Miss Manners: Husband's atrocious table manners costing LW business

[cereta]

Dear Miss Manners: My wonderful husband is everything I could want; however, his one flaw is his table manners.

My profession requires me to attend upscale business dinner meetings, and we are asked to join friends for meals as well. Unfortunately, most people we encounter at these events are completely turned off by my husband’s table manners — which also, for some reason, reflect badly on me. We have lost many friends, and I’ve lost business contacts as a result.

I am used to it, but others are not! He likes to eat with his fingers rather than use dining utensils, even greasy foods that get all over his hands and face. If he does use a utensil, it’s a tablespoon to scoop up the food all the faster. He will ask the server for a tablespoon the moment we are seated, even though nothing requiring one is on the menu. He also drinks soup by picking up the bowl and slurping it down, and stares at other people’s plates if they contain food that he enjoys, waiting for them to put down their spoon for a moment and then asking if he can finish the food on their plate.
At one business dinner in a very upscale hotel dining room, we were seated eight to a round table. Desserts were placed before each diner, and after “inhaling’’ his chocolate cake, he went around to everyone at the table asking if he could have their cake if they weren’t planning to eat it! Most of the diners at the table intended to enjoy their dessert, but at a normal, leisurely pace — which he assumes means they don’t care for the food placed before them.

The shock on their faces showed that they didn’t know how to respond, and most inched their dessert toward him. He happily sat at the table with six other desserts in front of him, tackling one after the other, while everyone looked on in disgust. Then he excused himself from the table, announcing he had to “go wash up’’ since the grease of the steak dinner was all over his hands and face.

Needless to say, I lost all further contact with any of my associates who dined at that table with us. Gently suggesting change does not work! Neither do dirty looks or reprimanding statements. Any suggestions?

Your husband's behavior reflects badly on you because . . . he is your husband. The sole reason for his inclusion at business functions is in that capacity. But even in social situations, you cannot expect to avoid some measure of censure.

His behavior is abhorrent, but you are the one most able to take corrective action. You — or rather, he — therefore have two choices: Reform his manners or cease to include him. This will be easier in your business life than your personal life, since you can tell your husband you have to avoid further damage to your career — “business people are so unforgiving’’ — and you can tell your business partners that your husband was unavailable.

Comments

Re: OH MY *GOD*

[beable]

2. Why? I don't believe for a minute that he's incapable of using standard silverware, or, you know, not demanding other people's dessert. Look, here's me, right this moment, not demanding other people's desserts. So why does he continue to do it? Is he threatened by your success, and trying to undermine you? Is he asserting power in the relationship by showing that he will act like a baboon with bad manners in the most embarrassing settings? Because I cannot think of a good

Yeah, seriously. There's "I dont know which fork to use or whether this specific fiddly food is _actually_ finger food or why I have 7 different spoons" manners which yeah, I mostly know from watching Downtown Abbey, and there's "I am being actively gross" manners and I agree that he is probably embracing the power trip of being uncouth to the point of grossness on purpose.

Re: OH MY *GOD*

[petrea_mitchell]

I dunno, looking for every mechanical advantage to cram down the food faster, eating seven desserts all at once, and then the hasty bathroom break right afterward says "eating disorder" more than "power trip" to me.

(Though, no reason it can't be both tangled up together! And it certainly doesn't change the advice to LW: stop bringing him, and think about whether this is a part of a broader issue.)

Re: OH MY *GOD*

[melannen]

Yeah, this is either deliberate sabotage (but it sounds like he might do this when they're alone too?), a made-up letter, or some kind of eating-related. Like, someone who doesn't have disordered eating on *some* level isn't going to *want* an entire dinner and seven slices of cake? If it's real it almost reads like descriptions I've read of things like Prader-Willi Syndrome where people truly can't exercise self-control around food.

Re: OH MY *GOD*

[cereta]

I had thought about that as soon as I posted, and if so, I would sympathize with him, do sympathize with him up to the point that he keeps going to these dinners knowing this will happen. He could be in some kind of deep, deep denial, which is reason, oh, seven that LW needs to have a come to Jesus talk with him (or perhaps with themselves). I get that addiction is messy and chaotic and multi-faceted, and food addictions are even moreso, because unlike nearly every other addition, you can't just go cold turkey. And maybe I'm missing a key component. But there's a solution just dangling right there, and one or both of them needs to see it.