Christian name or Mr/Mrs/Miss?

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A lot of things, I do not find "professional"

Saying "huh" and "what" instead of "excuse me to".




Tough diamond

I am Asian and get called a "n***a" several times a week. Usually they act like it is an insult. Usually the speaker appears black

Not once, that I remember, has anyone called me "Chinese"

Definitely. Here in Finland most people know their name days and their family members' name days, too. They are also celebrated just like birthdays, but the celebrations aren't as big on the former even though name days have been celebrated longer here than birthdays have.

My City step-daughter visited us over the summer, and was enraged that a waitress had the insolence to call her "Hon"; a friendly regional colloquialism for "I like you". 'Round these parts, if she were to address me formally by my honorific, her meaning would be precisely the opposite.

As we age, people tend to address us more formally; kids are raised to show courtesy, which includes a degree of respect and deference to their elders.

I don't care what you call me, as long as you give me my senior citizen's discount.

I prefer this too. Having come out of a Christian religion it feels wrong to have my name called 'Christian', I really don't like it. It makes me feel like I can't get free. Also I generally prefer the use of my given name and surname. At school, as a teacher, I have been in schools which use my forename and those which use a title and my surname. I don't mind either.

Yes some cultures do have that deference thing for the elders, or "betters" as they sometimes used to call themselves where I was. I never internalised it and I'd feel embarrassed if a younger person tried to defer to me, not that I've ever known any who would. Respect as an equal is good enough for me. It's probably impossible to raise kids without having some degree of control over them but I see no need to rub it in with special titles. My own view is that traditional societies often went too far and abused their authority over young people, and eventually brought a backlash down on themselves, so now old people are often the ones who are being abused, though it would obviously be a more comfortable world without abuse.

I feel that standards of civility are very low in many areas of British life these days. Police officers often address male members of the public as 'Fellah', though they're not as disrespectful to females for some reason. Professional tradesmen will also address their customers as 'mate' or 'pal', which is anything but professional behaviour IMHO.

Well if people are using honorifics, technically it should be Dr. for me, but I generally prefer anyone other than my students call me by my first name.

I don't mind when strangers outside of the workplace call me Ms or Miss or Mrs since they are just trying to be polite, but it is irritating when people do it at conferences, since I am wearing a name tag on my chest that clearly says that I am a PhD.

Probably my least favorite way to be addressed is "Mr." though. I do have short hair, but once again I have clues about why that is not the correct honorrific on my chest.

Where I live it is impolite to stare at a lady's chest.

I'm pretty sure that's true where everyone lives.

I feel that the only time people should use my Christian(last name) is if I was of some high ranking nature or if I had a family, other than this I find it non-needed and not necessary.. However, I don't go overboard if I'm referred to such..

^ One's Christian name is his forename.

At a uni I went to there were a lot of far east Asian students and not everyone was Christian/from a Christian family because it was a multicultural campus.

The forms said 'family name' and 'given name'.

Not sure which country/countries the students came from exactly but their family names came first. I don't just mean at uni, which is fairly common practice in Europe, but in everything like letters etc.

There are footballers like this too.

China and India are a couple of examples, I think. When I first saw "given name" on a form I was pretty annoyed and thought "here they go again, why don't they leave well alone?" but when you think about it, it would have been pretty confusing to leave it as "forename," and the meaning of "given name" is pretty self-evident, unlike a lot of new terms they foist onto us. Perhaps naturally, once I'd left Christianity, I felt a little offended and held back by the assumption that I had a "Christian name."

I just remembered this:

Just Mr..

I go by Chris even though my birth certificate says Christopher. So if it's between Christoper and Mr. I prefer Mr. But if it's between Mr. and Chris-definitely Chris. Don't see how it is at all phony or rude. Sad to think of people who feel that way. Truly sad.