The narrator, who represents the voice of the townspeople brings up the fact that she refused to pay taxes; not only this, but she kicked the men out of her house that had come to collect them. This was completely unconventional, and worth a mention several times throughout the text.
After her father died, they find it scandalous that she would just keep one servant in the house, and a male at that. They gossiped, "Just as if a man--any man--could keep a kitchen properly." They think that a woman, especially a "proper" woman should keep more servants about.
Her behavior with Homer Barron scandalizes the entire town. She was upper-class, and he was working class, and heaven forbid they be seen together, especially without a chaperone. They start to gossip, and feel that she had become a "fallen woman." The narrator states of it that "Some of the ladies began to say it was a disgrace to the town and a bad example to the young people." They think that relatives should come and stay with her, to convince her of the error of her ways.
In the end, they pity "Poor Emily" in most that she does, and find her a perverse curiosity, but her unusual stubbornness and strange ways do scandalize the town quite often.
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