Manners maketh America

It’s striking that, the closer you get to the epicenter of grief, the better people behave. Look at the dignified behavior of George Floyd’s justifiably outraged family, in contrast to the screamers and vandals in cities thousands of miles from Minneapolis. …

Manners are good for you. In a paradoxical way, suppression of your ego actually helps the ego get along in the world. In my day job as editor of a British magazine, I sit calmly and listen as more pompous contributors shout and scream at me about my correction of their misspelling of the word ‘dog’. Then I quietly add them to a mental blacklist headed ‘People I Will Never Commission Again’.

Good manners never hurt anyone, they improve the public realm and — N.B., all rude egomaniacs — they make you more successful.

By Harry Mount, editor of the Oldie.