Respect, that Good that Is so Scarce

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When there is a shortage of food in a society, devastating famines occur. When there is no water, thirst is lethal. When respect disappears, coexistence disappears. “Why is respect scarce, if it costs nothing?” asks American sociologist Richard Sennett, whose work is a valuable study of customs, human activities and social morals. In one of his essays, titled precisely Respect, Sennett, who in his youth was a talented cellist and had to change m…