Neil McNicholas: A lack of respect and civility says it all about society

I’m sitting here at my desk looking out of the window at the parking spaces on the High Street across the road from my house where anarchy is alive and well.

Developmentally speaking, a two-year-old child is under the mistaken impression that the entire universe revolves around them and is there solely to feed their every want.

Hence the raging tantrums synonymous with the “terrible twos” when, on occasion, those expectations are not met.

That’s where discipline used to come in – the process of teaching a young child his or her actual place in the scheme of things, a process that continued until they learned that reality.

Sadly, of course, there are now at least two generations who would have to look up the word discipline in a dictionary to find out what it means.

As a society, we are reaping the whirlwind created by those do-gooders who have systematically decried all forms of discipline, even seeking to make it illegal for parents to chastise their children, or for teachers to discipline those same little darlings when they are disruptive in school, and, later in life, preventing police officers from doing their job effectively, and if necessary physically, in their efforts to enforce the law.

These same two generations have learned from experience that if someone says “no”, or they are told not to do something, it means nothing because there are never any consequences for ignoring what they were told and doing what they wanted.

There are no consequences for misbehaviour, no punishment for not doing as they are told, 
and therefore no reason not to do just what they want. And with that simple lesson in life unlearned, they grow up (except not really) to be adults who don’t listen and don’t do as they are told, and their behaviour is rewarded by an ongoing lack of any negative consequences or punishment.

And so, as I say, I was sitting looking out of my window at the usual parking anarchy across the street. A motorcyclist arrived, leaving his bike under a tree but not in a designated parking space.

Not content with already breaking the law, he totally ignored the requirement to obtain and pay for a ticket to park (no doubt rationalising that as his bike wasn’t in a proper parking space why should be pay for a ticket).

Hours later the bike is still where he left it and, of course, the parking warden has been mysteriously absent, and so, when the owner returns and hasn’t received a penalty notice, the lesson he will have learned is that it doesn’t matter if you ignore and break the law because there are no consequences.

Next a car driver pulled in to a very tight space that is quite clearly not a designated parking slot – in fact the bumper of his vehicle was sticking out into the street.

Off he went, ignoring the need to obtain a parking ticket, and returned not too long afterwards having done a quick bit of shopping but without the inconvenience of having to find, and pay for, a legal parking space like everyone else (except for the motorcyclist).

Again the parking warden
was nowhere to be seen and hence he got away with breaking the law and will no doubt do
the same thing in the future because he knows he can get away with it.

What is wrong with us as a society that so many people these days seem to have this “Me, myself, and I” attitude and that everything must be for their convenience, giving a two-finger salute to law and order and to anyone trying to tell them what they can and can’t do?

The answer is what I started out by saying, that we are effectively leaving large numbers of people at age two in their psychological development (or lack of it in this case).

No one has taught them, then or since, that the universe does not in fact revolve around them and that their “me, myself, and I” outlook on life isn’t acceptable any more than it was when they were two.

It’s as crucial a lesson as being taught not to put their hand in a fire, or not to play in the traffic, or how to dress themselves (clearly another lesson that isn’t always taught!), and how tie shoelaces.

Being taught right from wrong, and learning that there will be unpleasant consequences for doing what is wrong or not doing as we are told, are essential building blocks not just in an individual’s moral development, but also in the moral functioning of the society of which we are a member.

The motorcycle is still illegally parked and still nothing has happened.

Neil McNicholas is a parish priest in Yarm.