When I first encountered Robert Heinlein’s attitude toward manners, I thought he was just a little bit over the top. The older I get — and the ruder our culture gets — the more I realize just how right he was. And he saw it that clearly over 60 years ago, when the “rot of society” was scarcely visible to the 99% of folks.
To wit:
“A dying culture invariably exhibits personal rudeness. Bad manners. Lack of consideration for others in minor matters. A loss of politeness, of gentle manners, is more significant than is a riot.”
Combined with another quote of his, the picture of where we stand now becomes some what ominous.
The two highest achievements of the human mind are the twin concepts of “loyalty” and “duty.” Whenever these twin concepts fall into disrepute–get out of there fast. You may possibly save yourself, but it is too late to save that society. It is doomed.(1)
You can change this. You can. Stop being rude yourself. No matter how provoking the outside world and all the other actors upon the stage appear to be, you yourself can chose to remain in control of how you are, how you behave and — thereby — who you are in the world.
That is, I can’t make anyone else be mannerly, mature and trustworthy, no legislation or “law enforcement” or “punitive action” will ever make it so. But I can chose to make myself that way.
Actually, there’s nothing else any of us can do. Ever. “Rules” don’t work — but individual choice does.(2)
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(1) In another place in this writing he follows this (or an equivalent statement) with: and the thing about space travel is that it made it possible to go elsewhere.
(2) In part that’s what lies behind “do you know why a small group of people can change the world? Because that’s the only thing that ever has.” A small group of people who have chosen, each for himself, how and what to be in the World. Large groups simply can’t do that, not in our present culture — which inherenly limits the individual.