Behavior

Thinking about Manners / Habits
(AND IT’S INFLUENCE IN OUR PRESENT SOCIETY)


A book was published in December 1984 titled SUCCESS by Michel Korda in the US. Essential part of that book narrated reasoning for Manners in particular.

Michel, basically mentioned about the history for certain habits like shaking hands, tasting wine, escorting a guest from right side etc;

Shaking hands was to prove the person has no weapon in his hand, tasting wine was to prove it is not poisoned, and escorting guest from right side is to prove accessing hand for a weapon.

Silver cups were used to nullify the effect of any poison in the drink. Removing the cap / hat with right hand and welcoming guest is just to make sure the right hand is engaged in a civilized action rather than taking out a weapon from pocket.

Most of our habits related to this virtue, is due to the good effort taken by the parents, followed by teachers, well wishers and the good natured people in the society – in which an individual is brought up from infancy.

Elders always say, learn from mistakes of others besides of their own.

Most children are considered as Angels gifted by God (of one’s own religion) when born especially after a long wait and lots of medical treatment to conceive one.

It all works out fine, till, the infant becomes a boy or girl say by the age of 5. This is the time to watch the person and guide accordingly to keep him in the track of positive progress. Such a care shapes, the child to become competent in the school, society and among relatives – with acceptable manners and habits.

The environment in which the child grows makes him / her to acquire ILL / WELL manners and get stuck with it for life. A change at a later date from bad ones to good ones is harder compared to a change from good to bad.
So, it is the childhood that dictates hard core goodness or decency in a person as stated above.

When talking of manners, it is not only of ON THE TABLE, but ALSO of various other situations.
For instance, talking to a person, writing to a person, or dealing in a matter official or un-official and so on all needs to be done with certain courtesy / manners.

Ever since computers were made accessible for writing, the language changed from standard to slur or slang especially by younger generation. They also use the so called short-cuts for saving cost on say SMS by damaging the originality of the language.
One can write a book or even an encyclopedia to narrate the ill mannered expressions that crop up in daily communication these days.

This situation has created indecency even among highly educated / placed individuals in the society who also have become victims of this kind of ill manners in communication. If such an act is performed on a legal situation, it can amount to contempt of court!

Reading through the daily news media both visual and printed, it has come to light, the pattern of manners and related behavior among the present generation has greatly become un-tolerable/ un-acceptable and of grave concern to all peace loving people in the society.

Say for example, the following practice is seldom followed:

Get up early in the morning and take blessing of parents / elders. Start and finish all routines in an order to pass from one to next etc;

There are more arguments between parents and children rather than a conversation on any thing. It is noisier than a normal exchange of words. May be term it as shouting at each other?

The whole issue is complicated than it appears. The once vacant or empty brain in the child-hood has filled in by itself of much good and not so good stuff in to it from sources that attracted the individual.

The other aspect is curiosity based on hearsay, observation and intimidation by others.

Therefore, a kind of inferiority complex tries to set in, which is very obvious to parents and can easily be eradicated. But, many parents ignore this act and the priority changes from corrective to corruptive one.

Similar uncontrolled actions / observations form into a child a more or less stubborn attitude of damaging nature once and for all. Later date counseling cannot remove this tainted nature from a grown up child.

One more reason, for one’s differed behavior is simply due to the adamancy of parents who load the child to the level of collapse – just because they think they love their baby and expect the person to become what they want rather than what the child wants overnight!

I know of so many persons who could not pursue any thing useful for themselves due to pressure from parents. Later they changed / adapted to their own choice and became better- in education and career- though after loosing considerable amount of time and money.

Therefore, this kind of exposure meted out to an individual can make / break him or her simply because, of the manner in which the individual is treated from infancy.
When I think of manners/ habits, I fail to understand, why the age old virtues are not to be seen or experienced any more.

I conclude in my own way on this question based on my observations and material available in the society.

Joint families are disappearing fast – where the head of family maintained an order in all good practices.
Even in individual families, parents have only a limited advisory status towards their wards.
Cinema / T.Vs have played considerable role in damaging the good nature of our youngsters.
There is more venomous stuff in the day-to-day activities which is increasing un-controlled.
Anti-social elements have taken a sizable percentage of the younger generation, for their own ill conceived plans.
We have ragging, teasing, eve-teasing, assaulting elders / parents, petty robberies, chain snatching, and many such ill mannered activities in our society.

There are more serious acts like drunken drive and razing people resting even on the pavements, murdering kith and kin just for a share of wealth for which no contribution was ever done, running away with some ones daughter / son and ending life at times etc;

If only good habits were planted in the children from their infancy, our society will become a place with an open Pandora’s Box.

With all the ill mannered activities on the rise, we will see many more un-wed mothers in our society in the age group of 8-12 years. We laughed at this phenomenon when found happening in the west few years ago, and now, time to laugh at our own selves.

One doesn’t have to fear the unknown (GOD) to correct and indulge in good practices, but to be truthful and honest unto themselves and fear their own conscious.

I believe that ones self itself is the best consultant in these areas. After all, one cannot cheat one’s self. DO AS YOU WOULD BE DONE BY





Write up by
V.Sivasubramaniam
31-07-09