Neighbourhoods

This is a platform altercation (well almost)

Here’s a wee tale about responses to incivility in public space. I was on a train the other day – corridor carriages, seats facing – and sat almost opposite a young couple who were dozing, the young man rather slumped with his legs sticking out.

Some ticket inspectors came through, and then at the next stop a woman got on and the first I knew was to hear her cursing the young man: “tuck your legs in you silly sod! What am I supposed to do, jump over them!?” Etc. But she sat next to him even though there were other places available.

He apologised quietly and pulled himself up. She was still cursing. I stared at her dark glasses and suggested that if she took her glasses off she might be able to see well enough to notice that there is plenty of room to pass. I said that her remark was unfair. She said “I’ve got arthritis.” The young man kept saying “I’m sorry.”

Then one of the ticket inspectors appeared from beside the doors – I had not realised he was still with us – and suggested to the woman that she apologise. “I thought that was very rude,” he said. And she did.

 

The curious incident of the dog-owner in the early morning

Into the last mile of an early hour’s run last Saturday, I passed through a wicket onto fenced common land. The field is about a mile in perimeter and mainly used by dog-walkers plus a few other runners. I found the gate unfastened (there is a rather pointless leather strap that can be used to hold it in position) and I left it so, as it is more often than not.

Fifty metres further on I heard a bellowing accusation, directed at me – ‘You might have shut the gate…’ I pointed out that I’d left it as I’d found it. There followed a torrent of abuse, extraordinarily loud for 06.35 in the morning. Amongst it all was the instruction, whatever the circumstances, to fasten the gate shut out of ‘respect for the public’. (That’s a subject I can claim to know a little about, but this feller wasn’t to know that. In that context, he provided a tidy example of anti-social behaviour in the public realm).

He stomped off, telling me to fuck off. Bemused, I congratulated him on being sufficiently grown up to be able to swear at people.

There are two other gates to the field, neither of which has a fastening. It’s possible he feared a marauding horde of fierce peasants from the estates of the nearby town, I really don’t know. But the self-evident folly of his attitude seemed to illustrate perfectly the arrogant, superior middle-class middle-England conviction that it is the right of the Haves to tell others how to behave, whatever the context. It was like a local echo of the Westminster approach to Scotland.

I often puzzle over whether this is a universal phenomenon across time and geography. My experience from time spent in other countries suggests it is: but in England, with our centuries of pretend (and pretentious) imperial dominance, people do it better – with more emphasis, more conviction, more individual presumption of their own superiority. It seems such a shame.

 

‘This is a private conversation!’ When we need an official to intervene

I'm enchanted to discover that there is such a thing as the National Campaign for Courtesy. I bet they get some spam. Their chair has been praising the actions of a train driver who made an announcement rebuking a noisy mobile phone user.

The assumption is that ‘the announcement was made because another passenger complained to a guard’. This was a commuter train, and the first class carriage, so perhaps it was neither the first nor predictably the last occasion when the complainant encountered this individual behaving in this way.

Let's pass over the widely-held expectations that people who travel first class either (a) tend to be more civil towards one another than mere plebs, and/or (b) tend to be more assertive about their own importance and rights… It’s more instructive to think about how the story raises a central question in social relations: what is the point at which behaviour perceived as anti-social or uncivil, requires an intermediary?

Should the complainant have spoken first to the phone user? (And in the circumstances, would non-verbal communication, ironically, have done the job?) Some people would say they should have done so. I might have tried that myself, with a smile and gestures towards the ears or a finger to pursed lips.

In the neighbourhood context, where a comparable disagreement arises over noise, the advice is generally to try to speak to and reason with the offender first. Central and local authority websites, housing association guidance, consumer advice materials (e.g.), they all usually recommend that initially a personal, conciliatory approach should be tried.

The story raises a few issues about appropriate behaviour in the public realm and between neighbours. For a start, one-off instances of discourteous behaviour in the public realm are not the same as repeated cases. If you know your journey will soon be over and you are not likely to see the individual again, you may just choose to sit it out.

And community space is not the same as public space. If you live next door to someone whose behaviour you find uncivil or antisocial, your response might not be the same as it would be in a public venue, a park or square, or on public transport, or a non-local online forum, from which you can usually escape - whether or not you feel you have a strong sense of co-ownership of that space.

What’s more, you can’t always count on your fellow citizens to back you up if you do complain. People may not sympathise with your sense of injustice; or if they do, there may be other reasons why they feel unwilling to express any kind of support, which might leave you, finally, heavily dependent on whatever official intervention society has on offer. At its worst, this diminution of social capital can be exaggerated to the point that it puts enormous pressure on those official roles, until they in turn become defensive and cannot cope: think Northern Ireland, for instance, or even the Amsterdam of Anne Frank.

So I have sympathy for the train passenger who chose to refer to the train ‘guard’ (the term used in the report) or ‘steward’ (as we might call them now); as I do for the victims of neighbours from hell who cannot bring themselves to communicate with their tormentors but reach directly for some official intervention. A civil society recognises that humans can still be pretty rugged and occasionally we need officials, accountable to democratic bodies, to keep us from reverting to savagery.

And on the subject of train phone conversations, this seems like a good moment to share one of my favourite anecdotes from the literature, reported ten years ago:

‘A young woman is talking on the cell phone, apparently to her boyfriend, with whom she is in something of a crisis. Her voice projects in far-from dulcet tones. Most of the passengers take up a physical and postural stance of busying themselves with other foci of attention… busy doing “not overhearing this conversation”… Except for one passenger. And when the protagonist of this tale has her eyes intersect this fellow-passenger’s gaze, she calls out in outraged protest, ‘Do you mind?! This is a private conversation!’

Schegloff, E.A., 'Beginnings in the telephone', in Perpetual contact, Cambridge, 2002, p285-286.

 

 

Kids these days: juxtaprose 8

‘They have no fear of their teachers, they get into fights in their presence and talk back to them in the most offensive manner. They wear their rapiers not only on the street, but also in the school. They play ball during the church services and instruction periods, and even run wild in unseemly places.’ (Arnstadt City Council, 1706, quoted in).   (Previously juxtaprosed)

'An inspector said a 'core' of pupils had no boundaries, with some being ‘rude, aggressive and threatening violence’. One pupil was seen to tell the headteacher to ‘f’ off while others would just wander around the classroom. Parents complain about kids smoking on school property, bullying, fighting and rudeness to teachers.' (Daily Mail, 2012).

Where did all the vandals go?

Brian Wheeler discusses several theories about why vandalism rates are falling, among them:

• People have stopped reporting vandalism
• Stuff is harder to vandalise
• Anti-social behaviour crackdowns are working
• Vandalism prevention is more sophisticated
• Smartphones have killed boredom
• Social media is the new graffiti, and
• Young people are drinking less.

Of these, I certainly think the second and fourth have merit as arguments. But if you’re thinking ‘none of the above’, OK, how about the last, which could carry off the prize -

• Lead has been removed from petrol.

 

The unruly element (it's just a shot away)

If you ever feel you need reminding, against the general steady flow of filtered public opinion, that maybe the past wasn’t entirely devoid of anti-social behaviour – or that when anyone got a little boisterous it might not just have been high spirits – try this short interview extract (at about 17:20) with a not quite obscure popular music combo from a bygone age. (Six days left to listen).

The band in question had their kit trashed at a gig. Note the diffident, cultured accents, non-judgemental mild fascination at the episode, the interviewers' phrases like ‘an unruly element,’ and the question which begins ‘You must have been in some wild scenes before…?’

Wait, there's more. An account (at about 40:33) of some chap in 'bright purple velvet trousers... gaily embroidered collar and cuffs' - think Malvolio - reflecting that 'one perhaps doesn't ask for responsibilities... Perhaps one is given responsibilities when one is pushed into the limelight...' Thank you beeb.