This is discussion archived from a time before the current discussion method was installed.
Working Title: Honorary Uncle: From YKTTW
Thera: Removed this from the main page, natter and all that.:
- In the area of The Netherlands this Troper grew up, it was customary when you knew elderly people your family wasn't intimate with, but still met on a semi-regular basis, like neighbors from a block down or such, that didn't wanted to be called "Mr." or "Mrs."
- This troper referred to certain family friends as such but grew out of it fairly early on and it seemed to be somewhat of a nostalgia-tinged archaic oddity rather than a widely found custom. These days most of her actual aunts and uncles aren't even referred to as such.
I modified it into something a bit more generic. Thing is, there seems to be some disturbing trend in the Netherlands where formal speech is considered to mean you are cold and indifferent to someone(probably has to with most people only hearing formal speech in politics, where it is used rather coldly). As such, people also dislike to be referred to as mom/dad or any other title of such kind. To put it in perspective, I'm from 1990, and use the formal tone with my parents, and call them mom and dad, but to some of my peers this apparently means that my parents are suppressing/abusing me. Similarly with Honorary Uncles.
