the arrogance of the rich

I picked up these wealthy people late last night. There were three couples going home. I drive a maxi-taxi, which is a Toyota Hi-Ace 3.0lt diesel 10 seater van. As I left the pick-up, I might have taken the first corner a little sharply. I heard one of the women in the back call out slow down, as it seemed she nearly slid off her seat. That she was drunk and didn't have her seat belt on had nothing to do with it of course. OK. I slowed down. I drove at 45-50kms an hour, being very careful going around corners. Two corners later the women slides off again. I heard a string of expletives in the back and realised suddenly that she was directing them at me.
"You're driving like a maniac. Are you on drugs or something?" was the first clear thing I heard. What?!! A maniac on drugs? I was furious. "Have you even got your seatbelt on?" I called. I was boiling up. I was a millimetre away from braking (very suddenly) and telling them to get out. If you don't have respect for a guy who works all night, taking drunk people home when the only alternative is a chilly 6km walk, you deserve to freeze. That the bitch obviously thinks taxi drivers are lowlife on drugs shows just how narrow minded some of the rich are.

I held my temper in check and drove them home. The bitch got out first, and I did notice her husband made an effort to look me in the eye and thank me. She of course didn't say anything and I totally ignored her. The four others in the car were then very polite for the rest of the trip, thanking me, but not, as I noticed, tipping me. Assholes.

Things like that put you off. It took me several fares for me to regain my normal good disposition. If there's one thing I hate it's people thinking they are better than someone else, when they clearly don't have a rat's anus of an idea who the other person is, instead just blindly judging someone by their occupation or appearance.

But I suppose that's the sort of society we get wen we value wealth higher than anything else, and correspondingly base our identities on our occupations (ie. ability to earn money).