Zealous rudeness
Dec. 5th, 2007 07:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sawylI was shocked by a conversation I overheard whilst swanning around town this afternoon, in which a religious zealot attempted to convert a poor shop assistant. It went almost exactly like this:
| Shop Assistant: | [inaudible mumble] |
| Zealot: | Well, he's the best PR man around. The very best! He's the top! |
| SA: | Yes? |
| Z: | Yes. He can do miracles. Real miracles. And he's the same yesterday as he is today and will be tomorrow. |
| SA: | [seeing where the conversation is headed] Um... |
| Z: | [frothing at the mouth] Do you know His name? Do you know who I'm talking about? |
| SA: | [frantic by now, trying to disengage] Um, actually, I'm an atheist... So if you'd like to come over to the till... |
Oddly, I found myself less horrified by the content than by the sheer boorishness of the zealot; that they could be so ill-mannered as to behave in quite such an appalling way towards a person who was simply trying to do their job. It was so uncivilised, so obnoxious, so symptomatic of bad breeding. I'm distressed that anyone in this day and age would think such behaviour acceptable in public.
