Salisbury City Councilman Kenny Hardin
♦ There is a big difference between being valued, accepted, welcomed, appreciated versus being simply tolerated. There are people who unconsciously engage in the latter practice and fail to realize the negative impact it has on sustainable relationships.
I’m more inclined to think those people do it purposely because they don’t see others as their equal or relevant enough to give them respectful consideration. I’ve been treated as tolerated and I’ve shown my disdain and refusal to accept it. I know friends and colleagues who feel the same way but for fear of losing something they don’t fully have anyway, they will laugh when nothing is funny and scratch when they don’t itch.
But oddly, when that person who is being disrespected and marginalized responds and demands the same level of respect and consideration, those guilty of doing it feign surprise and indignation.
Instead of giving validity that this lack of civility, cordiality and dismissal may have occurred and the receiver of it genuinely experienced it, it’s much easier to paint them as being difficult, angry and not part of the Team.
This is what is wrong with Salisbury. Leaders can keep talking about coming together, cohesiveness and operating as one, but if everyone’s voice is not valued and respected, it’s all a fake and wasted effort.
If you invite people to a table of brotherhood to seek progress, but then act as if you don’t truly want them there, don’t value their presence, talk down to them, patronize them and then expect them to just smile and go along; you’ve done nothing but create another failed moment in an already tenuous relationship. You can’t then sit back and wonder why apathy and refusal to participate is so high and pervasive.
Strong Leadership is not intermittent and shown only as necessary in response to a crisis. Don’t show me your concern and act as if your care about me simply because there is the potential of impact to the stability of your world too. You can’t come out marching, praying and seeking solidarity to avert a crisis and then act like I don’t exist when normality resumes.
Stop asking me to care more than you show me you do. There is no longevity or sustainability in that type of charade.
