POLITENESS MATTERS TO ME

October 15, 2026 - Published

Recently, I've noticed an uptick in complaints about politeness. They tend to be in 2 groups: those that don't care about other people's feelings, and those that do care about other people's feelings.

This article is not for those in the first group. For the second group, you may find this article very interesting.

It's my personal guess that most people in the second group dislike politeness primarily due to misunderstandings about what politeness is. This is NOT their fault, but instead due to how politeness is explained to them. I think this is really unfortunate because politeness is something that's always been very important to me for a lot of reasons.

There's a lot for me to talk about, so I'll try to keep this article as brief as I can. I'll start with an introduction of what's relevant about myself to explain my perspective.

== ABOUT ME ==

I am not an anthropologist, a psychologist, and definitely not an expert at etiquette. This article is entirely my own opinions and my own conclusions based on my life experience. Do not expect this to be science.

I am not autistic, as I expect most people in the second group to be. However, I am very neurodivergent and grew up with a lot of social anxiety. My limited social contact (outside my family) from an early age meant that I had to learn a lot of social norms, nearly from scratch, just to participate in society.

This means that, hopefully, I can write from the perspective of someone with similar experiences while being able to explain how I was able to learn and accept politeness in society.

This article is not meant to make you like or prefer politeness. However, I'm hoping that by the end of this article, you can look at the concept of politeness and say, "Oh, that does actually sound generally reasonable and beneficial."

I have the impression that most people reading this article already have the understanding that politeness has to be learned to some degree to participate in our neurotypical-dominated society, so I'll be skipping any attempt to convince you.

== WHAT IS POLITENESS ==

Politeness is often defined as something similar to the following: "behaviour that is socially correct and shows understanding of and care for other people's feelings."

While I would consider this correct, I have a slightly different definition. To me, politeness is the act of modifying behavior primarily to protect other people's feelings, in a way that is expected based on circumstances.

I'll define rudeness as a near opposite -- acting in a way that either hurts people's feelings, or does not align with expected polite behavior under the circumstances.

As a note, politeness is not necessarily good, and rudeness is not necessarily bad under my definitions.

== POLITENESS IS COMPLICATED ==

Let's focus on the most vague part of the definition. What does "expected based on the circumstances" mean?

As we all know, politeness is extremely complicated. I know this is a pain point for a lot of people -- even sometimes for those that are allistic -- so to explain what I mean about politeness being circumstantial, I'll only use simple examples here.

Generally, it would be considered polite to call someone "ma'am" or "miss" if they are a woman. However, if the person you are speaking to is a man, then this would generally be considered rude.

Generally, it would be considered polite to offer eating out at a restaurant with someone. However, if you offered a steakhouse to a vegetarian, then this would generally be considered rude.

Generally, it would be considered rude to punch someone. However, if you are in a boxing match, then it would be expected to punch your opponent (though, I wouldn't call this polite either since it's not primarily about your opponent's feelings).

It makes sense that something may be polite in some situations rather than other situations. These are affected by the people involved, the related events, and even the culture.

For example, it's generally considered rude to slurp in Western culture because it tends to bother other people. However, I heard that slurping noodles in Japan is generally considered polite because it shows that you're enjoying it.

It's usually about these points that I hear people say, "Politeness is too complicated! Why are there so many factors and arcane rules to follow? How do neurotypicals always just know the right thing to do?"

Now, here I'm hoping to break one of the biggest lies told to autistic people: they don't. It's actually rather common for neurotypicals to break rules on politeness, most noticeable when they're children. That's because politeness is learned, not innate.

Think about it: why would a westerner automatically know what is and isn't considered polite in Japan? In order to learn the rules of politeness, they would have to either be told the rules directly, or live there and pick it up through immense trial and error. Of course, this also means that this is how a westerner would learn what is considered polite in the west -- Japan isn't some magical exception.

It is important to me that this is understood, because I've heard of a lot of situations where someone breaks social conventions and is berated for it. Most of the time, berating someone for being rude is actually rude behavior itself. Even outside politeness, it's usually more practical to be polite about these corrections.

As an example, one time my roommate stepped into my room with his shoes on. In his culture, this is perfectly normal and acceptable behavior. However, in my culture, this is almost comparable to him having sneezed into his hands and then wiping them off on my shirt.

I could have berated him for this, but instead I pointed it out politely and requested that he not do it again, providing simple reasoning as to why. He agreed, and we've never had a problem with it since.

This is a rather ideal situation, but it's also what politeness is for.

== POLITENESS IS FOR PEOPLE ==

We already know that politeness is dependent on circumstances. While this term is usually used for situational context, it also refers to individuals and the cultures of smaller groups of people.

For example, while it is generally rude to make fun of people, I see a lot of friend groups where playfully making fun of people is accepted behavior, even if the words themselves are particularly rude.

I'm restating this concept to address another common complaint I see: "This rule for politeness doesn't apply to me."

Personally I would say that, outside of the most basic harmful actions (e.g. shoving someone), there are no real rules for politeness, and even these can have exceptions (e.g. shoving someone in order to save them from an oncoming car).

When you hear things like, "You must lie to someone in these situations in order to make them feel better," that is a rule of thumb from someone in a specific culture. As someone surrounded by other neurodivergent people, we have a different culture, which to me often seems to highly value blunt honesty instead.

It is not uncommon for something to be polite to one group of people but rude to another -- even the thumbs-up gesture, usually having a positive meaning, is the equivalent of a middle finger in some countries. Again, this is why it's important for people to be gracious to others for breaking social conventions.

This is all just to say that politeness is not about following specific rules for the sake of following rules -- they are adapted around the dominant forces in a group primarily for the sake of preserving people's feelings.

Unfortunately, it just so happens that most of us are in neurotypical-dominated groups, with cultures that have developed rules of politeness far beyond intuition, even if they do (or did) have a real internal logic to them.

Asking a neurotypical why a rule of politeness exists will often get you an answer similar to asking a native English speaker why a rule of English exists. "I don't know, it just exists, but you have to follow it."

The average English speaker does not know why the plural of "mouse" is "mice" rather than "mouses." There is an entirely traceable origin through etymology and linguistics that anyone can look into, but to the average English speaker, it's an illogical rule that must be followed.

When you speak to these English speakers, you must say "mice" to be understood. However, that does not stop smaller groups from making rules that are understood within their group. They can say "mouses" with no consequences.

I have had many friends come up to me and say that, despite flying in the face of most social conventions, they would prefer if I be bluntly honest with them. Because of that, I adjusted my behavior for the circumstances and made myself bluntly honest for them, which has tended to help our relationships a lot.

On the other hand, I am someone with an anxiety disorder. It matters to me that, when delivering sensitive messages, people are more delicate than usual. I communicated this with them, and it has been generally successful for both sides.

Not all "rules" of politeness have to be assumed -- they can be communicated and built upon by the people around you that care about your feelings.

== WHY NOT BE LITERAL ==

The last major complaint I've seen is, "Why don't people just say what they mean?" If politeness only exists for people with mutual respect, then why can't people say things in simple direct terms with the assumption that they're respecting each other?

First of all, they can. Unlike most neurotypicals, I think it's entirely possible for society to exist in a state where everyone speaks honestly and directly.

I do not think that this is a downgrade or upgrade from the current society, but one with a separate list of pros and cons. Of course, I'm not in support of it since it would be at my personal detriment due to my previously mentioned anxiety disorder, but talking about this scenario in any more depth is out of scope for this article.

Second of all, people talk in polite forms because it's more efficient than direct forms. This sounds contradictory, so let me explain.

I see a lot of people say that "polite forms are saying things that are different from what the words actually mean," which is technically true, but not uncommon in language.

If someone says "CO2" to me, then what they're actually saying to me is "carbon dioxide" -- this is impossible to know from the phrase "CO2" alone, but is instead an agreed-upon shorthand for "carbon dioxide" in our society.

Similarly, if someone says to me, "You wanna hang out?" then even though the words themselves mean, "Do you desire suspending yourself outside?" it's more likely that they mean, "I am inviting you to be very near the same place as me for an indefinite period of time where we may or may not do some type of activity because I desire your presence, and would like to know if you desire that too so we can then proceed to do that shortly after my invitation is accepted."

Since these technically mean the same thing, I think we can all agree that the first sentence is a lot more efficient than the last one.

For a more relevant example, let's use a common polite form in English. Imagine you are sitting at a dinner table, and someone points at a plate of chicken. "Can you pass me that?"

Just like with the other example, this does not mean the literal words, "I would like to know if you have the ability to pass that to me." However, people also make the mistake of thinking this is an exact equivalent of a direct phrase like "Give me that."

When comparing "Can you pass me that" to "Give me that," then the direct form looks more efficient, but that's only when you're ignoring the nuance.

I think that "Can you pass me that?" turns it into a question specifically so it's open to the answer "no." The question of ability is less about literal ability and more about availability and willingness. If someone is being asked this question at all, it is likely that they are able to pass the plate, but that person may be busy eating, or tired, or would prefer that someone else pass the plate.

In other words, the question means something more like "If you are willing and able to, I request that you pass that plate to me because it would be helpful to me if you did." That makes the sentence "Can you pass me that?" a lot more efficient by comparison.

As a side note, "Give me that" also has a nuance of being more forceful and confrontational. I personally think that it's due to a combination of not giving room for the answer "no" without direct confrontation, and due to direct statements being more natural for people to use when angry. This is just speculation, though.

Anyway, this type of "code" only works when you've learned it, which again, that learning is a lot easier for neurotypical people. However, I hope it makes sense that the efficiency justifies its existence. This also extends past the actual words being said, of course.

English has many cases where factors outside the words themselves can add meaning. You can change the sentence, "It is." to the question "It is?" just by raising the pitch at the end. This is efficient because it adds meaning without adding more sounds, like syllables. However, this is at the cost of adding more factors to consider.

Unfortunately for us, neurotypicals have extended this to many factors.

Eye contact, tone of voice, body language, and more, are all factors when speaking to neurotypicals. Believe me, I hate it too, but when you think about it, you really can't deny the efficiency.

== CLOSING THOUGHTS ==

I'll summarize with what I feel are the most important points.

Politeness is about preserving other people's feelings. If you care about other people's feelings, then politeness is worth learning.

Politeness is not necessarily the rules that people talk about. There are "rules" for politeness in certain cultures, but anybody can make any exception at any time.

Neurotypical people mess up politeness too -- it is everyone's duty to be kind whenever this happens and to only correct behavior in order to reduce harm to others' feelings.

Politeness in neurotypical society often involves encoding a lot of information into efficient bits, even if it makes it harder for outsiders (neurodivergents or people of other cultures) to decode.

If you want to learn about politeness or are unsure about a specific situation, then simply ask; it would be rude for someone to brush off an earnest question like that.