Following the recent brawl between boxers Dereck Chisora and David Haye, the General Secretary of the British Boxing Board of Control, Robert Smith, made an insightful comment in a radio interview. He said, “They are professional sportsmen… they should treat people with respect. Unfortunately this could be a society problem. There doesn’t seem to be any respect with anybody at the present time.”
Good observation, Mr Smith. Drought-stricken Britain is currently suffering not only a rainfall deficit, but a respect deficit. This is, of course, very much a characteristic of a society that has become increasingly secularised. Just as the much touted virtue of tolerance seems to be conditional on agreeing with the absolute premise that there are no absolutes, so the virtue of showing respect seems to be conditional on sharing the same opinions and beliefs as the person or institution in question. The possibility of respecting anybody or anything that has a fundamentally different perspective to one’s own has become almost a thing of the past.
Not agreeing with someone is no reason to treat them disrespectfully. The argument put forward is that “respect is earned”, but it is difficult to believe that, for example, Christians or Christian beliefs are ever likely to ‘earn’ the respect of the National Secular Society, who recently helped obtain a court ruling that Bideford Town Council cannot begin their meetings with prayer.
Some Christians, of course, are equally lacking in respect in the way that they express their disagreement with atheists like Richard Dawkins. We are, sadly, often guilty of adopting the behavioural standards of the world. Perhaps it is because even we can be amongst those who, to use Baroness Warsi’s words, find it difficult accepting that a person of another faith isn’t a threat to our own.
