Rudie can't fail

I overheard an interesting conversation at the bank one day. I was standing in the predictably long line that forms just before closing time, there on a work errand. Two WASPy men behind me struck up a bit of idle chatter. One recounted a previous time he waited in a long line at this bank, next to a woman who, bored, twirled her pen in such a way as to repeatedly come close to hitting the mans shirt with it. One man said, "You know, at a certain point in time you have to ask, 'Is it a lack of culture, or the prevailing culture?'" This stuck with me. Now, I always secretly take pleasure in my appearance whenever I go there; grease-laden and sweaty, I feel like the humble laborer sticking out starkly in this polished house of commerce. But this feeling never enters the realm of rudeness. I was raised to have decent manners, and my parents were moderately successful; except for my habit of fiercely picking my nose at any time, I would consider myself polite. And it's not as though I would begrudge this man his right to take offense at the girls wayward pen. But standing there, intently eavesdropping on the rest of their exchange wherein they lamented, in a pompous way that would make T.S. Eliot proud, the Decline of Culture in America, I couldn't help siding with that crass girl. When the elite in society claims a monopoly on taste, what could be more powerful as a political expression by the underclass than being just plain rude?