Posted: Jan 13, 2012 11:13 am
JoeB wrote:In our culture the word respect is hardly ever used and when it's used it's mostly like "We should be respectful to the elderly", or such.
A lot of people seem to think this is self-evident, and they add an 'always' in there. I mean sure, I'm more likely to have the default respect that some of us here agree with for older generations, since the chances are they have more wisdom and good experience to impart. But if they do something I find horrible, I won't continue respecting them just because they're elderly. After all, there's only a correlation between age and wisdom, not causation.
Or do most people really mean "We should be polite to the elderly"?
JoeB wrote:Could it be that conservatives (or authoritarians) place more emphasise on the importance of respect than liberals?
I think it's more a difference in views of respect. Conservatives could be more likely to think "He's done something I don't agree with, but he's in a position of authority and I respect him, so I'll let it slide". While liberals could be more likely to think "Although he's in a position of authority, that doesn't affect whether I respect him or not, so he's now lost my respect because of what he did". Or something.