open letter to man on 6 train with cameraphone

Dear middle-aged Hispanic man with cute but badly-behaved daughter,

Yes, it is fun to take photos and videos of your daughter and play them back to her. It is not, however, fun for other passengers when you make cellphone recordings of your daughter screaming at the top of her lungs, and then play the recordings back, repeatedly. Did you know that your daughter's screams are even more shrill and piercing when filtered through the poor sound quality of a cellphone speaker? Did you know that allowing your daughter to scream at you, repeatedly, demanding that you play back the recording yet again is an inappropriate behavior for a child of any age on the subway, and that by indulging this behavior, you make yourself look like you have no idea how to be a parent? Also, you made me uncomfortable during the minute and a half or so that you pointed your cellphone camera in my direction, but I assumed that I was being paranoid and you were simply watching something on the screen. However, when you turned the phone around, said "That's you!" and replayed a video of me, I was ready to call the ACLU. Or the NYPD. Someone with four letters. I did, in fact, say "That's very rude." "That's rude?" you said. "Yes," I said, decisively. I wanted to also say "You are raising your daughter to be the kind of person no one will like," but I didn't, because that might make me such a person, at least for a moment, so I kept my mouth shut. But I hate you.

-Jen