Utahns surveyed by Dan Jones & Associates for the Deseret News and KSL-TV offered pollsters plenty of opinions and observations about why, and where, they think incivility seems on the rise today.
Among their comments:
• "Across the board young people and people are not as civil to each other. If you pull in front of someone, he'll chase you down the freeway doing all sorts of things. I only did it once. I was coming up from BYU and I changed lanes in front of this guy, so I sat there and smiled as big as I could."
• "(We need more) general human kindness and understanding. Empathy is nonexistent, especially in the youth."
• "(Look at) holding the door open for somebody. In my era, when a lady came up you held the door open for them. These young kids don't seem to care. The young kids are less tolerant of older people too. We are raising a generation of people who are less polite about everything. Undisciplined."
• "I think we're judgmental of each other. I don't think that's very civil. I think there's becoming more of a class division. Kind of '(the) have and the have nots.' I think it creates differences. I think it creates tension."
• "The respect given teachers is less from parents and children."
• "A lot of people are plugged into electronics (such as iPods), and they ignore everything and everyone around them."
• "Just society as a whole, with all aspects (is less civil) — at the movies or wherever you are involved in society. No one looks at the effects on other people."
• "Kids and their parents. Employers and their employees. Individuals for the most part. They are getting more rude all the time. No respect and no responsibility."
• "There is intolerance for anything or anyone that's different than they are."
• (We're) not treating others like we should. We are more selfish, and we need to treat women better."
• "People are impatient. They don't listen and they're too quick to answer. Everyone is in a hurry generally, though."
• "People so many times don't try to work things out. Give me a little mishap and then they will try and sue someone. I think minor things can be worked out."
• "(Today there are) people who have lived in the same house for 10 years and never even said hello to their neighbors."
• "(I don't like) the way the teenagers are dressing ... especially the last couple of years, where they were all showing their midriff and showing it in school. And boys with baggy pants."
• "(People) get carried away too fast and they get fired up when they ought to have some common sense."
• "Police officers and city government are under so much tension. I think they are so scrutinized that they have been forced into ruder or less civil behavior."
• "(There is a) total lack of respect and morals. You go into the schools the language is so filthy. It is unbelievable."
• "(What is missing is) day-to-day courteousness. No one is patient anymore."
Where do those questioned most often see incivility?
• "Talk radio and debate over political issues."
• "At work — everybody is under such stress."
• "The airports. People are just annoyed and seem to be very impatient people."
• "The workplace, people swearing a lot, being rude to each other; the media, what we see on TV and on the news. They have taken faith and God out of everything, and that's opened the door to so many problems."
• "TV in general."
• "When you are walking on the sidewalk somewhere and you're the only person, and just you, and they don't move on over. I'm over to the far edge with my baby, and it's like hello, I have my baby. I was coming out of Target the other day and this man came out with his dog. He had a dog in the grocery store."
• "Waiting at line at grocery store or at a check-out counter. People are really rude. I empty my coins out rather than having to use a check or a credit card and people behind me will be like 'Cash? You're using cash!?"'
Source: Dan Jones & Associates