Oops, you're right it's ambiguous. I changed it to "doesn't mean you necessarily have a right..". Basically there's a continuum: if someone is completely polite you should listen to them. If someone is completely obnoxious you're probably fairly justified in ignoring them, though I think you should pay some attention in case it turns out that they're not actually being that obnoxious in context and have a point (ie someone behind you in a line yells "MOVE you %&^er!", and it turns out you're standing on their foot)
But if someone is a bit ruder than you think is necessary, but still being relatively reasonable, then imo you probably shouldn't ignore them. It does depend a LOT on context though, what I'm mainly having a problem with is people who set the bar for "rude" so low that they feel comfortable ignoring everyone.
It's worth mentioning that my personal ideal of interpersonal interaction is very polite and non-confrontational, so a large proportion of people are "ruder than I would like". It's possible that what you would classify as "slightly rude" I would classify as "VERY rude", and what I would classify as "slightly rude" you would classify as "perfectly normal", but despite these classifications we'd draw the line for "too rude to talk to" at the same place :)
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Re: Seeking clarification
But if someone is a bit ruder than you think is necessary, but still being relatively reasonable, then imo you probably shouldn't ignore them. It does depend a LOT on context though, what I'm mainly having a problem with is people who set the bar for "rude" so low that they feel comfortable ignoring everyone.
It's worth mentioning that my personal ideal of interpersonal interaction is very polite and non-confrontational, so a large proportion of people are "ruder than I would like". It's possible that what you would classify as "slightly rude" I would classify as "VERY rude", and what I would classify as "slightly rude" you would classify as "perfectly normal", but despite these classifications we'd draw the line for "too rude to talk to" at the same place :)