Is it okay just to accept bad behavior?

Warning: Emotional Rant is about to ensue.

Is it me or does it seem that these days to be perceived as a person of substance you need to be rude, a drug addict, an idiot, or say you are warlock teaming with Tiger's Blood?  

Each day we are exposed to some or all of the above mentioned - at work, TV (TMZ is not allowed in my house), radio, print, Facebook, wherever, and it feels like we have to honor these people with our attention because it is what dominates our culture.  Possible solution - shut yourself off from the free world.  Hide away in a cabin, in the woods of a remote part of Maine, Canada, perhaps a cozy jungle bungalow.  While lovely for a stretch of time, I don't think I could handle that much solitude.

While they may not be representative of a larger portion of the population - these, for the lack of a better term, emotional vampires require so much attention that they suck up precious time with their antics. It's like that snot-nosed, annoying kid who ran around in your kindergarten class spitting and punching girls, who took up most of the teacher's time to get under control, and by the time she/he did - bamm...it was snack time, then nap time, and then time to get on the bus. In 1977 it was half day kindergarten.  So, not much real learning was acquired.

I can think of a few people, from kindergarten and throughout my life - including present time, that are "rewarded" for their bad behavior with attention or whatever else they require, it perpetuates a cycle of selfishness and the rest must suffer the slings and arrows of their outrageous behavior.   What to do?  Ignore it.  It's hard when you must work with or are related to or required to socialize at some levels.  Chalk it up as...well, we all have egos and some rear their heads differently than others.  Call them on it.  If someone is behaving like a jack ass or a school yard bully...call them out on the carpet, as I would expect the same if I were behaving poorly.