Thursday, March 12, 2009
Trimester Three, Blog Two (due 3/15 at midnight)
After considering our class discussion regarding the Lynne Truss excerpt and rudeness, come to your own conclusion about rudeness. Make a statement about rudeness (such as Truss’ statement that “abuse is becoming accepted as the quickest and smartest way of dealing with criticism in all areas of life”), and support your assertion with anecdotal examples (130). You should also comment on at least one other classmate’s post. If you are the first to post, pose a thoughtful question for your classmates to consider.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
8 comments:
Rudness is a state of being. It is a part of the human condition, from time to time everyone of us experiences the urge to be rude. The question remains... Is acting on this urge acceptable? Or...is it harmful? In two instances I have found rudness to be both acceptable and harmful. The first I have titled "An Eye for An Eye." Once, at the optometrist office, I nearly had a smack down with one of the employees. The story is this...I was waiting for my prescription to be filled, that is...my contact lenses to be replaced. Usually the word waiting is accompanyed with the image of a line. Well, you see, here there was no line. I was merely waiting on the clerk to finish chatting with her boyfriend on the phone. This action can be classified as the instigating action (action A). I felt that this action (action A) could only be returned with rudness, as is often customary. I told her that I was waiting and that if she didn't want to help me, I was sure her superiour would be very accomodating. This was rude, however, it followed an action of rudness, which is ok. The next story is one in which rudness was found to be harmful. I have entitled this, "The Postman in the Mirror." Once, many eons ago, when I was in the eigth grade I encountered my postman on a friday morning. He arrived on my doorstep with a package...for me, of all people. Then he asked a question--which was also an instigating action; although, it was not rude. He asked, "Do you have a way of identifying yourself?" Cleverly, or I thought I was at the time, I ran to my room to fetch a mirror. When I returned to the waiting postman, I held the mirror up to my face and said, "yep, it's definetly me!" This, he did not take very well. He turned puce and nearly threw the package at me. I guess he wasn't having a wonderful day. And the harmful effect of my rude action (action A) is that in the present day, this postman and I have a terrible relationship.
THE END
I believe that rudeness is now, more than ever, apparent in our youth. They have little to no respect for anyone or anything, and trump about as if they own whatever room they happen to walk into. Unfortunately, those of us who are passive, (I say this with myself in mind) aren't always so wonderful with the "eye for an eye" theory, as previously mentioned by Elysia. My story on this topic happened at my place of employment. While working at Main Street, a group of lovely hoodlums decided unanimously to stain the fireplace with hair dye from a box. Now, call me crazy, but I'm having trouble locating the dying of a fireplace in my top hundred list of cool things to do. First of all, our coffee shop is ideally a place for people to toss around witty banter, drink coffee, and finish up work...unless I just haven't been clued in to our latest beauty shop commodities yet. Not only did these imps give us an uneeded makeover, they also added to the vocality and selective word choice that day by shamelessly blurting out a constant stream of profanity. Their actions portrayed rudeness in several ways. Primarily, they had absolutely no respect for our property or for those of us who had to clean it up (cough, cough). Secondly, their obnoxious nature and potty mouths disturbed the evenings of many other paying customers. All in all, middle schoolers should probably be chained up...and most definatly deprived of hair dye.
Rudeness, in any case, is a choice not an obligation. No matter what situation one finds themselves in, they have a choice of action-- "to be [rude] or not to be [rude], that is the question." One example of this is when I practice my trombone at home (not often) and my brother yells at me to stop. Each time this happens I have to opportunity to either tell him to shut up (return the rudeness), keep playing, or stop.
In answer to Elysia's question, "is rudeness harmful," I respond that it is. I think that in every situation rudeness can be avoided, and if it is it can help you more than hinder you. If I return the favor of my brother's yelling I get in back, not him leaving me alone as I would like, but more yelling and put downs. In no way does this help me learn the finer points of musicianship.
Rudness, as stated by all previous bloggers, has become a major issue in today's society. Young people in our world seem to have never been taught respect, responsibility, and manners. Furthermore, I believe, also stated by previous bloggers, that rudness is an urge that can be reacted upon or ignored. Different situations cause different emotions and actions.
One instance of rudness that occurs in my very own household bugs me oh so much. I absolutely hate it, HATE IT, when my parents, or even my sister, walk downstairs to where I am enjoying a relaxing period of time watching television, take the remote, and change the channel. I mean, what the heck?! I was just watching that. Not even a please or may I, they just take it! But now I'm ranting.
My question to all of you, is do you think that rudness in youth has become more evident over time, and if it has, in your opinion, why do you think so? My personal opinion is that there is a lack of support coming from the home and parents of today's children suck at parenting. Now I'm ranting. Again. Moving forward, it will be interesting to see if the continuing downward spiral of manners and courtesy will fall to even lower depths as a new generation emerges. Keep your fingers crossed folks, because if they do continue with this trend, I'm personally bashing in as many heads as possible. Rudness can be harmful and CAN be avoided. End of story
Rudeness is one well-known attribute that is becomingly seen more and more throughout the world. It's not necessarily becoming more accepted, but rather less acknowledged. Many employees who utilize this attribute on a daily basis are rarely, if ever, reprimanded by their supervisors for this behavior. Those who experience this behavior often just shrug it off or mumble "the last word" under their breath, and feel as though they kept their pride, whether said employee heard them or not. Either way, rudeness will continue to pollute the everyday atmosphere of our world.
Rudeness is something that people use to hide behind. It is one of those things that people use to not let others get too close. It is also a way to let others know that we are not interested in them, nor do we care what they are doing so long as they give us what we want and leave us alone.
I agree with Ben that rudeness is started with parents. Parents teach their children rudeness by how they treat them and how they treat other people. The children then grow up being rude, teach their own children to be rude, and the snowballing continues. At the rate that this world is heading, we will all be rude and nasty in, oh I don't know, say ten years. That is unless some of us can grasp the concept of rudeness, and can change their ways and teach future generations.
I do not feel the need to enlighten my peers on the overwhelming rise of rudeness, nor to define the actual nature of this entity. It is something we all live with, not only from others but within our own minds. We are constantly replying to others with snide things we wish we would have said, and sometimes, with a little courage or maybe stupidity, blurting out these secret hatreds. What I do wish to surmise however, is the actual root of rudeness. While many would point the finger of blame to anger, the actual source of rudeness is fear. Fear that a person is less then their enemy, fear that they are being belittled. There is no definite way to gage whether acting rude helps or defeats the situation entirely. Puffing up one’s feathers only helps when your enemy is weak enough to submit to fear. We constantly try to throw in the last word, hoping that now we are finally the bigger person. We can walk away from a situation with a sense of triumph if we know we’ve caused the ultimate humiliation. In ways, it’s invigorating to know you’ve succeeded in verbal smack down, but many times, the outcome of our impulsive behavior is more than we bargained for. One word of retaliation can separate a situation from being a momentary feud to being lifelong nemesis. Ultimately, the decision lies with those pushed to the edge of reason and restraint. Is the momentary release of letting them “have it” worth the long time consequences or is it better to walk away?
I have to say that I agree with Elysia when she said that rudeness is a state of being, and that every one is in that state from time to time. But, I think the majority of the time, rudeness stems from just plain not thinking.
For example, with my sister. Time and time again, she will come home from college on the weekends and borrow the car. She'll leave Sunday night, and on Monday morning I'll get in the car and start driving, only to realize my gas light is on. She's done this numerous times. It is my opinion that she, and others, just don't think about other people sometimes. I'm not just saying that only she does it, but everyone does. You just get caught up in your own thinking. I know I certainly do sometimes. But, since she did that to me yet again this weekend, I'm not so sympathetic. I checked this evening and my gas light's on. Again. This is when "not thinking" turns into rudeness. It's common courtesy that when you borrow something, you return it in the state you borrowed it in.
And to comment on Tori's hair-dye catastrophe, that's just dumb. Who just does stuff like that? Middle schoolers should indeed be chained up.
Post a Comment