On student manners, or lack thereof...

NAIROBI: Good manners are one of the things that separate man for beast. Courtesy and etiquette are strong words to live by.

When I became a parent, I realised why the Bible says human beings are inherently drawn to wickedness. The number of mother hours that went into teaching my children polite words such as please, thank you, I am sorry, were many. It, however, only took them a second to pick up insults and less polite words. I almost gave up.

We are living in our world where courtesy is becoming synonymous to weakness. Pushy seems to be the way to the top while words that would have made our parents cringe are now forms of endearments.

Young black men now refer to each other as n*gg*rs, while young girls affectionately call each other nouns that are a reflection of the world’s oldest profession or the equivalent of the female canine. Conversations are peppered with four letter words and I am not referring to words such as love and good. It has become so prevalent we do not even flinch anymore.

Not only is polite conversation taking a beating but so is behaviour. There is a creeping lack of courtesy in how we treat each other. From the road, to queues, from the class, to the home, bad manners are everywhere. Look at what happens on our roads when an ill-mannered driver decides to overlap. Soon everyone and their granny follow and there is a grid lock!

Ultimately, the harbinger of good manners is responsible parenting. The child’s first classroom is home. If the adults and older siblings are well mannered, the child will be too. It is not enough to talk the talk and walk it, we must drag our children along with us because like I said, they seem more drawn to the bad than the good.

So, we as adults must correct them by whatever acceptable means possible. The African way is that it takes a village to raise a child and we are that village.

The parent, the teacher, journalist, conductor, politician, you and me. While it may be a jungle out there, doesn’t mean we must become animals to survive in it.

“Manners maketh man”... now that’s a thought worth pondering.