The New York Spectator/Monstrous Manners
Irvine, William
THE NEW YORK SPECTATOR MONSTROUS MANNERS by William Irvine I've heard a lot of talk lately about something called The Return to Elegance. It also seems to be known variously as The New...
...Everyone stays at home now, coos the New York Times, giving intimate little dinner parties for their childhood chums...
...After ordering drinks, the host was handed a menu, at which point one of my fellow guests turned to him and asked, "What's good here...
...No wonder your athletic bra chafes so much...
...The flame is only fanned by an ever-burgeoning market of self-help and diet books, which are, coincidentally, the most popular reading matter of the most inquisitive minds...
...People have developed a new respect for the manners and morals of the pre-1960s generation, we are told...
...More recently, a new low in social etiquette has been breached: It is no longer considered necessary to give even the slightest pretense of an excuse for canceling an engagement...
...Tell me about your abortion...
...No questions asked...
...I am afraid that the homeless have helped in the popularization of a once-taboo-activity, public urination...
...and extreme amounts of smoking while others at the table were eating...
...And be consoled in the knowledge that the New Yorker who sees fit to reprimand you for your bad behavior is indisputably the rudest of them all...
...People who come in from the provinces are often mystified by the heft of the Manhattanite's social calendar...
...feel that they are not honor-bound to return messages that are left for them...
...This does, in turn, reduce one's credibility as a guest to that of a dental patient...
...My response to an impertinent question is an impertinent answer, usually in the form of a falsehood...
...Because of their sheer multitude, social engagements in New York have become an extremely devalued commodity...
...You do have cellulite on your legs...
...This situation is made even more immediate in social intercourse with those who have "call waiting...
...I will not begin to regale you with the tales of burping and sputum...
...Such questions should not be entertained at any cost...
...How much do you weigh?' "What did you pay for that...
...Again, a disturbing trend in the making...
...This is certainly a most generous gesture, and should imply that he would pay for everyone...
...On a recent afternoon, I was a guest, with three others, of a member of the Knickerbocker Club for lunch...
...It is surely no illusion that what used to pass for manners in this town has eroded dramatically as of late, and I shall make a small attempt to mark some of the more offensive trends that are encroaching upon the standards of polite society...
...Most behavior at New York restaurants these days adds life to the old adage: You can dress them up, but you sure can't take them out...
...If some of the recent behavior that I have witnessed among Gotham's 10,000 is any indication, the majority of fashionable New Yorkers spent their formative years on a gypsy caravan of pigs and chimps...
...In this case, the recipient must make an instant judgment about whom he wishes to talk to the most...
...60 THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR OCTOBER 1987...
...Niceness is such an easy pablum to wish on anyone that it has become a sort of etiquette insurance for the masses...
...Today, there seems to be no conversation topic which, marching under the banner of liberal enlightenment, is unfit for discussion...
...No one batted an eye...
...It is best to keep in mind that it is impossible to be rude to a machine, and one should therefore opt for hanging up whenever so inclined...
...The implication here is that the recipient frequently waits until one has left a message before deciding whether or not to talk...
...But those less offended by such interrogations make their future all the more rosy...
...It also seems to be known variously as The New Conservatism, The New Snobbery, and The Age of Plutocracy...
...It is now proper not only to collect cash from all the guests but to take the receipt for the entire dinner as well, particularly helpful at tax time...
...But new levels of the crass have been conquered...
...Once considered an extreme offense to the unsuspecting caller, the-answering machine has become as accepted a player in modern life as the telephone itself...
...Owners of answering machines also seem to William Irvine's book, Madam I'm Adam, will be published this month by Charles Scribner's Sons...
...Although the illusion of frantic popularity can be perpetrated for years, the out-of-towner soon realizes that, like ants in the farm, New Yorkers have little to do except swarm madly about in an extremely small terrain in a quest for food...
...This seems to me to defeat the whole purpose of the thing...
...Of all the manners that have really fallen by the wayside, by far the largest percentage concerns the eating of food in a public place...
...A hostess is now enchanted if one RSVPs for a party, because, as it turns out, no one else has bothered...
...As if this alone were not enough, an entire subculture of vexatious techniques has sprouted from the machine, techniques which are not considered the least bit unusual...
...This obsession results in the making of appointments, just as one would with the dentist, except in this case they are with people you presumably like to spend time with...
...Make way for street defecation...
...A particularly quaint custom seen quite often involves a host's willingness to use his credit card to pay for the group's dinner...
...On a recent expedition to a stylish watering hole, I witnessed: a woman combing her hair over the table...
...Thus, a dinner party can be blown off with a simple, "Listen, I just can't make it tomorrow night...
...filing her nails into her coffee...
...Many answering machine owners mow turn them on while at home, wait for a callerAo identify himself, and then, only then, break in on the line, as if running furiously from the bathroom to answer the telephone...
...Most inhabitants of this city have a committed interest in whipping up even the most pathetic imitations of the evening roster of, say, Brooke Astor or Madonna...
...a Euro-style youth nonchalantly stealing a chunk of his waiter's tip after the rest of his party left the table...
...an elegantly dressed J.A.P...
...Watch for the latest entries in this field, "Enjoy your meal" and "Thanks for sharing...
...The only appropriate response to "Have a nice day" is "Why don't you let me be the judge of that...
...It is now not even considered bald to admit to your hostess that another event on the same evening (no matter which invitation was received first) is more enticing, "and so of course you must understand if I go to dinner on the Forbes's yacht...
...Salarywise, what are you raking in...
...Now, everywhere you turn (taxi drivers, fellow subway riders, drunk stockbrokers wandering around South Street Seaport), there is someone relieving himself in one of the city's many sheltered corners...
Vol. 20 • October 1987 • No. 10
