Some of you remember Julia Child, whose TV
cooking show changed the way Americans eat. The health-conscious criticized her
for using too much butter. Her acerbic retort was that she was cooking for four
people, and a stick of butter wasn’t too much. “Everything in moderation," she told us, "including moderation.”
I was reminded of Julia recently while reading
newspaper accounts of our leader’s tweets. They and those who respond on
Twitter and other social media seem to have never met Julia. The insults come
like heightened metabolism, the hyperbole races to a rant, and the general
tenor of conversations stretch the definition of politeness. We could all
tolerate a bit more moderation. They could be civil.
Talking heads on cable TV dull our senses. They
say horrible things about our leaders, slant the news to their advantage for
one hour each day, and then turn the microphone over to someone else with a
rapid heartbeat. These folks are paid to be rude, to support one political
party over another. One channel exists to praise Trump, the other to bury him. Yet,
we lend them our ears! Civility vanquished?
How did we lose it? The unprincipled
commentators are only one ingredient of the messy stew we’ve become. Vast
numbers of people don’t watch cable news, millions of others don’t read
newspapers, and still more don’t listen to current events on the radio. Those
who do watch, listen and follow just abet them, encourage them, and are
complicit with them. I do, and I am, I admit it.
Something changed in the last three or four decades.
Civility is something you learned at home at an early age. You learned how to
speak when spoken to, how to treat people well, how to call your elders Mr. or
Mrs. or Miss, or Sir and Ma’am. No parent intentionally raises kids to be
uncivil. No school intentionally teaches kids to be uncivil. Yet it happens.
Maybe it starts when we don’t correct incivility when we experience it.
Everyone is their own snowflake, you know. Let’s not stifle their creativity.
Those who haven’t been taught politeness don’t recognize impoliteness when they
see it. In the end, we elect national leaders who are on daily marathons of
incivility, trying to reach 10,000 steps of crassness. If our leaders and the
talking heads speak that way, why should I worry? Some moderation, please.
Everyone has the power to express their opinion
on social media, with no need to be polite about it, or factual for that
matter. Unimpeded free speech is a great freedom. We can speak our minds
without fear of retribution from the government or those we dislike. We can be
as uncivil as we want knowing there is no recourse, and we can start most
arguments with IMO. But, should we? Can’t we do it in moderation?
If we can assume that 90%[i] or more
of us are reasonably civil toward each other, why do we allow the other 10% to
drag down our society, to let it wallow in presidential hubris? Two years from
now, or six years from now will a new leader be able to turn us back to a
nation that treats science with respect, that doesn’t lead by calling people
names or calling them the enemy? Perhaps we could convince people, in the meantime, to be uncivil with a bit more moderation. Maybe we can take that first
step in the journey back to civility among ourselves, with and from our
leaders,
I’ve seen civility, I’ve experienced it, I witness
it from time to time in the present, and aspire it for ourselves in times
ahead. St. Francis supposedly told his followers to spread the Gospel to all
they met and to use words if they must. Can we spread the good news of civil
society by being civil ourselves? Think of it as the butter of life; not too
much moderation.
[i] A number I picked out of the air, but which I
believe to be true with no data to back it up, and you know where this is going
….
