The Price of Hubris

The story of the fight between the Morgan Stanley banker and the New York cabbie has been in the papers for two days now. The big shot banker claims the cabbie tried to rob him by inflating the fare from $200 to almost $300. The cabbie claims that was the agreed upon price and that the banker refused to pay it once he got to his mansion in Connecticut. What is clear is that the fight got pretty uggly and the banker stabbed the cabbie in the hand with a penknife when the outraged cabbie started driving him back to the city. What I want to know is why didn't this executive take a company car? These guys can take limousines for crying outloud and they do it all the time. But putting all that aside, why didn't he just pay the fare and complained about the cabbie later? That would have been the smart, sensible thing to do and he's supposed to be the superior intellect here. Yet he showed unbelievable lack of self control and tact by fighting with the cabbie like a fishwife, and by assaulting him with a weapon. The reason for this is simply "hubris." He was the big shot and the other guy only a "lowly cabbie." "How dared he butt heads with me like an equal?" "This worm I could stamp under my feet?" The truth is that the banker showed his dark side and it wasn't a pretty one. Being used to a world where all his needs are fulfilled right away, where underlings do his bidding with no questions asked, he was challenged by the lowest of the low and he simply couldn't take it so he snapped, embarrassing the high brow company he works for, earning himself a a nice little suspension, to say nothing of a terrible reputation, and that might be just the beginning. I suspect that little wild episode is going to cost him plenty, might even lose him his job, as Morgan Stanley does not like this kind of publicity and the cabbie will end up with a nice chunk of change. Lesson learned here? Treat everybody the way you want to be treated. It doesn't matter what you do or how big you get, we're all equal human beings on this earth, and we all deserve respect for what we do for a living.