Noise is still a disturbance, and immigration is still contentious. These things are not changing, and in fact, efforts to persuade the public otherwise have brought ever-greater disorder.

This side of things is painfully obvious in the New York subway system, in which back-to-back violent incidents are, these days, its most prominent feature. Some things are a given on the train: Annoyances and eccentricities, especially in New York, make public transit what it is. But likewise can riders expect some level of order, if only downstream of simple no-eating, headphone use, or escalator courtesy rules and norms. And other things, namely the crimes that make up the news cycle of late, are flat-out unacceptable.