I was recently indirectly involved with a “social” event. The young person at the centre had already been given an expensive formal function for their 18th birthday and now asked for a fancy-dress barbecue for their 21st.
“What about invites?” asked the parents somewhat naively? “Oh, I’ve put it on FaceBook, 180 are coming!” Five half sides of lamb were purchased to feed the multitude, rotisseries hired, relatives seconded to assist with catering.
On the night, just 47 guests arrived! Many unknown to the guest-of-honour. What a waste of food and effort.
More and more we speak of, and some of us teach, “communication and its importance in 21st century society”.
Technology has advanced in leaps and bounds — letters replaced by telex — replaced by facsimile — replaced by email— replaced by Facebook.
Today, seemingly, every young man, woman and child has a music player ear-piece in one ear; a mobile phone glued to the other ear while busily texting or twittering: communicating inane, puerile, vacuous trivia to one another, while creating vast profits for the relevant “telco”.
Some invitations we receive are general and vague, “Why don’t we meet at the Club soon?” and can be treated in a similar manner.
Other invites are more structured and specific, after much thought and planning. A venue has been booked and paid for in advance. Catering is costly: numbers must be committed in advance Even for functions in someone’s home, food has to be purchased and prepared.
But when it comes to a commitment, the current trend is to ignore or to “waffle”. Oh, I’m not sure what I’m doing on that day/at that time. What personal disrespect! These people are implying Well, your invite’s OK as far as it goes, but I might get a better offer later, so I won’t say anything now. I’ll wait until the last minute, review all invitations; then contact the best offer and rudely add myself (and sometimes a partner) to their catering plan. Or I’ll just arrive: they’ll be so embarrassed that they’ll just accept my presence.
Répondez, s’il vous plaît
The literal translation is “reply, if you please” which some choose interpret as “If I choose to, I might reply. Of course, the true meaning of rsvp is “please reply!”
This doesn’t mean we have to accept the invitation. Nor does it mean we have to give a reason for not accepting.
It does mean we have been given the courtesy of an invitation and we should reply! Forget about the social mores of the day—we have a human-decency, one-person-to-another, obligation to contact (phone, write, fax, email, text) the inviter promptly and advise whether or not we will attend.
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