American Table Manners
I remember the first time sharing a meal with an American. I was shocked, horrified. My American friend was absolutely incapable of properly using a fork and knife to eat dinner. It was like seeing a little chimpanzee with severe mental restrictions try to use a wooden stick to cut a piece of filet de boeuf. Am I genetically related to this creature?
When you eat with Asian people you know they will make weird slurping sounds. It's their culture. The thing with Americans is that you do not expect this. OK, we can all agree that they are strangely curious about anything not American; insert very annoying overly excited nasal voice "HelLlo!! WherE are YOU FROM?!!" "SO nice TO SEE YOU GUYS!!!" "OMG?! REALLY?!". But other than that, they seem to share many of our own qualities.
So, my friends across the pond, do you not learn your children to use cutlery? Why not? I assume some Americans do have proper table manners. However, oddly enough, it does not seem to have trickled down into the majority of American population. Do you simply not care about food and culture? Perhaps the decades of eating hamburgers have retracted the need to use a fork and knife.
I am always eager to learn more about other cultures! Please, my friends, teach me about your cowboy culture!
Does the method by which your company jams food in their faces really rustle your jimmies this much? Who gives a fuck.
There is a difference in continental vs American manner of holding cutlery. Most kids in business settings either learned the former manner from their parents or have adopted it to avoid freak outs from their Euro counterparts. Is this what you’re crying about?
Probably due to multiple factors... 1) the diet of the “average” American largely consists of finger foods, sandwiches, burgers, etc. that don’t necessarily require the use of utensils 2) there isn’t a large emphasis on the skill 3) the age of fast food and eating on the go.
It honestly is probably some combination of the above, but in general I think as meals moved away from the dinner table and people became more “on the go” it isn’t a surprise to me that people don’t feel the need to use the proper “table manners” you mentioned.
Honestly I'm pretty offended
Ahh yes, the daily "Americans bad, rest of world good" post
Did you you generalize 330 million people and make an entire thread because one American friend placed his knife down and switched his fork to his other hand before eating?
Yes I'm confused. Is this^ what you mean by bad manners OP? Or did they do something else?
Practicality > Manners & Customs.
Personally coming from a posh/preppy background, I do think there's a time for practicality and there's a time for manners. You just gotta be aware of when it's appropriate and when it's not.
Also go fuck yourself for saying thinking Americans are Chimpanzees.
As an American in London, I have seen plenty of British individuals display less than exemplary dining manners themselves. This is more of a background/dining setting thing than nationality.
what do you expect? brits never known to have good table manners
The ~7% who went to public schools are usually well-mannered, but a high % of the rest absolutely are not. There are a lot of chavs in the UK unfortunately
But it's cool for certain Asian cultures to buy, sell, and eat live animals from wet markets?
It's cool to eat sushi.
If you do it wrong, you could easily catch some disease or some parasite.
And I guess it's cool for Europeans to eat lamb hearts and stuff meat in pig intestines.
Issue with wet markets is that most of the meat is unsafe and there's 0 transparency where the meat came from and how it was prepared. If you make it transparent and safe, there really isn't a problem.
right. because lamb hearts and stuffed pigs intestines are the reason why we’ve all been staring at the same 4 walls for the past 100+ days. ffs
" it does not seem to have trickled down into the majority of American population"...... I'm oddly shocked that you've found the time to eat individually with the majority of the American population and analyze their table manners. Time constraints alone for this task are baffling.
Lol You're saying all European people have table manners? I've seen some pretty disgusting table manners from Europeans.
Table manners are learned at home. If your parents don't teach you table manners, chances are you won't have them. This has less to do with where a person is from.
coming soon to the off topic forum near you. European dental aesthetics!
and later this summer - THAT ENGLISH GUY'S BREATH
but wait, later this year, just in time for the holidays, a love story. Pot bellied Frenchman doesn't allow his flab to prevent him from grossing out you and your wife in his WHITE SPEEDO on his way to seduce unsuspecting blonde beachgoers. A tale for the ages. Will he find love? Will he find a treadmill? This winter, his testicles won't be the only thing in suspense. it's The FUPA and the Frauline.
Growing up lower-middle class, I wouldn't mind attending a finishing school to learn proper etiquette for truly formal social situations. I bet it would be fun.
you need a class to learn how to cut a steak with a fork and knife? just go on youtube bro
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