DEAR MISS MANNERS: I hold different political beliefs than many of my friends and family, although I don’t generally advertise them. This election cycle is causing me a considerable amount of anxiety. I stopped following social media once I realized it no longer brought me joy.

Now family members have started sending me political messages directly via email or texts. When this happens, I politely state that I am not interested in hearing more on the subject and ask them to refrain from sending me further messages of this kind.

Usually, the sender complies, but sometimes I am treated as if my request is unreasonable and rude. Is it?

GENTLE READER: No; their persistence is. But if your current method continues to fail, Miss Manners would also endorse your deleting these messages without comment.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I am of an unorthodox religious persuasion which holds the belief that the dead may be contacted, and that there are various aids to this process.

Anything tied to the dead person may be used, although the more intimately tied, the easier it is to establish the connection. The most intimate items, of course, would be segments of the deceased’s own body. So, to the question.

Is there any polite way to make it clear to a loved one that you hope, when they pass on, to inherit some part of them? I have racked my brain on this one and even done some research, and I am failing to come up with anything.

I suspect that if any rules apply, they would be the same that concern making it clear to a loved one that you hope to inherit any specific item -- which is to say, it’s very rude to ask at all.

But I think in this case it’s something not likely to enter most people’s minds. I would also like to make it clear that I wouldn’t be making this request to, say, anyone who may believe that it is necessary to their resurrection that their corpse remain intact. Rather, I would be asking friends and family who are (for instance) Buddhist or atheist, and therefore not likely to be overly concerned with what becomes of their physical remains, or co-religionists, who may be sympathetic to my inquiry, but still distressed at conversations involving their own mortality.

GENTLE READER: What did you have in mind? “Mind if I borrow your eyeballs when you croak?”

Miss Manners is afraid that she is unable to help find a polite way to say this -- as there is a reason it never entered anyone’s minds. If you truly think that certain family members or friends might be amenable to it, she supposes that you could ease into the conversation by telling them of your beliefs and asking their general thoughts on organ donation. If they’re squeamish about that, then you can be reasonably certain that they will not want their body parts used to get a call from you in the afterlife.

(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 am a middle school teacher, and although we are not beginning classes in person yet this year, I cannot stop thinking about something that always bugs me at the beginning of the school year.

Many of my students walk around campus with some type of earbuds in. It is an expectation of mine that when talking or listening, students take them out. This is because the other person involved cannot know whether the person with earbuds is listening to audio or to them.

I explain this to the students, and emphasize that it is an issue of showing respect to the person you are conversing with. They often fight back on this rule and insist that turning off the audio when conversing is enough.

Am I missing the mark on what’s important here? Do you think removing earbuds is something that shows respect or lack thereof?

GENTLE READER: These students will also probably try to convince you that they can listen while playing video games, texting their friends and playing with slime, but the optics are still rude.

Proper etiquette is so often shown through symbolism. Taking one’s cap off in school provides no practical purpose, but it shows reverence for the institution. Demanding that ear pieces be removed when talking to others is, Miss Manners assures you, entirely within your jurisdiction. You are the teacher. It is your duty (as well as the parents’) to teach your students respect. In fact, it is probably the most valuable and practical lesson they can learn.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: What is the meaning of white hydrangeas and lilies in a vase left at the doorstep of a single woman?

GENTLE READER: That the sender wants to tempt the recipient’s innocence and then to mourn its loss.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: We have two great-nieces who are sisters. One has graduated from college, and the other from high school. They are truly lovely girls, both very intelligent and mature.

They live in another state, and we would like to send them both monetary gifts to mark the occasions of their graduations. Normally, we would send more money for a college graduation gift than a high school graduation gift -- and therein lies our dilemma.

The girls are both currently living at home, and while we would obviously send a separate card/check to each of them, it feels odd to send one great-niece more money than the other. As I mentioned, they are both very mature, and I don’t think they would question the differing amounts, but I still haven’t been able to write the checks.

GENTLE READER: Then refrain. That is the problem with giving money as a present: The beneficiary knows exactly how much the gift is worth.

While your great-nieces may not question it now, it will soon occur to the younger one, at least, that her status is not going to change. You can avoid this with equal checks, but Miss Manners instead recommends choosing presents that reflect their differing tastes -- not the relative value of the recipient’s achievements.

(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 often enjoy margaritas on the rocks with salt on the glass rim. He has a habit of first licking the salt on the rim and then taking a swig.

I think this habit is rude, but he thinks it is no problem. I simply take a drink normally, enjoying the salt while drinking (not licking!). Is his habit socially acceptable, as he claims, in the context of margarita drinking?

GENTLE READER: Licking is the prerogative of those not old enough for margaritas -- and, even then, it is limited to popsicles, lollipops and other inherently silly foods.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I just started walking a friend’s three dogs in the evenings while he’s at work. They are very sweet animals, but one of them has difficulties interacting with other dogs. Even if she seems excited, she can snap and get protective when another dog gets really close.

I’m strong and calm enough to hold her in place safely, and we specifically try to walk at times and on side streets that won’t have many other people out with their animals. The problem is a single path through a local park.

Usually when we go, it’s more or less abandoned. It isn’t a dog park, or even fenced in. It’s not very wide, and it’s the only way back to the house that doesn’t involve a main road with sometimes-dangerous traffic. And, especially in bad weather, it’s almost impossible to move off the path onto the grass, which is what I’ve done with other anxious or excitable dogs in the past.

Despite all this, there have been a couple of occasions when someone has had their dog off-leash and tried to engineer a meet-and-greet. By “engineer,” I mean their dog was already much closer to us than the owners, and they called out cheerfully to let us know that their dog was friendly.

What is the polite way to approach this situation? The last dogs I walked were very small, so when someone else was being unsafe about letting theirs charge off-leash -- or giving me incredibly dirty looks when one of “my” dogs started barking because they saw someone else’s approaching down the street -- I could just pick the dogs up and carry them around the nearest corner or in the opposite direction.

But one of these dogs is almost 50 pounds, and while I can keep her at my heel in a bad situation, picking her up and walking off just isn’t an option. I’d rather just avoid these situations altogether, but when someone is being so friendly and oblivious while doing something so dangerous, I feel like a deer in the headlights.

GENTLE READER: The approaching owners communicated that their dogs are friendly. You need to communicate that yours (really, your friend’s), to your regret, are not.

Take a firm grip on the leash, lean back as if the dog is about to pull you forward, and tilt your head to one side with an apologetic shrug. This may work, but it may not: In Miss Manners’ experience, dogs are often better at reading body language than their masters. If that is the case, call out, “I’m so sorry, but I’m the dog walker and this one is not good around other dogs.”

(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.)