Common Sense

It's amazing when I consider what I find to be common sense compared to what the norm seems to be.

Let me elaborate.

I think it's pretty common sense, whether you believe in the "Golden Rule" or not, that you should treat others as you want to be treated. "What you get is what you give" in other words. Yet it still AMAZES me how people can be so rude and cruel to people without knowing them at all. I understand that people have bad days, and I know on some days it's not as easy to be civil to others... and that's why I usually give people 3 strikes. But really, sometimes 3 does not seem to be enough for some people, and to me that's sad. No matter what the situation, by the third encounter people should realize that your impression of them relies on what they do and say. There really are some people that no matter what you do to them or even around them, they just treat you like you're scum at the bottom of their shoes. Common sense to me would say "If I treat someone like scum, I will be treated like scum" to which I would follow by asking myself "Do I want to be scum?" If your answer to that is anything but "no" then I would suggest you re-evaluate yourself, but again that's just a suggestion.

Does rudeness really bypass common sense? Can people really be rude to others and not see anything wrong with it? So perhaps that may not count as common sense rather than general courtesy. Maybe I should have titled this "Common Sense and General Courtesy" instead... but I'm going to leave it as is because I can.