Sunday Roast: Learn some damn manners before acting all elitist

Sunday Roast: Learn some damn manners before acting all elitist

Feb 12, 2012 |  by  |  Art
About the author
Mark Visbeek is a designer, musician, superstar, and loves illeism. Always looking to create beautiful things, I'm often distracted by the amazing stuff happening around me. My most important weapons are limitless amounts of love and a faux-French accent.

It’s Sunday and you’re hungover, angry at the world, at bartenders and most of all: yourself. No worries, we feel the same. That’s why we’ve invented Sunday Roast. A bi-weekly conversational ‘column’. A written one. Online. Every other Sunday, Mark and Sabrina vent about the horrible burdens and ungodly mishaps of their 21st century life. Usually reserved only for bars, we bring our problems right into your home. Sharing is sexy, and a problem shared is a problem halved.. You are cordially invited to our pity party.

Previous Sunday Roast here.

Dear Sabrina,

I hear you. Arrogance is everywhere, and especially in fashion for some reason. And now that I think about it, it seems to be the common disease of the people that pride themselves in being intelligent, educated, concerned with the well-being of the world and interested in higher culture. It is those people seen as the intellectual and cultural elite that time and time again fail to show proper manners or have a single clue of how to be nice to someone.

Let me give you an example. I told you before about when I went to Kriterion to see the six best films of the year, but I didn’t tell you what happened there that changed my look on the cultural elitist crowd. We walked in, a little late because we were hungover, and got in line to get our tickets. After a couple of minutes, the queue had grown a little longer, and it didn’t seem to be moving much. Already I could see the people in line starting to get anxious, but their masks of maturity were still on. Another couple of minutes passed without much movement in the queue, and the whispers started. Middle-aged, sophisticated, well-dressed couples muttered under their breath, speculating about what was going on.

Your shiny shoes won’t hide your sucking at life.

We are now a small ten minutes in, and the floor is filled with masks. A staff member came into the hallway to announce that they had some problems with the reservation system, but that they wouldn’t start the film before everyone got in. It didn’t help. People start raising their voices, ‘this is ridiculous’, ‘why are these people so incapable’, ‘I’m not going to pay’, and etcetera. An old lady even walks up to the counter from the back of the line to address her aggrievedness directly to the cashier. Mind you, this is an arthouse cinema, celebrating the art of film, where film-lovers come to enjoy the delicacy and finesse of works of audiovisual art. These people are supposed to be cultured, refined, forgiving, patient. They’re not.

Imagine the same scenario in Pathé De Munt. People probably wouldn’t even notice the line isn’t moving, because they’re too busy having a good time chatting with their friends. And when they do notice, they’d just shrug and get out their phone to check their Facebook. They may not be culture lovers like you, and you may despise them for thinking the new Mission Impossible is the best film ever made, but at least they don’t have a goddamn stick up their ass and know to just chill the fuck out when they’re mildly inconvenienced.

So I’m all ok with people wanting to act distinguished, cosmopolitan and elitist, but please just learn some damn manners first. And if you secretly enjoy being rude, loud and mean, just go with it and drop the fucking act. Your shiny shoes won’t hide your sucking at life.

Love, Mark

P.S.
You’re not arrogant, you just have a big mouth. You smoke, drink and curse, but you turn into a kid as soon as you see cats or snow. Or both.

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