A lout who Blackberries his way through a meeting, a class, or any other kind of public occasion, is saying essentially to others there, "Hey -- I'll decide how much of my attention you need and deserve. What I give you, that's what you need, no more, no less. Get over it."

Yes, the older generation is forever decrying the decline of manners. It's only good manners to do so -- manners construed as respect for others. We don't want that respect to go aglimmering, because when it does, life -- hard enough now -- gets impossible. Once the louts and Blackberryists and Bluetooth shouters who make their way down the department store aisle, disconnected from any reality around them -- once these types take over the public arena, you can forget the little decencies that say, "Let (BEGIN ITALS) me (END ITALS) do something for you."

"You?! What's your claim on my time? Who are you, pal? Why should I even care?"

The lout doesn't have to articulate these rebukes verbally. Behavior says it all. A Blackberry crackdown would be a very wholesome thing for society, to the extent we've still got such a protective covering as "society," with its varied modes and codes. Who, in an environment of radical freedom, is going to lead the crackdown? Who's got the authority, or for that matter the nerve?

Civilization never has been easy. There's this human thing, first observed in the Garden of Eden. It scorns the need for submitting personal aims to outside judgments that can be stale and wrong but likelier will prove wise, sensible, downright unavoidable if we're all to live together. Thank you for not Blackberrying.