You aren't born with manners, as a baby the first words are more likely to be mamma or go goo than 'please' or 'thank you' (If you're first words were please or thank you consider yourself a child prodigy) Parents teach kids manners, if they don't their kids learn by copying the other kids in the playground. To be honest I was dragged up pretty well but there was a stage where my manners were sadly lacking. It is very rude to swear and when I worked for the civil service it was a way for staff to let off steam, I even learned to swear in Dutch - which ticked off my manager no end because she couldn't tell if I was swearing or not. Since most of my jobs - except that one - involved a degree of interaction with the public I'm sensitive to bad manners and at the moment we're not doing the next generation any favours.
Take this morning, standing in a queue at the post office. Mothers on cell-phones ignoring their kids, people pushing into the queue to get forms for various things, in one case the guy was so keen he stood on the foot of the woman in front of me, a woman who was so interested in her cell-phone conversation that she was ignoring the questions of the clerk trying to serve her. With our busy and increasingly isolated lives we get less and less chances to talk to real people. Good manners cost nothing so the next time you're out and about turn off your cell phone and turn on a smile, you might make someone's day.
(I'm always polite to our customers, I've come to know a lot of the regulars by name. We do our best to make everyone who walks through the door feel welcome.)
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