Miss Manners: Sometimes it feels good to get down in the gutter

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I realize it’s an unpleasant world with unpleasant people who are going to say unpleasant things. But sometimes, you have to get down on their level in order for them to get the message.

For instance, in cases where a stranger calls someone fat, that person could give an equally rude response, such as: “Yeah? Well, you’re majorly ugly, and at least I can diet.”

Not exactly taking the high road, but sometimes it feels good to get down in the gutter.

GENTLE READER: Thank you for your attempt at helping in the noble cause of mannerliness, but Miss Manners is afraid that your suggestion represents the problem, not the solution. In pursuing the laudable goal of lessening the amount of unpleasantness in the world, you are proposing adding to it.

That low road is extremely crowded. If you want to help, please stay off of it.

Perhaps it would help you to know that retaliatory rudeness never works. Do you really believe that the person you call ugly will reflect on having provoked you with a similar insult?

Besides, why are you even engaging with rude strangers? The ultimate insult is refusing to acknowledge another person’s existence. Better yet, ignoring the person passes the etiquette test. (Detractors condemn such responses as passive-aggressive, but Miss Manners much prefers them to aggressive-aggressive.)

DEAR MISS MANNERS: What are the two main subjects you should not discuss?

GENTLE READER: There are three: politics, religion and sex (including gender). If you think this restriction is outdated, you haven’t tried launching these topics lately.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I was taught that at formal dinner parties, bread plates are not used, and that they are not considered part of a formal place setting for multicourse meals. Now, I am given to understand that formal dinner place settings include bread plates, placed to the left of the charger, and a small bread-and-butter knife.

I was also taught that the correct order was for a salad to be served after the main course, not before, so the salad fork and knife were “inside” of the main course fork and knife.

Are these two rules obsolete?

GENTLE READER: You were taught correct social manners. But how many social seated dinner parties in other people’s homes have you attended in recent years?

What has happened is that purely social get-togethers over meals now mostly take place in restaurants, and the procedures of expensive restaurants have come to be considered correct formal practices.

Miss Manners is not deriding restaurants here; she understands that they have different requirements.

In a household, the meal is ready to be served when the guests are called to the table. Fine restaurants must wait for customers’ orders before preparing the food. And those customers are hungry, so the restaurants give them bread and salad to keep them from chewing the napkins.

Please send your questions to Miss Manners at her website, www.missmanners.com; to her email, gentlereader@missmanners.com; or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.