Neighbors

I live in an urban neighborhood. It is not just a collection of buildings. There is a civic association. The population at one end of my street is very stable. The other end has more transient tenants. But the street life is quiet and people are recognizable when they pass by.

 

I walk around my neighborhood at least once every day. I walk to the local shopping center frequently. I am getting to know faces. I make eye contact and say 'hello' whenever possible.

 

I am not a politician or a salesman. My humanism dictates that I practice integration into my environment through daily effort. This entails taking responsibility for the interface between my own property and the surrounding environment. I consciously attempt to contribute to the quality of life on the street. As an older gay man this has its challenges, but I persist.

 

The recent exposure of a neighborhood in Cleveland illustrates what happens when people do not include awareness of and responsibility for their environment in their daily behaviors. The house which served as a prison for kidnapped children for many years was described by one neighbor this way, "The windows were boarded up. I thought it was vacant." The absurdity of this lack of interest was exposed by several other observations of more reliable neighbors, who said they saw the perpetrators coming and going frequently.

 

What else was seen over a decade and not reported to police? I would speculate that plenty of clues to the horror within were visible in that length of time. It was ignored most likely. Neighbors did not want to get involved.

 

The U.S. is reported as a hyper-religious society on paper. Our politics have been tainted with religion for thirty years, since Ronald Reagan's handlers learned how to exploit hollow moralism for votes. And, predictably, as moralism rises in a society, individual creativity and responsibility declines. More hypocrisy, less ethical action on an individual human level. The rise of thuggery and gangsterism in the popular media testifies to this cultural trend.

 

Humanism must be a personal commitment in order to be effectual and ethical. Once the humanist takes responsibility for personal development and responsibility, inside and out, being a good neighbor becomes part of daily practice. A practicing humanist would not ignore a house with boarded windows in a neighborhood where children have been abducted.