This is inappropriate

There are many times I feel we need to return to kindergarten for some key lessons in behavior. These poor teachers have to deal with five-year-olds in larger numbers than a regular day care class would contain. The rules of behavior are likely written on the walls in large colored print and repeated often as a mantra and when needed.

With too many folks following the lead of childish acting politicians (we all know who they are and even their fans know), we have lost the ability to have civil discourse and amicably disagree. So, class, let’s join together with Ms. Johnson or Ms. Jones or Mr. Thompson and repeat the following:

Treating others like you want to be treated is often called a Golden Rule

Threatening folks who disagree with you is not good behavior, nor is it wise

Promoting violence to resolve perceived or real problems is unlawful

Rationalizing lies is the same as lying – sometimes these folks are worse as we know the liar is lying

Denigrating classes of people because they seem different is mean and shortsighted

As I have said many times before, Alan Turing, a gay man shortened WWII by two years and saved 750,000 lives per Dwight D. Esienhower – what if he had been arrested and jailed for committing gay acts which was unlawful in Great Britain at the time?

Dr. Vivian Thomas, an African-American man helped develop a procedure in the middle of the Jim Crow era to save the lives of babies dying from poor blood flow, called “Blue Babies” – some doctors at Johns Hopkins did not want him in the operating room; what if he was denied the ability to practice?

The Tuskegee Airmen, consisting of African-American pilots, were at first not allowed to fly combat missions during WWII. So, they practiced and practiced honing their skills. They got so good, bomber pilots began asking for the Tuskegee Airmen to protect their planes. Something about putting your life on the line does that to people.

Katherine Johnson received a Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2015 for her contribution to America’s Space Race, as the first woman and African-American to work in a room full of white male mathematicians who guided the space effort.

Nicholas Kristoff and Sheryl WuDunn have penned the difficult to read “Half the Sky” about the maltreatment of women and girls around the world. Treating women like chattel is not only wrong it is economically short-sighted as these communities are competing in a world with only half their assets. Women hold up “half the sky” per a Chinese proverb.

I mention these five examples out of many others as contributions to our planet and country have been made by all kinds of people. If we allowed bigoted perceptions to unduly restrict, criticize and denigrate these folks to the point that they were not allowed to function, the world would be a different place. It matters not how warply twisted and seemingly self-righteous one’s cause, treating people like you want to be treated is still a mainstay of the Christian and other religions. It is a sin to do otherwise at least how I read it.

We must allow civil discourse. We must give people opportunity. We must not denigrate them or their efforts. And, we must not tolerate those who do the opposite of those things to certain people, especially those who are elected officials. To be brutally frank, an elected official has no business conducting themselves in this way. If they do, they need to resign or forced to resign. Full stop. This is especially true when you have more extremists that follow their lead not knowing these folks are just spouting BS to get elected.