"Manners, please!"

Everyone has his/her own belief. One of trait to which people consider to hold on is courtesy or we call it a good manners. Nationalists would say courtesy is good deeds which not violate constitution. Conservatives would define courtesy as manners that enables one to get along with public's rule. People who have strong faith in their own religion would state that courtesy is kind of deed based on their religion remarked. If we ask more people from diverse backgrounds, there will be more answers which will tangle its own true definition. I think those different people actually answer this 'courtesy' question like a piece of puzzle that, if we arrange those pieces, they will form a big picture of conclusion. Moreover, I think there are only two essential criteria of good manners; conditionally suitable and have a good purpose in it.

From time to time, trends do not change: old people always complain what young people do. Old people hate how young people play with fashion style: they think youth style is rather uncivilized. As a youth myself, I know that feeling to prove that they are not right at all about youth. However, it is impossible to do because respecting elderly is law of nature. Then we have to act politely in front of them and make them feel comfortable and respected. It will be different if people who we treat is important people such as public figure, minister, or even the president. It is still the same that we treat both of them politely. But the way how we treat elderly is as same as how we treat our parents: full of caring but still in respect. While, we treat public figure like we treat elderly but without affection which sometimes possibly misunderstood by them as annoying act. We will act to them politely, even with protocol procedural. And it will be more different if we treat our own friends. We will not act too polite to them and even too harsh as long as we do not hurt them. But when they need help, we will happily help them and this is kind of manners too. The situation also effects to different manners. More serious the condition, more polite we will act. Based on how good manners works, I state that good manners is kind of good deed at the right time, at the right place, for the right person, or we can call it as conditionally suitable.

We know good manners is the key to happier world because everyone respect the other. Moreover, we can conclude that good manners' purpose is to make other people and ourselves both feel comfortable and happy. It is a good purpose, indeed. Then, if we do good deeds just for our joy but hurt the other, it cannot be called as good manners. One of the example is bribery. People who accept money from bribery think that they do a right one because they make people who bribe them happy and it applies reciprocal. But, we do know that bribery violates law and make this country lost a lot of money. Because the number of people who get hurt would be more than that of people who feel satisfied, we cannot call that act as a good manners. That is just a real crime that covered by the fake or misunderstood good manners.

In the end, it all comes down to how we act to other people. However, if both essential criteria of good manners do not fulfilled, we cannot call it as good manners. As the intellectuals, we should understand the difference between the real good manners and the act that just look like good manners. Hopefully we do this right because, we know, everyone deserves to be happy.