Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

yes

7 (87.5%)

no

1 (12.5%)

Total Members Voted: 8

Voting closed: November 24, 2004, 10:43:39 pm

[arkabee]

this one has been mulling/simmering in the back of my head for some time.

someone runs a stop sign (saw on the way back from lunch today), because they are in a hurry.  they don't respect other drivers, do they?

someone leaves an empty bottle of jack daniels (it was about a year ago, i think it was jack, coulda been evan williams) sitting on the white line of the turning lane at a stop light.  not much respect there for others, or am i wrong?

so i step outside for a cigarette (i don't really respect myself much), and i find myself staring at the man at the end of the parking lot.  why is he standing next to the building?  why is he facing the building?  what is he, no, nononono, he _can't_ be.  why is this man peeing on the building?

at least he was respectful enough, as he zipped and turned to go into his car, to shout:
"sorry, i really had to go!!"

[arkabee]

incidentally, i would never state that i have not peed in public, however:

not at 2:00 PM
the day before thanksgiving
adjacent to a public street

IN SIGHT OF THE BANK TELLER LADIES IN THE BANK DRIVETHRU!


i asked the people in the front of the building, whether he'd come in to the building and asked to use the bathroom and been turned down.  nope.

[AlohaDawg]

Amen.

I started two or three screeds and decided to walk away as well.

Over the past few days I've heard Ron Artest talk about getting 'disrespected'. I wish I could tell him in person that playing a playground game for millions dollars does not inspire respect from me or any other rational person. And certainly bad behavior doesn't either (and that guy in the white cap is a complete asshole complete with multiple felonies).

I too have been quizzically regarded when I tell people my respect is earned. I think that deep down, these sort of people don't respect anything - not themselves, not their parents, nothing.

We have a large segment of the population that are basically nihilists and I think that's a huge problem because nihilists and people with respect and values can't really occupy the same place at the same time, can't really work together to accomplish anything.

I think that an awful lot of what makes a person's personality and defines their ability to respond appropriately to physical or cognitive stimulus is values. If they don't believe in anything outside of themselves, if they have no ability to do anything that doesn't benefit them directly, they become very indifferent, selgiraffe and revert to something approximating the "natural state" as those old-time philosophers would say - where each individual competes with every other individual for everything.

It's gonna be tough sledding as a culture if a significant number of people slip down into that kind of belief system.

This is why I think a truly secular society is so dangerous. It eliminates too much of what makes a community work including some basic, common values. Not rules, but values.

[CortJstr]

Over the past few days I've heard Ron Artest talk about getting 'disrespected'.

Why is he still employed?

[AlohaDawg]

Even better question than that, to me, is in response to his lawyer or agent or something, talking about how he's "a kid" and just wants to "do his job".

When did playing a game become a "job"? No athlete has a 'job' in my opinion, they are privileged to make money (way too much money) playing a game.

[slink]

THE BANK DRIVETHRU!

Really? They exist?
Do you have drivethru laundrettes and shit too?
Wow.

[CortJstr]

When did playing a game become a "job"? No athlete has a 'job' in my opinion, they are privileged to make money (way too much money) playing a game.

Which brings up the larger question; does any entertainer have a job? Pro athletes aren't really that different than actors or muscians in terms of what they do for society.

[wombat]

This is why I think a truly secular society is so dangerous. It eliminates too much of what makes a community work including some basic, common values. Not rules, but values.

I don't want to start an argument on this really, but I want to stand up for those of us who are godless but still have values.  I would bet that you and I agree on most questions of how people should behave towards one another, despite my inability to believe in any higher power.  And you know what else, I'll bet you'd still behave honorably in your life if you were somehow presented with absolute proof of the nonexistence of God.

[AlohaDawg]

We should have a private conversation about that some time. I think the proof is around me constantly. What  you would call a 'statistical anomaly' I would still call a miracle.

The values that we agree on are likely to be many of the same values that the three major faiths of todays world, Islam, Christianity, and Judaism all more-or-less agree on (and many other faiths, too). In talking about community building and maintaining a civil society, I guess it doesn't matter where those values come from if one is clinically and non-spiritually analyzing how communities/societies work and why sometimes they don't...although I am interested in hearing from secular humanists about where their values come from, how they came to hold them, and what keeps them holding them.

[miles]

This is why I think a truly secular society is so dangerous. It eliminates too much of what makes a community work including some basic, common values. Not rules, but values.

While I don't agree with your sentiment, I don't think the US, at least, is in danger of becoming a truly secular society.  We are probably the most religious we have ever been.  As far as respect goes, does anyone know how more secular societies in Europe are fairing compared to the US?

Interesting, though, that some say the US supported Saddam Hussein earlier on specifially because he was seen as secular.

[AugustWest]

Secular != amoral.
Religious != moral.

[AlohaDawg]

To me it's not about having 'no values'. It's more about having a broad cross section of the population sharing somewhat common values or a fairly tolerant population; I think in America we have a combination of these.

In Europe they are approaching a flash point between the immigrant Muslim population and the centuries-settled european culture in each area. The Europeans (at least the governments of Holland and Germany) have publicly appealed to immigrants (and specifically Muslim immigrants) to more fully "integrate" into their society - I think this could be taken as an affront to their faith - so this could cause even more problems. The core values of the immigrant and established populations are so disparate that it will require either rapid integration into the economic and political system (near the top end of both) or an atmosphere of tolerance which doesn't seem to be improving right now.

[side_show]

The question of whether respect is increasing or decreasing or not is a tough one.  

In Canada I see action toward an increase in respect of the individual - there’s a growing tolerance towards diversity and a broadening of laws to allow, more and more, for one to live one’s life as one chooses so long as it does no harm to others.   So I think, things are going good.  But then, I look at how polarized the world has become, especially toward American policy, and I get worried.  After all, the big news story in the paper today is about how while Bush is visiting Canada he will not appear in front of our parliament.  He is doing this to prevent being booed by our politicians (he was booed when he appeared in Australian parliament, and the decision to not appear in our parliament was made, apparently, “to avoid embarrassment.”  When the world’s largest superpower no longer holds the respect of its allies, its government should feel embarrassed.

Then I look at the way children are marketed to now, and I get really scared.  Since the dawn of the tween market and the media machine around Britney and Christina and all the clones, there has been this alarming trend of sexualizing little girls in a way that I find highly disturbing.  Low-rise jeans and bra tops should not be made in sizes for eight year olds, and more alarmingly, there should simply not be a market for them.  But they are, and there is.  Then I think, a society that has no respect for childhood is inherently sick, and is set on self-destruct mode.

I feel that at this point in history, as a society we are flailing, that we are at a low level when it comes to respecting each others’ humanity.  Yet, when I step back, I have to recognize how, pardon the French, it’s the same shit on a different day.  I often worry that our society is headed towards a distopian future.  Then, sometimes (though less often) I hope we’re headed toward utopia. In the end, when I look at history (as I have been a lot lately – I’m working on a piece that spans over more than 50 years) every violent swing towards bad is tempered by a swing to the good and an eventual middling out.

[AlohaDawg]

Do you think perhaps that Australians should be embarassed that their respected, elected politicians lack the self-control to respect, if nothing else, the office of the President of the United States regardless of their opinion of the man in it? We have significant ties to Australia economically and militarily and the same goes for Canada. Maybe there is some room for embarassment on the part of people who can't be trusted to act like adults in a forum as important as the seat of government.

[side_show]

Considering the direct way that Bush's White House has negatively effected Canada in the past four years (banning beef, tariffs on wheat, refusing free trade of lumber), never mind the constant interference and overstepping of his government in to Canadian pollicies (attempting to strong arm Canadian govt into the war in Iraq in spite of the clear lack of support by our population at large, attempting to prevent gay marriages, threatening border closures every time our policy doesn't exactly match his), it's fare to say the majority of Canadians would expect our politicians to voice their anger and distaste.  Given no other means to voice grievances, as was the case with the “booing” parties in Australian parliament, I should hope our politicians would at least boo.  There has been several years of polite pleas for diplomacy from Canadian govt. falling on deaf ears -silence equals acceptance.

As for embarrassment for "lack the self-control" - Bush has severely botched his relationship with Canada.  If I had a neighbor treated me the way he’s treated Canadians, I'd let that neighbor know he wasn't welcome if he came walking into my house.  That's how parliamentary debating goes down - it's how it functions.  Booing, clattering of hands on tables, clapping in approval are all common sounds in parliament - it is not a passive institution.  I don't understand why Bush, who at the very least is a bad neighbor and at the very worst has essentially leveled years of diplomacy between our countries, has earned some special place of respect outside of how our government usually functions.  I don't think the "Office of President" merits any respect on title alone, but I come from a country where our last primeminister got pied in the face, and the majority of our country found it humourus, so perhaps there's a cultural difference?  You mentioned earlier that people have to earn your respect, so why shouldn't this apply to Bush?  He hasn't earned the respect of the Canadian people or the Canadian government, and in fact his actions toward our country have been extremely disrespectful and in some cases destructive.  You get what you give.