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Decency In Politics. Is It On Its Way Out?
What is decency in a human being?
What is human decency? Ask twenty people on the street and you will probably get twenty different answers. The meaning of the word decency can allude to a number of different values. The four most important in my view are the following.
Ethics
Honesty
Integrity
Empathy
You can also add to the mix, common sense, kindness, strength of character, patience, respect for the right of others, and the ability to sympathize.
Arent these the ideals our leaders should display to us, the citizens?
When you look around the world at the current crop of world leaders, how many can you say are decent human beings? Not many. Angela Merkel, Guiseppe Conte, Justin Trudeau, and Jacinda Arden are just a very few on the decent side. You could not, by any stretch of the imagination, consider any of the following leaders to be decent people: Xi Jinping, China. Vladimir Putin, Russia. Kim Jong Un, North Korea. Donald J. Trump, USA, Boris Johnston, UK Jair Bolsonaro, Brazil. Ali Khamenei, Iran.
