Yes, George, it's an absolute, and you're quite free not to "buy it." And you're right: I can't justify it rationally, if by "rationally" you mean with a reasoned argument. But I can suggest you make a serious study of the works of Cartier-Bresson, Kertesz, Chim, Doisneau, Ronis, Brassai, Evans, Erwitt, Riboud, Winogrand, Levitt, and Frank, for starters. Once you've done that you may understand what I'm saying.
I'm not saying that these two pictures aren't street photography. They certainly are. They're just not very good street photography. There's a subtlety in good street photography that's missing in these pictures. But the difference isn't something you can describe in words. It's like the difference between a prose description of a child's visit to a farm and Dylan Thomas's "Fern Hill." The first may tell you what a farm looks like. The second gives you something beyond that; something priceless and beyond what prose can describe.