of people feel in their day to day lives drives a lot of bad behavior. I'm not saying I'm innocent of this, I've felt it too in plenty of situations that didn't call for it, and regrettably was less kind than I should have been as a result. But I try to be aware of it, and always try to ask myself it it's really as urgent as my lizard brain is trying to tell me it is, and even if it was that urgent, does that still justify unkind behavior?

Is shoving or elbowing another person aside going to make the difference between whether or not you make it to the bus before it pulls away? (hint: at least where I live, most of the time that's a no because the drivers usually won't leave if they see people from another bus heading towards their bus). Is shoving and elbowing people aside in a crowded grocery store going to make any noticeable difference in how quickly you get your shopping done?

Does a few extra seconds of time actually justify cruel and unkind behavior towards people you perceive as slightly inconveniencing you?

Someone pointed out to me once how a lot of people, when out grocery shopping, amble through the aisles at a leisurely pace, maybe checking out this new product or that tester... But when the time comes to queue for checkout, all of a sudden everyone is super impatient and not leisurely at all.

That fully rewired my brain.

Ever since then I've tried to keep that in mind when I shop. If I'm not hurrying through the store, I'm not gonna be impatient in line for checkout.

#the urgency and impatience tends to drive a lot of ableism too#Gods forbid someone need help or walk slower or get stuck somewhere#people will walk into my chair because they're not looking where they're going#and I've almost gotten run over at intersections because I wasn't crossing the street fast enough even though I still had right of way#people who rush tend not to signal or say excuse me either which is both rude and unsafe

Thanks for these tags @disability-etiquette, because this unnecessary urgency (in situations that aren't actually urgent) really is a massive driving factor for ableism, and that needs to be addressed and discussed.

So many strangers have been so cruel to my elderly and disabled family members for being "too slow" in public.

And not to derail from the ableism, but this urgency / impatience also fuels a lot of fatphobia too. I've already had to block some people in the notes of this post for making fatphobic comments. People often get very angry at fat people for moving slower and/or taking up more space, and will use their unnecessary urgency and impatience to justify being mean and impatient with fat strangers in public.

Oh absolutely, and not derailing at all in my opinion, the struggle for fat liberation goes hand in hand with ableism! The overlap is significant - many disabilities can affect body size and shape, so it's very much connected to ableism in my eyes! You're 100% right and should say it.

its essential to challenge societal norms that normalize such behavior and foster empathy.

Out of all the annoying replies I get to some of my posts, the only one I find more annoying that "OMG I can't believe people on this website don't already know this and need to learn this from a Tumblr post!" is "ahaha this totally must have happened to OP and now they're so salty they had to make a Tumblr post about it! 🤣🤣🤣"

Like, I make a post saying "hold the door for the person behind you" and I get a bunch of notes like "Ahahaha OP had someone slam a door in their face and now had to go on Tumblr and make a post about it! 🤣🤣🤣"

This is almost never someone following me directly, it's almost always someone reblogging from someone who reblogged from me, so they're probably not aware that I'm a manners education blog. Most of my ideas for posts come from doing research, or they come from messages or submissions, only a tiny fraction are based on real world experiences, and they never seem to be the ones people assume are based on real world experiences.

Quite the opposite actually, somehow the posts that I make based on my own real world experiences are the ones that get notes like "ugh nothing like this actually happens in real life, this isn't a real problem, talk about inventing problems 🙄" and always the ones I find from doing research that get notes like "ahaha this happened to you, get wreck'd OP!!! 🤣🤣🤣"

Still, even if someone is unaware that the post is from a manners education blog, I'll never understand why if you assume something bad happened to someone else or someone's upset about something, why is your first instinct to mock them about it? I find that to be alarmingly sadistic and immature.

"Haha someone slammed a door in your face!" Are you a 10 year old schoolyard bully? Grow the hell up.

Any story which refers to Haiti as an impoverished nation, which is all of them, should also mention that when Haitians won their independence from France, French gunships showed up and demanded they pay something like 22 billion dollars in today's money to compensate France for the stolen land and enslaved people they could no longer exploit

It took Haiti over a hundred years to pay that ransom and it's difficult to explain just how badly that fucked up their entire development, especially since France also demanded a 50% discount on everything they bought from Haiti just to make it harder. Like! No wonder they're impoverished!

Anyway if France would like to assist Haiti in its current difficulties they could always pay back the fucking money they extorted