Etiquette Shmedicate

Is it just me, or have people gotten incredibly ruder in the last 10 years or so? Are there just so many more of us that we intrude upon one another more often, or are we turning into a nation of insensitive jerks? You make the call…

I’m voting for ruder, by the way...

Now, some of the phenomena I observe regularly and shake my head in disbelief at is technologically induced, I’ll grant; but isn’t it incumbent upon us to use this stuff wisely and decently? Take cell phones, for instance, (One of my great pet peeves…) What kind of person conducts phone calls while using a public toilet? I mean, I can kinda see playing the onboard games while in the shitter, although hearing little beeps and boops while doing one’s business is just a tad disconcerting… When did pooping and talking at the same time become OK: And of course, thereby sharing the whole conversation, as well? Wireless ear pieces for phones are now all the rage, so not only are people holding tacitly personal conversations in pretty much every public place, they appear to be talking to themselves, which cranks the weirdness factor up a tick or two…

I know I’ve said this before, but honestly, I am gonna find one of them PLEASE, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, HANG UP THE PHONE AND DRIVE bumper stickers and put it on my car. My friend J.B., who is truly a redneck, (He calls himself an Educated Redneck, “Which means Ah’ll tell yoo whut I’m a-gonna do to yoo bah-for ah do it…”), got so mad at one he considered tossing a golf ball out his sunroof in retaliation, (“Woulda bounced twice an’ landed right in the’ middle o’ the hood…”) Yeah, that could be dangerous, but I sure understand how frustration could build to that level…

And for that matter, (Final rant on cell phones for now, I promise), who decided that it was OK to focus entirely on the conversation at hand while doing anything in public? If you can’t walk and chew gum, spit the fuckin’ gum out, OK? I mean really: If you are incapable of talking and walking, shopping, driving, or even being around other humans while maintaining at least a semblance of a clue as to what is going on around you – HANG UP THE FUCKIN’ PHONE, BONEHEAD!

Road rage – This is definitely a fairly recent phenomenon – What changed? What switch in the common psyche got flipped that makes people fight, chase, even kill another human being for a driving faux pas, real or perceived?

Yeah, some parents were assholes to coaches and ref’s when I was a kid playing organized baseball or hockey, but I don’t remember parents shooting coaches, do you? You’re going to kill your kid’s High School football coach ‘cause you don’t think he’s playin’ your kid enough? For that matter, what kind of idiot later describes these criminals as, “Just a nice, normal guy,” when discussing their now incarcerated neighbors? Birds of a feather…

Have people always parked their shopping carts right in front of a rack, then wandered off to contemplate a purchase, and genuinely looked pissed off because you moved the cart, which was in front of what you wanted to buy? Did they always look huffy and say, “How rude!” under their breath after reclaiming their carts?

Have people always moseyed along at a snail’s pace in a store, not even remotely aware of the fact that nobody can get by them because they’ve spread themselves across the entire width of the aisle? Have they always looked pissy when somebody who wants to move faster says “Excuse me?” and tries to get through?

Granted, people have always talked in movies, but have they always been outraged when somebody tells them to shut up? Have they always threatened to kill the poor working sap that gets sent to shush them in response to numerous complaints?

I’ve seen variations of this kind of behavior for a long time now, because I work in sales, and Salespeople are famous for the My Shit Is Infinitely More Important Than Whatever You’re Doing attitude, but it seems to be spreading to the general public. Walking up to the meat counter and telling the guy you need help now, when there’re eight or nine other people in front of you, spread out along the counter, who took numbers and have been patiently waiting their turn… And then being pissy with the butcher when he points that out? When did incredibly rude, vitriolic tirades become mainstream and acceptable behavior?

When the recent story on Mel Gibson’s DUI arrest came out, I checked out the entertainment news network that broke the lead on the missing four pages of the Deputy’s original report. In response to his drunken threats to, “Ruin,” the Deputy because Mel “Owns Malibu,” and his blatantly anti-Semitic tirade, readers who wrote comments on that site were overwhelmingly in favor of Mel; “He’s right, the Jews are the world-wide cause of most problems,” and “Why can’t he go out and have a good time like a normal person and not get hassled?” were pretty typical of the comments I read. Wait... Doing twice the speed limit, having an open fifth of Tequila in the car, impugning the Deputies race and/or faith, and resisting arrest - These are examples of having a good time like a normal person? I was afraid of that...

That, in and of itself, was enough to convince me that we have indeed become a society largely composed of insensitive, self-absorbed clods with the social graces of a fruit fly, (Always in your face and really difficult to swat). I wasn’t raised that way, our kids weren’t raised that way, and neither were our friends. Maybe this kind of thing is why we don’t get out much anymore, but then again, we’re not missing much either, are we?

There, I feel better now – Don’t you?