[awm]

I'm curious what effect rude and unpleasant players have on the business end of live bridge. Are there are substantial number of people who are "chased away" from the club because of this? Or is it a constant cause of complaints that doesn't really impact the club (and league) income?

[helene_t]

I don't think income is an issue here in the western part of the Netherlands were there are enough people who want to play bridge. So the fact that rude people are tollerated is more a question of guts than of business consideration, I think. It could be different in rural parts of the country.

[jillybean]

‘rude’ is perhaps not specific enough, in my opinion people are rude when they continue talking and don’t return our greeting when we join their table, the married (I assume) couple who bitch at each others play, bidding and judgement after each board are imho rude but would not stop us playing, it’s the more extreme behavior that causes problems for me. The Pub behavior

jb

[awm]

Certainly bridge is doing better in the Netherlands than in the US (or many countries).

But nonetheless directors have a decision to make: do you censure the rude players (assess penalties of some sort, ban them from the club, etc) or let it slide? To some degree this decision will be made out of laziness (it's easier to avoid confronting the unpleasant folks) but to a great degree it's probably made in the perceived interest of the club. If it was obvious that a significant number of people were choosing not to play at the club because of one or two bad eggs, the chances go up that directors (or the club owners, or committee running the club or whatever) will decide to do something. If it seems like people occasionally complain about the rudeness but they come back anyway, less likely something will be done.

[pigpenz]

All I remember is that they dont like you if your bad and dont like you if your good.
I guess its human nature for people to be that way

[Free]

I rather get "chased away" from players who don't know anything from the game (this is not beginners, but people who already play lots of years and still don't know anything) than from rude behaviour. The rude people are only 2-3 boards at your table, and I just don't care about such people's opinions about anything that I do at the table (bridgewise), because they usually can't play a decent card right... They're a waste of my time, so I just ignore them.

[barmar]

I assumed that the question was in reference to eggregious behavior, such as berating partners and arguing with the director, not minor annoyances like long post mortems or not greeting new opponents.

[joshs]

Some people hate other people-- and I hate people like that.

[mycroft]

I know this happens at clubs, because it happened at my old club (where I was a player, not yet a TD):

The owner/TD did everything to be nice to the rude players (ruled in their favour, glossed over the rudeness, and so on) because he knew that the rude players wouldn't be back if he played everything straight, and the rude players played 3,4,5 games a week.

Unfortunately, the rude, but regular players were either LNs (or Life Intermediates, at best) or "think-they're-experts", and the people they were rude to were frequently real experts, or close enough (I know of four who were selected for international competition at one point or another). They said the Canadian equivalent of "blow this for a game of soldiers", and played home games, or drove to another city to play there, or (given that a lot of these were university students) migrated online.

So the quality of the game got worse, as all the experts and juniors left. So the good and not rude players, who would put up with a few rude sets of opponents for the challenge of the rest of the game, gradually found no benefit to playing in the club as opposed to home games or online, so they stopped coming as well.

So, by now I expect (it's been a few years) that all the rude players are huddled in one corner sniping at each other. But they're still p(l)aying, which is good, right?

Michael.

[helene_t]

sceptic, on Oct 18 2006, 10:43 PM, said:

if you do not point out someones offensive or bad mannered behaviour, they will carry on doing it, it is quite easy actually to deal with, just sit someone down and talk to them in decent manner, explain the problem to them and ask them to change their behaviour, you will be quite suprised at the reaction of some people, who genuinely do not realise how other people see them

I'll try that next time. I find it very difficult to say, in a clam, neutral voice, something "Sir/Madam, your behavior is most disruptive, please use decent language". I tend to either
- Try to pretend that I ignore them
- Argue, in a calm, neutral voice, about the subject they are arguing about.
- Shout back.
- Change the subject.

Neither of those four strategies work, though.

On a few occasions I've called the director but they have been unwilling to try to do something about it.

[blackshoe]

As others have said, it is difficult for some people to deal with rudeness in other people. Unfortunately for TDs, it's their job to do so. Seems to me that if you want to be a TD, you have two choices: learn to deal with such people calmly, politely, and firmly, or give up on being a TD.

While I would not suggest anyone should be rude at a bridge game (at the table or otherwise), there are times when the only way to deal with rude people is to be rude right back at them*. For players, I recommend you let the TD make that decision and take that action.

Rudeness in bridge will stop when two things happen: the TD is called each and every time rudeness occurs (including when an opponent is being rude to his partner) and the TD explains (the first time) that rudeness will not be tolerated and penalizes the player (every other time, and the first time too, if the offense is serious enough).

*Years ago, in another ficton, a Fair Witness replied thusly to an Irascible Old Man:

IOM: Have you ever seen me be rude to a lady?
FW: I have never seen you be rude to a lady. I have seen you be intentionally rude to a woman.

[inquiry]

Well this poll is a little wrong... If you live in a big city were there are many duplicate clubs to choose from, if one has rude, obnoxious people and the others do not, where would you play? On the other hand if you live in po-dunckville and there is only one club with one game a week, what other options do you have?

My answer if I lived in my mother's hometown would be I would play despite the rude people... my answer where live with many choices is I would let my money go to a sight that disallows such behavior.

[paulg]

For those playing at clubs with rude players, you are all warmly invited to the Tuesday and Thursday duplicates at Berwick-upon-Tweed. We'll even find you a partner.

I appreciate that it is a long journey for some, but we do finish by 10:30pm.

Paul