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Dishonesty is not the only alternative to honesty. There is also the highly underrated virtue of shutting up.

Judith Martin

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Judith Martin
Age: 86
Born: 1938
Born: September 13
Economist
Journalist
Washington
District of Columbia
Alternatives
Honesty
Virtue
Also
Shutting
Women
Underrated
Dishonesty
Alternative
Highly

More quotes by Judith Martin

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It is wrong to wear diamonds before luncheon, except on one’s marriage rings. Before, after, and during breakfast, luncheon and dinner, it is vulgar to wear a mixture of colored precious stones. It is always a comfort to know that so many things one can’t afford to do anyway are vulgar.
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There are three social classes in America: upper middle class, middle class, and lower middle class.
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The etiquette question that troubles so many fastidious people New Year's Day is: How am I ever going to face those people again?
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You should resolve not to seek public approval of your private business, when you are not also prepared to accept public disapproval.
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Honesty has come to mean the privilege of insulting you to your face without expecting redress.
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Society cannot exist without etiquette ... It never has, and until our own century, everybody knew that.
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Indeed, Miss Manners has come to believe that the basic political division in this country is not between liberals and conservatives but between those who believe that they should have a say in the love lives of strangers and those who do not.
Judith Martin
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We have the reverse of the Puritan work ethic in America now. No one ever becomes a star by plugging along year after year. What is needed is flair, talent, 'an eye,' contacts, charisma, and, most of all, naturalness.
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The truly essential bargain between host and guest requires the guest only to respond promptly, show up on time, socialize with other guests, thank the host, write additional thanks and reciprocate. You needn't bring anything.
Judith Martin
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When politeness is used to show up other people, it is reclassified as rudeness. Thus it is technically impossible to be too polite.
Judith Martin
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For email, the old postcard rule applies. Nobody else is supposed to read your postcards, but you'd be a fool if you wrote anything private on one.
Judith Martin
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Learn graceful ways of saying no and of pointing out that this pressure to do something is not in line with most people's wishes.
Judith Martin
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Honesty is a virtue, but not the only one. If you're in a courtroom you need the whole truth and nothing but the truth in the living room, sometimes you need anything but. Often.
Judith Martin
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A lot of men got upset at the feminist movement because they had all the toys and we wanted some.
Judith Martin
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I make a distinction between manners and etiquette - manners as the principles, which are eternal and universal, etiquette as the particular rules which are arbitrary and different in different times, different situations, different cultures.
Judith Martin
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Hypocrisy is not generally a social sin, but a virtue.
Judith Martin
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In its natural state, the child tells the literal truth because it is too naive to think of anything else. Blurting out the complete truth is considered adorable in the young, right smack up to the moment that the child says, 'Mommy, is this the fat lady you can't stand?
Judith Martin
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Like language, a code of manners can be used with more or less skill, for laudable or for evil purposes, to express a great variety of ideas and emotions. In itself, it carries no moral value, but ignorance in use of this tool is not a sign of virtue.
Judith Martin
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Meanwhile, the empty forms of social behavior survive inappropriately in business situations. We all know that when a business sends its customers 'friendly reminders,' it really means business.
Judith Martin
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The whole country wants civility. Why don't we have it? It doesn't cost anything. No federal funding, no legislation is involved. One answer is the unwillingness to restrain oneself. Everybody wants other people to be polite to them, but they want the freedom of not having to be polite to others.
Judith Martin