I consider myself to be a nice person, at least I try to be. I married a saint. A great deal of the people in my family I would consider nice and I was raised to be a good person. To be nice, to be polite, to try and help people and to take people into consideration while I’m stumbling though my daily life. It all goes back to the golden rule: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” To me that one statement solidifies all thought on theology, morals and ethics and if everybody went through life treating everyone like they wished to be treated then the world would be a better place.

Now that I've stated that cordiality, has gone out of style I'd like to know when and why. Since when did being nice become a bad thing? Since when did being a nice a person label you as a dork? One example of this is the guy on the beer commercials to whom the mobsters ask: “How ya doin’” and he actually tells them. “Well I’m doin’ fine. Just got into town, blah, blah, blah.” What's wrong with making a little conversation and if you don’t want to know how somebody’s doin’ don’t ask.

It just seems that more and more in our society we’re punishing or chastising people for being good and compassionate and we’re rewarding aggression and immorality. The other night on CBS the producers of Big Brother 54, or whatever number they're up to now, were running a commercial where some of the contestants were introducing themselves and were boasting about how they were bi-polar and nasty and how they were going to do “anything necessary to win." They were proud of this! From what I’ve heard you can’t tell the good guys from the bad on wrestling anymore. In fact the last time I watched it both sides acted exactly the same way, so how do you tell them apart? Action movies are becomig much the same way with the protagonist acting just as violent and dispicable as as the anitagonist. Who do you root for? When I saw "The Blair Witch Project" I rooted for the witch. The main characters were so rude and I have never been as tired of hearing the "F" word in my life. The Internet Movie Database says that it was used 133 times in that 86 minute movie. Can the witch act much worse?

I think that the reason for this twisted representation of what is right and what is not is that politeness, civility and a consideration for other people is not stressed anymore nor is it expected. People don't correct their children anymore nor do they act in a fashion that provides a very good example. I don't know why people insist on acting this way but it probably goes into our fascination with the boundless freedoms that everybodys always preaching about. Nobody these days likes to be told that how they're acting or how they're living their lives is wrong. "I can cuss out a waitress in a restaurant. I can cut someone off in traffic. I can flip people the bird. I don't have to help this person or that person. It's a free country! I have freedom of speech! I have freedom of expression!" I was in a meeting with my Grad School advisor one time and she pointed out the signs that were over each water fountain in the building and said not to spit into the water fountains.

"Should it be necessary to put those signs up?" She said. "Shouldn't it be a given that you shouldn't spit where other people are drinking." I guess somewhere in the constitution it gives us all the right to spit where ever we want to.

There are two things that I was always taught to do when I was growing up and I still try to practice them even though nobody else seems to. One was don't interrupt when someone is talking and the other was be prompt. I don't know how many times a day that somebody comes in and asks me a question, I work at a library reference desk, and keeps interrupting me when I'm trying to answer their question to the point that I'm never sure whether I properly answered their question or not. You see this a lot on television where two people, usually on some political show, are both screaming at the same time. Everybody's talking, nobody's listening and nobody learns a thing. I always try and make sure that if someone is talking to me that I wait until their finished rather than just horning on in whenever I feel like it. I'm not saying that I'm a saint or anything but it seems to be common courtesy.

As far as being prompt goes, we have clocks everywhere; on our wrists, on our cell phones, and if one more cell phone rings in this library I'm going to stomp it flat, on our cars, our VCRs our DVD players and our TV's. So as far as I'm concerned there's no excuse for people to be consistantly late these days. Yet it seems that if you ever have to meet somebody that they just can't get there on time. I teach an internet class at work. It starts at 6:00 pm. It's marked on the brochure that we hand out and we're sure to mention it when someone signs up, but it seems that not everybody can get this designation through their heads. It's either that people are that disorganized or they just don't care. I guess there is a "they'll wait, I'll get there when I get there" mentality that some people have, but it doesn't seem to be very respectful to whoever it is you're meeting.

The thought that burns me up about most rude people is that so many others excuse it by saying that they just don't realize what they're doing. "That's just the way they are," "They're being themselves" are some more lame excuses for people when they're being a pain in the neck. I can't believe that. I think that most people realize that they're being rude, it's just these days they can't slow down enough to care. They can't stop and say to themselves: "Would I like to be treated this way? Of course not. Maybe I should be a little nicer."

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About the author: Jonathan Farlow is a frustrated writer/librarian and lives in Archdale, NC with his wife Kathy and daughter Sara. Visit his web site. You can read some of his stories there. Feedback is welcomed. Email: jonathan-farlow@excite.com

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