Williamsburg, NY – Hogging more than one subway seat. Blasting music from an iPod. Leaning up against a subway pole.
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Inconsiderate straphangers who break these unspoken rules of rail riding are now getting publicly shamed on a new Web site created by a Brooklyn graphic designer.
“I’m not asking people to be Mother Teresa,” said Grant Gold, 24, creator of ViolationReport.org, where fed-up commuters can upload photos of flagrant etiquette offenders or, if they’re brazen, print out a “ticket” to hand out in person.
“I’m just saying, don’t be a jerk.”
Gold has named 12 common violations committed by discourteous commuters. Eating smelly food on the subway? You’re breaking Rule No. 8, “The Portable Diner.” Blasting music? That violates Rule No. 3, “The Human Boom-Box.”
But the most common violation?
“That’s ‘The Alpha-Male Stretch,'” said Gold. “When there are people standing, don’t keep your legs out and your bags on the seat [next to you].”
Gold, a recent graduate of the School for Visual Arts in Manhattan, created the site as part of his senior thesis after reading no-brainer Metropolitan Transportation Authority notices reminding people to give up their seats for the elderly.
“I thought, ‘Really? Do people have to be told this stuff?'” said Gold, who was born in Texas, raised in Colorado and now lives in Williamsburg.
“Out West, you’re just used to a little more courtesy. In Texas, a stranger says, ‘Hi, how you doing?’ and it’s nice,” he said.
The site has about 70 photos calling out rude riders for breaking the rules. Gold hopes more New Yorkers will post pictures and file the phony violation notices online.
He also has a list of violations oblivious pedestrians commit on city sidewalks and is creating standards for proper waiting room, cafe and park etiquette, too.
“It’s all about being self-aware,” said Gold, adding that the site is also meant to be funny. “Just take into account that you’re surrounded by one thousand other people, and they may not appreciate the Lady Gaga you’re blasting.”
New Yorkers, of course, already have their own tactics for dealing with the Big Apple’s most boorish.
Latrice Jackson, 36, a home health aide from Bushwick, Brooklyn, said Grant’s Web site was “a cool idea,” but she preferred a more confrontational approach.
“I say all the time, ‘Excuse me,’ and I just look straight at them,” said Jackson, whose biggest pet peeve is when people violate her personal space – what Grant calls Rule No. 12, “The Awkward Uncle.”
“You have to be direct, and then they’ll change,” she said.
New York watch out a 24 year oild shtinker wants to change NY why dosent he just go back to Texas if he dosent like us
New Yorkers have ways of dealing with “direct” people too. If you give the wrong person the eye, there’s a one in 15 chance that he may just whip out a gun and shoot you.
hershel, you’r a POYER
Miss Jackson, you give the eye to the wrong guy and you get rule #13 in your face….
I would hand out notes to pedestrians on the roads sticking out the cariage till the middle of the road on red light, to see if a car is coming.
‘V’nishmartem Meoid Lenafshoisaichem’! And then to the people that stand about 2/3 in the road on the right and other people on 2/3 on the left of the road and give you enough space barely to squezze through them when it’s red for them….
And let’s not go into the old debate of the drivers in BP… That’s for another time!
Oh so posting on this site isen’t rude? It’s just the others, who upset you that are rude. Right! And by the way who are you, ( and I mean myself ad well to decide who and what’s rude or apropriate, mind your own beeswax you bunch of foss new yourkers) what have we become that a shtinker can dictate to us how to live our life and that a conveluted get back at you atitued isen’t rude any longer, yerachem hashem .
Although this site posts wrongdoings of people, its to be investigated if all the guy wants is $$$
Second point, when pictures could be altered and made up, what’s the warranty that people won’t use it to embarress others for all kinds of reasons?
Good for her. As someone who rides a metro every day (in DC), I would be delighted to see people show better manners. If people insist on being obnoxious (taking up multiple seats, blocking doors, or otherwise inconveniencing their fellow riders), they should be taken to task.
We all know there are plenty of clueless cretins riding the subways with zero consideration for others. But seeing what some people consider “violations,” and reading the nasty comments that follow, I’ve discovered that the subways are also filled with bitter, self-loathing jerks who have zero respect or tolerance for anyone who dares not be them.
Coming from a primarily Orthodox Jewish audience, it is shameful that you are offended because someone suggests that rude behavior is inappropriate and unacceptable. I am a frum Jew who was always taught that respecting other people was not only appropriate but required. My parents would be furious if I behaved the way that people do on NYC mass transit.
Additionally, frum Jews are routinely among the most blatant offenders. I have seen frum men literally shove someone out of a seat rather than sit next to a woman (if you decide to push into the seat next to the window, it is horrifying that you would then shove someone else, who was there before you, onto the floor). This, and similar behavior are a chilul Hashem and lead others to dislike and disrespect us.
If you use being “a New Yorker” as an excuse for bad behavior, you should be ashamed of yourself. And while your adherence to other mitzvot is admirable, making excuses for such behavior does negate any holier-than-though attitudes or arguments. As an out-of-town frum Jew, I must insist that it is not because we are not New Yorks that we think it is reprehensible, but rather because we highly value menchlichkeit.
I’m an ultra orthodox Jew from Williansburg, I was taught to get up for an elderly or disabled person, and I do so, I’d also hold the door open for the person coming in the store behind me and thanking another person who does it for me.
I am a Ultra Orthodox Jew from Long Island that was forced to move to Brooklyn because of work. I want to say that living in Brookln is a nightmare for someone like me who is used to having the highest level of manners, courtesy, and respect for others and having come from communities who practice those same standards. The standards of decency or the lack thereof is horendus. Many Brooklyn people come from the third world and they bring their disgusting customs from their former countries with them. The list of disgusting things they do is quite long. For example loud horn honking at all hours of the day and night, home owners letting weeds grow six feet high in front of their homes, smoking in people’s faces, throwing garbage in the streets and on to other people’s yards, double parlikg, triple parking, pushing, shoving, in stores and on uncrowed streets, drunks yelling in the streets at all hours of night, playing loud music in the street at all hours of the night, double parked UPS trucks, loud fire trucks, loud ambulances and police who are in hurry to get donuts, oil trucks who block the streets, motor cycles reving their engines at all hours of the night, etc. I am fed up!
Although I agree with most of your posting re. the conduct of third world people who come here with little knowledge or regard of the rules of common decency, I must disagree with some of your points. Fire trucks, police cars, ambulances must be loud or they will never get thru the traffic to help us. As for the doulble parked UPS trucks and the oil trucks that sometimes block our way…what other choice do they have given the size of many streets. With regard to the loud music, horn honking at all hours, weeds overgrown and garbage being tossed onto the streets…there is no question that you are 100% correct and those people who do such things disgust me also.