Second-Hand Noise & Other Postmodern Irritants

One of my recent posts dealt with the issue of boundaries.  I want to pick up on that theme again in light of an experience I had yesterday on the L here in Chicago.

I'd just returned from a series of meetings in lovely Las Vegas, and I was beat.  I caught the Blue Line train at O'Hare Airport and settled into my seat, hoping to have an hour of peace after a long and busy weekend.  Before we 'd arrived at our first stop away from the terminal, I witnessed no fewer than eight people (about 40% of those in my train car) immediately start talking on their cell phones.  And I mean really talking--loudly, emphatically, and unapologetically, as if no one was with them and they were in the privacy of their own homes.

I heard each and every conversation: one young woman was griping about a boyfriend; an older man was having a verbal fight with his wife; a TSA worker was schmoozing with a friend.  And on and on.  I had no choice but to listen to their inanity, in all its minute detail.  I felt like I was trapped in a car filled with a bunch of chain smokers.  Their second-hand "smoke," however, was noise.

Part of me wanted to stand up, grab the cell phones out of everyone's hands, and hurl them out of the door at the next stop.  Part of me wanted to shout aloud, "Turn off your damn phones!  I don't want to hear your conversations and I couldn't care less about what you have to say to your friends and family!"  I restrained myself.

Today, I wonder why.  And I'm mad at myself for keeping silent.  If we have become comfortable enough as a society to say to strangers who are smoking in our face, "Would you mind putting out your cigarette?", then why should we tolerate the noise- and space-pollution of people who don't give a second thought to their surroundings or show sensitivity to the privacy of others?

What would you have done?