by KRISTIAN GRAVENOR

My impeccable Westmount pedigree has taught me so much about the rules of social conduct that I feel obliged to share.

Specifically, it’s about disliking people. There’s so much resentment and snobbishness floating around, yet no explicit rules about when you’re entitled to hold someone in low esteem.

Okay, so firstly, it’s never okay to dislike people for stuff they can’t control. You must never dislike someone for stuttering or for being Belgian, because they didn’t decide to be that way.

Rule two is that it’s legit to dislike people based on their actions. If someone persistently blows Gitanes smoke in your face or recites feminist poetry after coupling, you’re allowed to put them in the grudge file.

The first rule is more important. A hockey player recently denounced French players wearing visors. Had he strictly denounced the visor-wearers, he’d have been in safe territory, as people aren’t born with protective visors. A better-structured putdown would also have saved Bloc Québécois MPs the taxi fare for the emergency meeting they convened to discuss the affront.

It’s sometimes unclear who deserves to be excused and who deserves to be condemned. If someone smells bad, you’ll have to decide whether he can control his malodour. You’re on your own there. Not everybody has the same threshold between empathy and condemnation.

More befuddling: Can we condemn somebody based on a tiny, isolated moment of poor judgment?

I love you too much to allow you to stop reading halfway down this column, so I now offer highly relevant local examples of those touched by instant—possibly undeserved—ignominy.

First, J. Gordon Whitehead. The McGill student spontaneously belted Houdini in the stomach in October 1926. It was likely an unexpected test of the great illusionist’s punch-me-in-the-stomach trick. Houdini died. Two seconds of stupidity and Whitehead will never be remembered for anything else.

There’s Vaudreuil. Good guy. Endured snobbish oppression of the French aristocracy for being born in Quebec. His great moment happened when the Brits laid siege to Quebec City. Or could have happened anyway. Vaudreuil chose to wait it out in Montreal. Big screw up. He missed his chance at military triumph and the vulnerable Brits prevailed.

In 1970, Robert Cliche led a solid electoral battle against Mayor Drapeau. One day, a journalist shoved a microphone in his face and asked him about the FLQ terrorists. Cliche refused to denounce them. Bad move. Drapeau won every single seat.

Countless Montrealers have suffered a Steve Rogers moment (ask a baseball fan) where a pile of accomplishments is cruelly blown away in a second’s misfortune.

One Montrealer reversed the process. Verdun Rock Machine bigwig Peter Paradis saw his entire posse shot dead and caught a cap or two himself on Wellington. In a moment of rage, he vowed to blow up a hall full of rivals and innocents, according to his book Nasty Business. He didn’t do it but sure took pride in congratulating himself for triumphing over the impulse. Paradis took the high road and later ratted out a pair of colleagues so he could stay out of jail.

So be aware why you dislike someone and decide whether it’s fair to feel that way. It’s always more enjoyable when your dislike is founded in the rational cement of solid prejudice.

• • •

Where’s Carlo? Forget Karla, Carlo Calvi is the most sought Montrealer. The dapper Italian moved to Outremont after mysterious forces hanged his banker father off Blackfriars Bridge in London in June 1982. The impeccably mannered and articulate Calvi fought from here to bring the murderers to justice. Happily, the trial of the killers has finally begun. But Calvi has gone underground. I’ve been fielding a string of international pleas to locate Calvi—simply because I spoke to him a few times—but I can’t find him either. This week, Ferruccio Pinotti, an Italian journalist who managed to interview Calvi here in 2002, launched Poteri Forti (Powerful Forces), a book that exposes the web of intrigue involving Opus Dei, John Paul II and the Mafia. Pinotti can’t find Calvi either.

Comments? kgravy@openface.ca