It's an interesting problem. I don't think it's the economy. I think some people are just jerks or oblivious, and there are no consequences because society is big and anonymous. Some people are willing to shame the offenders, but many aren't.

Also (and this is purely based on my observations), parents don't emphasize manners like they used to. There's sort of a "let kids be natural" movement that's been going on for a while now. So I genuinely think that some people just grow up clueless, and, because nobody corrects them and nobody is willing to shame them, the rudeness continues.

You know, I try to be as considerate as I can as often as I can, and I set the example and teach my girls the same, but there are times when I just want to smack someone upside the head with a clue-by-4, because there are SO many people that need a clue and haven't got one. I blame that on the parents, because they are the ones enabling their slobby children. You learn what you live with and if you live with pigs, that's typically what you become. Unless you get how repulsive it is, and clean up your act accordingly. But I know of this "let kids be natural" movement, and basically, the gist is to let them be little savages without correcting them, because "it causes their wittle bwains too much stwess!" Bullshit, I say. You want kids to have manners and be responsible for themselves, you HAVE to make an effort to TEACH them. If you let them run amok, you get animals. I don't understand why people don't get this!

x.x

I think it's mostly confirmation bias.

For the uninitiated:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias

"Confirmation bias (also called confirmatory bias or myside bias) is a tendency for people to favor information that confirms their preconceptions or hypotheses regardless of whether the information is true."

And Joe, you don't think society has changed at all in terms of how people treat each other?

Ladies, if you espy a lonely man, a visitor at a convention or whatever, take him in, show him your favors--be neighborly!

Your city will be known as a nice place, and get more convention business.

People seem less rude nowadays. Maybe I am older, and therefore shown some deference. I can remember when some clown-haired hags considered it normal to screech out their windows as if they owned the neighborhood. I used to wave my dick back at them.

That doesn't happen very often anymore.

I do notice an uptick in people who say "I have ADD' as if that is an excuse to not listen all the way to the end of a sentence. They never seem to have ADD when they are getting the blow job, or building up to the punchline of their joke.

Re: "Letting children be natural": As Flynne put it, it's the idea that self expression trumps "rigid" manners.

I didn't realize it was an actually philosophy until I read one of Judith Martin's columns, in which she rails against it.

Some of the central ideas of "modern" child-centered parenting include:

-Letting the child decide when to eat, go to bed, etc.

-Never saying "no," but, instead negotiating. Do not punish or correct behavior, as it will destroy a child's self esteem.

-If a child wants something, give the child what it wants because you don't want to discourage them from making the best decisions for themselves.

-If a kid says something rude, it's just a form of self expression.

I live in a city with a lot of granola parents, so one specific example I've heard of is Naomi Aldert's "Raising our Children, Raising ourselves." She advocates, among other crap, "growing up side by side" with your child.

Amy, I think society has changed, but that is a trend over time. A sudden uptick, as asked by Dr. Helen, suggests confirmation bias.

I'd also suggest that the change over time is mixed. There is less racism and overt sexism that I remember growing up in the 60s and 70s.

The trend I've noticed the most is a belief in entitlement (which I believe is directly attributed to the lies told young people that they can do anything they want.)

The second trend is an increased resentment of people in power, especially MBAs, Lawyers and Doctors, at being challenged.

I'm not convinced of your rudeness hypothesis--I haven't seen an increase. I think it's mostly a function of the baby boomers become more crumudgeonly.

Published in 2010? Check out David Wong's "Monkeysphere" theory. Published 2007. http://www.cracked.com/article_14990_what-monkeysphere.html

The thing that constantly amazes me is this sense of entitlement so many people have these days. You know - I'm more important that you, therefore I need to be in front of you at the Walmart (where I see it a lot) checkout even though I have 72 things in my basket and you have one. Or, my conversation on my cell phone is more important than your ability to hear your companion at your restaurant table. My favorite is the ten-year-old giving me attitude as I am trying to do my job by waiting on the person in front of her in line (who is at least 40 years older than her and much more pleasant).

I don't usually point out those asinine behaviors to the idiots mainly because if I'm really angry about it I end up sputtering and sounding stupid instead of reserved and intelligent. I do, however, comment when I see / experience politeness especially if it is a young person.

At least in my area, it has become a rare exception for anyone to use their turn signal. This actually goes beyond solipsism...even if you are the only conscious being in the universe and all those other cars are being driven by robots cleverly programmed to give the appearance of being human, it would still be a good idea to let thos robots know when you're about to make a turn...

Amy - I totally agree with your idea about the 'strangerhoods.' I've heard all the arguments about how new technology is affecting people's behavior, but frankly, I just see the same behavior transimitted in a different (wider) media.

I live in a large metropolis famous for its traffic, greed, and philandering politicians. I hear from a lot of transplants that this city definitely has an attitude problem, and I see it all the time in the way people drive (aggressively, if not homicidally) and behave (yammering on the cell phone, etc.) because they're busy, tired, and convinced of their own importance.

I used to work in a coffeeshop and saw that type of behavior all the time - and then saw the customers' chagrin when they realized that they knew me from their neighborhood and had just been horrifically rude to someone who lived around the corner from them. It was actually quite hilarious. Of course, I always make sure I smile and wave really big whenever I see them now.

People have been complaining about technology and how it's ruing civilization since pretty much the advent of civilization. Senecus complained that all these new fangled books were a distraction. Martin Luther bitched about how this printing press thing was making everyone an author and the intellectual stuff was being drowned out by the rennaissance version of Jersey Shore. And the rudeness and disrespect of youth has been leading the downfall of civilization since the age of Plato.

"I do notice an uptick in people who say "I have ADD' as if that is an excuse to not listen all the way to the end..."

Add to that, "Oh, it's BOTU", whose business is rudeness, isn't it? - tl;dr.

j/k. You have definite entertainment value, even if you can't read Federal budget reports from the OMB.

Federal budget reports from the OMB? No, I have no been reading those lately. How are they?

This may be a small part of the overall rudeness problem in the US. I live in a city where most people are polite and friendly. My mother just spent two weeks in the hospital and everone was helpful, kind and friendly.
However my daughter had a bad expereince with the medical people at family planning. She is single and currently uninsured so was forced to go there for a lab test she needed for an abnormal pap smear. She was both quized and badgered about her sex life and birth control method. These are public employees and they treat their clientele like mentally challenged 15 year olds. I think there are a lot of natural bullies in the world and when you put them in a position of authority you will get a lot of rudness when they think that they can get away with it.

We modern humans are a bunch of grabby, self-involved jerks, same as generations and generations of humans before us. It's just that there are suddenly fewer constraints on our grabby, self-involved jerkhood than ever before.

Ding, ding, ding! We have a winner!

The old saw of barbarian societies being more polite, because an offense could cost you an axe to the head, comes to mind.

I think it has to do with changing popular culture.

For one, we encourage "play nice" behavior in elementary school, so we have lots of boys fearful of a punch in the nose. They don't want to think of themselves as wussies so they behave rudely, which they confuse with assertiveness.

For another, well, can you think of much popular entertainment that doesn't basically celebrate, or at the very least excuse, the crude, the careless, or the thuggish?