DEAR MISS MANNERS: Increasingly, as I scroll through social media, I see more and more GoFundMe pages. Many of the issues do require serious money, including funds for top surgery (removal of breasts for trans or nonbinary people), money for rent, insurance fees, mission trips and more.

Unfortunately, I feel unsympathetic and quite frustrated when these come across my page. Yes, I believe top surgery is a legitimate decision. I also believe it is an elective surgery, and asking for donations makes little sense. I would never ask for donations for a different elective surgery, like breast augmentation or liposuction.

We all have to pay rent. Just last month, when I struggled to pay my own rent, I applied for (and received) a housing hardship stipend and increased hours on my weekend job to make ends meet. If you didn’t want those insurance fees, you should have read the fine print before signing your name.

I wish there was some way to communicate that these fundraisers all seem like money grabs. Am I justified in my thoughts, or should I learn to be more sympathetic, and donate to these causes?

GENTLE READER: You are not likely to discourage money-grabbing as long as it works. So why are you even contemplating helping to make it work?

Distributing whatever funds you have available for charity by giving to whoever happens to ask is not the best way to support good causes. Unfortunately, many people feel pressured to do so, even if they sympathize less with augmenting breasts for the unendowed than with providing food for the hungry.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: My wife says one should time the mailing of greeting cards (birthday cards, Valentines, etc.) so that they arrive on the special day itself.

I maintain that as postal deliveries may occur any time during the day, they should be timed to arrive the day before the event they are meant to celebrate. What sayeth Miss Manners?

GENTLE READER: That she is in awe that your wife can predict postal service to the day. Does she also know the recipient’s birthday plans? Surely, she wouldn’t want the card to arrive when the celebrant is making merry elsewhere, only to return too late and tired to retrieve the mail.

(Please send your questions to Miss Manners at her website, www.missmanners.com; to her email, dearmissmanners@gmail.com; or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)

DEAR MISS MANNERS: My husband and I walk almost daily. During this coronavirus shelter-in-place time, there are many more people out walking.

Our understanding is that you walk facing traffic. However, many people are walking with traffic. When we encounter them, we always move away to give the proper social distancing, and they sometimes look at us like we are the protocol violators.

Are we? Can you please educate us (and them) on the proper side of the road to walk on?

GENTLE READER: If you are walking in the street itself, moving six feet away would put you smack into the middle of traffic. This is not a good idea -- even now, when there are fewer cars on the road. Miss Manners hopes you will find a safer path.

On sidewalks, moving over six feet would also go into traffic on one side, or onto someone’s property on the other. So it is incumbent on both parties to move, three feet each.

But how do you encourage others to do their part? Well, not by shouting, “Move!” with or without expletives. Discourtesy only adds to the distress.

First, you move as far as you safely can. Then smile and perform the gesture that a theatrical headwaiter would use to accompany his saying, “This way, please, madam, sir.” It is an arm swing, with open palm and the arm moving from a vertical position to a horizontal one.

Practice, and do not omit the unctuous smile. People do not shoot accusing looks at headwaiters.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: My wife and I are elderly, and we are often asked, “How long have you guys been together?”

This is usually directed to my wife, who has some cognitive issues that I believe the questioner has perceived. People who ask such questions to someone they suspect has cognitive issues are, in my opinion, low forms of humanity, and do not deserve a polite answer.

My wife usually hesitates and looks to me to help her out, asking “How long?” If they both insist, I turn, give the coldest expression I can muster and mutter, “I don’t remember.”

This ends the matter, but if it happens to be two women together asking the rude question, they start whispering to each other that I am a grouch.

GENTLE READER: Yes, that was grouchy of you, and silly of them. But “low forms of humanity”? Oh, please.

These ladies were not even really interested in your conjugal history. They were just trying, awkwardly, to make conversation. If they had any recognition of your wife’s problem, they might have posed their question on the assumption that long-term memory may survive when the short-term does not.

What should you have answered?

“Not long enough.”

DEAR MISS MANNERS: In business correspondence, when I don’t have a name, I begin with “Dear Madam/Sir.” However, these days, not everyone is binary. Should I add “GF person” (as in gender-fluid), or “Human” or ...? Please guide me in being up-to-the-minute respectful.

GENTLE READER: You are to be commended for wanting to be inclusive. However, there are so many possibilities to consider that Miss Manners fears that an all-inclusive salutation would take up the entire paper, leaving no room for the content.

So: “Dear Client,” “Dear Acme Toilet Paper Company” or “To the Customer Service Department.”

(Please send your questions to Miss Manners at her website, www.missmanners.com; to her email, dearmissmanners@gmail.com; or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I was having a disagreement with a friend about her 9-year-old daughter. She thinks it’s OK for her child to correct adults as long as she’s right. I feel it’s totally disrespectful to correct your elders. Especially at 9 years old!!! What is proper????

GENTLE READER: By that logic, you had better make sure that you are the elder in this relationship -- since Miss Manners notices that you are freely correcting your friend’s parenting.

But yes, as a general rule, it is unseemly for children to go around reprimanding adults, no matter that they are often undoubtedly right. But neither is it proper for anyone to issue citations without using tact, and that rule has been roundly violated here.

However, to the larger question: How to properly guide children to correct misinformation without creating offense -- a skill that will help them later in life, especially in their early careers.

It must be done with humility. As in, “Oh! I always heard that the Earth rotated from west to east, but I must have heard wrong. I will have to check my sources” -- thus helpfully prompting them to check theirs.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I am not a member of any social media, which seem to be the rage these days. My husband’s younger relatives are now starting to have children and announce the births there, instead of sending out the birth announcements that I have always depended on for vital information such as the name of the child and the date of birth.

My husband does communicate through social media with these relatives, but has never felt it necessary to convey this information to me. When asked, he is vague about the details, since he does not feel it necessary to give presents for any reason, birthdays and Christmas included.

Since I have always handled the giving of such presents and am in ignorance of the relevant information, I have chosen not to send presents. Am I incorrect?

GENTLE READER: You cannot send presents to people whose events you are not aware of, or whose names you do not know. Miss Manners feels certain that once these young relatives are tipped off to this idea -- and the presents and good wishes start dwindling -- they will recommence sending announcements through the proper channels. In the meantime, consider that you have a temporary reprieve.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: What can I say to parents who comment on a child’s size? My child was asked, “How old are you, 7?” “Five,” he answered, to which she responded, “Oh! You’re really big for a 5-year-old.”

We would never dream of telling someone “Gosh, you’re really short for only being 47,” or “Golly, you’re very fat for being 28,” so I don’t know why it seems OK to speak this way to and about children. I’d like your help with a polite response I could make.

GENTLE READER: “Thanks so much for noticing. We’re hoping that by the time he turns 8, he’ll be big enough to drive.”

(Please send your questions to Miss Manners at her website, www.missmanners.com; to her email, dearmissmanners@gmail.com; or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)