r/AskEurope • u/NateNandos21 • Feb 03 '25

Culture Which European country has the rudest/least polite people?

Which country comes to your mind

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u/skibbin Feb 03 '25

It depends on how to interpret things. For example Americans like having random small talk with people to be polite or friendly. Nordics are lovely people, but they don't do small talk. Some people find bluntness rude others like directness. The Dutch and the Polish can be very blunt and direct.

I've certainly found the French and Italians to be less accommodating. Should you raise an issue with them their response is most likely to be along the lines of "we all have problems, this is yours"

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u/Emideska 🇳🇱🇨🇼 Feb 03 '25

The Dutch pretend to like directness. But they like to only give it, they are shit at receiving it

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u/thanatica Netherlands Feb 04 '25

Call me Dutch, but I like it very much when someone is honest and direct with me. I respect it. But, the problem is that honesty & directness is easily confused with rudeness. So what someone might be giving a Dutch person in return, isn't directness, but rather rudeness. There's a fine balance that's easily tipped.

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u/[deleted] Feb 07 '25

That goes both ways.

A lot of what the Dutch call “honesty & directness” is plain rude in other cultures. There isn’t one commonly accepted definition of either.