If recent elections, not only in Canada but in that garbage dump blaze of a vote currently underway in the United States, are any indication, the words polite and politics don't belong together in today's world.
There is nothing polite about politics.
If it were a sport, it would be UFC, not golf.
Turns out the two words, despite their similarities, didn't belong together about 500 years ago either, which is roughly when they first appeared in the English language.
Politics goes back to the Greek word politika, which the etymology dictionaries say means affairs of state or government, and was the title of a book by Aristotle on that very subject.
Polite is a slightly older English word but its roots are in the Latin words polire, meaning to make smooth.
In other words, polite is cousins with the word polish and has no direct ancestral connection to politics.
That doesn't mean polite and politics can't be friends, as words and as concepts. They certainly have plenty in common.
Polite and politics are centred around social relationships, public and private, between individuals and between groups.
Humans evolved to their present state because of their ability to work together and treat each other with kindness - in other words, to be polite.
In televised debates between candidates running for public office, however, whether it's for premier or president, modern politicians seem to think it displays strength to be impolite, to constantly interrupt their opponent, to belittle them with verbal jabs, sighs, rolling eyes, shaking heads and annoyed faces.
It's rude, ignorant and annoying, especially for the voters tuning in actually hoping to hear what the candidates have to say.
In the next breath, many politicians wonder why they are held in such low regard. They're not very smart to go along with being jerks.
Very few politicians are actually jerks, of course.
They just think they need to act like jerks to their political opponents and anyone else with the nerve to disagree with them as a way to show they stand by their beliefs and aren't weaklings easily pushed around.
Outside of the political arena, politeness is also in increasingly short supply.
Social media, despite its name, is the repository to horrible acts of cruelty disguised as free speech.
Few people would have the courage or stupidity to say to someone's face that they should be raped or killed for their opinions, but that level of anti-social conduct is standard operating procedure in a world of fake identities.
Even in the real world, outside of the artificial bubble of politics and social media, being polite is now the equivalent of a man wearing a tie and tucking in his button-up shirt.
There's something quaint and old-fashioned about basic niceties like holding a door open, saying excuse me, saying you're welcome after being thanked, looking someone in the eye as they speak and saying sir and ma'am.
Yet even being polite is now a political act, something that others might consider not only impolite but discriminatory.
Some women find ma'am, lady and even the word women offensive.
As college and university professors across the United States and Canada are discovering, the pronouns he and she are no longer safe words to use with some students.
Looking people in the eye can be interpreted not as a sign of respect in the person and what they're saying but as intimidation.
Dressing in a more traditional or - heaven forbid - corporate style is a demand for power and respect, instead of simply being professional or wanting to look good.
In other words, polite words and actions are being reinterpreted as acts of oppression, rather than acts of kindness, further eroding the social value and benefit of being polite in the first place.
In an age of entitlement, the irony of expecting to be treated fairly and politely but refusing to extend that same courtesy to others is lost.
Perhaps the people are getting the politicians they deserve.
Perhaps the politicians aren't just fostering the impolite culture, they are also reflecting it.
Our politics and our entire society are paying dearly for our increasing inability to be polite to one another.
-- Managing editor Neil Godbout
