From the Desk of Mayor Bill de Blasio:
You share the same reprehensible nature as every other insignificant asshole in this godless city, but you distinguish yourself from your fellow commuters by engaging in one simple act: you pretend to be polite. You follow social norms at all times in public places, wearing the mask of basic human decency as if it were your own flesh and blood. While friends and acquaintances see through your “please and thank you” facade almost immediately, to those of us who only know you as The Commuter Who Does No Wrong, you are infallible.
Thank you for protecting us from the cesspool of impropriety that lurks behind your cordial smile and polite words. To incentivize the continuation of your virtuous pretenses, we are offering tax breaks for every act of civility you have completed on your commute this year. Each item entitles you to a separate deduction, so select all that apply to maximize your reward.
1. You let all customers off the train before boarding even though they were taking their sweet time about it at the height of fucking rush hour.
2. You said, “Sorry! Pardon me!” as you squeezed past someone despite not feeling particularly apologetic; you had to maneuver your wretched body onto the train somehow.
3. You, although being very comfortable, realized that it was too crowded for you to lean your entire spine against the pole, so you grudgingly turned around and grabbed the metal germ rod with one hand, making room for six other passengers to ooze into your personal space to do the same.
4. You noticed that another passenger might need to sit down more than you, so you offered them your seat (secretly hoping they’d decline) because you did not want to be seen as an openly inconsiderate asshat.
5. You moved your shopping bags to make room for a human passenger. You’d rather sit next to your bags than a random stranger any day, but you could not ignore the fact that your bags didn’t pay the fare and hadn’t walked over three miles in uncomfortable shoes all day.
6. You sat next to a manspreader which forced him to close his legs a little, and you convincingly said, “Excuse me!” instead of “Fuck you!” You could have told him off, but you determined that he wasn’t worth one single ounce of your emotional energy.
7. You took your enormous backpack off and held it in front of you, allowing a stranger to reach over your shoulder and grip the pole. This was honestly torture for you and your pathetic arms, but you didn’t want that idiot rolling around and crashing into you because they didn’t have anything to hold.
8. You looked up from your phone for eleven seconds so you could help clear a pathway for the miserable sad-sacks who needed to get off the train. In the long run, it was less stressful for you to move out of the way than to be moved out of the way.
9. You stepped off the train and kept walking even though you didn’t know which exit to use. While you couldn’t care less about getting in people’s way, you definitely didn’t want to get trampled; thus, you opted against coming to a full stop in the goddamned middle of a moving crowd.
10. You walked seven steps out of your way to deposit your coffee cup into a garbage can, suppressing that primal urge to toss it onto the tracks. If you contributed kindling for a future trash fire, then you’d be personally responsible for delaying the trains which are already slow as all fuck on a fire-free track.
11. You noticed a commuter committing a blatant faux pas, but instead of starting a verbal altercation, you shot them a quick look and moved on with your life. In that seemingly insignificant moment, you came to understand an essential truth: people are a little oblivious and a little preoccupied and a little selfish sometimes, and you cannot expect everyone to mask their true selves as consistently and masterfully as you do.
