KEY POINTS:
What is it with the pampered offspring of the middle-class that they think they can treat service workers like dirt?
This week, 130 students from Victoria University, in Rotorua for the annual University Games, were evicted from motels after trashing rooms and leaving their accommodation strewn with vomit,
alcohol and food, according to the motel owners.
Allegedly drunk when the students arrived, the partying didn't stop until the terrified moteliers called security guards and kicked the students, the intellectual elite of this country, out of town.
And when they sobered up, was any contrition shown? Not that we've heard. Instead, the students said the accusations were exaggerated and there "wasn't as much alcohol as made out" (sic). They did admit causing noise and minor problems with carpet stains and vomit.
Minor problems? Excuse me? Since when is vomit in any capacity or quantity, especially when ejected from a drunken yobbo's mouth, simply a minor problem?
Possibly for the spoilt brat who uttered this statement, after whom mummy and daddy have mopped up all his life. That is, when they weren't loaning him the family saloon, ironing his Rodd & Gunn, buying the best chardonnay for his parties and inviting girls from the right sort of families to lunch on Sunday.
He's never had to clean his own bedroom, let alone his own vomit.
There's nothing new in this. Four decades ago the same sort were chundering into pot plants at school balls in Wellington's Majestic Cabaret, gagging on the humour of it all, while daddy paid for the hired suit to be drycleaned before returning it to Frank Casey.
Some of these guys went on to work in Foreign Affairs, or become merchant bankers, and chundered on the entire country before buggering off overseas, hopefully for good.
Ten or more years ago when my children saved up for the annual Big Day Out tickets, we watched aghast as carloads of rich kids from Christchurch made their inebriated way north, posing for photographs alongside AA signs for Mangere, thinking they were being terribly brave.
They ended up crashing at our house for the night, and the son of a High Court judge vomited down the side of the bed, over the wall and on to the floor. He wasn't so comatose that he didn't know what he'd done, but slunk away the next day without a word.
I took revenge years later by telling his disbelieving mother and father about the nocturnal habits of their darling son, by this stage a law student.
This isn't the exclusive realm of university students, either. Restaurateurs throughout the country harbour memories of disgraceful carry-ons by those who think a gold credit card entitles them to behave worse than pigs in a sty. My Russell restaurant looked as if a group of chimps had been let loose with bottles of wine, steak and salad after a visit by staff from an Auckland insurance company.
The white damask napkins had to be tossed out, the stains never came out of the tablecloth, the once-fresh flowers on the table were crushed into the floor, and chairs were upturned on the carpet.
Just last week I sat in the Koru lounge at Wellington Airport and watched as a group of non-members bullied their way past the concierge who, as anyone who uses the lounge regularly will attest, is the loveliest, most helpful and friendly woman.
Oh, how clever they thought they were when they sat down, congratulating themselves on putting one over a service worker who, in their tiny minds, is inferior to them by nature of her job.
If I was a Rotorua motelier I would have rubbed the students' noses in their muck. If their parents can't house-train them, they should be shamed into some sort of civilised behaviour by members of the public.
No wonder they think the world owes them a living, as they go into election year campaigning for all student debt to be written off.
We already pay 70 per cent of their fees, so why should we be forced to pay the lot when these kids can't be even bothered to clean up after themselves, or show any shame?
Tertiary qualifications are not compulsory, and many of them are useless. Maybe if they took on jobs cleaning motels, waiting on tables, or looking after airline passengers - where security of income depends on treating customers with respect, politeness and friendliness - they wouldn't have to take out a student loan.
For the first time in their miserable lives, they might learn something useful, such as treating fellow citizens as human beings, regardless of their occupations.
