Quote:
Originally Posted by Bill14564
(Post 2023038)
This will be our second season seeing the snowbirds return though I'm not sure last year really counted. We've noticed a marked increase in rudeness in the last couple of weeks; does it always get this way and do we get to enjoy another five months of this?
Just this week:
- Car coming through the Residents gate honked at a cart that had the audacity to pull into the neighborhood rather than crossing the road. The cart didn't impede the car, it was well into the diamond lane before the car reached it, but apparently not sitting and waiting for the car to pass was an offense.
- Car swerving out of the Residents lane and coming through the open gate on the Visitors side without stopping honked at a cart stopped in the center area waiting for exiting cars to pass. Since the incoming car did not stop at the gate it's possible the cart was still part way in the lane when the car reached it which would have caused the car to have to actually slow down after it raced through the open gate.
- Shopper in Publix trying to push my wife out of the way with their cart as (edit) she was looking at the turkey breasts. "I want one of those," seemed be the signal that her time had expired and she was required to move or risk being bumped.
- Shopper exiting Publix making rude comment about me being stopped to load groceries. Not parked, actually sitting in the drivers seat with the vehicle in drive as groceries were actively being loaded but apparently I was inconveniencing them somehow.
|
In large parts of North America—indeed most of it—politeness, thoughtfulness, and patience are engrained. It’s just how people are. They can wait an extra couple seconds. There;s no big hurry. There are a few areas—generally crowded, but not all crowded places—where there is little patience with delay or indecisiveness. People are expected to be ready, to know what they want, to get what they need and go. This is what prevents chaos. For example, in New York City, a tourist from Pennsylvania who refuses to edge across a busy street in a car or push into a turn after a light changes holds up dozens of cars behind. If people stand outside a subway car unsure of whether to enter, some other people are blocked and may miss their train, and this may disrupt their entire evening.
There are a lot of different cultures in this country. In some cultures, honking is not only acceptable but nearly required. Think for a minute about American cultures. If your family has lived in, say, Beatrice, Nebraska, for a century, a huge amount of how you see the world is culturally conditioned. In so many ways, you react the way your grandparents did to whatever happens. And if you move to The Villages, your speed of doing things meshes with that of a large percentage of villagers. But what if your family has lived in, say, Brooklyn or Long Island for a century? Even in 1860, New York and it’s environs were teeming with activity. It hasn’t gotten better. People got off the ships, found rooms and jobs as quickly as possible, worked long hours in thousands of businesses, then rushed through the crowds to get home for dinner and a fight with the family. “Time is money” was burned into the brain. Children and grandchildren inherited it, along with many other traits and accents. It’s a large part of the reason why the city has thrived, even though it’s also sort of a long-term trauma that damages the brain, like multiple concussions.
This way of reacting to events is not changed in a few days as people unwind. It’s a part of one’s being. It gets better, but it can take years. And if your culture considers honking a way of saying “pay attention,” who teaches you that it isn’t acceptable? And who are they to decide? Have you ever listened to someone speak with a very slow Southern drawl and wondered if they think as slowly as they speak? Like their minds as well as their tongues are wading through molasses? Or you hear people from New York or some similar place talking so fast you can’t follow them? You wonder if they can think as fast as they speak, and you find it exhausting.
I lived for decades in rural Pennsylvania, but after a year here, while I try to be polite, I find that I’m still in a hurry and impatient with indecisiveness and a failure to pay attention and an inability to gauge the speed of traffic and merge. And yet I’m incapable of driving in New York City! I seem like a hopeless oaf to them, and that’s the way some people here seem to me.
Add to that a level of pent-up anger a lot of us seem to have, even though we love it here. I’m not sure why that is. Still, I’ve seen more people in vehicles here giving the finger to other people in vehicles in one year than I’ve seen in the rest of my life combined. It’s as if a lot of us old guys are spoiling for a fight—and I’m definitely not.
So in brief, if it’s rudeness, it’s come by honestly, and it isn’t easy to eliminate. If people are rude to you somewhere, ask yourself what could have led to that, whether it’s because of their upbringing and culture, rather than because they are offensive people. Maybe you yourself are being selfish, getting in people’s way, not thinking, doing what you are used to doing instead of paying attention. That happens around here, and it doesn’t get better with age.
