Carl's Maundering Blog

Attention, self-proclaimed victims: respect is earned, not free.

This evening on the bus ride home, I sat on an unoccupied seat near the rear of the bus, listening to a podcast. In the seats behind me, there were some loud young men chatting with each other; I had the volume setting on my iPod turned up toward the loud side so that I could better focus on what I was listening to. (Spoken word podcasts tend to have much quieter output than music tracks, so I usually have the iPod volume turned up past the halfway setting anyway.)

About ten minutes into the ride, I felt a tap on the back of my head. One of the youth was apparently trying to get my attention, so I removed the earbuds and asked, "what is it?" This unfortunate youth then asked for something (I'm not sure what it was, it sounded like some sort of hip-hop jargon) and I replied, "I don't understand." He asked for it again (something like "bloof" or "baff"), and made a gesture with his fingers toward his mouth. I wondered if he was asking for a cigarette or drugs or something, but he decided that he needed to embellish his request with profanity, while one of his loud travelling friends looked at me and asked, "you don't know what a 'bruff' is?." (Again, I still don't know what term they were using.)

The boy (or young man, I suppose he could have been in his twenties) then began accusing me of disrespecting him - not in those words; most of his utterances employed rather disgusting language. I had had enough, and asked him to clean up his language - in those words. This set him into a mild rage; how dare I have the audacity to demand civility?

Before breaking eye contact, I said, "you have not earned my attention." As I returned my iPod's earbuds back to my ears, I heard his friend laugh and repeat my remark - "you haven't earned my attention" - then mention that their stop was coming soon.

Then the hoodlum struck me in the back of the head again. With an exasperated sigh (I'm not known for my patience, and I find that sighing not only helps to muster patience, but to signal to those around me that I'm having difficulty doing so), I removed the earbuds again and looked him in the eye.

He said, "Don't look down on me, man," and pointed to his forearm. I looked at his forearm. I'm not the quickest to understand subtle cues, but It was pretty clear he was pointing to his skin color, which was odd, because it wasn't very different from my own. Nevertheless, his implication was that his skin color excused his rude behavior, and that to express otherwise was racist. It was pathetic, really. His language and attitude plainly exposed, in the words of Dr. King, "the content of his character."

As he got up to leave, he again looked at me and said, "don't look down on me," this time inserting a few more profane words. I responded, "You're standing and I'm seated; I'm looking up at you, not down." Yes, that's how much of a nerd I am - I lace my retorts with lame puns.

At that moment, he reached down to my face and sent my glasses flying with a flick of his wrist. Then he exited the bus, so he may not have heard me exclaim that I would involve the authorities if he did so again.

After he left, I got some complimentary remarks from other passengers on the bus on the way I handled myself under the assaults of this hooligan. However, I regret the incident. I should have alerted the bus driver. I should have asked the operator to eject these passengers at the beginning, when they chose to abuse me with the language they probably learned from listening to hip-hop music.

I admire the belligerent bus behavior that made Rosa Parks famous, but I'm appalled by the idiot that rode the bus behind me today. I have always been taught to respect everybody, and I try to teach my children the same. I'm learning that respect should not always be granted by default to everybody. In the case of punks like today's assailant, respect has already been squandered; I'll gladly respect again once it has been earned through proper demeanor.

Here's a link to another Net Neutrality propaganda video. Although the graphic image used to advertize the video is off-putting, I still recommend clicking and watching it.

Again, this illustrates a cause that I agree with, but with supporters of the cause that use violent imagery, emotion-based "activist" rhetoric, and the glorification of mobocratic behavior to spread their message. It's hard because I feel strongly about the issue, but absolutely do not want to be identified with the uncouth "activist" grandstanders and attention seekers, even though they tend to share my views on this issue. I do not want a return to the improprieties that made the '60s infamous.