Drawing the Line at Disrespect

You know what I find really upsetting, more than anything? Disrespect. I see it every day, and occasionally have an opportunity to say something about it. And I usually don't say anything about anything until it gets to that point. I have told kids I will put up with just about anything: silliness, loudness, lack of attention, etc., all these are kind of normal and natural in today's society. But disrespect is where I draw the line. Usually, it only takes a little firmness, a little enforcing of the protocol of what we call "call-backs" in education. A few examples of this are: Teacher says, "Macaroni and cheese," kids respond, "Everybody freeze;" "Hocus Pocus," "Everybody focus;" "Class, class," "Yes, yes;" "One, two, three, eyes on me," "One, two, eyes on you!" The children I work with generally respond positively to these cues and order is restored. There are dozens of these. But when they start talking back, and getting in your face, or refusing to do what's being asked of them, there is often the need to step in and stop everything. They have to know they have crossed the line. And they usually do. There are always exceptions, but there are measures in place for classroom behavior management, and it is a normal part of our routine. What really gets me are grown-ups that show no respect. I have observed that many of them are in the Millennial Generation or Generation Y. I am sure this does not apply to all people in this age bracket, but Generation Y is the generation born between 1982 and 1994. Generation X includes those born between 1965 and 1981, and are the age of the children of the Baby Boomers, or those born between 1945 and 1964. It does seem to me that the children of the Greatest Generation should not suffer from disrespect of people their parents' age, but I know it can happen. The problem is, as I see it, we are seeing more and more disrespect with each generation. From kids at school these days, we hardly ever hear "Please" or "Thank you," we don't hear "Fine, thank you, how are you?" Instead, all many say when you ask them how they are, is, "Good." that is, if they say anything at all. They don't say "Excuse me" when they plow into you. They don't return "Good morning" or even look your way in the hall. And on social media, forget about it! It seems like the Internet and growing up on video games has conditioned everybody to just use the computer screen as a weapon or a platform to spew toxicity. And I am through with it. From now on, I will delete unsavory remarks from any posts of mine that people feel like they want to puke their figurative guts on. And I'd just as soon they don't use Messenger or Email or text messages or any other similar medium for that purpose either. If people can't talk to each other, I would prefer they just refrain from replying. Why is that too much to ask? People say, why don't you just block them? It's not always that simple. I want to go to every length possible to communicate with people, but even when they just attack with every comment they post on my feed (and I NEVER comment anything that isn't positive or at least civil on their feed), I don’t really want to block or unfriend them, especially if I know them personally. Another example of this kind of thing is those awful laughing emojis. So discourteous, so disrespectful, so mean-spirited, and so common. It's getting so I don't even want to get on social media at all anymore, and maybe that should be a serious consideration. I've already practically completely quit TV news, which is not a huge problem, since I don't have cable. I do have an antenna, and can get my programs that have the same worldview as I do. There just does not seem to me to be any place for disrespect in civil society. At least some people want discourse among people with different points of view to be civil and respectful, but I can't say I think that most people are consistently civil and respectful. I wish I could. But in the meantime, I'm going to remove from my feed whatever I don't like to see, whatever I perceive as toxic, I just don't want to see it, and if there is anything I can say that runs through every kind of social interaction I engage in, with children or adults, I think that is the one constant. Respect or nothing. We can all do that and we owe each other that. The end.