THE DEATH OF DECORUM

or How We Need To Stop Being Polite And Start Telling Stupid People To Shut Up

“Yeah, I guess you’re not that smart, are you?”

The reply caught me off guard.

It wasn’t said with smile or a wink. It wasn’t followed by a “just kidding”.
It was just stated, left to dangle in the air and then slowly drift into my brain and eat away at my self-confidence.

The comment had been said by a neighbour of ours in a previous home. I had been helping him with some design work on my computer. Two things he knew very little about.

He was watching over my shoulder as I helped him craft his business cards on my screen. I accidentally deleted an element and said, automatically, “Argh… I’m such an idiot.”

Now, I feel comfortable in saying that self-deprecation is not only a Canadian thing. I feel it’s something practiced by almost every culture. Though Canadians, likely thanks to British influence, are very good at it.

Side Note: For years I referred to self-deprecating humour as ‘self-defecating’ humour. It should be stated that they are two very different types of humour.

Mike Myers’ recent series, The Pentaverate, on Netflix is a good example of self-deprecating humour. The lead character in Mike’s show is a Canadian, like Mike is in real life. In one of many self-deprecating jokes, the lead character’s scenes go from low resolution and old television aspect ratio to high definition wide-screen when they travel to the US.

As someone who appreciates self-deprecating humour, I know that’s a joke.
I don’t take it as a statement of fact.

My old neighbour, who’s American, would likely see that gag as an opportunity to gloat about Canada’s supposed inferiority.

Which brings me to something we were discussing at brunch the other day.

The current world, specifically social media, is full of blatantly false statements, denials and declarations. It’s certainly something that’s been happening for many many years now but I feel it really ramped up about 7 or 8 years ago.

People, and dirtbags, discovered that society is largely governed by the unspoken agreement of not being a self-serving dickhead.

In conversations that include opposing viewpoints, there was an unspoken agreement that facts remained facts and not impacted by personal views. For example, you might disagree with your local grocer’s strict ‘must wear pants’ policy but you also acknowledge the fact that sausage and/or mushroom sales may suffer if that policy is not adhered too.

Well, it turns out people, and dirtbags, have realized there is a whole host of things under the umbrella of decorum that are not hard and fast rules and, more tantalizingly, are not law.

And this, I think, is where the problem is.

People, and dirtbags, have further realized that they can abuse the civility, etiquette, empathy and pleasantries of the rest of us for their own gain.

If during a work meeting a co-worker said something that was evidently untrue, for the most of us the response would be to minimize the embarrassment for the person. Either brush over the false statement or help to reinterpret what they might have meant in an effort to save face for them.

Whereas some people, and all dirtbags, have learned that if it benefits them in some way, they can just double down on the untruth and we’ll be too stuck in our decorum to do anything about it.

That’s enough of that, I say.

Decorum is important. It is what makes society tolerable.
However, decorum cannot be allowed to become society’s undoing.

Weigh situations carefully. Choose your battles as they say.

Is the purveyor of some asinine string of words just an idiot with nothing to gain?
Or do they stand to gain something and are banking on the rest of us being too polite to speak up?

What’s wonderful is that you can combat these attempted abuses of decorum with style and panache.

Some well chosen words can clearly mock the abuser and deliver the message that we may be polite but we’re not fools. Nice try.

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(pictured: Author combs through recent missive to ensure he hasn’t packed it with self-defecating humour)