Death, Taxes And Assholes On The Subway

Ben Franklin once said the only two certainties in life are death and taxes. As Mr. Franklin never rode the subway, we can forgive him for overlooking a third certainty well-known to New Yorkers: every time you ride the subway, you will encounter people exhibiting an unprecedented combination of idiocy, rudeness and psychosis. And that’s just the MTA employees! For the uninitiated, a survey was conducted a few years back showing the most stressful time of day for the majority of New Yorkers was traveling to and from work. I’m sure a lot of this stress is rooted in the unreliability of New York’s transit systems. But the people of New York could also help themselves quite a bit if they followed a simple code of etiquette. Such a code does not officially exist, but most people with a touch of common sense, courtesy and intelligence seem to innately follow these rules. Unfortunately, that makes up a small minority of the New York population. Technically, the MTA once ran ads on its subway cars alerting passengers to some of these rules, but this came off as insulting at best. The incompetent MTA giving lectures on subway ethics is like the Taliban handing out flyers on how to dress. Oh wait...

With the understanding that most people are obviously not aware of subway etiquette—and with the recognition that without idiocy, rudeness and psychosis, New York would be missing a certain charm--I have listed a number of common subway infractions and the suitable punishment for each violation.

RULE #1:LET PEOPLE OFF THE TRAIN FIRST
Look, I know you’re a 300-pound slob and it’s important that you find a seat, but that’s not the fault of the poor saps trying to get off the train. There’s nothing more annoying than watching someone on the platform drop their head and bull rush through a pack of exiting passengers like they’re tackling dummies in high school football summer sessions, just to find an open seat. Here’s the deal: if you ran as hard as you did to find a seat three times a day, five minutes at a time, you wouldn’t be so out of shape and you wouldn’t have to sit down. Unfortunately, these are the only times you exert yourself, so you remain a portly mess.

Punishment: No seat on the train, and an immediate 15 minutes running on a treadmill. If the infraction is particularly egregious, beef up the punishment by hurling fake dummies at the offender as he/she runs on the treadmill, to simulate the ocean of existing passengers that the offender has chosen to ignore.

RULE #2: DO NOT TAKE UP MORE THAN ONE SEAT
Not surprisingly, there’s a fair amount of overlap between the violators of rules #1 and #2. Indeed, the people who rush onto the train before the exiting passengers can leave the train are often morbidly obese and desperate to sit down. Unfortunately, this inevitably leads to an infraction of rule #2. It’s not the fault of the dude sitting next to you that you look like Shrek after a K-Mart shopping spree, yet he has no choice but to enjoy the warm comfort of your hamstring resting on his balls.

Penalty: Same as the penalty for breaking rule #1, although I also recommend forcing the offender to walk to work for a whole week. I don’t care how long the commute is.

RULE #3: DO NOT WALK UP OR DOWN THE LEFT SIDE OF THE STAIRS
This is one rule that, for whatever reason, drives me nuts when it’s broken. You’re walking up the stairs on the right side along with everyone else in the cattle herd, when someone who is either oblivious or clearly more important than the rest of the planet darts up the left side of the stairs. Invariably, someone starts walking down the stairs in the opposite direction, forcing the offender to squeeze back into the right side, where he/she should have been in the first place. I personally relish being right next to the offender in these cases, because I will not let them squeeze in under any circumstances. It makes for an uncomfortable situation and the offender is exposed as a selfish jackass. As far as I’m concerned, they should go to the back of the line. It’s like waiting at a toll booth when someone speeds down the shoulder and cuts in front of everyone else—just a straight-up dick move. Except in this case, it’s like said dick just sped down a lane that’s meant for oncoming traffic. I will never understand what’s so difficult about staying to the right. This isn’t England. Everybody stays to the right at all times.

Penalty: Since the offender clearly prefers the English way of doing things, the most fitting penalty for walking up/down the left side of the stairs is listening to 12 straight hours of England’s worst singer from arguably the worst decade ever (the ‘80s): Phil Collins.

Don’t argue with me about the ’80s, by the way. It was a decade where the excesses of the ‘70s gave way to self-pitying, pretentious douchebags like the aforementioned Collins and Hall & Oates (who, like Collins, first experienced success in the ‘70s but hit their douche stride in the ‘80s), and provided Glenn Frey and Don Henley the opportunity to emerge from the Eagles umbrella to expose themselves as equally repugnant cocksuckers. Still not convinced? Next time you have a free moment, listen to “Bette Davis Eyes.” Listen to Kim Carnes’ coke-hangover voice, which lies on the wrong side of the fine line separating “sexy and breathy” from “nails on a chalkboard.” Consider the artificial synth-laced production, the overall air of self-importance, and you essentially have the ‘80s in a 3-minute nutshell. The advent of hip-hop , the Replacements, the Minutemen and “Appetite For Destruction” are excused from this rant.

RULE #4: TURN THE VOLUME DOWN ON YOUR iPOD
I have to allow some room for error on this one, because I can understand how it would be difficult to know if other people can hear your music when you’re headphones are on. I might be guilty of this myself, having spent years in front of guitar amplifiers making noises not unlike those of sea lions during the mating season, disabling my own hearing, self-esteem and long-term memory in the process. However, since I’m giving people the benefit of the doubt, I would also like to think people would have an inkling of self-awareness when someone on the other side of the subway car can hear your iPod playing “I Like To Move It Move It,” particularly when it’s eight freakin’ 30 in the morning.

Penalty: Listen to “Bette Davis Eyes” for three hours straight with headphones, volume turned up full blast.

I’ll be back tomorrow with Part II of this installment.