By Nancy Patrick

As children grow up, their parents instruct them in certain social rules of acceptable behavior. I remember my parents’ teaching me to say “ma’am” and “sir” when addressing my elders. I also learned quickly that any sassy response from me was unacceptable. You can all recall the “dos” and “don’ts” your parents taught you.

I call the innate “dos” the “givens.” For example, people should know unkindness and selfishness hurt others. We know not to steal from others. Our hearts tell us that adultery and murder constitute a “don’t.” Some knowledge resides in our humanity—the understanding that all people share the uniqueness of souls.

I felt fairly comfortable that my peers knew the unwritten rules as well as I did. We lived by an implied moral code. Some of the beliefs I held included honesty and morality. That doesn’t mean I never told a lie or committed an immoral act; it means I knew when I did something wrong.

Recently, former Chancellor Joe Gow lost his job at the University of Wisconsin-LaCrosse after the discovery of online videos he had posted of him and his wife having sex. Gow told CNN that the university had violated his right to free speech and denied him due process. He explained that nowhere did his contract state that he could not post personal videos.

As a retired public school and private university teacher, my jaw dropped in disbelief. In all my years as a teacher, I never had a contract that instructed me not to post photos of myself engaged in sexual activity. Nor did anyone ever tell me not to have a sexual relationship with a student. No school district cautioned me I could not take property belonging to the school for my own use.

Why didn’t these entities instruct me on the details of their expectations of me? I think they assumed I knew right from wrong. Most of my peers lived by similar moral codes. Again, I don’t mean that they or I always followed the code; I mean we recognized our shortcomings and took responsibility for our own behavior.

In our current social environment, I frequently turn my head quizzically when I hear from the news channels some of the reports of public officials and their behaviors. As a child, I naively trusted people in positions of power. I assumed they were knowledgeable and competent because they held respected positions, sometimes in the community and sometimes in the nation or world.

Sadly, people’s innocence shatters when they realize that many people not only break what they consider important moral values but also deny the behavior is wrong. Over the last several decades, the shared, implied moral code of my world has been shredded by those who believe people have the right to behave as they wish.

Personal ambition and greed have overcome any sense of social obligation or responsibility to those with whom we share the world. Our fear of losing what we want and think we deserve often causes us to put our own selfish goals before anything else.

American citizens are currently embroiled in a battle of values and beliefs. Some of us strongly believe that the law should apply to everyone, including politicians. Others think high-ranking officials should be exempt from following the law. Even more troubling to me is the belief that the law and morality have nothing to do with a person’s fitness to serve in government.

Public use of profanity and vulgarity has become the norm in social settings. Some people curse as readily as they breathe. Their children learn from them and do not understand when their teachers correct them for using profanity. Double standards confuse children so they grow up not differentiating between inappropriate and appropriate behavior.

During the past several decades the idea of social responsibility and obligation to others has faded to the point that many people are self-centered, greedy, ambitious, and cruel to others. In the past, it was a given that adults be courteous to others, even those with whom they disagreed. It was a given that adults would be sensitive to people with special needs. It was a given that competition be civil, and it was a given that fairness was a standard of behavior. 

Many people have abandoned those unwritten rules, much to the detriment of society as a whole. When we condone behavior in which grown people make fun of handicapped people, mimic awkward behaviors, and demean those who hold beliefs dissimilar to theirs, we have reached a shameful level of egotism.

I realize that the topic of immigration is a hot button issue, but our personal views reveal the contents of our hearts. I also realize that the United States cannot contain all the people of the world. I wish I were smart enough to solve the world’s crises that push hordes of people to seek refuge in others countries. 

Alas, I am not. I feel the same sense of frustration, anger, perplexity, anxiety, and dread that everyone else feels. I share your fear, but I know that God loves human beings and expects us to love, even tolerate, each other.

Deuteronomy 15:7-9

“If there is a poor man with you, one of your brothers, in any of your towns in your land which the Lord your God is giving you, you shall not harden your heart, nor close your hand from your poor brother; but you shall freely open your hand to him, and shall generously lend him sufficient for his need in whatever he lacks. (https://bible.knowing-jesus.com/topics/Ethics,-Social).  

Nancy Patrick is a retired teacher who lives in Abilene and enjoys writing