On a crowded train at rush hour a group of teenage boys makes a boisterous entrance. They’re shouting, jostling, gesticulating, teasing one another and making off-color remarks about other passengers. The four young men are crowded in to my left, and they grasp the pole below where I’m holding on. A young woman to my right automatically removes her hand from the pole when one of the boys’ hands makes contact with hers. This elicits a volley of reproaches: ‘Yo, you see the way this lady moved her hand away?’ ‘She thinks she’s gonna get germs!’ ‘Yo, that lady’s racist!’ The young woman starts to defend herself: ‘No I’m not, I just don’t like other people touching me.’ This just throws fuel on the fire: ‘Yeah, she don’t wanna touch no negro.’ ‘I told you she’s racist!’ ‘Yo, that lady hates her job!’ This last comment, for some reason, gets the strongest response from the others, and for the next several minutes it’s hurled back and forth like some kind of absurdist battle cry, becoming more emphatic (and apparently hilarious) with each utterance. ‘The lady hates her job! The lady hates her job!’ The young woman, meanwhile, discretely shifts her position closer to the door, hoping to avoid getting drawn into something potentially uglier. Other passengers, myself included, stare stone-faced straight ahead, all aware of the futility of any reaction other than indifference.