I was raised to address strangers and those I wish to show social deference to as “Sir” or “Ma’am”. It’s a difficult habit to break, as it is deeply engrained.
What is an equivalent gender neutral honorific that is relatively common in English? If I can’t break the habit I’d rather have a substitute word to use instead of an awkward pause in the middle of addressing someone
I’d just use Google to ask but I’d rather ask the people directly rather than an AI generated answer based off of Reddit threads
I can’t think of one that would be as universal as the sir/ma’am pair.
I think it’s probably most polite to ask them.
Or at least to assume one or the other, use it with an enquiring tone, apologise if corrected and move on.
But that won’t fuel the internet discourse™!