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I laughed a lot when I watched this video. For one, the kid’s freak-out is classic… especially when he grips the side of the seat and starts trying to hold himself in. If you pay close attention, you’ll notice that he has a lap belt on in addition to the straps coming over his shoulder. So chances are… he wasn’t REALLY about to fall out.

But the woman sitting beside him makes me laugh the most. She laughs and enjoys herself the entire time. Even when the kid next to her is freaking out and screaming that he’s falling out… even when he repeatedly says that he’s in pain… she laughs and has herself a good ol’ time, completely oblivious to the misery of her companion.

I’ve never ridden a ride like that. I’ve never almost fallen out of ride. But I have been in situations where I felt the people around me were completely oblivious to the fact that I was there. In fact, I had two such experiences this weekend. And while the situations were vastly different, the people involved behaved much in the same way.

Have we, as a society, become too self-involved to think about common courtesy? I think some of us sometimes forget that there are people in the world other than ourselves. Are we a society based on selfishness?

I’ve mentioned selfishness before. In fact, I’ve advocated being selfish when it comes to our own happiness. I’ve said on numerous occasions that it is often permissible, if not necessary, to think only of ourselves. But that was a little different. In the post Selfish For Self, I said this about the situations where selfishness is the best policy:

What I’m talking about are the choices we make about how we’re going to live our lives… who we’re going to be… where we’re going to go… and what we’re going to do once we get there.

But the kind of behaviors I’m talking about now are not the ones that our happiness hinges on. They’re not the ones that are personal or affect only us. The behaviors I’m talking about won’t determine who we are or how we live our lives.

The behaviors I’m talking about the ones that affect other people’s happiness or other people’s lives.

In the video above, the woman who was having such a great time couldn’t do a whole lot to help the kid who was schizing out. She was also caught in the throws of the ride and strapped down. She might have reassured him that he was, in fact, not falling out. She might have told him he’d be ok. But there are also some things should could have not done which might have made the experience a little less traumatic for kid crazy. She could have stopped laughing.

I spent Friday afternoon at my sister’s graduation. She was receiving her master’s degree so it was a big deal for all of us. Congrats again, sister! There were a handful of other graduate students being “hooded” and several hundred students receiving their bachelor’s degrees. It was a pretty big ceremony and the arena normally reserved for basketball games was pretty full.

Behind me sat two people with a screaming child. To my right sat a family full of loud talkers. In front of me sat a woman who couldn’t ignore her cellphone. Luckily I was on an aisle, so I had one free side. In addition, I heard about a hundred other cell phones ring during the ceremony. I heard about two hundred other screaming kids. And there was a dull murmur of talking that never ceased.

Ok… I’m a student of human nature. I understand that people talk. I understand that kids scream. But is it REALLY too much to ask that people stop talking for a hour while a major event is going on? Is it REALLY too much to ask people to either control their children or take them elsewhere? As far as cellphones go… there is no excuse. Every cell phone has an off button and a silent mode. All of them. I should know. I had the common courtesy to turn mine off before I went in to the arena.

I spent Saturday shopping for Christmas. The holidays are notorious for displays of the best and worst of human nature. On one hand, we spend time and money thinking about others. We get together with friends and family and enjoy loads of merriment. At the same time, we crowd into stores. We swarm into the streets. And we get snippy and easily frustrated with one another.

At one point I was walking down the aisle of a store and almost ran into the girl in front of me because she stopped in the middle of the aisle to answer her phone. I had to walk a huge circle through displays of merchandise because another group of people stopped in the middle of the walkway to catch up. Four or five of us were walking very slowly behind another woman on the phone. When her child looked up at her and said “Mom… you’re in a bunch of people’s way”… the woman on the phone replied “So… I don’t care”.

Typical holiday shopping experiences, yes? They’re frustrating, but not surprising. And no… none of them are really that big of a deal. So some girl stopped right in front of me to answer a phone. So a bunch of other people decided to stand in everyone else’s way to talk. So a woman bluntly didn’t care that she was holding up the rest of us.

It’s not the behaviors themselves that I’m curious about. It’s the attitude behind them.

Screaming kids bother me. I understand all kids scream. It’s part of their genetic code. When I was a kid, I’m sure I was a screamer, too. So I don’t hold the children themselves responsible for disrupting the rest of us. The parents need to learn how to handle their children. The parents need to understand that not all of us have learned to block the sound of shrieking toddler out. Instead of selfishly making the rest of us miss the graduation, the parents should have taken their children outside. Their choice to have to children shouldn’t interfere with anyone else’s choice to enjoy the ceremony.

People who talk need to go elsewhere to talk. Unless someone is dying, there isn’t anything that can’t wait to be said until after the graduation. There isn’t anything so important that it couldn’t wait an hour. It’s like people who talk during movies. Talk at home. Watch the movie. Talk at home. Watch the movie. Say it with me: talk at home… watch the movie.

I can’t make blanket statements about cell phone users. I am a cell phone user. But I know when to use mine and when to turn it off. I know when not to answer the phone. I know when to take the phone somewhere else to use it. Some people don’t know that. Don’t talk on your phone during a graduation ceremony. I’m sure your party plans for the rest of the evening are important to you. But the other 800 people trying to watch their loved ones receive a degree that they’ve worked so hard on for years and years… don’t give a crap about your phone call.

And when you decide to stop and talk, move out of the way. Would you stop in the middle of the highway to take a phone call? Would you stand in the middle of a busy intersection and talk on the phone? So why would you stop in the middle of the store’s “highway” to talk? Especially when it’s painfully obvious that everyone else in the entire world is having to move around you? I know what you’re thinking. Is it really THAT big a deal to have to walk around someone? No… it isn’t. It’s the principle of the whole thing.

People make mistakes. Even people who are normally courteous and considerate of others occasionally have a selfish moment. I know I’ve had my fair share of them. So I’d like to end this fairly “ranty” post with a simple reminder to myself and others:

It never hurts to take a few seconds to think of the people around you… and think about how your actions might affect them. Pursue happiness… make the most out of life… and have a good time doing it. Just don’t let your good time spoil someone else’s.