Respecting your peers

Respecting others is sometimes almost impossible. Right-wing extremism, left-wing extremism, religious or political fundamentalism, anti-science, flat-eathers, etc. But in my view, they should all be respected from the outset.

With antisemitism on the rise in France now (parts of the yellow west movement), and anti-Islamic sentiments proliferating elsewhere, I find it immensely important to try and understand what happens to the people in question, before it goes so very wrong as it did in e.g. the Weimar Republic or with the ISIS culture. Degrading e.g. neo-Nazis as people not worthy of any respect is, to my mind, not a constructive way forward (again, unless evil actions removes the right to respect). Trying to understand cultural, social and other perhaps contingent circumstances and societal structures starts with respecting the humans as such.

For example, you might hold the weirdest ideas about the world, and I would still respect that. I need to. Otherwise, how could we live side by side on this small planet? I might not agree with your ideas at all, I might even try to convince you to change your perspective, but even so, I would still respect you as a human being, as long as you don’t act in contrast to law and human rights.

Respecting others is sometimes almost impossible. Right-wing extremism, left-wing extremism, religious or political fundamentalism, anti-science, flat-eathers, etc. But in my view, they should all be respected from the outset (as long as actions are not illegal, needless to say). One obvious problem is that some representatives of the above-mentioned world views would probably not respect me back. In my mind, though, respect is a necessary means when trying to meet other peers on the course of e.g. solving conflict. Meeting others with respect oftentimes results in expressions of asymmetry, showing that the respect is not mutual at all, but only uni-lateral. This makes dialogue very difficult. The difficult quest is to nevertheless keep up respecting fellow humans. A friend of mine (my neighbor) once even taught Taleban soldiers in Afghanistan about human rights and peace-keeping by not using arms. It was completely new to many of them and to her surprise many of them in fact listened to her – a woman. A few of the young Talebans came to her after the workshop and told her that what they really wanted was to live a peaceful life with family. Well, then they should stop fighting. Education always is a good idea, I guess. I am still quite pessimistic about whether she managed to change their actions anyway.