Wednesday, June 18, 2008

Dear Miss Manners:

I am a baseball fan, but my enjoyment is spoiled by the distasteful TV views of spitting by players, coaches and even umpires.

Please tell your readers (hopefully many players, too) that their habits are gross, not appreciated and a very bad example to kids. Ditto for the probable underlying causes, including chewing tobacco, seeds or what ever else they chew. They can relieve their anxiety or boredom with a stick of gum (not bubble) if necessary. The TV broadcasters could use a little common sense, too, by not capturing the spitting on close-ups. Will you help?

What -- and get killed? And not only by those who believe that spitting is a time-honored, if not sacred, tradition among baseball players, but by those who are indignant that gum-chewing was not also condemned.

Nor does Miss Manners want to take on the task of refining television, which does not strike her as a promising proposition.

Lest you believe this to be cowardice, she hastens to explain that although she dislikes vulgarity as much as you or more, she disagrees with your approach. Television in general, and athletes in particular, can hardly be expected to serve as models of decorum.

But bad examples can serve as examples, too. Children will always be exposed to the variety of human behavior, and it is the job of the responsible adults they know, such as parents, teachers and clergy, to teach them to evaluate it. A parent who shares the child's admiration for a player's prowess, but then says, "Eeew, disgusting" when he spits will elicit a giggle.

But the parent's influence will linger, all the same, when the athlete's fades.

Dear Miss Manners:

A now-deceased friend of mine once did a quite large, lovely watercolor of me, recently sent by her surviving husband. I really like the picture but feel it's somewhat unseemly to display a portrait of myself in my own home. If I had a spouse or children, I could justify its presence by reasoning it's there for them to look at. Alas, no such luck.

Are there any rules or traditions about displaying likenesses of one's self? I'm thinking I might be able to rationalize that it's there to keep my dog company when I'm at work.

Not bad. Or you could explain that you value it as a reminder of your late friend.

But you do not actually need an explanation. You asked Miss Manners about displaying "likenesses," but the traditional rule made a finicky distinction between paintings, which can be displayed in the public rooms, and photographs, which belong in the private ones. Artistic photographers are welcome to object.

2008Judith Martin