Trash Talking

Flying into Cleveland on Friday, I was somewhat amused at the running commentary of the two young guys -- probably college students on Spring Break -- describing what they saw from their airport window.

"Look, there's nuclear reactor!" [Perry nuclear power plant]

"Can we see Cedar Point from here?" [Probably not!]

"That's a $&%^& golf course." [I don't golf, so I wouldn't know.]

Then one said, "There's where the white trash live."

OK, that did it. A school-marmish voice (mine, I confess) demanded, "Who are you calling 'white trash'?"

The shocked young men apologized. "We didn't mean anything by that. We were just having fun." (Followed by nervous giggling)

Afterwards, I contemplated our penchant for labeling people who are different from ourselves. I see a great deal of it on blogs. Just this morning I read about: "panty-waisted psychobabblists . . . slick chicago mobster. . . " on a right-wing blog and in comments posted at the end of a liberal column, "clueless dopes . . . heartless idiots. . . .people like YOU with such sour, negative, crass and defeated attitudes. . . . "

At the bottom of comments on the latter, someone posted, "At least there were a minimum of personal attacks in these posts.I thought the most memorable part of the article was . . . . . Kind of surprised that no one else mentioned it. Oh well.... not really. Why let the uplifting actions of an individual get in the way of partisan ideological babble. "

I guess it isn't only young kids who need to think a couple of times before labeling.

End of this Sunday's sermonette.