Message to America
Lack Of Civility In America Brought To Light
By Tommy Garrett
Sep 19, 2009 - 1:06:43 PM

WASHINGTON D.C.—Incivility has become the norm in America. Just over the past week, we had parents engaging in outrageous talk about whether or not they wanted their children to hear the president speak to them about staying in school. With a 30 percent dropout rate in America, the highest by far of any other nation in the civilized world, there is no surprise to most people why the rate is so high. With parents who are more outraged about the race or political party of the president instead of trying to understand the issue of the dropout rate and how to solve the problem, you can see why children are so defiant and refuse to listen to their parents who tell them to stay in school.

Following that debacle we had a congressman, Joe Wilson of South Carolina, scream, “you lie” on the floor of the House of Representatives during the president’s speech to both houses of Congress. This was more incivility. Whatever his reason was for breaking a centuries old standard of respecting the office of the president in the U.S., it was even more interesting to note that in 2003 Congressman Joe Wilson voted for the Medicare Prescription Drug Act under then President George Walker Bush that had the very same language in the bill, which he now finds utterly outrageous, so much so that he yells “you lie” at the current president. Without going into reasons, I suspect he’s now unable to contain rage that just six years ago he not only didn’t display, but supported with that legislation under a president from his own party. That can be left to Americans and voters in his district to decipher. Simply put, I’m happy he’s not my congressman even though I disagree with the president’s healthcare plan. There is a way to civilly disagree.

Within days over this past week we had superstar tennis great Serena Williams go on a tirade against a judge who was deciding on a move she made during her tennis game. I won’t pretend to like or care about sports, as I don’t; however, I will say her screams and cursing were heard around the world as loudly as Congressman Wilson’s shouts just days earlier. Serena Williams allegedly said, she’d shove a tennis ball down the judge’s throat or something similar to that. Whatever it was, it was uncalled for. It was rude and unprofessional of a tennis player who makes tens of millions of dollars a year while simply having the talent to play with a ball and then hocking her good name, her image and reputation to our youth in order to rake in endorsements than most of us will never make in a lifetime. Williams immediately apologized, so did the congressman, even if it was halfhearted and not really meant.

Then during the MTV VMA awards on Sunday night, singer Taylor Swift, who had worked many years in her career for the very honor she received, not to mention the sacrifices her parents and family made to insure her stardom and her much deserved success, won the Best Female Video award only to have her moment taken away within seconds by rapper Kanye West who stormed the stage to tell Ms. Swift she didn’t deserve the award, and that it belonged to her competitor Beyonce Knowles, who later in the evening won for Video of the Year.

Swift was shocked and heartbroken. All of the years she’d worked were thrown away within seconds by a thug who used his mother’s death as an excuse to justify his drunken and unprofessional, not to mention uncivil, behavior. He wanted his 15 minutes of fame and Swift paid the price for it. He showed absolutely no respect for her or the audience, not to mention himself when he took her special moment away. His rant caused her acceptance speech to be cut. She ran backstage into the arms of her family who consoled her. All of this because of incivility; people who have no class, no respect and feel a sense of entitlement that gives them the right to, at the very least, rain on someone else’s parade.

What do these three people, Joe Wilson, Serena Williams and Kanye West, have in common? They are all highly successful, and in my opinion overpaid, people who have everything handed to them. Sure they will all say they worked hard for their success. Did they work for the extra millions they get paid for just being who they are? Did they consider when they yelled out and got the attention away from the real star of the moment that they deserve to be paid for their awful behavior as well?

To those whom much is given, much is expected. These three people were not the only examples of incivility and unprofessional behavior, but people who have been given much more than most of us will ever be given. These three whiners don’t like it when they don’t get what they feel is theirs, while our soldiers fight in the Middle East in heat, dust, dirty and unsanitary conditions so that these people can have the right of free speech and in their cases, to yell and berate those they disagree with but owe some form of respect to. Sadly, the very people who have the most in America are increasingly becoming the least grateful or respectful.

Please remember serviceman PFC Bowe R. Bergdahl, who was kidnapped by the Taliban and is being held while on tour in Afghanistan recently. PFC Bergdahl was serving with an Alaska-based infantry regiment. Pray for all of our military men and women in harm’s way on a daily basis while on the frontlines of the fight against terror.

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