Git Mishige,
DaasYochid, if you help someone switch their flat tire and the guy drives off without saying thank you, would it bother you?
Apples and oranges. There are many potential reasons that a thank you card didn’t come in the mail, but very few reasons someone wouldn’t verbally say “thank you” if you helped them change their flat tire. Also, the flat tire is one person doing an extended kindness, whereas thank you cards are a situation where many people are doing a kindness all at once.
It seems that in todays day and age things are taken for granted and sheer manners is lacking, starting with yourself
That comment lacked manners as well.
Being dan l’kaf zechus does not mean that if you fail to receive a thank you note, you have to pretend that the person sent it, but it got lost in the mail or abducted by aliens. It means realizing that people are human beings and make mistakes, and there could be a myriad of reasons that you don’t know about.
For example, the recipient may have a great sense of hakaras hatov, but poor organizational skills, and lost his or her list of gifts and givers. Or they accidentally checked your name off the “note sent” list. Or didn’t keep good enough track of who sent what from the get go. Or mis-attributed your gift to someone else (FYI – I once received a thank you note for a gift that I did not give, which means someone else didn’t receive a thank you note for that gift!).
Are these things mistakes and wrong for someone to do? Yes! But perhaps they are more forgivable faults than an assumption of straight-up rudeness. Should the recipient(s) keep better track of gifts and work harder to show their appreciation? Yes! But can you stand up and say that you are superhuman and have never, ever let anyone down? Being dan l’kaf zechus in this case perhaps isn’t about absolving someone of guilt, but of realizing that they are human, made a mistake, and weren’t out to get you. And that they would have sent you a card had they not been encumbered by their human faults.
Note carefully in all of this that I am not advocating for neglecting thank you notes.