Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

To: babble-on

I know the feeling, but I believe the real difficulty is that nobody understands the meaning of “public” or “community” anymore and everyone believes he or she is entitled to have the world the way it would be if he or she were in the living room at home. One example: a father who wanted to read aloud to his daughter on an airplane for 3 hours became outraged when I asked the stewardess if I could have a different seat, as I wanted to study; a mother became outraged because I, wearing a business suit and on my way to a week’s conference where I would not have access to dry cleaning, removed the soap bubble jar from her toddler who was sitting next to me and asked her to please find something for him to do that would not spill. In the latter case she whined “Well, how else am I going to keep him quiet?” and I looked Junior in the eye and said, “Hush!” in the Mom voice and he shut up like a trap. But she was still not amused. And last week on the way home, a Murmuring Daddy was trying to Parent Effectiveness Training his brat who was sitting next to me (Daddy was standing) and demanding that his father place him on his shoulders on a subway car that was too short for that activity -— whereupon the kid let out a screech that, no lie, was just as loud as a Formula One car passing the main grandstand at Monza at full song (I have reason to know whereof I speak). I restrained myself from slapping him insensible, but did tell his father that if he’d warned me the kid was a bat I’d have put in my ear plugs. Daddy murmured, “He’s only a child....”

So it is possible that EVERYONE in that car could have examined his or her behaviour to see if it was disturbing and annoying to others; but I think this guy went about it the wrong way.


32 posted on 04/09/2008 9:17:06 AM PDT by Appleby
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 17 | View Replies ]


To: Appleby
So it is possible that EVERYONE in that car could have examined his or her behaviour to see if it was disturbing and annoying to others; but I think this guy went about it the wrong way.

There's always the kid that sits behind me or my wife on an airplane and incessantly kicks the seat - into your back. Then again, most human beings bug me one way or another, but I've learned to IGNORE them all. lol
43 posted on 04/09/2008 9:32:18 AM PDT by Rick.Donaldson (http://www.transasianaxis.com - Please visit for lastest on DPRK/Russia/China/et al.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 32 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson