Respect is a word that is used all too frequently by many people who have little understanding of its true meaning. We turn on the TV and on a daily basis we are subjected to troubled souls floundering in desperate confrontations with others, screaming abuse at their "tormentors" because they believe themselves to be disrespected. The fact that this is screened as entertainment is another matter. What is more troubling is that, as a society, there seems to be a worrying increase of people, particularly the younger generation, who seem to believe that respect is an automatic human right. If only that were so, there may well be much less human suffering in the world.
What can be done? How can we gain respect from those around us? Whilst I truly believe that trying to change others is a fruitless exercise, I equally believe that teaching others is not. We all learn from our surroundings, as our surroundings, as well as our perspective of them, are all we have. Our surroundings change, our perspective shifts along with them.
In our relationships, we all are teachers and students. I don't think that any of us have ever come out of a relationship, of any kind, and claimed that we learned nothing from it. Even the most negative of experiences has something to tell us about ourselves.
In unhealthy, destructive relationships, where one, or both, parties feel aggrieved, it always takes the two people involved to have created the pattern in the first place. It is never one-sided. True, one might be the "bully", the other the "victim", but the fact that the victim remains in the relationship allows the bullying to continue. However, it only takes one person to decide that the pattern needs to be broken. When the victim removes themselves from the situation, there is simply no-one left to bully. It is unfortunate that the pattern may continue if the bully moves on to find another victim. In an ideal world, however, if this happens enough times, there may just be a chance that the bully will eventually have to take a good, long, hard look at their behaviour.
Constant disrespectful behaviour towards a person can strip them of their self-confidence. And yet it is often the lack of confidence of the person behaving badly that is causing the situation. They project their own self-dislike onto others, as it is usually too painful to admit that they don't feel good about themselves.
By allowing someone to repeatedly disrespect you, not only are you disrespecting yourself, by validating their behaviour, but you are also teaching them that, essentially, it is fine for them to continue.
We teach our children to mind their manners and to behave respectfully towards others. In this world it is easy to let the stresses and strains of life get to us and behave badly towards others, even to those we love dearly. We can all be forgiven for behaving badly during stressful periods in our lives. But eventually, even as adults, we all need teaching, we all need someone to take us to one side and tell us when we are in danger of losing their respect.
But repeated and continued bad behaviour towards another human being is a form of abuse. And we all know that abuse is unacceptable. Walk away.