I’m sure this could have happened anywhere. On any busy street at any time of day in any ordinary part of any big city. But it happened a couple of hours ago at the junction of Tunstall Road and Dewsbury Road, Beeston. You must know the place.
I was heading into town. I’d managed to avoid getting run down at the previous junction, the one between the old Sammy Grants factory and Winstones – not somewhere you would wish to be caught dead, for reasons that any local would tell you – which is a feat in itself as it’s easily the most stupid, inhuman, and dangerous pedestrian crossing known to humanity (and I use the phrase “pedestrian crossing” with a huge dose of irony, as it was obviously designed by the team that brought you Death Race 2000.) Anyway, I’d managed to cheat certain termination at the crossing from hell and I was feeling that feeling you get when you have just escaped a life endangering encounter. I approached Tunstall Road positively pinging with endorphins. I was immortal, invulnerable, god-only wise.
Tunstall Road has a central aisle. Traffic on the South side comes from the M62 slip road. From the North side the cars are coming from town and heading for the roundabout that takes you to the M62. It’s pretty busy most times of the day. Pedestrians cross the road in two stages, meeting people travelling the opposite way in the middle, the slim, noisy, not exactly hospitable, central aisle.
Today only three people were my counterparts on the opposite side of the road; a young Asian woman, and a guy in his late twenties carrying a two/two-and-a-half year old on his shoulders.
As we converged halfway across I caught a snatch of the Asian lady’s mobile phone call – to a customer service centre so, well, it wasn’t exactly polite – and noticed the guy was singing to his kid – it sounded like some heavy techno tune, and obviously wasn’t Postman Pat, but I thought, hey, that’s lovely.
Yards before they reached the protection of the central concrete sliver of safety there was a minor collision. Nothing malicious, no damage done, and nothing really to write home about. The tip of the chaps shoe somehow managed to clip the back of the lady’s flip-flop, detaching the hopelessly inappropriate footwear into the road. She had to retreat a whole fifteen inches to retrieve it.
I’m sure I detected a moment of hesitation in the guys response. A charitable pause where he reflected on the responsibility of being in charge of an impressionable infant, considered the immense implications that parenthood entails, and began to craft an appropriate response that his small son could emulate as a model of sweet reason in such a tricky social situation. But, unfortunately, the lady got her retaliation in first.
Now, a lot of my family are from mining stock. I’m familiar with pit village, tap room banter. But this lady would have made the coarsest collier blush. Before the guy had even chance to apologise she had questioned his manhood, his legitimacy, his intelligence, and called him names that I would not care to repeat in print.
This was not received well by the fellow at fault. He responded in kind. Or, rather, unkind.
There I was, stuck in the middle of a carbon monoxide-choked hell hole with a Jerry Springer situation. But I was feeling like a messiah, wasn’t I!
Surely these people could be brought to their senses, I reasoned. They could buckle down and bring themselves to decent, respectful, adult behaviour, even if it was just for the sake of the kid. I knew I had to say something. That’s minimum kind of social duty, right?
“Erm, any chance you two might, erm, well, you know . . . button it?” I said, forcefully.
Both turned and regarded me, agog.
Fortunately I took evening classes in agog (pure and applied) at my local adult education institute. Then I read for a degree in higher agog at Leeds uni, so I’m fluent in all fourteen dialects of contemporary and classical agog. Currently I’m researching a PhD in the cultural ramifications of agog in social media in the School of Art, Architecture and Design at Leeds Met. I’m something of an expert when it comes to agog. Agog don’t phase me.
Seriously, I thought they were both going to join forces and shove me under a passing 42 tonne articulated lorry.
Both these people were citizens of a country with long traditions of tolerance and a live-and-let-live ideology, however flawed. Both, presumably, had benefited from free education, health care and social security (however imperfect, and getting more imperfect day by day) through most of their formative years. So why the instant recourse to casual rudeness, inconsideration and downright nastiness? Surely we should expect better, shouldn’t we?
It’s not an isolated incident, sadly. Anybody who ventures out in public these days will have similar stories. And I’m not asking “What should be done?” which is simply shorthand for demanding someone else take responsibility and then blaming them for not doing it properly. But my question is, should I have just kept my trap shut?
Who appointed me Morals and Manners police anyhow?
As someone who doesn’t tolerate idiots very well I probably would’ve done the same and said something. I don’t think there is anything wrong with stopping people behaving like that in public in front of any audience… even worse that there was a child involved.
I saw a question on Twitter earlier which said “has the mobile changed our ability to plan ahead – are we more short term/ fickle because we are always connected”. as someone old enough to remember a time before mobiles I feel the answer to that question is “yes”. social media seems to take away some of that commitment towards an event because it’s just the click of a button to say “Maybe” or “Not Attending”.
I think you could apply some similar thinking to manners and social interaction in general. yes, we’re always “connected” but in many instances we are protected by the bubble of the internet and i’m left thinking that some people just don’t know how to act when you put them outside and into the real world or tear them away from their smartphone screens for more than a couple of minutes.
a bit more time each day in actual conversation would do some people the world of good.
I think the internet bubble is more than a metaphor. How often do you walk along a busy street having to avoid iDiots humming away to their iPod, tapping away on their iPhone, updating Facebook on their iPad, expecting the world to part before them? Well, it’s no more politeness by proxy for me; they shall feel the wrath of my size 15’s treading on their iGnorant little toes.
The people moving while texting isn’t the problem, it’s the ones who stop suddenly or turn without looking.