They're rude or I'm unreasonable?

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This is a random topic I don't know where to put.
But I was curious - it's hard to tell. People seem to be doing things I would consider rude and would not do, as if it's totally acceptable, and I wonder if they're actually just damn rude, or my sense of what's rude is unreasonable?
For one example, having to take a train today, someone sat right next to me when there were empty seats, immediately started eating, and repeatedly moving so as to elbow me.
I would see this as rude. If there are empty seats, you sit there, you don't get up in another person's personal space unless you have to. It's even more rude in my opinion to start eating right next to that person, when the train ride is only an hour and you can eat later, or you should have eaten beforehand (it was half-eleven, not early). Then just for good measure, repeatedly elbow them.
Rude, or am I being unreasonable?
I also just got yelled at for objecting to someone else who lives here spying on me and constantly telling me about it. In my opinion, if you notice little things about another person's private life because you're (for now - I'm working on it, it's driving me bloody insane) forced into close quarters, you don't make it your business to stalk that person and then make sure they know it. You use discretion. This person constantly tells me that they're spying, saying things like "I noticed you had hair in the bin, I know you've been trimming your hair," or "I saw you moved things off the heater, I know you've had it on," and then yelling at me for being "defensive" when I tell them to stop spying on me and telling me they're spying. It makes me hypervigilant, like I have to cover up everything I'm doing or that person will "notice" (read - spy, stalk me) and then make sure I know they are.
Is that rude, or am I indeed being defensive and unreasonable?
Anyone else run into situations like that where you don't know if other people are out of line, or it's you? Examples?

No. It doesn't sound like you were being unreasonable.

On the train if someone is bothering you, you can change seats

That less confrontational

Someone behind be might not have realized that he was striking the seat, or talking too loud

Many precious lil "people" get totally angry at the slightest perceived provocation. Misunderstanding. Slight. "Disrespect"


So I fear and hate them....

Sometimes someone is trying to make conversation, but they do not recognize that they are bothering you



Usually I move away from them

They did not do anything illegal

And if they did, then what could I do? Tattle to 911. Civil lawsuit. Any third option? Not that I know of

I completely agree with you, I think both of the people you mentioned were being rude.

Quite rude, I would say. Rudeness, however, is socially defined -- it's different than a moral act, so while there's general agreement on morality (murder is always wrong, it's just that some cultures define some humans as lesser beings...), what's rude in one society is polite in another.

Both cases you describe, it could be argued that the other person is trying to socialize, in their own peculiar way. So I'm guessing the kind of people who get all bent out of shape and do the "I was just being friendly!" routine when I tell them to back off might see those actions as friendly gestures, maybe. Especially with the roommate ones, I really can't tell if that could be perceived by most as just an way to connect or not (and thus inept rather than outright rude).



Hasn't happened in a while so I can't think of any examples, but when I was younger, all the time. And it was often someone "just being friendly" in ways I was not open to. I've seen arguments on Disney boards over these sorts of things -- basically debates on whether the socializing choice is the polite one, or the introvert one (sitting with people or far away from them on a nearly empty train car, for instance) -- and I think even NTs are divided enough on these issues that there aren't many hard and fast social rules. The roommate stuff I'm less sure about.