When I read Rubber Chicken Madness's post about Rude People, I knew I had to come blog about it for Mama Kat's Writer's Workshop.

 
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Name a pet peeve you have about how other parents raise their kids. Go on…stir the pot.

Mine is parents who don't teach their child manners.  Therefore, their child grows up to be a Rude Person.

It seems like a lot of modern parents find manners to be unimportant.  Like they're old-fashioned, or a thing of the past.  I totally disagree. Being polite and respectful is timeless.  It is so easy to just teach your child to say please and thank you.  It starts with modeling it yourself.  One of my kids' first phrases was "tank oo!" because I said it to them all the time.  And I taught them early to say "peez?" when asking for something.  Let people go ahead of you in traffic, and wave a "thank you" when they do the same for you.

And another big thing for me is "excuse me" and "I'm sorry".  If a kid is running around a store and bumps into me, it's only going to annoy me if they don't say "oops, sorry!"  But if they just keep on running, that parent is going to get the evil eye from me.  And that's a scary thing - just ask my kids.

All I have to do is raise an eyebrow if they've forgotten a please or thank you. And if my children ever treat an elderly person with anything but respect, they will feel my wrath. But I don't have to worry about that, because they don't do it.  I have gotten compliments on my kids' manners since they were old enough to have manners.  (and that's young, my friends, you gotta start 'em young.)

Andrew literally runs to open doors for people.  Tim works at a fast food restaurant and gets complimented on how polite he is.  At school and church, the girls get rewarded and complimented on being polite and helpful. It's not that there's not a time and place to be rude.  I am in no way trying to portray my kids as perfect little angels.  At home, we have burping contests and sing the Fart Song at the dinner table.   We do, after all, put the fun in dysfunctional.

But my kids know how to act in public, and how to treat others with respect.

Do you feel that manners are still relevant and important?