By what values should we strive to live in order to achieve a community in which differences are accommodated, a community where there is diversity of discourse but a recognition of the common good regardless of politics, religion, race and personal beliefs? Such an ideal will never be realized but the values which could lead to a serviceable approximation of the good society need to be taught early and for as long as it takes to reduce the hate and bile, mutually exchanged, which disfigures too many countries, including our own, too often.
Four words come to mind and a brief discussion of them will do for now.
Respect. This is one of those good, old-fashioned concepts which has fallen into disuse but should not have done. As I have told our young cricketers and tennis players when I once talked to them before they went on tour, respect takes many forms: respect for each other on the team but also for their opponents, respect for honesty in how they play the game, respect for the laws of the game and for those who officiate, respect for the traditions of the game and for those who have built before them, patriotic respect for the country they represent and, of course, respect for themselves.
