By the same token, some people need to be spoken to in a language they will understand.
I know what you mean. For me, it's a calm, rational, polite conversation or none at all. It doesn't matter who it is, with the possible exception of some lunatic down a back alley, but then I suppose there wouldn't be much conversation going on anyway.
I remember having a conversation in an office with a bank official a few years ago. I'd asked the bank a question about their policy regarding chargebacks, as far as they relate to paypal. They couldn't, or wouldn't, give me a straight answer, and kept saying they couldn't give me legal advice. I repeated that I was not asking for legal advice, I just wanted to know what the bank's policy was. This conversation went round in circles for about 10 minutes, until I asked if they could give me the contact details for their head office so I could ask them. The official went away for about 5 minutes, then came back and said, "Ive spoken to our legal department, and they said they're not prepared to give you legal advice !"
I said that was fine, I wasn't asking for any, I was just asking for an answer to my question regarding their policy. The guy had just wasted 5 minutes on pointless phone call. In the end, I could see that he was hating being there, and wasn't used to someone being persistent but not aggressive or violent. If I had been, he could have called the police or security. Eventually, he suggested I have a look on their website and see if I could find the information I wanted on there. I said yes, fine, I'd have a look and if I still couldn't find it, I'd arrange to call in and see him again. At this, he said, "No, don't do that, I wont be able to help you !"
I guess a lot of people would have throttled him for being so evasive, but what would have been the point ? That wouldn't have got me the info I needed anyway. I just thought it was funny that he spent so long avoiding answering my question, rather than just being honest. I asked another bank the same question later the same week, which they happily answered straight away.