Greetings Tracy.

I certainly have to say that I agree with most of your post. You make sense in what you say and obviously want to have respectful dialog with others. That's good. I respect that.

I have a particularly warm attitude towards respectful people. In the U.S., you find some of the warmest subcultures in the mid-west and in the south. Great people. Warm and friendly. I call them "quality people". I also have had equally warm and friendly contact with people from other countries like England, Scotland, and Ireland. But like you, I see a decline, especially among young people.

Also, you said that sometimes people need to be reminded that they are acting in an unacceptable way, and I could not agree more. "Spot on" as I've heard the Brits say.

Where I may see things a little differently is in the psychology involved in law and respect.

I read your post carefully and have detected that there seems to be an assumption throughout. To the best of my ability, it seems that the assumption is that law can bring respect, that is, if you implement and enforce the right law, than people will be respectful. Hopefully I'm on target here.

What I've learned is that law only brings about the facade of respect (through fear). Law is a guardrail for those who have the tendency to drive off the road. Those who don't drive off the road don't need the guardrail. Also, to some degree, law is also a source of protection for those who don't drive off the road.

Evidence of this principle can be found in the fact that nearly all countries in the world have more laws today than they have ever had in history, yet, the decline you mention continues. Law clearly is not the answer. Yes, it is necessary, but it does not produce respect.

True respect is earned, but true respect is like communication in that it has a sender and a receiver, and unfortunately, whenever you involve two people in a process, the process complicates significantly. Nevertheless, with this in mind, the problem of a lack of respect is rooted in something other than a lack of law, and this "something" is a deep subject indeed.

First, let's talk about the respect "sender".

A "sender" "sends" respect to another person based on their "perception of power". For example, if a person's perception of power is physical strength, then they tend to "send" respect to those who are physically powerful. If a person's perception of power is intellectual power, then they will tend to act respectfully towards those who have intellectual power. We can concluded that (a book could easily be written on this subject alone) a person's perception of power is foundationally rooted in what they believe.

So, the real culprit in this dilemma related to people acting disrespectfully towards one another is based in their belief system, and with this in mind, you can imagine what myriad of things combine to form a person's tendency to (or not to) act respectfully.

Let me start with an example I've very familiar with.

As a Christian (one who truly believes that Christ is exactly who He said He was), I believe that people have the potential to become children of God. I also believe that it is hard for us to discern whether people will or will not (perhaps later in life) accept this honorable office, so it is important to think of them as such at all times, regardless of their current demeanor.

If a person accepts this gift of life from God, they are "grafted into" the family of God and become brothers and sisters. So naturally, as someone who believes this, and someone who believes you need to treat your family well, I have a tendency to act respectfully towards strangers believing that I may spend eternity with them and them with me as "brothers" and "sisters".

With this belief system, there is little need for law for me. I don't do things that bump into that guardrail often. The Bible speaks about this in very interesting and revealing (about human nature) ways.

In contrast, if someone is raised without an understanding of God's plan, and if perhaps they were raised with a belief that we all "evolved" from apes and lower primates, then there is no logical reason (no motive) for people to have respect for others. Other can easily be viewed as competition for resources or jobs or others needful things. This kind of a belief system can lead to an extremely self-centered and self-focused personality that may even justify harming someone else for their own survival, or in some cases, their own pleasure.

Of course, this kind of self-focused personality does not emanate from all who believe in evolution because of emotions. Emotions are the great balancer in some cases. In other cases, they do a great deal of harm. Either way, they are designed in such a way that helps to balance and moderate society in a natural way. Of course, there is a lot more to this and I'm covering a lot of ground here, but I'm trying not to write a book.

So, here was have the sender.

Now, let's talk about the respect "receiver". This is the person who is or is not acting in such a way that will cause another to respect them.

Of course, keeping in mind the complex array of perceptions of power out there embraced by "senders", there will be a complex interaction determining who "gets" respect from whom, so again, a book could be written on this subject (many have been).

So, once you remove a belief from a culture that sincerely values individual persons (and their rights), you now move into what I call an emotionally-based society. This type of society is guided in their actions more by emotions than logic because the true nature of an individual's purpose becomes ambiguous. Purpose is self-determined and therefore chaos (to some degree or another) ensues. Emotions rule and logic and reason dissipate. Society declines in most areas.

When this happens, you move into a society of positivistic law. This is a type of law that controls everything you do, usually for the safety of others. An emotionally-based society requires this kind of overbearing system of law just to keep the appearance of civility.

Unfortunately, no matter how much law you impose, you don't create respect. There will continue to be a decline of respect and therefore a decline in the quality of life until the system degrades into a police state, because this is the only state (a play on words) that continues to appear civil (safe). People then trade freedom for security because there is so much fear generated from the increasing chaos.

Of course, a police state is a great place if you're an international banker or international trader (a "merchant of the Earth" as the Bible calls them), and so it is in the bankers' and traders' best interest to shape each individual's belief system to exclude God and to include self-determination (selfishness in purpose).

With all this in mind, we can only conclude one thing.

The only way to return to a respectful society is to restore a belief that people are fundamentally valuable, and the only way to give people true value is the understand that they are potentially eternal and forever to be in your presence as family.

I conclude (as have the founders of the U.S., which sadly is moving quickly to becoming a non-Christian nation, and will sadly soon see the consequence of it) that the best way to implement a social system that works is to make sure that law is thin, and that the real force behind profound change is social pressure.

Social pressure can profoundly change a person. Law cannot.

Social pressure is expressed and exerted by our interactions with others. The hope of acceptance (carrot) or fear of isolation (stick) we may feel from someone else through their actions and attitude is an emotional force that is understood by nearly everyone regardless of belief system, culture, race, and hence, part of the reason that I call emotions the great balancer, and in part, specifically designed as such.

If we are unhappy with the way someone is treating us, the most effective thing we can do is respond in a way that displays the quality of our person. Observers will see this interaction and will respond in a way that creates social pressure in favor of the self-controlled and respectful and disdain for the objectionable. The objectionable then experiences feelings of isolation and either (1) changes (a good thing and the reason this system is designed this way, or (2) goes somewhere else and does the same thing until the same result occurs, giving the objectionable yet another opportunity to change.

We may not want the objectionable to have another chance to change. We may just want to zap them off the face of the planet, but God is patient and gives even the objectionable plenty of opportunity to change, and He expects us to do the same, for even they may become our brother or sister at some point as they grow and change and (hopefully) humble themselves and learn to treat others in a way that brings honor to themselves and inspires others to do the same, perhaps though their interaction with other objectionable persons.

As for those who won't change, well, that's not my business. So long as they don't violate God's law ("natural law" or "the law of nature" as the Bible calls it), then they will have to answer for themselves in the end and be socially isolated in the mean time.

(I truly wish I could go into much about on this subject because it is so important, but there are so many underlying principles to build upon that the time it takes is prohibitive in this venue. Each principle must be built upon another until you eventually have a well-rounded understanding about how things work. This foundation for me was gained from reading the Bible. I hope others will do the same. It's not always easy to understand the deeper things, but with some work, it's well worth it.)

So, this is a very thin explanation about why I allow people to express themselves without too much interference from me on this system; in short, because it (human interaction) is a self-balancing system through the design of our emotions and how we interact with each other.

I certainly don't want people to feel offended, but when they do, it's only because there is a fear, and God does not want us to have fear unless it reveals a lie we are believing. If we didn't have some way to realize that we have fear, or better yet, some motivation to get rid of it (emotional pain), then how would we be able (or why would we be driven) to resolve and eliminate that fear and hence the flaws in our belief system.

When I feel offended by someone, the first thing I do is locate the fear that I have. The then find the lie behind the fear (yes, every fear except the fear of God is based on a lie), and replace it with the truth. Then, the fear just goes away. This is the pattern laid out in Genesis, but few ever see it (perhaps more later), but for now, it is this: (1) That a lie was told, then (2) fear ensued, then (3) suffering followed.

In this life, we get to know our fears by our emotional pain (suffering). Feeling offended is one of these valuable ways we get to know our fears, and thereby resolve them; becoming stronger. If I shield people from being offended, I am doing them a disservice by being a party to preventing them from getting to know their fear and thereby preventing them from having the opportunity to overcome their fear.

I have used this principle for much of my life (I discovered it in the Bible in my 20s) and have used it to change from one of the most fearful people I knew into a person of (some degree of) courage. It takes work and is not easy, but it's well worth it; and it all came through the process of:

(1) suffering (feeling emotional pain)
(2) identifying the fear behind the pain
(3) identifying the lie behind the fear
(4) replacing the lie with the truth
(5) experiencing the freedom (from fear) I now enjoy

This process is not possible without those in my life that made me feel fearful or offended. Now I see each offense as an opportunity to grow in strength and courage. Indeed, it is.

If I implemented "law" on this forum to prevent people from feeling offended (fearful), I have cheated them out of the opportunity to grow as well as the opportunity to shine in contrast to the offense suffered. I would not want to cheat anyone in that way.

However, I receive no pleasure in seeing people offended, but I do receive pleasure in seeing people grow and become better and stronger, something we all could certainly stand to do.

So, I will happily ask that people treat each other in a civil way on this forum. I do wish all people would do that, and I do hope this statement is a source of social pressure on anyone who would treat someone else harshly. But I also appeal to those who are challenged by someone else, that they would rise to the occasion and allow themselves to grow. I would feel an even greater reward seeing someone grow in this way. They will also be a blessing and inspiration to others in so doing (growing).

I have a great respect for those who face adversity gracefully, and I know that the common emotional values that most of us share cause most to feel the same way. I know that this form of "natural law" protects us as well as teaches us, if we allow it.

So, let's be kind to each other, but let's also be brave enough to respectfully stand up to those who are not. Let's also not impose law (rules) that protect us from that ever-important responsibility we have to know ourselves, and hence, to grow.