It's about fried chicken

[Sancho]

6. I grew up in the South...and was subject to motherly rules...

First, if it's a bunch of guys or informal family, anything goes...
but if you are at some kind of formal, debutant, wedding thing, "the only time you use your fingers are shrimp with tails and small sandwiches on trays". Frankly, if dinner is KFC you are already in the "anything goes" category! Of course you may need to save the buckets and clean them up to pass around at revivals.

I don't know if it's just the South, but we had some interesting rules from Dad too:
"You can drink (alcohol) at any age if there's no woman within 50 miles who knows you."