Rude...
How does one battle rude in a society where rude, boorish behavior has become the norm? Of course it is so easy to leap right to a place of rudeness when confronted with a barbaric behavior, thus rendering the victim the perpetrator. Additionally, if one speaks too often about the slights that one has endured or observed then one paints himself as a perpetual victim, which he is not.
That said; let’s look at Sunday, yesterday as an example. A friend and I were headed to the farmer’s market and were on a one way street and approaching a traffic light, a green traffic light where a man in a pick up truck had exited his vehicle and walked to a vehicle behind him to carry on a conversation in the roadway. What on Earth would make a person think that this is an appropriate action to take; blocking a lane of traffic and scoffing at the law and making the other users of the roadway either wait or go around?
At the farmer’s market my friend was purchasing a lovely bouquet of fresh flowers and the vendor was diligently helping him. A woman approached and waited all of four seconds before she interrupted the vendor and engaged the vendor is a five minute conversation about various flowers, their prices and characteristics; taking the vendor away from her task and making a customer, my friend, wait. In the end the woman walked off without buying anything. My observation, she never had any intention of making a purchase, she felt entitled to interrupt and she did just that.
Fast forward three hours to my weekly shopping at Kroger, where countless other shoppers parked their carts in the center of the aisles blocking all other shoppers; where other shoppers, mobile telephone to ear walked up and down the center of aisles oblivious to other people and even in some instances forcing others “out of their way.” This act is played out daily on our roads and highways too where if one is not driving fast enough, then one is tailgated and forced to move out of the way or off the road. Where getting there first often means that I will kill you or put you in harm’s way to do so.
The fix for these problems starts at infancy. Parents in our society have failed. We have raised generations of me first, ego centric, brutes that care only for their rights but take little if any responsibility and have no clue or understanding of what it is to be a lady or gentleman. We have failed to teach generations to let others go first, to say thank you in stores when a purchase is made, to move over and let others pass and to wait one’s turn. Is it any wonder that our roadways are strewn with litter? Why someone else will pick it up. Is it any wonder that all too often a gun, knife or ax is picked up to do in a family member or co-worker or neighbor? It is indeed a sad, sad state.
