I don't know... I think a blanket condemnation of the lack of civility and common courtesy is exactly what is needed. That is not to say there won't be exceptions, but you discuss contingencies for those with the professor beforehand. If you're a working mother (or single father), you let the professor know that there may be times when emergencies arise with your children and you just can't make it, or may be late. You then try to establish a method of contacting the professor before class when and if those situations arise. During class, you set your phone on vibrate or mute so the ring doesn't disturb others, and do not take the call in class. If you see it is your child, you raise your hand, explain the situation to the professor, and ask for permission to leave the room to take the call.
Those situations are not the norm, however. All too often it's the unimportant call which interrupts the class. I happen to be an instructor who works for a company which markets wireless phone service. We are quite serious about cell phone etiquette. Phones are allowed in my classes, as they are part of the business, but they are on mute, and calls are taken in the hall. If a call is answered in the room, or more than a certain percentage of the class is missed due to phone conversations, being late, etc., the student is not passed and is required to take the course again, at full tuition. Since that comes out of the manager's budget, those phone habits are broken rather quickly. Now if we could just reach the rest of the world... :-)
I don't have any sympathy for your parking issue, though. Yes, the people parking in the wrong spots are rude, but you have to factor that in to your drive time. It's perfectly acceptable to plan to have to walk from the "wrong" parking spots, only to find that you get the "correct" spot and arrive a few minutes early. It isn't acceptable to not plan for that possibility and therefore be a few minutes late. If it's a 30 minute commute and you leave home 31 minutes before you need to be there, you're the responsible party. But then, I'm kind of peevish about those sorts of things. :-)
The only problem I see with this approach is that is usually relies on shame to produce the intended result, and since nothing is morally "wrong" any more, shame is nowhere to be found. Perhaps it can be brought back with civility?
Carry on, Professor, and more power to you!
Your response would be valid, if not for two things: my school schedules all the classes I need in the middle of the day. I have to leave work to go, and then come back and work. I then make the time up in the evenings. The extra ten minutes doesn't seem like much on one end, but when it's 9 pm and I have an essay to write for the next day, I want to get home.
I have literally spent thirty minutes circling the parking lot looking for a space because there is literally nowhere to park. It's a very small school, the commuter lot holds maybe 300 cars. And when commuters are not allowed to park anywhere except the commuter lot, that's frustrating... my problem is that I always leave work ten minutes before I really think I have to, because I don't like being late. But I spend twice that trying to park. They sell us parking tags at $30 a year, the least they could do is make sure we can park!