Yeah, no problem!

Yeah, no problem!  

          I realize that I am going to sound at least old-fashioned, if not down-right curmudgeonly with this complaint, but I can live with that.  At some point in the last 10 years or so, someone decided that it was appropriate for clerks, wait-staff, and everyone else who works with customers to stop using the words “you’re welcome” after someone says, “thank you”.  In their place, it is now evidently appropriate to say some variation or combination of, “yeah”, “uh huh”, “sure”, “ok”, “no problem”.  Most often, it seems, I hear 2 of these in combination. 

          Whenever I hear this, I want to stop time and lecture this clerk that the proper response to “thank you” is still “you’re welcome”.  I really don’t understand when and where this changed, but I have a feeling it is connected to our society’s general shift towards less formality in all aspects of the culture.  Perhaps it is a generational thing.  It seems to me that few parents teach their children formal manners any more.  I’m sure many parents still teach “please” and “thank you”, or children at least get that in Kindergarten, but the training in politeness seems to stop there. 

          I’m not suggesting we go back to a time when formal rules governed much of what happened in “polite society”, and when young people actually took training in etiquette,  but “no problem” just seems a little TOO informal to me.  It feels like I’m being told “Hey, it’s no problem that I refilled your drink.  It’s not like I had to go out of my way, or anything.”  Um, no, that’s your JOB. "No problem" carries an attitude no matter how it is stated.   Saying “you’re welcome” is a simple acknowledgement of being thanked and appreciated, and it doesn’t carry an attitude. 

          I will be traveling to New Hampshire soon, and I’m going to pay particular attention to the responses I get to my thanks-giving to see if I notice any patterns in age, or regional differences.  This is definitely a shift in society that I do not like, old-fashioned curmudgeon that I am, thank-you-very-much!

7/17/11