I’ve noticed an interesting hole in our social fabric, and we should watch it closely, lest it cause further unraveling.
We’ve lost our sense of dignity.
I don’t mean that we have become undignified in our manner (though perhaps we have), but rather we’ve forgotten what the word “dignity” means. (“The state or quality of being worthy of honor or respect”, in case it’s become hazy to you too.)
Exhibit A: Britney Spears. She has little dignity herself, there is no dignity in the coverage of her, and none at all in reading about her at the supermarket checkout. Dr. Phil lost any remaining dignity (and perhaps breached medical ethics) when he detailed Brit’s emotional problems to the press after meeting with her in hospital. Not that he did so with any thought to something as passé as dignity. A man in the public eye cannot afford dignity: dispensing with it is all to often the price of fame, and apparently a small price to many.
Which brings us to exhibit B: “Reality” TV. Actually, there is little to say about this that isn’t blindingly obvious.
My third example is less obvious, but perhaps ultimately the most pernicious. People often lament that our security encroaches on our liberty, but few complain that our security has long ago triumphed over our dignity. From taking off our shoes at the airport, to detention without limit at Guantanamo Bay, to the use of force by authorities against unarmed civilians (see: Robert Dziekanski’s undignified end), to something as apparently innocuous as bag searches when leaving a department store, we are all to eager to sacrifice the integrity of our person to the interest of others. I’m not necessarily arguing that the indignity of an airport screening should alone be grounds for relaxing our security procedures, just noting that the word “dignity” almost never enters the conversation about such things.
That we take all this as a matter of course is evidence that we’ve lost track of our dignity. This bodes poorly for our future interactions with each other, and poses all sorts of problems when we have to deal with people whose sense of dignity is intact.
One oft-cited complaint by Iraqis against the American occupation of their country is the casual humiliation of citizens in the course of any interaction with American troops. From Abu Ghraib to house-to-house searches to the giant Green Zone fortifications in the middle of Bagdad, the occupation has been a constant affront to the dignity of the average Iraqi. The unfortunate part is that I think the Americans on the ground, so used to having their own dignity affronted, don’t really grasp the implications.
This is something Matt and I discuss frequently
Have we really lost this? Or is it now that we no longer have any excuses?
I hope it’s only been misplaced. There are still people with dignity around, it just goes unnoticed.
Maybe if the Americans elect a new president who has a little personal dignity (Obama, McCain, maybe Mrs. Clinton), we’ll get a trickle-down effect going…
The current crisis in health care relates directly to this issue of dignity…witness recent stories about the abysmal conditions in the Centennial wing of the hospital in Halifax where nurses can’t bathe patients in the water since the water pipes harbor legionnaire’s disease and where recovering cancer patients keep fly swatters on their bedside tables. Just a couple of examples of the horrifying environmental conditions in this hospital where patients waiting for admission to nursing homes have their personal dignity eroded.