http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/dynamic/news/top_story.html?in_review_id=399364&in_review_text_id=346927

Have you asked the rudest question?

by Luke Leitch

If there is a communication that corrupts good manners most, it must be the ill-advised question. Now a respected American arbiter of etiquette has declared that the rudest question of all is "Why aren't you married?"

This incautious enquiry tops a list of 10 conversational calamities deemed the worst by the Emily Post Institute, which has been America's self-declared "civility barometer" since 1946.

Second in the institute's top 10 list of excruciating social gambits is the uncompromising "Why don't you have any children?" - another question likely to provoke those asked it to choke on their canapés.

Diplomats in the US State Department are among those to be given the list of unmentionables, revealed last night as part of a seminar on protocol.

Other catastrophic chat-up lines in the list include: "Are you tired? You look it?", "How much did that cost?", "You're dead wrong", "How old are you?", "Ah, c'mon. You can tell me", "I can see I'll have to simplify this for you", and - somewhat oddly - "As the President was telling me the other day".

Another less specific faux pas listed by the Emily Post Institute is to correct someone's punctuation.

The opportunities for questionable questions, then, are seemingly endless.

So perhaps it is best to avoid the interrogative entirely, mindful of Samuel Johnson's adage that "questioning is not the mode of conversation among gentlemen".

After all, the trouble with asking a rude question is that you might just get an answer.

© Associated Newspapers Ltd., 12 June 2001

-- (Don't@ask.Emily), June 14, 2001

Answers

Doesn't seem rude to me. The answer is... "because I'm not stupid".

-- (single @ and. loving it), June 14, 2001.

Doesn't seem rude to me. The real answer is "Becuse I haven't found someone stupid enough to marry me."

-- (pot@callingKettle.black), June 14, 2001.

What about, "Why do you have children if you're not married?"

-- David L (bumpkin@dnet.net), June 14, 2001.

"Don't you know where babies come from?" (Yes, it was great.)

"Don't you use birth control?" (Yes, we should email the Pope and tell him he needn't worry about forbidding it.)

"How do you feed all these kids?" (With the usual flatware.)

"Don't you know the world is overpopulated?" (Are you offering to leave?)

-- helen (its@crowd.yes), June 14, 2001.

the one I usually get is when everyone in the elevator turns to me and asks, "was that YOU?"

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-- Lon Frank (lgal@exp.net), June 14, 2001.

The best way to answer rude, intrusive questions is "why do you want to know?"

-- Lars (larsguy@yahoo.com), June 14, 2001.

I think the best way to wiggle out of an uncomfortable conversation, is to direct the subject back onto the other person. In other words, answer the question with another question about them.

-- (yep@yep.yep), June 14, 2001.

LOL helen.

-- Carlos (riffraff@cybertime.net), June 14, 2001.

Dont you get it helen. Having that many children is a BURDEN on others who have to PAY one way or another for your overpopulation.

Now.. when you take those things out in public for god's sake shut them up and do NOT let them run around like animals. Selfish people with kids always amaze me.

-- youneedtosop (hey@you.com), June 16, 2001.

youneed - what the HILLYHEY are you talking about? Explain to me how YOU have to pay the bill for MY children.

-- sheesh (some@peoples'.kids), June 17, 2001.

I don't know about youneed, but I am sick of paying the bill for other people's children, especially the fat lazy slobs who have kids just so they can collect from the money we taxpayers hand over to the gubmint. Schools, welfare money, foodstamps, health care, the list goes on and on. Too many frickin idiots having kids when they aren't even capable of taking care of their own lazy goddam asses.

-- (get your own @ fucking. money), June 17, 2001.

getyourownmoney, why do I get the feeling you do not have a job?

-- get (yourself@an.education), June 17, 2001.

"why do I get the feeling you do not have a job?"

I don't know, maybe because you're an idiot?

-- (get your own money @ you lazy. welfare slob), June 18, 2001.

No, it has to be another reason. Perhaps it is because you do not have a job. Yep, that's it. The reason you hate other wlefare cheats so much is because you view them as competition.

-- get (yourself@an.education(and.a.job)), June 18, 2001.

Hey dimwit, do you think I would care about you welfare suckers taking my taxes if I didn't have a job and pay taxes? Gaaawd, you are stupid!

I have 2 college degrees and make plenty of money. Unlike you I work HARD for it, and that's why lazy fucks like you make me sick.

Why do I get the impression you are a lazy welfare sucking slob who cranks out puppies like there's no tomorrow? Based on your posts, it's obvious!

-- (get off your ass @ fuck. waste), June 18, 2001.

No, you don't have a job and you don't pay taxes. You hate other welfare cheats, because they mean there is less money in the "gubmint free money fund" for you.

You have 2 college degrees? ROTFL. What college in their right mind would even admit you, not to mention graduate you? If you consider the walk out to your mailbox hard work, well then go ahead and humor yourself.

Why do you get the impression you that I am a lazy welfare sucking slob who cranks out puppies like there's no tomorrow? Probably because you are envious of productive members of society. While it is true that I have several children, I foot the bill.

Now once again I will ask you how YOU have to pay for my children?

-- get (yourself@an.education(and.a.job,and.some.breathmints))), June 18, 2001.

Now, kids, play nice. Sometimes it really tickles me how the same arguments can keep cropping up, no matter what the initial thread posting was about...

Anyway.

I think it isn't necessarily rude to ask "why aren't you married" - it depends on who's asking whom. If a woman asks a single man that question, he's more apt to be a little flattered, rather than offended. If the woman is also single, and they're at, say, a party, he's probably going to take it as a come-on. Again, not offended. (But maybe a little frightened; that would be a pretty to the point come-on ;^)

-- Bemused (and_amazed@you.people), June 18, 2001.

Bemused: I came pretty close to asking the woman next door if she was pregnant last week. She's got two children, maybe 8 and 10, and I recondisered before asking. Summer is here. She's wearing short tops versus the long, flannel shirts of winter. It could be that I'd never seen her figure before.

-- Anita (Anita_S3@hotmail.com), June 18, 2001.

recondisered? Okay...reconsidered. [I KNEW that looked funny.]

-- Anita (Anita_S3@hotmail.com), June 18, 2001.

Now *that* would have been bad. "Hi, I didn't know you were pregnant! Oh, you're not?"

Ouch, might as well pack your things and move. Pretty funny, Anita.

-- Bemused (and_amazed@you.people), June 19, 2001.