Stuff You Should Know - Why Manners?

Episode Date: June 6, 2023

Keeping your elbows off the table, keeping your fingers out of the gravy boat – at some point these became very important rules of etiquette. But what purpose do manners serve? It turns out they just may be the glue that prevents society from unraveling.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

So, there is a ton of stuff they don't want you to know. Yeah, like does the US government really have alien technology? Or what about the future of AI? What happens when computers actually learn to think? Could there be a serial killer in your town? From UFOs to psychic powers and government cover-ups, from unsolved crimes to the bleeding edge of science, history is riddled with unexplained events.

Listen to stuff they don't want you to know on the iHeart Radio app Apple Podcasts or wherever you find your favorite shows. Welcome to the Good Stuff. I'm Jacob Schick, a third-generation combat marine. And I'm his co-host and wife Ashley Schick. We believe everyone has a story to tell, not only about the peaks, but the valleys they've been through to get them to where they are today. We're joined by some amazing guests who share the lessons they've learned that shape

two they are and what they're doing to pay it forward and give back. Listen to the good stuff on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of I Heart Radio. Hey and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark and there's Charles W. Chuck Bryant and there's Jerry over there. We're all being very dainty, mindful and considerate and this is stuff you should know. That's right. And another great article from Libya, she got right to the meat of the matter so maybe we should too. Sure. Okay. I had about six, seven minutes of discourse on my own personal experience with manners, but okay. Hey Pepper, those in. I don't really have that. I know. So we are talking about manners and essentially we should probably define it because manners are exactly what you think of, but what you think can also slide into what really is considered etiquette, which we'll

talk a little bit about later, but manners can vary quite dramatically from locality to locality. They can be regional, national, cultural, household to household. They can differ within the neighborhood. For example, some houses in neighborhood will ask you to take off your shoes when you go in the house. Others are like, why would you do that? That would be considered manners, one way or the other, especially the taking off of

your shoes thing. So it's kind of like an expectation of polite behavior that is culturally bound typically. That's what manners are. And a time era... uh... era based it can be for sure but some chuck uh... libyus cited almost out of the gate in a jibson vizier who's a political advisor from uh... the fair for on the carer

his name was ta hotel that's a be confused about the hotel but uh... that and he uh... in his resignation letter, essentially, his retirement letter to the Pharaoh, gave all of this advice to young people in particular. But it was just basically life advice, but it was generally advice on manners.

And it holds up today, like 4,000 years later. Some of it does. One of the pieces of advice was to stay away from a battle of insults, good advice. Yep. Avoid gossip, that's another good one. Yeah. One that's a little questionable is eat whatever

a superior offers you. Especially if they mash it in your mouth, say eat it, super cow. Yeah, no, I agree. But they can't stand the test of time for sure, but sometimes they're very locked in time. But the difference between manners and etiquette, even though you can use those interchangeably generally,

but etiquette is a little more formalized, like set of rules, and you'll often see them like published in books. And a lot of times it's tied to very ritualized, formalized stuff like, you know, in the King's Court and Royal Courts and fine formal dining meals and stuff like that. So it's a little more formal.

Yeah, manners are another way to put it. Manors are something that are ingrained from you by your culture from your early childhood. Elegant is something you kind of actually have to actively seek out to learn, like whether it's from a book or from a finishing school or something like that. Yeah. Or you have like a spinster ant who doesn't have anything else to do. But brow beat you and to keep your elbows off the table. Tammy.

Uh, Tammy. Oh man. Um, so one thing that you're going to see pop up a lot, to keep in your elbows on the table. Tammy? Tammy. Oh, man. So, one thing that you're going to see pop up a lot, and we probably don't, you have to mention all of these examples, because Livy is always so great at, our cup always run it over when she gives this stuff. But one repeated thing that you'll see is a lot of philosophers talk about this kind of stuff, and most of them agree. And most people agree that

manners aren't just, it's not just, hey, people like to people. It's, this is sort of the, these are sort of the unwritten rules that keep us functioning as a, as a civilized society. Yeah. High and low. Like, some are really, really important. Like, prohibitions on violence, especially random on expected violence against other people. That's tepeter. It falls under. Yeah, it does.

It falls under the category of manners, technically. And then also, it can be much more evolved and just designed to make life more pleasant, like, say, opening doors for people. Man or woman, but the person following you holding the door for them. That's manifold. It just makes it nicer than the shutting the door on somebody's face who's coming in behind you. And that, if you put all that together, manors essentially hold civilization together. They're the glue that keeps civilization civilized. Yeah, there was one modern day philosopher that, um,

Olivia found name, Anya Baringer, who, uh, said it's sort of like, um, it keeps you pro-social and keeps your attention focused on, on making sure other people are doing fine. And, and an example that Olivia gave was like, you know, let's say you're throwing a dinner party at your house. And what you really want to do, though, halfway through that dinner party maybe is good or bad, because you're just beat.

But you don't, because that would not be manorally. So what you're doing is you're focusing on everyone else and making sure their drink is filled, that they had all they want to eat, and you're maybe clearing the dishes and doing all that stuff. So you're focused, and it's all under the umbrella of good manners, but So you're focused and it's all under the umbrella of good manners,

but what you're really doing is focusing on pro-social behaviors. Right. And so some people, now we enter, like, some people are really critical of that. Like some people would argue, you're really tired, go to bed. Why are you sacrificing your health conceivably just to keep some people you may or may not even particularly like satisfied in? Not your dinner party, I mean sure you would hope but I mean somebody always brings Tammy. I know Tammy. So there's a guy a philosopher named Diogeny's he was one of the founders of the School of Synics way back in the day in ancient Greece. I believe in the third century, yeah, about 2300 years ago. In Diogenies, he dedicated his life

to pointing out the hypocrisy that manners generate in people. He saw manners as a forced mask that people had to wear, that hid their true selves from other people. And he wasn't saying you should go around and like hit other people If you want to like he married the thing with morality like you needed to be moral and upstanding, but you didn't need to be

You know but deferential to some superior Because they're superior because society says they are there no more superior to you than you are to them period because society says they are there no more superior to you than you are to them. That was Dioge and he's whole thing and he hated manners so much so that he engaged in some pretty shocking behavior in public just to kind of prove his point. Yeah, as the stories go, he would masturbate and urinate in public and defecate. Yeah, so I don't know. When you talk about like he really believed in like upstanding morals sure but hit his point was if you're doing something in private with no problem

you should be able to do it in public you you're hiding your true self if you don't masterbate in public essentially was diogenes point and as a result people don't typically take up diogenes point and in fact he's very frequently uh... considered considered an exception to the rule. Like the fact that he railed so hard against manners

and just basically seemed like a weirdo to everybody else kind of shows the importance of manners in keeping civilized society together. Like people are like, okay, yeah, I will kind of not respond to a jerk who's socially, know, socially, my social better in exchange for not having to walk down the street and watch everybody masturbating in public. Right, right.

Even the great philosophers over time that have sort of had a problem with the really formal, hoidy, toyty, the really formal, hoidy, toidy, courtly type of stuff, and that kind of extravagance. Most of them even still agreed that like a basic level of manners and politeness is important to hold society together. And if we didn't have that stuff, society would just crumble. Where it can get really tricky, and we'll talk about this here and there, is when you get too into policing someone else's manners or when you're using that as sort of a, I guess

sort of a dog whistle to talk about like the quote unquote wrong kinds of people and that kind of thing. That can get very squirming and thorny. Right. should say, and we'll get into it a little more later, it's, manners are culturally bound. Like what's what's good manners in one society is not necessarily easily translated to another society. Yeah. I think so. Let me use the example of the Jojo, Joho Nasi, Joho Ansi. of the Johonasi, Johonasi. I'm going with Johonasi, people of Namibia. And they're hunter-gatherers and they have a tradition where the hunter who brings back meat is often, it's typically criticized for, they're not being enough meat for the

meat being of like, so-so quality. And they're doing that to like knock them down a peg so he doesn't feel any more superior to anybody else. And you actually see this in like the British Isles. It's a real tradition, not necessarily of criticizing the meat, a hundred brings back, but it could happen. And more just kind of like social restrictions on getting too big for your bridges I think is a way to put it.

Yeah. And a lot of the European style of etiquette is historically, a lot of us based around these meal times and very formal set meal times that you sit down all together and you eat this big meal. And a lot of cultures through history don't do that kind of thing. Native Americans didn't, or, you know, many tribes didn't sit and have some big meal. Their jam was to like, hey, I got a stew on the pot at all hours of the day. So if you show up in my place, I might offer you some food, you might want to eat

if you're hungry, then that's great. So we don't have that kind of formal thing. So that's obviously going to cause some friction and awkwardness when Europeans come over and meet Native Americans and say, we're going to make our way your way. So I was reading about that. And apparently that social standard for manners, for offering food and having a perpetual pot of stew going, that was that held up during lean times winter. Like it didn't matter how little food you had, you still were expected to have that pot of stew for visitors. Yeah, and I think if the TV show Reservation Dogs is accurate, and I believe it is, to

modern day Native American culture, they, and on that show, they were, they eat a lot and they offer each other food a lot. Yeah, and there's another thing about offering food is there's a lot of cultures that expect you to decline being offered additional food. But there's that's part of a larger kind of dance where you the host continues to offer multiple times and then after a set amount of times you can then and I were actually expected to say yes, that would be great thanks. I'll take I'll take some more. Yeah, that can be a big thing in the South offering you food over and over or like I've

experienced that with Italian families in the Northeast. You know, sit down, keep eating. Right. And you know, I'm usually happy happy to have a bl, you know, I'm usually happy to a bludge. Right. I don't want to be rude. Sure. Who would be? Are you going to take a break?

Yeah, let's take an early break before we dive into Europe. There's a ton of stuff they don't want you to know. Does the U.S. government really have alien technology? And what about the future of artificial intelligence, AI? What happens when computers learn to think? Could there be a serial killer in your town? From UFOs to psychic powers and government cover-ups from unsolved crimes to the bleeding edge of science, history is riddled with unexplained events. We've spent a decade applying critical thinking to some of the most bizarre phenomenon civilization

and beyond. Each week, we dive deep into unsolved mysteries, conspiracy theories and actual conspiracies. You've heard about these things, but what's the full story? Listen to stuff they don't want you to know on the iHeart Radio app Apple podcasts or wherever you find your favorite shows. What's up fam? I'm Brian Ford, Artisan Baker and host of the new podcast, Flaky Biscuit. On this podcast, I'm gonna get to know my guests by cooking up their favorite nostalgic

meal. It could be anything from Twinkies to mom's Thanksgiving dressing. Sometimes I might get it wrong, sometimes I'll get it right. I'm so happy it's good because man, if it wasn't, I'd be like, you know, everybody not my mom. Ha ha. Either way, we will have a blast. You'll have access to every recipe so you can cook and bake alongside me

as I talk to artists, musicians, and chefs about how this meal guided them to success. And these nostalgic meals, fam, they inspire one of a kind conversations. When I bake this recipe, it hit me like a ton of bricks. Does this podcast come with a therapist? Listen to Flaky Biscuit every Tuesday on the I Heart Radio app Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

With all the chaos and turmoil in the news, it feels like we never get to hear about the good happening in our world. We're on a mission to change that. Welcome to the Good Stuff. I'm Jacob Schick, a third-generation combat marine. And I'm his co-host and wife, Ashley Schick. We believe everyone has a story to tell, not only about the peaks, but the valleys they've been through to get them to where they are today, as we get to tell stories of inspiration and perseverance.

We're joined by some amazing guests who share the lessons they've learned that shape two they are and what they're doing to pay it forward and give back. Our guests range from some of my fellow warriors to NFL cheerleaders, to extreme sports legends to New York City firefighters who survived 9-11. Listen to the good stuff on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. All right, so as we say manners and etiquette has changed here and there over the years. And as we'll see a lot of times when there's a big sort of like a big war or big social change or big change in power or something like that. A lot of times you'll see these etiquette rules changing.

And there's a book called The History of Manor, written in 1939 by Norbert Elias that said that medieval era through the 19th century, there was a big change in that that's when people started to care a little bit how they were viewed by other people. They started to feel shame for doing things for the first time. And they started to say things like, you know, it's really gross to see you blow your nose at the table or to go like to get up from your meal and go urinate in the corner or something like that. We should keep our bodily functions to ourselves. Yeah, so around the time of the Renaissance, the first guides to manners started to come out. And that was a good example of social organization in upheaval. The Renaissance was, so it makes sense that this would be one of the first guides to manners in Europe. It was called the Seville Tate Morum Piorillum, which means the Seville of childish manners.

It was written by Erasmus, the famous Dutch philosopher, back in 1530. And he took some time out from translating the New Testament to write down Manors which basically was like hey don't stir gravy with your fingers. Don't blow your nose on the tablecloth at the table Actually just don't blow your nose on any tablecloth anywhere in any part of the house Yeah, and then if they showed spoons a lot there would be communal soup. So you would Taste the soup with the spoon, and he instructed, okay, after that wipe it with a napkin after your use of that spoon before you put it back, which seems highly civilized for 1530.

Can I cover this other one? Yes, please. Because it's a pretty great trick, it still holds up today. If you have to fart at the table, cover up the sound of the fart with a heavy cough. I can't cough that long. Well, and to me, those two things are sort of, I don't know if I can do those things at the same time, because they both engage the same mechanisms for me. Right. I don't know. That'd be weird. I've never tried. Instead, you should just suck in a bunch of air and pucker your bottom hole.

That's my advice. Yeah, I'm going to try that at some point, not at a dinner table. I don't fart at the dinner table at all. Get for you, Chuck. Your really arasments would be proud. In the 18th century, in the Royal Courts, things got a little more sophisticated, etiquette got a little more sophisticated, etiquette got a little more rigid. The word etiquette actually came from this time period, comes from France obviously. And there are different stories that it came from the word for ticket or label. Some people

you might find online that it came from signs, keep off the grass signs that King Louis had at Versailles, even though Livia said she couldn't find a lot of really great things to back that up. But Marie Antoinette apparently did have a nickname for her French aristocratic retainer, Madame etiquette, because she was always saying like, you got to do this, you got to do this. Right. They also did eventually start printing instructions for how to behave at court and that really follows in the vein of a label or a ticket. So that also kind of later on, I think, after the fact became etiquette, a name for that. It didn't make its way into English until I think the 1700s,

the mid 1700s, and there was an Earl of Chesterfield, the fourth to be exact. His name was Philip Dormer Stanhope, and he was very famous for a series of letters that he wrote to his illegitimate son. He was a minister in Holland for the English crown. And while there he fathered a son and he kept in touch and basically tried to explain to his son how to behave in civilized society. And it ended up being, if you put all the letters together, a pretty funny, witty, but also very insightful treatise

on manners at the time. Yeah, it was kind of long distance fathering. He talked about, it would be a list, quite a few of these, these are pretty good, but long talkers, that's a pretty fun one. If one of these unmerciful talkers lays hold of you, hear him with patience and at least seeming attention if he is worth obliging. Yeah, or advice. Yeah, don't carve meat to so much that you bespatter the company

with the sauce or turn the glasses in your neighbor's pockets. So just don't, you know, just be cool when you're carving meat, I think is what are you saying? Yeah, that's pretty good. What else? This one I don't quite get, although I think I do maybe for the time period, in scandal, as in robbery, the receiver is always thought as bad as the thief.

So I get that, he's talking about gossip. So like the gossiper is no better than the person that they're gossiping about. No, I think the person listening to the gossip too. Well, everyone's bad then. But what I don't get is comparing it to a robbery. If you're the fence and you're getting the stolen items, you're no better than the thief who actually went in and stole the item. Oh, the receiver is the fence.

Okay, I get it now. Yeah, yeah. Like Redfoot. Yeah, yeah. Another one that I thought was pretty interesting was Be Not Dark, Norma Stereos. And he was basically saying, be friendly to everybody. Yeah, yeah. Another one that I thought was pretty interesting was B-N-O-T-D-D-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T-N-O-T basically said like when you're speaking to your equal, you can be better than them by being silent. Like really watch how much information you share with those people. And Philip Sandhope was widely criticized. I'm not sure if it was in his lifetime or not when his letters came out and were published for being a very cynical person, but who was also, you know, shrewdly tuned into manners and how to act

courtly, but that really, it's, he exposed it for its worst kind of use, which is social jockeying essentially, trying to get ahead by hijacking the prescribed set of manners or rituals or etiquette that anybody can engage in. And if you do it right and you're charming enough and you appear sincere on the surface, even the greatest psychopath around can become very wealthy and powerful thanks to etiquette following etiquette manners. Yeah, I mean, that's a little tricky though, because a lot of people have labeled that very thing and sort of the great democratizer. Yeah. If you're someone who is of, you know, at the time in whatever culture you're in,

like in a, what's looked at as a lower class, and you can learn these etiquette rules and pass yourself off as the upper class that it levels the playing field. Totally. It does both. Yeah, it's interesting. They're not mutually exclusive. in these etiquette rules and pass yourself off as you upper class, then it levels the playing field. Totally. It does both. It's interesting.

Yeah, it's interesting. They're not mutually exclusive. It's just some of those people can have ill intentions or be insincere jerks. Other people are like, I really want to do better for myself. And there's not easy access to colleges is how to get ahead in life. So I'm going to go learn this stuff and be earnest about it. Yeah, I mean, that's a common, I'm not going to call it a trope, it's just sort of a common theme in a lot of movies

of someone sort of conning their way into the elite society, whether it's, oh gosh. Secret of my success. Short circuit two. Six degrees of separation. Or or you know what I can't think of no griftors in having to do that. I've never seen it. Oh wow, griftors is great. But you know I can't think of like an old sort of English movie version of that but I know like like tricking your way into court was a common theme. What about Barry Lyndon?

Oh, yeah, there you go. Thank you. Thank you everybody. What a great one. Did you hear the applause? Yeah in my head So and then in the United States There uh there the initial adoption of Manors and etiquette in particular was basically European exports imported to the States from very early on. And it wasn't until the 1920s that, well, I shouldn't say that, it wasn't until the 1920s that Americans were exposed to the formal etiquette that had developed over the years on its own in America, through

Emily Post. Now, it had been developing from, say, the mid-19th century on. It got, it basically was attached to a rocket ship during the second industrial revolution in the United States and the ensuing gilded age, because there was suddenly a lot of very wealthy people who may or may not have had any wealth whatsoever before. So all of these, all of these etiquette, these rules of etiquette started to develop and pass along.

And Emily Post was raised in that world. And she, as I think of 40 something divorcee, sat down and put pen to paper and wrote what became the most successful etiquette book of all time. Yeah, 1922, etiquette in society, not a colon everybody, a comma. Edicate in society, in business, in politics, and at home. These days, that would still have a colon and some dumb, long subtitle. It'd be nothing, it'd be instead of commas, it'd be colon, colon, colon, colon everywhere. A.K.A. How to act, right?

Right. But, you know, Emily poses very famous for being sort of one of the first Americans to put this forward. She talked about belonging to the best society and in her eyes that meant well, you know, you're born into it in Europe or you're born into it or earn it in the way of wealth in the US. But what I'm really trying to talk about is just how to belong in those worlds because you're polite and you have good behavior and a charm of manner. Vanity Fair, Laura Jacobs from Vanity Fair said it was one of the 20th century's

great acts of democracy. And again, it's this idea that here's the code everybody. It's for everyone to learn if they want to. Yeah, I was reading about her. I was reading that Vanity Fair article. And Emily Post was a heck of a person. She had a great sense of humor. She had a great sense of perspective of herself in the world and even the manners that she was talking about. But she became divorced

after it came to light that her husband had been running around on her. But before they divorced, she found out about this because he was being blackmailed. There was a black mailing scheme that blackmailed everybody in New York society and they finally got around to Emily Post's husband and he told her about it and she said, do not just fall prey to these people, call the cops, expose these people and she did it at the risk of great personal scandal. Like she was outed as having been cheated on by her husband, which really shouldn't have shocked anybody, like all husbands cheated

on their wives back then, especially in that level of society, but she put herself out there and allowed it to happen to be publicly humiliated, I guess is what you call it, in order to prevent some scummy blackmailers from winning again. And she actually shut down the blackmailing ring with the help of the cops just by allowing this to happen. Was there an etiquette angle there? Was that just more on Emily Post? It was, it just shows that she had such a sense of justice and what was right that she was willing to put herself out there in a really uncomfortable way to ensure that that justice was done, I think. Awesome. Yeah, Susan, neat person.

So, Judith Martin is another very famous manner advice person here in America, Miss Manor's, AKA Miss Manor's. This advice column started in 1978. It's still around. And Judith Martin is another person who says, you know, this is the glue that binds Society and kind of holds us all together. Yeah, there was another term that which I really like called the politics of Respectability

coined by historian named Evelyn Brooks Hickenbotham and She was talking about black women in the progressive era who were saying, you know, be polite, be modest, and this is how we're going to help make change. And Olivia points out like these awful pictures during the civil rights era of black Americans, you know, dressed in their best Sunday suit, you know, getting firehosed at a demonstration, you know, stuff like that. Yeah.

Some people have said like that's, that was a good tactic, like it made a lot of sense at the time, and it probably did help quite a bit, but just if you step back and think about having to be civilized in the face of that just to get basic entrance to to constitutional rights is Pretty rotten if you stop and think about it like that. Yeah, I mean there are a couple of angles for sure So I say we take our second ad break and then come back and talk about get this manors Let's do it. There's a ton of stuff they don't want you to know.

Does the US government really have alien technology? And what about the future of artificial intelligence, AI? What happens when computers learn to think? Could there be a serial killer in your town? From UFOs to psychic powers and government cover-ups, from unsolved crimes to the bleeding edge of science, history is riddled with unexplained events. We spent a decade applying critical thinking to some of the most bizarre phenomenon civilization and beyond. Each week, we dive deep into unsolved mysteries, conspiracy theories and actual conspiracies.

You've heard about these things, but what's the full story? Listen to stuff they don't want you to know on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you find your favorite shows. podcasts or wherever you find your favorite shows. What's up fam? I'm Brian Ford, Artisan Baker and host of the new podcast, Flaky Biscuit. On this podcast, I'm going to get to know my guests by cooking up their favorite nostalgic meal. It could be anything from Twinkies to mom's Thanksgiving dressing. Sometimes I might get it wrong, sometimes I'll get it right.

I'm so happy it's good, because man, if it wasn't, I'd be like, you know, everybody not my mom. Either way, we will have a blast. You'll have access to every recipe so you can cook and bake alongside me, as I talk to artists, musicians, and chefs about how this meal guided them to success. And these nostalgic meals, fam, they inspire one of a kind conversations.

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Okay Chuck, so we were talking earlier about how manners and even etiquette are not easily translated across cultures sometimes. Some are. I was looking for universal manners and I could not find them. I think the closest thing that I found that was essentially universal is, and I don't even think that's correct, but I'll say that it's very widespread is the concept of superiors equals and inferior within a society and how you interact with each one. That seems to be fairly universal except in Scotland and among the dual for aunty, jewel for aunty. That's funny.

Yeah, I mean, there are a lot of examples of this. We talked about Edward T. Hall in our parapersonal space episode in 1955. This is when he was doing some of his best work. He talks about, and this is of course 1955, but it's kind of funny to look at some of these, but he talked about Americans interacting with other countries. And he was like, you know, if you're from China, you might be, you might think someone raising their voice, like always means that they're angry. So that they see an American like really emphasizing a point by raising their voice, they might

be called off guard and think they're angry. Whereas, and again, this is the 1950s, and Latin America, if a business person from America introduced themselves, like, you know, from across the room and said they're, I'm Mr. Charles W. Chuck Bryant, they may think that's a little too formal, but then on the other hand, they also might say,

but these Americans, they'll just like kick back and put their feet on their desk in the middle of a meeting. And you don't do that kind of thing at work. I can just see an American meeting somebody from like Brazil and introducing themselves as Mr. and the person from Brazil just does their best like emo-fips, like, la, dee, da.

Remember, Emily was famous for that. Who? Emo-fips, yeah, that-di-da. Remember him, he was famous for that. Who? Emo-fips, he had that weird, like, page boy haircut and he was... Phillips, emo-fillips? I thought it was Fips. I thought it was Phillips, am I wrong? No, I think you're wrong.

Emo-fips, it's one of those two. He's still around, I think. Yeah, he just passed away. I don't think so, no. Okay. I never, I think, didn't we talk about him recently? Yes. Within the last couple of years.

I feel like we did. Okay. No, he's still life good for him. Is it Phillips or Fips? It's Phillips. Okay, I'm sorry, Ema. He's almost 70. What?

I know. Wow. That page boy, that would make you look young. Chuck, I think we're getting old too, is one of the things. No, let's talk about punctuality for a minute. Yeah, that's huge. Because that's depending on where you are, I mean a lot of things.

I often laugh when I think back at going to my dear friend, Seema's wedding, she married my good friend, Chris, and they had, you know, big Indian wedding. And everyone was always late on her side to all the functions and she just always laughed and was like, hey, the Indian's relationship to time is very loose. And so everyone just get used to it because it's going to be happening all weekend long. Right. They were all wonderful and they were always late and it was a lot of fun and funny.

So in Australia and New Zealand punctuality is very, very important. Like, even more important than in the United States, where it's pretty important here. I mean, there's usually about a five-minute grace period to where the person is willing to not get upset, I think. And then, fins on the thing. 15 minutes, if it's something that you're paying somebody for, like say, hair appointment or whatever, if you're trying to move your part closer to the crown of your head, you can be up to 15 minutes late without them penalizing you, right?

But for the most part, it's pretty important here. I get the impression in Australia, New Zealand. I saw it put it as critical. Yeah. My deal with punctuality is I am a very punctual person I get very stressed out if I'm running late and I really try my best to not run late for anything And I've but I've gotten really good about trying to not let other people's lateness upset me

Like with friends and stuff. Oh, yeah. Yeah, because that's no good. Like, you don't want to be mad at a friend if you're waiting on them to go do something fun. And I don't mean like, yeah, we're going to go over and play Hockey Sack in the park, like a concert or something that has a time that you're now sort of running late for. I would get upset.

So what I've learned to do is not just not get upset because I can't control my emotions like that. But I have, there are certain people in my life that are always late and I just started telling them 30 minutes or at least. Smart. That's all you got. I'm not even gonna call it a hack. That's just smart living. No, it's just manipulation. But smart manipulation and I think justified too. Yeah, people are begging for it. We're both punctual. Definitely and I get very stressed out too.

Especially I've really had to kind of get more laid back about making it to the airport because you means like, let's just get there two minutes before they close the door. So we don't have to spend much time on the airport. In theory, I love that. But that's not, no, I can't. So I used to be like a, like, let's leave maybe more than two hours before our flight to get to the airport. And now I'm like, okay, I can conceivably leave, like maybe 80 minutes, 90 minutes before something like that, maybe an hour depending on how, like, Lucy Goosey I'm feeling.

I like to be early for flights just because I can just don't want to be stressed out at all. So I like to be pretty early. Okay. So fairly punctuality, very important. Another one is eye contact. That's another universal one, but it's not necessarily the same around the world. And in fact, it's quite the opposite from place to place. In America, the United States, you want to hold some sort of eye contact.

There's a certain amount and you have to, this takes a lot of practice. You can very easily treat it into like crazy looking territory or creepy. If you overdo it. But if you underdo it, you seem untrustworthy and shady. I know. So you have to do just the right amount of eye contact and you can look away and then you look back again depending on how long the conversation is. Apparently, in the UK, you just don't really make much eye contact at all during a conversation.

Yeah. What I found works for me is to try and not think about it because once that happens I'm done. Oh, yeah, yeah, sure. Like in conversation with someone I don't know, I try to be like, yeah, just have a normal conversation. You kind of look at someone's face in general, look them in the eyes, some touch their two way a little bit, touch their cheek here and there, if they say it's okay.

But once it gets into my head, if it's a nervy situation, and I'm like, am I making enough eye contact and am I making too much, then I'm just done for it. Totally, especially if you feel like three, two, one. Look away. Seven, eight, eight, look back.

And they're like, why are you counting? There may be at least a short stuff into eye contact because there's a lot more to just besides, you know, being rude or not being rude, like the science of eye contact and what it means and the brain signals that are being received and stuff like that. So, I don't know, there may be something there. They say the eyes are the window to the face. Quickly on punctuality, did I ever tell you my Chiquillo Neal photo shoot story I probably have. Yes, but let's hear it again because it's been a while. Well, I don't know if this is

the angle that I even mentioned last time, but I was a PA on a job. It was a still photo shoot for was Chiquillo Neal on a beach in LA. And he was supposed to get there at he was supposed to get there at like three so we could shoot him out at sunset on a beautiful beach at five and Shaq showed up at like noon and said I'm leaving it too because I got to go get my daughter from school. And if you've never worked in film shoots and TV and movie shoots and stuff, like you don't, like, schedules is very,

it's almost military like, and how rigid they are. And you don't just say, by the way, I'm gonna completely change the time frame here, but you can if you're Shaquille O'Neal. Yeah, and if you look closely, there is not a single general insurance commercial that was shot around sunset.

Here's the thing though, I don't want it. He wasn't rude about it. He was very nice. He wanted to get his daughter from school and everyone shifted their day and it worked out great. We had a good time. Yeah, you got to be careful, Chuck, because he lives here at Lanna. You might bump into him like a Papa John. He's from memory. Like, how was that be it? Yeah, totally. So, there's some other questions about manners. Like, it's really fun actually. We found a great article on TripAdvisor written

clearly by somebody who's not American born or US born but who has a pretty good idea of what it goes on here. So, it's really neat to see us here in America viewed externally, and like our mannerisms are habits, that kind of stuff, explained to somebody who's coming to the United States. So if you're on a trip advisor and you go into United States travel articles, look for polite manners. And it is exhaustive and extensive and very insightful actually, but it's pretty interesting to just kind of see us through that lens, you know.

Oh, totally. You sent this to me. It was a lot of fun to look through. And we were kind of trading on text like the ones we thought were funny. And we both agreed under general decorum this passage. Curse words should be avoided around children at all times. Some teens will curse in the streets, however, try not to confront them about it. That's right. So there's a lot of people who kind of argue that manners are dead.

And you can make an argument that, yes, traditional manners are dead, like knowing what fork is used for what course of the meal is very vanishingly understood these days, or keeping your elbows off the table, which apparently was initiated to prevent other people from taking your, like the posture you have, which allows you to lunge across the table at somebody as hostile. That's what I've seen, that it prevented people back when they were much bigger lung heads in general from fighting one another.

You just kept your elbows off the table and it's much less aggressive if you try on both. The whole idea of not putting your elbows on the table is an inherited piece of etiquette that frankly is outdated. That's my take on it. If you don't put your elbows on the table because you have manners, that's fine too. But the point is there are customs and manners and etiquette that we've gone through. They're just kind of, they made their point at the time and they were useful and now they're not so useful anymore.

That doesn't mean that manners and etiquette in general have gone away just that they've evolved. And now we have all sorts of new manners and etiquette that are thrilling for people alive in the 21st century. I'm thrilled by them at least. Another big one is smoking. I looked up the most recent static it fine. And here in the United States, about 11% of people still smoke.

And it's, I think, considered very rude these days to just light up a cigarette even if you're outside sometimes like really close to a bunch of people. I find it rude even if you're nowhere near a bunch of people because those, that smoke carries so well. It does. That, that yes, you, to me, I think we've reached the point where you're allowed to smoke That smoke carries so well. It does. That yes. To me, I think we've reached the point where you're allowed to smoke in your own house

and your own car. But it didn't use, I mean, we are all part of this era, you and I, where not even so long ago, it was fine to smoke anywhere in front of anyone. I spoke down an airplane once. That was definitely within my lifetime. I bet there were some once. Like it was, it was, you know, that was definitely within my lifetime. I bet there were some French beret guys smoking there. Sure. We were holding that smoking section down. And smoking section was the last

three rows. There was nothing, no barrier, anything like that. So you're just smoking up the back of the plane. It was such a dumb idea. Yeah. I was, I was curious. I was, I wondered how the rest of the world was doing with smoking. And so I looked up countries who smoke the most. And I can't remember which one was number one, but it was like almost 50% of the people there still smoked. Well, this is a different one I'm looking at now. It says China, but oh, here we go.

It's number one in a you are you. Now, Rue, where is that? I'm not sure. In Kiribati are both at 52%. There's only 12,000 people that live in Naur. Who else? So, I'm going to have to look up where that is, but that is, you know, I don't know if there used to be 24,000 people in half of them. Fast for lung cancer or what. Yeah. That's a great question. One of the other things about the evolution of etiquette and manners is just the snapshot that it provides the time we live in today.

And you can get a really good picture of that, the cut, ran an article. I think it's like 140 rules of etiquette. And a lot of them make a lot of sense. A lot of them really tap into the culture that we live in now. Like, my favorite one was, after 72 hours you have amnesty from mentioning how long it took you to respond to a text. So after that, you can just respond to the text like you're responding to it like no time has passed. In before 72 hours, you have to say,

sorry, this took me so long. And it's true, it totally makes sense. And I find it very mannerly that that just, I mean, it just makes sense to me. But so things like that. So if you don't answer texts after let's say you wait a whole week. Yes. You don't have to say oh man I'm sorry this thing got buried. No you do not and as a matter of fact I've kind of intuitively picked that up because I've got one brewing with my friend Matt that is easily weak and a half old. Yeah. And I've

just learned not to call it out because it makes it way worse. They're well aware that it's been a week and a half. And it seems insincere to be like, oh, sorry, it took me a week and a half to get back to you. It's this is when I had time to like give this thought, this attention, and I'm getting back to you now. It just makes sense to me as a delayed texture. What else you got anything else in there? There were so many. No, there's stuff all over about tipping, about work culture, just going out to bars, dating, ghosting people. It's okay to ghost somebody. If you've

only been on one date and you didn't follow up with a lot of texting or emails or any calls, you can just ghost them and feel fine about it. But if you did kind of like, you know, make it seem like you're a little more interested and then goes them, that's kind of mean. And then never they said, never goes somebody and then come back like later on in life and ask them for a favor of any kind. Like once you go somebody that's it, you're done. Interesting. You know, I will say that like I'm not Mr. Mr. Manners, but I do believe in being polite and like, you know, open the door for people and stuff like that. But I think that like, I think poor Manners, like if I was on the dating scene or something, I think poor Manners

can be a real red flag as just the overall sort of kind of person someone is. Right, and I think that's what Emily Post was helping people do was helping sincere people. She said the three principles of etiquette or consideration, respect and honesty. And so she was saying, if you are those three things, if you're considerate, respectful and honest, here's what you need to do to present that in the best possible light to people, let people see how great you are. This is just some easy rules for you to follow. That that, you know, so that you don't seem like a bore when you're out on a date because you're not a bore, you're a considerate, respectful, honest person

who deserves love. Yeah, and you're also making other people feel comfortable in at ease, and those are things we should strive to do. Agreed, Chuck. Well, since I agreed with Chuck also making other people feel comfortable and at ease. And those are things we should strive to do. A greed chuck. Well, since I agreed with Chuck and he chuckled a little bit because of something that he and I and Jerry know about, that means it's time for listener mail.

Okay. All right, I'm gonna call this one boy. It's so old I don't even remember what to call it. This has been in the old folder for a while. Right. Hey guys, long time first time, as college used to say I'm Larry King, just got done listening to the episode on international debt forgiveness. Ah, it's not that old. And as promised, it was very interesting and totally day ruining.

I wanted to mention something I'll understandably had to sort of yada yada on the episode for a concision. And that is the fact that the rest of Europe simply allowed Leopold the second monarch of a neutral country to set up his own personal colony in Africa. While this is true on its face, Sebastian Major's excellent three-part story on the free state of Congo, our fake history

episodes 80, 80, 182, elucidates how that came to be. While he of course goes on to recount the atrocities committed in the Belgian Congo in horrifying detail, the first two episodes are the really interesting part where he describes the most stunning and cynical whitewashing propaganda kind of campaign that painted Leopold II as the paragon of late 19th century abolitionist moral rectitude, culminating in the formation of a charity called the International African Association, which all created of an ear of beneficient stewardship that allowed unchecked exploitation of the land and people. That's quite a sentence.

That was one sentence? Yeah. Wow, fantastic. Yeah, wow fantastic and all of this is sounding like really familiar I was like yeah, I ran across all this in my research and I just realized now that this is from reading this email before That's why it sounds familiar It's basically like if the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation turned out to be a front for harvesting a Drina chrome from children Nice breath

The story will put you in a fetal position for hours those sub-Action majors charming a dr a dr a drinnecrome from children. Nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for a nice for And also in addition to Sebastian Majors, probably mentioned it at the time, but behind the bastards did, I think a couple of parts on King Leopold too. Great show from our very own network. Well, if you want to get in touch with us with more info,

like John did, we love that kind of thing. You can wrap it up, spanking on the bottom, and send it off to stuffpodcast. at iHeartRadio.com. Stuff you should know is a production at iHeartRadio.com. So, there is a ton of stuff they don't want you to know. Yeah, like does the US government really have alien technology? Or what about the future of AI? What happens when computers actually learn to think?

Could there be a serial killer in your town? From UFOs to psychic powers and government cover-ups, from unsolved crimes to the bleeding edge of science, history is riddled with unexplained events. Listen to stuff they don't want you to know on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you find your favorite shows. Welcome to The Good Stuff. I'm Jacob Schick, a third-generation combat marine. And I'm his co-host and wife, Ashley Schick.

We believe everyone has a story to tell, not only about the peaks, but the valleys they've been through to get them to where they are today. We're joined by some amazing guests who share the lessons they've learned that shape two they are and what they're doing to pay it forward and give back. Listen to the good stuff on the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Y eso es un gran tema de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de la idea de todo, de espiritualidad, relationships, de la gente y mucho más. Y también seguiré compartiendo mi vida y me he pensado en todos los con ustedes.

Y no olvides, también me voy a enseñar tus preguntas personalmente en episodios de los chiquis. Así que acompañáme cada día y en el día de hoy en el día de hoy de los chiquis y chiquis y a los chiquis de la idea de la abuela, la abuela,

o de la whatever, que te encuentras. Cheekies and Chill, and your Cheekies on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.