Text 42269, 72 rader
Skriven 2006-11-05 16:18:00 av Michiel van der Vlist (2:280/5555)
  Kommentar till text 42264 av Jeff Smith (1:14/0)
Ärende: Insults
===============
Hello Jeff!

On Sunday November 05 2006 06:02, you wrote to me:

 MV>> Frank is misleading you. As usual. sigh... It was not the "mr" I
 MV>> objected to, it was omitting the "van der" part in my surname. My
 MV>> surname is "van der Vlist", not "Vlist". As I told Frank,
 MV>> mutulating names that way is considered insulting here.

 JS>      In all honesty Michiel. Given the situation that would
 JS> necessitate the use of your last name I would have used Vlist also.
 JS> Not to be insulting but because that is what I am used to doing here.

Let me remind you of what you wrote to me not so long ago:

=== quote ===

 js>      What country does the person live that you were responding to?
 js> Seems to me that you would know how your statement would be taken.
 js> When you communicate in an international forum such as this one should
 js> try to take that into account when choosing their words.

===

 JS> Here as you may know we have a first and last name. Often times we
 JS> also have a middle name but it isn't usually used except for legal
 JS> purposes and when one's mother is mad and is calling. <g>

=== quote ===

 js>     Since you chose to use the term it behoved you to consider the
 js> meaning it would have by the people that your were communicating with.

===

My surname is "van der Vlist". Just like my father and my grandafter. I
inherited it from them.  It is not "Vlist" and "van der" is not my middle name.

Surnames starting with "de", "der", "van", "van de" and "van der" are quit
common here and they are *always* used in full. It is only when people want to
insult or degrade someone that they ommit them. On the rare occasions my mother
called me "Vlist" I knew something nasty was coming...

 JS>  With me Jeff is short for Jeffery. I respond to both but normally use
 JS> and prefer Jeff. I might insult you out of ignorance initially but
 JS> would use your prefered surname once I was aware of your preference.

Then I trust that - contrary to Frank - in future you will use my proper
surname whe you feel the need to use it.

 JS> I can not speak for the intentions of anyone but myself. I will say
 JS> though that we tend to use a certain amount of latitude here in the
 JS> use of peoples names. Myself included with no insult necessarily
 JS> intended. An example here would be the first name of James. Variations
 JS> here that might be used would be Jim, Jimmy, Jimbo, Jimster, Etc
 JS> without there having to  be an insult intended.

I think that is typically American. Over here we normally address the people by
the name they present themselves with. In FidoNet that would be the name as in
teh message header. The use of diminutives is for adressing children. Used on
adults it is insulting.

O, yes and using the surname in the second person without "mr". "mrs". "miss"
or a title is considered insulting as well. When I was young it was used to
address a subordinate or an employee, but that has gone out of fashion and is
no longer considered polite.


Cheers, Michiel

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