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Shufflingdead > Articles > Extracurricular
Drop the Meaningless Manners
I recently had one of the most unexpected social encounters of my life. As I always do, I got on the bus one particular morning, heard the bus driver mumble something at me, grunted back at him, and took my seat. Since I was sitting at the back of the bus, I happened to be the last person off this bus when we arrived at the Transit Station. As I was getting off, the bus driver said "excuse me," I turned around and he proclaimed "when someone says good morning to you, you say good morning back!" Apparently, the bus driver had welcomed me onto his bus with a "good morning" several minutes earlier, but being the sleep deprived, socially mal-adjusted bastard that I am, I paid no attention. I have come to the conclusion that the anger felt by the bus driver over my apparent rudeness, as well as my own anxiety caused by his confronting me could have both been easily avoided, if only society would do away with all of these so called "niceties."
Business operations could actually operate with a great deal more pleasantness, if it weren't for all these pleasantries. Surely, the public transit system would continue to operate without all those announcements of "good morning," "thank you," and "have a good day." I once worked in retail, I know that it's a lot of effort to try to greet every customer to come into a store, and even if you do manage it, many of them won't respond. This, again, leaves the greeter feeling dejected and the greeted feeling guilty. Then there is the extended interaction at the till, where one must ask the customer how they're doing, as if the personal happiness of a complete stranger has any bearing on the life of a video store clerk. The question is often met with an obvious degree of discomfort from the customer anyway, as the customer will inevitably respond to the question "how's it going?" with the oh-so-inane "it's going," or some tiresome opinion on the weather. Not only are these statements heard with unflinching regularity in the retail world, but they are wholly meaningless. There is no way to respond to "it's going," and unless my house is being annihilated by the weather, I truly do not give a fuck what it's like outside. We've all seen rain before folks, nothing to passionately bitch about here. For the sanity of everyone working in, or shopping at any kind of store, I propose we eliminate these outdated formalities.
There is a whole world of uncalled for small-talk disguised as manners outside of business as well. It seems as though every conversation begins with "hey, what's up?" or some variant which could easily be done away with. When two strangers cross each other while on walks, they seem to feel compelled to greet each other or at least smile, which is both unneeded and uncomfortable. Two people who don’t know each other very well will often dance around any topic of any interest, instead sticking to the safety of such topics as their majors, or, yet again, the weather. I myself prefer to launch right into discussions on Star Trek, Nintendo, and hentai. If a person has a problem talking about the things that actually interest you, then there probably isn't much reason to be talking to them in the first place; fuck formality.
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