Teenage Kicks

[batbat]

We watched 10 Things I Hate About You last night; one of those films that just happens to be on and which you become unavoidably sucked into, like a televisual mind-flayer. Actually, I loved it. It could hardly fail being based on such foolproof material - it would be difficult not to make a good high-school reworking of The Taming of the Shrew,

Comments

[alsoname]

What a great entry. I've been thinking about this issue a lot these days.

There is a monthly short-film contest at the local independent theater. Every month, people bring in their short films and they are projected onto the biggest screen in the southern portion of the state. It's an opportunity for ANYONE to get their film screened in a Real Movie Theater. (The catch is that after three minutes the audience can "gong" it.)

So this month I was sitting in the same row as a couple of asshole teenagers. They were "gonging" everyone else's films and yelling out abuse. So then it came time for their film to be screened. It was a terrible movie that had been filmed on a cell phone, with all the requisite bad image and sound quality. Not to mention, oh, bad script (or, more likely, no script), bad editing, bad acting, etc. And while it was playing, I looked over and the kid was futzing around on his cell phone, sending text messages or something. Like the fact that his awful movie was being projected onto the biggest screen in the region, which is an opportunity he will NEVER have again, meant nothing to him.

Later that night, his friend answered his phone and had a full-fledged conversation during someone else's film. And he was talking in a normal volume, not trying to be discreet or quiet.

I think cell phones are giving rise to a whole new conception of etiquette. Granted, these two kids would probably be considered to be assholes even by their peers, but still I see a lot of kids doing things with cell phones that they probably think are perfectly acceptable, but that strike me as rather rude.

[batbat]

It worries me more that people aren't willing to tell people like that to, frankly, shut the fuck up. I'm still naive enough to think that society as a whole is responsible for the behaviour of its members, so I tend to tell people who are being obnoxious on cellphones to keep the noise down - unless they're much bigger than me.

Most of the time it works, surprisingly, so I still hold hopes for the future that the lack of respect people have for each other is just a passing phase that will eventually even out.

One time I was on the bus trapped in a tunnel because of a traffic jam in the middle of rush hour and two teenage girls started listening to some dreadful Jennifer Lopez thing on one of their cellphones at full volume: I told them in no uncertain times to turn it off, and they did - but then gave me a telling off for being rude and having no manners for not saying please! Everybody on the bus burst out laughing, and it was a genuine societal-bonding moment. Then we collectively beat the two of them to death.

Well, we didn't, but it would have been good if we had.

[alsoname]

Once I was at a crowded zoo and two guys had a lit cigarette. (They were holding it up to the glass, behind which an orangutan was sitting, so that it would look like the ape was smoking the cigarette.) People were whispering to each other, "Is someone smoking? They're not allowed to do that!" But no one DID anything about it. Finally I walked right up to them and said, "HEY, CUT IT OUT!" They ignored me, but right after I broke the ice other people started to say, "Yeah, you can't smoke here!"

Later I saw these two guys walking down the path and speaking German, so it's possible that they didn't understand what people were saying to them (not too likely, though). And also they come from a more smoker-friendly culture and might not have realized what a huge transgression their actions were in California.

It was irritating that *I* had to be the one to speak up. I HATE confrontation and I've always had trouble asserting myself. There are lots of people who are just the opposite, who LOVE getting in little fights, where were they?!