The Wall Street Journal-20080111-WEEKEND JOURNAL- Taste -- de gustibus- Silent Rage
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WEEKEND JOURNAL; Taste -- de gustibus: Silent Rage
"This is the quiet car!"
The voice belonged to a woman glaring at my kids, ages 5 and 2, standing (quietly, I should add) next to the door. I ignored her and focused on snagging an empty spot on a packed Amtrak train -- a miracle the day before Christmas -- for our nuclear family with big luggage. (Why Amtrak can't figure out how to assign seats on its "reserved trains" like every major European rail company will have to be left for another day.) In any case, we weren't about to give ours up.
The pitch went up a notch: "This is the QUIET car!!"
"So be quiet." Ah, my wife to the rescue. She was as befuddled as I was by this assault but quicker, with years of practice in her native France, to put rude strangers in their place. Our traveling chum's contorted face flushed, and she hurried to the rear of the car that, we soon discovered, is "intended to provide a peaceful atmosphere."
I've never had such a stressful ride. It wasn't the kids, who barely made a peep, though the one time my son let loose a giggle, there came a familiar shrill call from way back, "This is the quiet car!" The two-plus-hours from New York to Washington were spent on tenterhooks. A soft-spoken Filipino grandmother near us fielded a quick telephone call, and was nearly lynched for it. At Philadelphia, a burly man boarded and went on to slam the doors of a half dozen overhead compartments, unable to find space for his bag. You sensed a collective breakdown coming on.
"They ought to call it 'the car for people with issues,'" my wife mused. Yes, admittance only with a note from the doctor. Why stop there? Let's have a singles-only car. Or one reserved for atheists. Or mix it up: Single atheists with serious disposable income. How about a car for drunk Jets fans? Or just for the thin, or just the fat, since either demographic might find the sight (or sound) of the other offensive on their journey?
As it is, the American obsession with sanitizing our immediate environment -- of noise, tobacco, trans fats, peanuts and plastic bags -- seems to have no limits. Or borders. With the new year, France and Turkey heralded their entry into polite, globalized society by banning cigarettes in bars and restaurants and public places. "It's a new art of living," proclaimed Roselyne Bachelot, the French health minister. Next they will ban smooching in the Luxembourg Garden because it's off-putting to the chronically celibataire.
Now, don't get me wrong. As a resident of Paris, I won't miss having smoke blown into my face at lunch. I find long, loud telephone conversations on trains obnoxious, though rarer in Europe than in the U.S., despite the lack of quiet cars. But showing a modicum of respect for your neighbors used to be a matter of simple politesse.
In this young century, we've launched a crusade, instituting all sorts of rules, in the name of making everyone happy and healthy. My "quiet car" lady didn't seem to be either. I've seen no scientific data, but I think she's typical. With the proliferation of fiats intended to make people act more considerately toward one another, we've seen public civility steadily erode.
For starters, enforced tolerance seems to make people ornery. A Malthusian explanation also suggests itself: In a world getting more crowded, we try to carve out what space we can for ourselves and limit what's left for others. This brings natural friction: Is your desire for fresh air more or less worthy than mine to smoke, or drive, or fly? This struggle could soon turn Darwinian.
Yet a growing population doesn't sufficiently account for the spread of nannying by strangers and concomitant ill-humor. The firm assertion of "rights" is itself a recent phenomenon, mostly a healthy outgrowth of the spread of free society. While the thin line between democratic freedoms and the tyranny of the majority is as old as the Enlightenment, never before have so many different kinds of people felt empowered to demand special privileges for themselves that in some way infringe on another person's habits, good or bad.
A friend with a philosophical bent notes that as civility retreats into competing claims of entitlement, the "invisible hand" of courtesy and sympathy is replaced by the soft despotism of the state. Someone has to settle the disputes over various rights. Inevitably, that's the government (or Amtrak). "It's a bit like kids fighting," he emailed. "If they can work it out themselves, they're probably both better off. Once they go to daddy or mommy for a ruling, somebody's going to lose." I'd like to think my children would (quietly) agree.
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Mr. Kaminski is editor of The Wall Street Journal Europe's editorial page.
