Law School Dad

I'm in a petty mood today, so time to moan about one of the annoying trivialities of life at Cardozo: Holding doors open for people. Frankly, I'm sick of it. (Disclaimer: This is by no means an attack on the noble profession of Doormanship, so ably practiced by thousands of Door Men and Women (New York's Politest?) in apartment buildings across this great city. At the very least, these fellows get paid for opening doors.) First, some background. The law school is situated over 11 floors of an office building. There are only three slow-moving, breakdown-prone elevators for the thousand-plus students, faculty and administrative staff who traverse the campus daily, so invariably people are forced to use the internal stairways to get anywhere. This means opening a door when you enter the stairwell and opening another when you exit. Then there's classroom doors, bathroom doors, locker room doors, PC and study room doors in the library, and doors leading directly to the Fiery Depths of Hell. (I made that last one up.) With so many doors and so many people trying to go through them, it occurred to me that a huge amount of productivity must be lost due to folks needlessly holding doors ajar for others perfectly capable of accomplishing the task themselves. Precious study time is expended as one tries to calculate whether the person two or three steps behind is close enough to be worthy of door propping. Stress and anxiety levels rise as students entering stairwells crowded with people try to gauge the politically correct distance at which they can insert themselves into the flow without raising the ire of their fellow travelers. While a one time door prop may cost just a few seconds of the holder's time, the accumulated time wasted over the course of a semester must be staggering*. My solution is simple. I propose a new rule banning the holding of doors. Entirely. That way, there are no misunderstandings, no grey areas of "should I / shouldn't I". Everyone is free to move at their own pace without having to constantly consider whether their door management skills are meeting the expectations of the courtesy-sensitive in their vicinity. Some here might argue that this just a curmudgeonly attack on one of the last remaining symbols of civility in our increasingly uncaring, self-centered society. I would remind such reactionaries that you checked your civility genes in at the door (another door!) the day you started law school. -LSD