Legislating Courtesy

[LaSorcia]

In Portugal, they recently passed a law giving "priority" to those who are elderly, disabled, pregnant or have a child under two years old with them. This means that in places of commerce, employees have to help someone in these categories before others.

Businesses are required to put up a sign saying they give priority to these people, and merchants who fail to give priority get fined. There are no special priority lines for these categories of people. They simply go to the front of any line/queue and get waited on first.

What do you think of this law? Should courtesy be legislated like this?

I don't know, I might be tempted to take small children with me wherever I went. Or maybe one of those life-like baby dolls in a stroller.

 

[Paidiske]

Here we have a similar law about seating on public transport, which I find fair.

Not sure what I think about priority in being served in the shops; I guess I wonder how necessary it is?

 

[LaSorcia]

Here we have a similar law about seating on public transport, which I find fair.

Funny, I didn't see those signs on buses or taxis.

And don't you think that if we need laws like that, it says something about deeper problems in society?

 

[akaDaScribe]

In Portugal, they recently passed a law giving "priority" to those who are elderly, disabled, pregnant or have a child under two years old with them. This means that in places of commerce, employees have to help someone in these categories before others.

Businesses are required to put up a sign saying they give priority to these people, and merchants who fail to give priority get fined. There are no special priority lines for these categories of people. They simply go to the front of any line/queue and get waited on first.

What do you think of this law? Should courtesy be legislated like this?

I don't know, I might be tempted to take small children with me wherever I went. Or maybe one of those life-like baby dolls in a stroller.

I think there is a problem when people start turning different forms of charity into requirements. It makes those receiving it feel entitled and ungrateful and denies people the ability to be charitable on their own, alleviating the ability for people to feel good about doing good and alleviating gratitude for what was done. Instead we end up with ingratitude and resentment.

 

[akaDaScribe]

Funny, I didn't see those signs on buses or taxis.

And don't you think that if we need laws like that, it says something about deeper problems in society?

I think the better approach as a society is to teach children from childhood up certain universal moral standards so that it becomes a social norm within that society.

 

[JackRT]

I recall some 50 years ago when I was in my early twenties riding a bus. A very pregnant woman boarded and I got up to offer my seat, A teenage punk grabbed it immediately. It did not work well for him.

 

[LaSorcia]

It did not work well for him.

Did you beat him up?

 

[JackRT]

Did you beat him up?

No, I simply escorted him to the back door of the bus.

 

[Saucy]

I don't such things should be legislated and forced by the government. It sort of takes away from having manners if you force people to display them. It also sort of violates the ideals of equality.

 

[Chesterton]

In Portugal, they recently passed a law giving "priority" to those who are elderly, disabled, pregnant or have a child under two years old with them. This means that in places of commerce, employees have to help someone in these categories before others.

Businesses are required to put up a sign saying they give priority to these people, and merchants who fail to give priority get fined. There are no special priority lines for these categories of people. They simply go to the front of any line/queue and get waited on first.

If I fell into one of those categories, and someone offered me favorable treatment, I'd be very insulted. I'd feel "less than", as the kids say, because that's exactly what the law is saying: "you are less than".

A possible exception might be if I'd been decapitated, and walked into a hospital emergency room carrying my head in my hands. I'd hope they would take me to the front of the line, in front of people complaining of stomach aches, and people claiming they needed emergency surgery because they just realized they were a woman born in a man's body.

 

[Paidiske]

When being heavily pregnant meant getting a seat on a crowded train, I didn't feel "less than." I felt grateful that my society looks out for people who might be struggling...

 

[Chesterton]

A very pregnant woman boarded and I got up to offer my seat.

If she were just pregnant, I'd say you were way out of line, but since she was very pregnant...okay.

 

[dzheremi]

When being heavily pregnant meant getting a seat on a crowded train, I didn't feel "less than." I felt grateful that my society looks out for people who might be struggling...

This.

As someone who would apparently be given priority in Portugal, I would appreciate this in situations when it is obviously needed. While it's mostly common sense and common courtesy (and no, I don't think either should have to be legislated, but I don't write the laws in Portugal), unfortunately it can't be assumed that everyone possesses either of these qualities (see post #6), and while I would love to appeal to ideas of 'fairness' and 'equality' when it comes to most aspects of how society should work, if it is simply a fact of life that we are not equal as human beings (and at the level which the law seems to address, it is), then why should anyone pretend otherwise? After all, from the description of what the law entails, it seems like it is mostly designed to help facilitate these peoples' participation in commerce, which is something that everyone involved should want to help realize. The money of the disabled, the pregnant, or the elderly is still money, after all, and these people no doubt want to participate in society to the fullest degree and as efficiently as they can. I can't see what sense there is in being against that in any way, other than perhaps the usual presumption of the able-bodied, young, and/or not-pregnant (not all of them, but certainly of those who would fail to see the usefulness of such laws) that people who are in such states ought to be treated the same as those who are not because that is what is 'fair'.

No it isn't. It just isn't, and nobody sincerely thinks that it is, and it's fairly easy to prove that: our national armies are not full of the elderly, the disabled, and the pregnant, and nobody on the pseudo-fairness flotilla would argue that they should be just because those who are not in any of those conditions are thereby made to fill up the ranks. Similarly, nobody ever seems to argue that the recommendations that the pregnant not ride roller coasters, drink alcohol, or smoke cigarettes are somehow 'unfair', even though these are things that those who are not pregnant can do to their heart's content (seems pretty 'unfair' to me, if we're going to treat everything as though it occurs in a vacuum). But suddenly when it comes to people who have no real problem that prevents them from being able to stand in a line at a shop potentially having to do so for a little while longer than they otherwise would so that the little old lady in line can buy her milk and get on with her day before others (who would anyway take half as long to do so as she does) can do the same, it's some horrible affront to fairness or equality or dignity or whatever.

Come on, really? Sure, I guess if the stores make some huge deal out of it by cordoning off those who need help from the rest, or ringing some big alarm whenever there's a pregnant woman in line or something, then I could see that being the case (I'm just one person, but I don't particularly want to draw attention to myself when I am just going about my day; I would certainly rather the world not stop on its axis every time I need to buy paper towels or whatever, so I don't know where this idea of 'entitlement' comes from, beyond recognizing that, yes, I ought to be entitled to participate in the outside world to the degree that I can and am actually putting myself out there for the express purpose of doing so; I'm sorry that this apparently comes across as arrogant to some people, though I honestly cannot understand why). But that's not what the law entails, from everything we can tell by reading the OP.

So I would say that if this law is enacted in a sensible way, it would probably be to everyone's benefit.

 

[akaDaScribe]

This.

As someone who would apparently be given priority in Portugal, I would appreciate this in situations when it is obviously needed. While it's mostly common sense and common courtesy (and no, I don't think either should have to be legislated, but I don't write the laws in Portugal), unfortunately it can't be assumed that everyone possesses either of these qualities (see post #6), and while I would love to appeal to ideas of 'fairness' and 'equality' when it comes to most aspects of how society should work, if it is simply a fact of life that we are not equal as human beings (and at the level which the law seems to address, it is), then why should anyone pretend otherwise? After all, from the description of what the law entails, it seems like it is mostly designed to help facilitate these peoples' participation in commerce, which is something that everyone involved should want to help realize. The money of the disabled, the pregnant, or the elderly is still money, after all, and these people no doubt want to participate in society to the fullest degree and as efficiently as they can. I can't see what sense there is in being against that in any way, other than perhaps the usual presumption of the able-bodied, young, and/or not-pregnant (not all of them, but certainly of those who would fail to see the usefulness of such laws) that people who are in such states ought to be treated the same as those who are not because that is what is 'fair'.

No it isn't. It just isn't, and nobody sincerely thinks that it is, and it's fairly easy to prove that: our national armies are not full of the elderly, the disabled, and the pregnant, and nobody on the pseudo-fairness flotilla would argue that they should be just because those who are not in any of those conditions are thereby made to fill up the ranks. Similarly, nobody ever seems to argue that the recommendations that the pregnant not ride roller coasters, drink alcohol, or smoke cigarettes are somehow 'unfair', even though these are things that those who are not pregnant can do to their heart's content (seems pretty 'unfair' to me, if we're going to treat everything as though it occurs in a vacuum). But suddenly when it comes to people who have no real problem that prevents them from being able to stand in a line at a shop potentially having to do so for a little while longer than they otherwise would so that the little old lady in line can buy her milk and get on with her day before others (who would anyway take half as long to do so as she does) can do the same, it's some horrible affront to fairness or equality or dignity or whatever.

Come on, really? Sure, I guess if the stores make some huge deal out of it by cordoning off those who need help from the rest, or ringing some big alarm whenever there's a pregnant woman in line or something, then I could see that being the case (I'm just one person, but I don't particularly want to draw attention to myself when I am just going about my day; I would certainly rather the world not stop on its axis every time I need to buy paper towels or whatever, so I don't know where this idea of 'entitlement' comes from, beyond recognizing that, yes, I ought to be entitled to participate in the outside world to the degree that I can and am actually putting myself out there for the express purpose of doing so; I'm sorry that this apparently comes across as arrogant to some people, though I honestly cannot understand why). But that's not what the law entails, from everything we can tell by reading the OP.

So I would say that if this law is enacted in a sensible way, it would probably be to everyone's benefit.

It may just be a mindset for me. I will give you anything, but don't try to take it from me.

I don't see how inviting the government in to regulate more and more aspects of our lives is a good thing. People turn to the government for everything it seems now. Now we aren't even capable of raising our children to have good manners so we need the government to make them?

 

[Quid est Veritas?]

I recently had to queue at Home Affairs for a passport for my newborn. Instead of standing in the long queue, we were shunted to the front. People coming with newborns are given preferential treatment. As someone with children; who can be difficult to control, feed or change in a queue; I think this acceptable.

Hospital Casualty works by a triage system, where patients are seen according to severity, not when they pitched up. Green patients, the most stable, who consequently often wait a long time, often get annoyed. Even here though, children and the elderly are often given priority within their own triage class. This is because they tend to deteriorate faster; but often just from courtesy too, as waiting rooms, or infective disease ridden casualty floors, aren't places to keep children or the elderly. This seems to me a similar idea, that priority should be given to those who are incapacitated in some way. I have no problem with it, for at some point you yourself will also get the special treatment. How is this so different from a pensioner's discount?

 

[Quid est Veritas?]

If she were just pregnant, I'd say you were way out of line, but since she was very pregnant...okay.

I don't know. The first trimester some women are very nauseous and feel quite ill. The blood pressure falls, so they often feel dizzy and can have syncopal events. They start feeling better as the body adjusts in the second trimester, before deteriorating again in the third when the pregnancy becomes intra-abdominal.

So a late first trimester or third trimester woman should certainly be given seating priority, in my opinion. How to determine a woman's current gestation at a glance? Best err on the side of caution, and give the gravid women the seat in general, I'd think.

 

[LaSorcia]

Hospital Casualty works by a triage system, where patients are seen according to severity, not when they pitched up.

Casualty/ER triage makes sense and works. I can't agree that social triage would work as well when government dictated. If left at the level of folkways and mores, great. The fact that societies feel the need to make laws for things that used to be 'common' courtesy should be a wake up call that something is deeply wrong, rather than accepted as a normal thing for governments to be doing.

As an aside, I once went into anaphylaxis and had to go to the hospital...fast. I knew about triage, but my brain was clouded from being close to dying and all that. I actually thought to myself, "wow, they took me right in, no patients in the ER today."

 

[JackRT]

Casualty/ER triage makes sense and works. I can't agree that social triage would work as well when government dictated. If left at the level of folkways and mores, great. The fact that societies feel the need to make laws for things that used to be 'common' courtesy should be a wake up call that something is deeply wrong, rather than accepted as a normal thing for governments to be doing.

As an aside, I once went into anaphylaxis and had to go to the hospital...fast. I knew about triage, but my brain was clouded from being close to dying and all that. I actually thought to myself, "wow, they took me right in, no patients in the ER today."

Same when my daughter overdosed. I dragged her into the car and drove like mad to the ER. I jumped out opened the door and shouted "overdose" --- I was almost run down by the doctors and nurses responding. Then in the waiting room I sat beside a woman who was complaining that her toddler had swallowed a nickel and wasn't being treated.

 

[dzheremi]

It may just be a mindset for me. I will give you anything, but don't try to take it from me.

Does your mindset need to be taken into account at all for others to be able to get through their day? Does your mindset make it impossible for you to wait in line for an extra minute or two? Because other peoples' physical disabilities might mean exactly that for them, and yet they still need to go places and do things.

What does recognizing that fact take from you, exactly?

 

[Chesterton]

I don't know. The first trimester some women are very nauseous and feel quite ill. The blood pressure falls, so they often feel dizzy and can have syncopal events. They start feeling better as the body adjusts in the second trimester, before deteriorating again in the third when the pregnancy becomes intra-abdominal.

So a late first trimester or third trimester woman should certainly be given seating priority, in my opinion. How to determine a woman's current gestation at a glance? Best err on the side of caution, and give the gravid women the seat in general, I'd think.

First off, since we're from different places, I just want to be clear that my little joke was based on an expression we have here, that one can't be "a little pregnant". It's possible you don't know of that, but unlikely since you seem to know everything.

But more seriously, the OP doesn't mention seating priority, but I wonder what difference a seat location would make for women in different stages of pregnancy?

What the OP does mention, is that those who are elderly, disabled, pregnant or have a child under two years old with them get to move to the front of the line (in retail establishments, I presume). I likewise question why people in these categories are in a particular hurry that I'm not in.