Of course it’s common to watch Netflix or Youtube when you’re having a meal by yourself. But in my experience, here it’s seen as kinda rude to watch TV when eating with friends or family, similar to if I was staring at my phone continuously, as it dilutes conversation and somehow leaves the impression that you’re together only in a physical sense rather than actually connecting with the other people.
Over the years this has been mildly surprising to me since I grew up in a family where we would mindlessly watch TV and not conversing much, if at all. So I was wondering, what’s the group meal etiquette where you live? Do people eat in silence and/or watching TV? Do you make an effort to converse even if it’s just small talk? Or rather leave conversations to come up by themselves, if they do?
I am referring mainly to everyday meals, not special instances, as in eating with people you live with rather than that one-off Christmas dinner you have with your parents.
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For me personally, yes. When I‘m alone, I even spend hours just to find the right unnecessary youtube video to have my meal with. But that‘s only when I am alone, when I‘m with my gf or family, the TV is often turned on in the background without us really paying attention to it, but it‘s on, most of the time
Not with the family. My ancestors kept passing on to their children that you don’t watch TV while eating with the family. Eating meals with the family usually happens in rooms and places without TV anyway. Germans tend to not have a TV in the kitchen like the Americans.
When alone, sometimes. But never in company. Excessive talking at the table is also discouraged among old-fashioned people, less so nowadays.
In my childhood, family dinners were pretty much eaten in complete silence except “pass me the salt please” and formal pleasentries like thanking the cook for the food. I’m quite happy that’s dying out.
It’s very common in Portugal to watch TV during family meals and it’s quite normal to have a TV in the kitchen for that purpose.
The news on the main free TV channels are always on at 13:00 and 20:00 (coinciding more or less with lunch and dinner times) and last a bit over an hour, so the typical scenario is to have the news on during the meal.
Even in my family, I have always watched television at the table, also because the evening news is on at 7 p.m., the time I have always had dinner, and I have kept the habit. Then, with regard to family gatherings, definitely not there, we just talk, unless it is a gathering organised specifically to watch something all together like an important football match or other events of various kinds broadcast on TV.
We don’t really have a kitchen table at home per se, just more of a breakfast bar, so we all sit together in the living room for dinner. Not sure if I’ve ever had a meal just sat together talking? It’s almost always been in front of the TV. Even for fancier or more important meals, everyone is usually too busy actually eating to talk anyway, dinner time isn’t really a time for conversations at all imo.
I’m from the US and having family meals with the TV on regularly is somewhat looked down on. When parents with kids do it, it’s often thought of as sign of lazy parenting, and when it’s adults who live together it’s an insult to the cook. It’s much more common if you’re eating alone.
Though I feel it’s becoming more normalized, I would say it happens only occasionally. Some people definitely do so, but I wouldn’t say it’s the norm. If you’re eating alone, sure. Or maybe when you have an easy dinner, like pizza.
Some people have conversations during dinner, we would also put on some background music.
It largely depends on the situation. If I’m having a proper meal with family, we probably wouldn’t watch TV. But it wouldn’t be uncommon to grab some pizza and watch TV together every now and then. I usually do that with friends, but it also happens with my parents. My Polish grandparents usually have the news running in the background over dinner, which in Poland is often cold, so it’s basically just them, my parents, and I making sandwiches and discussing whatever is happening on the news