I've seen it when people describe interacting with American wait staff at restaurants or similar venues - apparently not realizing that those employees are often required to act cheerful and aggressively polite to customers or else risk being fired, or losing necessary tips.
Speaking as someone from the UK, we know perfectly well that it’s required as part of the job. It’s one of the reasons we hate it so much: because we can tell it’s completely fake & we don’t appreciate being lied to.
People in the UK would rather have dour but straightforward service than forced cheeriness that speaks of some kind of “compulsory smiles everyone!” management acting behind the scenes.
