Column

Annoying people I have known

The world has too many annoying people for a single list. But trying to list them may remind me not to be like them. So here goes. See how many would make your list, too. For example:

Preachers who are really frustrated politicians. Also, politicians who are really frustrated preachers. Not that the two shouldn't have some characteristics in common. But the society that has replaced its politics with religion, or vice versa, has deprived itself of a healthy division of labor.

Anybody who would let politics interfere with friendship. That kind of thing shows the wrong set of priorities in life. These folks miss out on a lot. Some of my best friends do not share my political proclivities, which makes for interesting conversations. What are friends for if not to provide a check on our most cherished prejudices? And what good is a cloistered virtue never exposed to examination by others? Opinions, like an old blanket, need a good airing now and then.

Bosses who have never heard of FMLA (the Family Medical Leave Act) or, worse, pretend never to have heard of it in order to exploit employees. As for employees who exploit FMLA for their own selfish benefit, that's a separate but equally annoying problem.

Those nice, friendly people who insist on doing more for you than you want done. ("Here, let me fill your plate/let you in on a great deal/help you up these stairs/tell you how to live your life.")

People who suggest you edit their manuscript for them "in your spare time," or "read this paper I wrote," usually on some fascinating topic like Climate Change (formerly Global Warming), who really shot JFK, why it was actually the government that blew up the World Trade Center, and Barack Obama's really being a foreigner, Communist and/or both.

Strangers who call you by your first name, especially medical types who have you down on a cold metal table at the time--or in a state of undress. Or worse, semi-attired in one of those ridiculous paper garments that can't be closed and must be held together with one hand at all inconvenient times. Airline and hotel clerks are big on first names, too. On balance, I prefer the generic noun of address waitresses use, as in "Want some more coffee, hon?" It's friendlier, warmer, more Southern, don't you know, hon.

People who talk business on social occasions, or think of business meetings as social occasions.

Pedants, as opposed to scholars--and they usually are. Anybody who refers to Shakespeare as The Bard or believes his plays and sonnets were written by others, usually the Earl of Oxford.

People who are determined to make themselves unhappy even though (a) they're in good health, and (b) U.S. citizens. What more can anyone ask? People who think any pause in the conversation must be filled at once. Or who never have an unexpressed thought.

People who are always suggesting that we have a meeting, usually in lieu of actually doing something. What ever happened to people who just took care of business without any fuss-'n'-feathers?

People who assume you're unhappy if you're not smiling. This may be a peculiarly American misapprehension.

The kind of people who think they can talk you into religion. Or irreligion. Or into faith, hope, or charity, not to mention love.

Drivers, so to speak, who come out of nowhere, cut sharply in front of you, and then go careening off, weaving in and out of traffic. It's some comfort to know that (a) you don't see them for long, that is, just long enough for your heart to stop, and (b) they're bound to be short-lived.

The kind of people who go through life just spoiling for a fight even if they have to invent something to fight about.

Bosses who are rude to their workers. Workers who are rude to their bosses are not as annoying, since they're not using their power to abuse someone lower in status.

Amateur polemicists who confuse "imply" and "infer" so they can put words in your mouth you'd never say, or thoughts in your mind you'd never think. Closely related are the argumentative types who dismiss any important distinction in a discussion, or any flaw in their reasoning, as "only semantics." As if everything having to do with words weren't semantic.

People who don't know how to apologize. Their favorite construction is, "I'm sorry, but . . . ." That's not an apology; it's a rationalization. They only aggravate the original offense by trying to excuse it. The secret of the effective apology is to know when to stop. With "I'm sorry." Not a word more.

Just as bad--no, worse--is the conditional apology that's more conditional than apology, as in the phrase: "I'm sorry if I offended you." If? There's no If about it. Or there would be no need to say "I'm sorry" in the first place. Why do people do that--pride? The kind that goeth before another fall? It'd be better not to apologize than do so in a way that offends again.

Spouses who argue in public or, much worse, before their children. They really ought to get a room.

The congenitally repetitive, who assume you didn't hear them the first time, or maybe that just repeating the same point makes it more convincing.

Abusers of the written word who want to put quotation marks around everything except maybe quotations. Among the many runners-up: People who have to indicate a joke is a joke by saying, "Just kidding."

People who urge others to be "positive," even though the most positive thing one can do in certain circumstances is to react negatively. How did reactionary get to be a bad word, anyway? Who wouldn't react against certain things, like, say, much of the 20th Century?

And, oh, yes, the kind of people who haven't anything better to do than make a list of the kind of people who annoy them.

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Paul Greenberg, who has won the Pulitzer Prize for editorial writing, periodically updates his list of Annoying People I Have Known.

Editorial on 09/02/2015

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