You know what old guys do?
They sit around and drink coffee and whine about what is wrong with the world these days.
I think I figured out the two things that are wrong with people these days. It came to me as I grabbed my first cup of Joe this morning.
The first thing is people these days seem to have a lack of civility. Many people just are not real nice anymore. In fact, they can be downright nasty. They are mean to everyone they deal with.
Which leads me to the second item. People have a sense of entitlement. They think they are owed things. And they complain quite loudly if they feel they are not getting what they think they are entitled to.
They can be downright rude about it, which brings me back to that lack of civility thing.
You probably wonder what happened to set me off on this topic of lack of civility and having a sense of entitlement.
Well, there isn’t just one thing. There have been several incidences lately which seem to prove the point I am trying to make here. A few have involved my work as an editor and people I deal with. Others have involved people I know who have shared their stories of dealing with the public as part of their work.
I have a hard time understanding a person yelling at someone else and calling them names, just because they were doing their job. Some people seem to think rules do not apply to them. And for some reason, they think they are entitled to do whatever they want. They feel it is their God-given right, or they can do it because they pay taxes. Or some other reasons which also make little to no sense. And sometimes they are not shy about telling you about it.
I can almost see all of you out there who have to deal with the public on a daily basis nodding your heads in agreement.
Quite a few folks who have to deal with the public have related their stories of getting chewed out for just doing their job. City employees have a lot of those stories. They face some irate citizens on many days. People are upset about property taxes, or being told they can’t park on certain streets, or have to have their dog on a leash or that they can’t camp for free at the city campground anymore.
The list of things people are upset about is long, and the nastiness of the people complaining seems to be increasing dramatically. Blame it on the COVID pandemic if you want, but I think it runs a lot deeper than that.
Now don’t get me wrong. There still are plenty of nice folks in this world. And
luckily, many of them live here in Minnesota and in Faribault County.
But there seems to be an uptick in the not-so-nice variety.
I don’t really have an answer as to why. But you can certainly see it on a national and state level, and, unfortunately, locally here as well. With so much social media available, you can see examples of not being civil and feeling entitled every day if you want to visit Facebook and Twitter. Sometimes everyone feels they need to pile on with their nasty responses to someone else’s comments.
So, what is the solution? I wish I knew. I guess for many of us it is simply to try and be a nice person.
Help others out who need it. Volunteer to do things for the community. Every group and organization seems to be looking for people to join them, from service clubs to civic groups and committees. There are plenty of opportunities to help out others or your town if you just look around.
Try always being friendly and polite. Even when someone is not being very nice to you. Try to remember everyone is not having a good day every day. So be nice and try and be civil to everyone.
Smile a lot. It will drive those other nasty, rude and cranky folks a bit crazy.
So last week, just as I was having one of those days where I was putting up with some strange people and odd requests, I got a phone call from a subscriber who wanted to thank me for doing a good job with the Register each week.
He said he was getting tired of all the nastiness in the world being reported in the state and national media and found it refreshing and enjoyable to read the Register each week.
And since he had once been critical of our news coverage a couple of years ago, he said he wanted to let me know that he also thinks we do a pretty darn good job most of the time. I thanked him for the comments, of course. I mentioned it is not just me, it takes a team effort to get this newspaper out each week.
What I did not tell him was that he really made my day. And that is what I think each and every one of us should have as a personal goal. Make someone’s day, each and every day. Let’s bring back Minnesota Nice.
Now I’m going to get another cup of coffee and whine about something else.
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