By J.T. Ulfeldt, written for Cracked
#5. Being Polite in Traffic Is Akin to Murder
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Traffic Quiz: You're driving in the right lane of a two-lane, one-way street, when you see a nicely dressed pedestrian trying to cross the road. She's several blocks away from the nearest intersection, and there are no crosswalks, but she's obviously in a hurry and has been stuck waiting there forever. You slow, you make eye contact, you smile, and you wave her across.
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You smooth operator you.
You are a murderer.You smooth operator you.
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You smooth accessory to vehicular-manslaughter you.
You smooth accessory to vehicular-manslaughter you.
Personal injury lawyers have become so familiar with such vehicular niceties that they've coined a term for them: the "wave of death." See, the problem is that when a driver cedes the right of way just to be nice, the pedestrian unconsciously assumes that said driver's got her back. After all, the driver wouldn't have waved her across without first checking all the surrounding lanes for oncoming traffic, right? It doesn't always play out that way. Many times the driver's wave only means "if you step in front of my car, I will probably not run you down." Notice that in our example above, we didn't say you checked for traffic behind you. So there's a good chance that you're directly responsible for transforming that nice lady into a well-dressed stew when a car barrels past you in the left lane.
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"Forgive me?"
"Honestly, the thing I'm maddest about is the cilantro on me."
"Forgive me?"
"Honestly, the thing I'm maddest about is the cilantro on me."
Although, really, paying to fix the dent your skull put in that Hyundai is the polite thing to do.
#4. Respecting Your Superiors Can Cause the Loss of Innocent Lives
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We've all been there: your boss screwed up. But saying something along the lines of, "Sir, I think you yanked these numbers straight out of your upper rectum and, speaking of erroneous shit stains, you are one," is considered rude. So instead you opt for delicacy: "Wow, you know what's hard? Math. And spreadsheets -- man, don't even get me started on spreadsheets," you say, while nervously gesturing toward the presentation that's about to sink the whole company.
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"Maybe if I ignore him, he'll resign."
"Maybe if I ignore him, he'll resign."
Experts call such pussyfooting "mitigated speech." The problem is that it takes more brain power to decode a polite and deferent message than it does a more direct, arguably disrespectful one, and brain power is unfortunately a dwindling natural resource.
But it won't just sink our hypothetical business. Mitigated speech costs lives: around 80 percent of airplane accidents happen because of human error. What the numbers don't show is how many of those accidents could have been avoided if flight personnel weren't trying to play nice with their superiors. Yet, there's plenty of research suggesting that politeness should be added to the airlines' prohibited-items list, especially when co-pilots are indirect when relaying crucial information to the captain.
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"I'm going to give you three guesses what we're rapidly running out of."
"Altitude? Fuel? Time?"
"Yes."
"I'm going to give you three guesses what we're rapidly running out of."
"Altitude? Fuel? Time?"
"Yes."
One real-life example occurred in 1982, when an Air Florida flight was preparing to leave Washington, D.C. The plane had a dangerous buildup of ice on the wings, and the first officer damn well knew it. But instead of saying, "Captain, there's a dangerous buildup of ice on the wings," he said, "Look how the ice is just hanging on his, ah, back, back there, see that?" When the captain didn't get what he was hinting at, he tried again. "See all those icicles on the back there and everything?" Still no dice. "Boy, this is a, this is a losing battle here on trying to de-ice those things. It [gives] you a false feeling of security, that's all that does."
After one last failed attempt at politely telling his superior that the plane was unsafe to fly, they took off. Minutes later, he finally made a direct, impossible-to-misconstrue statement. It was also his last: "Larry, we're going down, Larry."
At least 78 people wished that co-pilot had been a bit more of a dick.
#3. Good Conversational Manners Hinder Female Viewpoints
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Politeness and etiquette can basically be boiled down to knowing your place and acting accordingly. For instance, if you're a student, it's polite to address your teacher formally. If you're at a royal banquet, you're expected to fill your soup spoon only two-thirds. And if you're a woman, it's considered rude if you speak, have opinions, or don't do as you're told.
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But hey, enjoy that soup.
But hey, enjoy that soup.
All right, maybe that last one isn't explicitly stated in any modern etiquette guides, but on some subconscious level, we still expect interaction between the sexes to function like that, as evidenced by differences in how men and women converse. Women generally use conversational styles that emphasize involvement, inclusiveness, intimacy, and group harmony. Men, on the other hand, tend to handle group conversations like a verbal pissing match, using interruptions, delayed responses, and disobeying turn-taking roles (not shutting up, in other words) to control the interaction. That's usually fine when it's men speaking with other men -- everybody's basically using the same tactics. But in group conversations with both men and women, female styles tend to suppress their own needs by deferring to men in order to maintain group harmony, thereby effectively positioning themselves on a lower rung of the social ladder. This happens even when the woman is of a higher social status than the man, such as when a male patient speaks to a female doctor.
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"I'm afraid it's-"
"Fit as horse? Great news! Just get me some Vicodin and Viagra, and I'll be on my way."
"... uh, yes sir. Right away."
"I'm afraid it's-"
"Fit as horse? Great news! Just get me some Vicodin and Viagra, and I'll be on my way."
"... uh, yes sir. Right away."
#2. Being Polite to Your Doctor Impedes Self-Preservation
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Being anything less than thoroughly considerate to your doctor seems like a bad idea. There are two professionals you don't mess with: the guy who makes your food and the guy who handles your gonads. The problem comes up when the short-term need to be polite is stronger than the long-term need to not die. Who on Earth would ever opt for a slow death over a moment's rudeness?
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Good guess, but no.
Good guess, but no.
Enter the British.
In 2009, a survey funded by Cancer Research UK revealed that a whopping 40 percent of Brits wouldn't go to the hospital with their cancer symptoms, simply because it would be impolite to bother the doctor with their personal discomforts. Which is especially odd, since you may recognize "your personal discomforts" as the entire reason that doctors exist. Compared with the rest of Europe, it's estimated that as many as 11,000 deaths could be prevented every year if Brits would just remove the sticks from their asses ... although, come to think of it, that would probably also require a doctor visit.
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"Busy day at the office?"
"Yeah, but we're good for firewood this winter."
"Busy day at the office?"
"Yeah, but we're good for firewood this winter."
#1. Politeness Turns Societies Into Powder Kegs of Violence and Murder
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You know that neighbor who's way, way too polite? Sure, maybe he's just Mormon or something, but you can't shake the feeling that there's something wrong with him. Probably got bodies stashed in his basement. It seems like a weird, baseless accusation at first, but you may not be wrong ...
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"Want to see my skin collection?"
"Want to see my skin collection?"
Anthropologists have discovered that an exceedingly polite society is also an exceedingly violent one. This can be clearly demonstrated in many different cultures in Asia, the Mediterranean, and Africa, such as the !Kung San people of the Kalahari Desert. They've been described by anthropologists as a gentle and harmless people for their kind and peaceful tendencies ... yet they have a proportional murder rate three times higher than the U.S. average.
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All smiles.
All smiles.
So what gives? Well, it seems that overt politeness is, ultimately, a catalyst for extreme violence. If everyone's inordinately polite all the time, then the moment someone breaks that social code it becomes a grievous insult that must be corrected (via face-stabbing).
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"I said preserves, not jam!!!"
"I said preserves, not jam!!!"
It seems that, since Northerners don't hold themselves to the same strict social code, they're able to shake off aggression by simply being rude right back at the offender, while Southerners bottle it up until it erupts. Politeness is like the cap on a bottle of kill-soda, and every single indiscretion, no matter how slight or innocent, shakes that bottle a little bit more.
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Enjoy cool, crisp, refreshing violence!
Enjoy cool, crisp, refreshing violence!
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