My parents have always taught me that treating others with respect is one of the most important things you can do. Whether it be someone you like or dislike, a person is a person and respect is the same all around.

I have grown up knowing that it is especially important to respect adults. Calling adults by the names of sir, ma’am, Mr., Mrs., or Miss, isn’t something people just do; it is because adults deserve a very high level of respect.

I think many people in our country have forgotten the important concept of respecting others. No matter your skin color, religion, gender, or even your political party, each person deserves to be respected as a human being.

Teaching and giving respect isn’t just a one time thing. When you show respect towards a person it has to be consistent. It is important to always show that same level of respect no matter the situation.

I believe that when we are younger we are taught the simple lesson of respecting others over and over again, yet as we get older this crucial personality trait is often overlooked or forgotten.

I’m sure you all remember the name of your elementary school teachers, and I guarantee their names all started with Mrs., Mr., or Miss, because that is what you are to call your teachers. However, once high school comes along, those titles fall off of those teacher and many times they are referred to as just their last name or sometime even their first name.

I didn’t think much of this idea until I was a junior and one of my teachers on the first day of school was introducing himself. He was an older teacher and he told us his name, but emphasized the Mr. He told us that when he was in high school everyone called their teachers Mr. or Mrs., and he doesn’t understand when or why students stopped adding respecting their teachers enough to call them Mr. or Mrs..

This really opened my eyes, and I began to see how truly important it was to not just call a teacher by their last name because they deserve to have that titled added on to their name.

Not only do we show our respect with the words we say but also with how we act. Doing simple things like holding the door open for someone and picking up something that an elderly person dropped shows a lot about one’s character.

My dad has worked hard to show my sister and I that women deserve to be respected in a different way. My dad respects my mother, and he shows that we should expect nothing less than that level of respect.

Many people ignore this, thinking that as our world is advancing and feminism is becoming more apparent in society that women don’t need to be as respected as they have been in older times. Many women complain about men trying to act chivalrous, and respect them because they think it is weakness.

Let me correct this misconception. Men showing respect to women is not belittling them or establishing dominance. It is however men having the common courtesy to carry out the tradition of respecting women that those before us have so fantastically demonstrated.

The concept of respect is never taught too much or overemphasized. Being respectful will never get you in trouble. It is a skill that every person ought to develop and perfect.