Night thoughts...
People, usually, respect others for being impressive for some reason, such as being in authority - like a company director or policeman - or being older - like a grandparent . The word respect has a number of definitions, but in general, the most common definition is ‘treating something or someone with kindness and care’. The question that often pops in my mind when I think about respect is: how much of it should be given to another?
Recently, there have been a lot of debates around how far one should go to respect another, such as gender equality, gay rights, anti - bullying, the mixing of cultures and etc. Where does respect come from?
For many, respect means the sense of worth or personal value that people attach to someone. Overall, respect is normally evaluated based on many factors such as what person is doing with their life, how they treat others, whether they are honest and etc. In other words, respect is a positive view that we form about others.
Although respect and norms of conduct related to it are vastly discussed, it remains very subjective and personal to each individual. In childhood we usually learn, how to show basic level of respect to others such as saying thank you, being attentive when person talks and etc. We are also told that if person is famous or in authority they should be respected by default. However, what I believe we do not learn is how to be respectful to people which are different from us in some ways.
What I often see, is that many people have a tendency to disregard opinions and personal experiences of others and as a result act in disrespectful manner. Meanwhile the lack of respect is not as aggressive as outright insult, it can be equally damaging. Disrespect implies that a person is not seen as a full human being whose presence matters. This is particularly true when uncomfortable topics such as racial discrimination, gender equality, poverty or cultural differences are brought up. I personally believe that these are what we should focus on when we practice respect. Mainly, it is because as members of a society we still fail to acknowledge the existence of suppression of certain groups of people within it, moreover we often play far bigger role in this than we think we do. Often we deny respect to others, because of our egos. I will not go to the details about how our egos and fear to lose power affect our ability to treat others with respect, however I think that in order to overcome this issue one should learn self-respect. In my view, only by learning self - respect we can recognise the needs of others and treat them with dignity.
Recently, there have been a lot of debates around how far one should go to respect another, such as gender equality, gay rights, anti - bullying, the mixing of cultures and etc. Where does respect come from?
For many, respect means the sense of worth or personal value that people attach to someone. Overall, respect is normally evaluated based on many factors such as what person is doing with their life, how they treat others, whether they are honest and etc. In other words, respect is a positive view that we form about others.
Although respect and norms of conduct related to it are vastly discussed, it remains very subjective and personal to each individual. In childhood we usually learn, how to show basic level of respect to others such as saying thank you, being attentive when person talks and etc. We are also told that if person is famous or in authority they should be respected by default. However, what I believe we do not learn is how to be respectful to people which are different from us in some ways.
What I often see, is that many people have a tendency to disregard opinions and personal experiences of others and as a result act in disrespectful manner. Meanwhile the lack of respect is not as aggressive as outright insult, it can be equally damaging. Disrespect implies that a person is not seen as a full human being whose presence matters. This is particularly true when uncomfortable topics such as racial discrimination, gender equality, poverty or cultural differences are brought up. I personally believe that these are what we should focus on when we practice respect. Mainly, it is because as members of a society we still fail to acknowledge the existence of suppression of certain groups of people within it, moreover we often play far bigger role in this than we think we do. Often we deny respect to others, because of our egos. I will not go to the details about how our egos and fear to lose power affect our ability to treat others with respect, however I think that in order to overcome this issue one should learn self-respect. In my view, only by learning self - respect we can recognise the needs of others and treat them with dignity.