Respect is positive social attention.

Respect is fundamental for successful human interaction. All of our work proceeds more effectively and successfully when we work with respect. The other three characteristics of the RAFT detailed below—Accountability, Fairness, and Transparency—all come back to Respect.

Offering Respect requires a conscious decision and deliberate action. It is expressed both overtly and tacitly. Interveners often say, “I respect everyone,” but people with whom we work know that it is not words, but behaviors that show true respect. Small acts, such as listening without being distracted or hurried, or simple courtesies such as standing up when a person enters a room, convey respect.

The dividing mindset insists that respect must be shown to me, first, before I will provide it. Respect then becomes a hierarchical thing, bound up with status, with those below needing to provide it to those above them, but those above do not need to grant respect downward.

The dividing mindset also engages in active disrespect.

Disrespect is felt as humiliation. Humiliation is the violent or aggressive assertion of hierarchy. It is putting someone in their place, a place well below the humiliator. The person asserting the humiliation exerts this type of authority on those who cannot, or who the humiliator believes cannot, respond.

Humiliation is not easily dismissed. The person humiliated eventually needs to discharge the emotion, especially if the humiliation is regular and ongoing. Much violence, both that directed outwardly onto others and that directed inward onto ourselves, is a direct product of humiliation.

Respect is reciprocal. You must give it to get it, especially in places where you are an outsider. It is never wrong to take the first step toward respect, no matter your position. Showing respect is the only way to ever make respect mutual.The connecting mindset offers respect freely to all.

Previous Page Publicity
Next Page Negative Patterns of Behavior based on Disrespect

Related Topics
Positive Patterns of Behavior based in Respect
Using Respect
Using the RAFT
Accountability
Fairness
Transparency