Neighbors and Nonsense

Neighbors and Nonsense

What makes a good neighbor?

If I had to describe what makes a good neighbor, I wouldn’t hesitate to give my answer. It’s the act of being considerate. A quality that so many people in today’s world just can’t seem to muster up in themselves anymore.

A considerate neighbor is never a bothersome neighbor. That’s because if they think something has a chance of bothering their neighbors, they won’t do it, or at least they’ll talk it over with their neighbors and get a reading on how they’d feel.

You might disagree with me on this, but I think ignoring or downplaying inconsiderate acts in others, is like trying to hide the proverbial elephant in the room. My view is that people who do things without considering how the thing they’re going to do will affect their neighbors, are not good neighbors.

Inconsiderate people, in my view, are people who just don’t care about how their acts affect others. People of this type are also usually selfish, ignorant, thoughtless, crude and obnoxious. Their egos are usually somewhat inflated also.

Apologists for inconsiderate people, (surely you didn’t think there was no one standing up to defend the inconsiderate among us), do and say everything they can to make inconsiderate “people” not responsible for being inconsiderate.

Yes, they’re just like those who say criminals aren’t responsible for their criminal persuasions. It’s a fluid in their brain that makes them want to steal, kidnap, murder, rape, abuse children, etc. So their crimes are not their fault.

The defenders of inconsiderate people say that those who are inconsiderate aren’t at fault for their being inconsiderate. A translation of this might be, “Don’t hate the asshole who lets his dog shit in your yard and doesn’t pick it up. He just wasn’t thinking, so it’s not his fault.”

So if you’re tired of people in general and just feel like pissing off the family across the street, maybe because you had a bad day, or you just feel like stretching your wings of freedom, remember; you’re perfectly right when you get home at ten thirty at night and blast your stereo so people three blocks away can hear it.

It’s inconceivable that anyone could be asleep at ten thirty at night anyway, right? So why would considering that people might be asleep even occur to you? It’s not your fault that you’re ignorant and inconsiderate after all.

If they or any other of your neighbors complain, you can say, “Gee, I didn’t know it was bothering other people,” and then the apologists will come to your aid.

Actually, I’d say that one could be inconsiderate and tell people to go to Hell if they complain about the stereo blasting at ten thirty, and the apologists would still rush to defend them as being faultless and innocent.

Then they’d chastise those who’d been abused for their reckless complaining and making “false” accusations.

The idea that people aren’t responsible for their actions, in my opinion, is the stupidest behavioral theory to have ever been conceived. These theories became popular around the mid eighties, and of course, they’re still around; to what degree, I’m not sure.

This seems to me to have started, or was part of an initial effort to change public opinion on crime, and become more accepting of it, by removing blame from criminal perpetrators and instead, creating doubt in the minds of people of whether they’re even right to accuse them.

I believe it’s a type of reverse psychology. It says if you want people to be accepting, they must be taught that rejection is wrong, criticism is bad and being abused is normal and we must accept it.

If you are lucky enough to have nothing but considerate neighbors, (nearly impossible when living in an apartment), you should definitely count your blessings. Don’t get too comfy though, because once those neighbors are gone, you don’t know what’s going to end up there next.

I’ve just recently discovered that some poor soul who is a member of “The Civility Movement,” (whatever that is), has taken it upon himself to write a book that purports to “teach” people on how to be considerate.

I can just imagine all of the inconsiderate people, described by the really intelligent people of the world as not being aware they are inconsiderate, considering if they should read this book aimed at “helping” them.

The book must be the literary representative of a Rube Goldberg machine.

_{Neighbors and Nonsense © free-reign 2020}

I've written this opinionated piece as I was inspired by a prompt I received in a daily email from @shadowspub. The prompt is, “Describe a good neighbor.”

Thanks for reading!

Sources for images used in this post:

Public Domain photos are from Wikimedia Commons:

_{Neighborhood Dispute: Image by A_Different_Perspective from Pixabay
About Us: Image from Pixabay
Walking Dog: Image by Christian Dorn from Pixabay
Shifty Guy: Image by Augusto Ordonez from Pixabay}