Sunday column: Complications edition

Today’s column is online here. Both questions were juicy ones: How can you tell when an adoptive family is isolating themselves, and is it okay to comment on strangers’ public posts on Facebook?

I get a lot of questions like these, where it’s not about right or wrong, or how to have a difficult conversation, but about being comprehensible to others. If I do X, how will people interpret it? If someone has done Y to me, should I take that as a compliment or an insult?

“Etiquette” is a polarizing word, I’ve found. There’s a faction who insist that the purpose of etiquette is exclusion and codifying class and gender roles, and there’s a faction who insist that etiquette is simply empathy and kindness. (I doubt people aren’t so simple as to think that etiquette is really, truly all one and not the other, but many folks feel in their bones that it is even if they rationally know better.) Both of those analyses have their share of truth, but I think the essential function of etiquette is communication technology: giving us a set of words and behaviors (handshakes, thank-you notes, hostess gifts, Facebook likes) to communicate our intent and desires to other people. To make ourselves comprehensible.

My editor usually writes a little tagline for the end of the column, urging readers to write in with problems of their own. This week, he wrote, “NEED HELP UNDERSTANDING SEEMINGLY ODD BEHAVIOR OF FRIENDS OR FAMILY? Send your questions to Miss Conduct at missconduct@globe.com.” I can’t wait to see what’s in my inbox Monday!