[fintstone]

It seems to me, that tolerating small things leads to large ones. We start with our children and teach them to respect our rules and those of society at large. Written and unwritten. Everything form removing a hat to children being sitting quietly in a store or restaurant for safety and as not to disturb other shoppers or diners who also paid their own good money to be there.

As children get older, they learn a broader set of customs, courtesies and laws society has imposed to keep order and help people interact socially. Good behavior on the playground and in school where others are hopefully trying to learn something (and make something of themself so their family will be proud of them). Among these are prohibitions against crime and mistreatment of the weak (women, children, animals, etc.). It also includes moral values like those of hard work and sacrifice, delayed gratification and providing for oneself and one's family. These expand to service to the community and nation. Share customs, courtesies and values are what makes a melting pot of a country work. Failure to enforce them socially and in the family (stigmatize those that fail to meet our standards of behavior) lets them down and the entire community.

When I joined the Air Force, they provided some very clear rules of behavior and very specific ways to do certain tasks. Wear of a uniform, headwear, when each could be worn, etc. When and how to salute...even marching had to be done perfectly in an era when most people drove. Beds had to be made immediately upon rising and in a very exacting way. One practice that struck most as particularly odd was the way we had to keep our possessions. We each had a small locker with a single drawer. Each garment had to hang facing the same direction with the buttons buttoned and the trousers had to all be hanged in a certain standardized manner. The same with items in the drawer which included shaving gear, soap, shampoo, handkerchief, underwear/t-shirts and belt. Each had a specific spot, size and orientation. No deviations were allowed. The t-shirts and underwear had to be folded and oriented in a very specific manner. They had to be folded exactly a certain way and size (Drill Instructor measured them) when you were out in class of physical training and standards were strictly enforces...every day. I wondered why they did this...and one instructor noted that they couldn't trust people with big things until they proved they could be trusted with small ones. If we could not fold our underwear as instructed, they were not going to trust us with using a weapon properly/safely or to work on an aircraft or nuclear weapon. We had very strict guidelines to follow in our future military jobs that we may or may not understand the reasoning for (or agree) but we would have to follow them without hesitation or deviation. It seemed to work well as generations of 18-year-olds went on to training and subsequently working on and operating complex aircraft. missile, nuclear weapon systems etc. without killing themselves or destroying the world.

Rules at school, the military, and society at large were always pretty easy for me and helped me be relatively successful in business and marriage. Even though I had very humble beginnings and arguably less opportunity than some. It was largely because my family, community, church, and school all had standards...and all enforced them. Not all of the standards of behavior were easy, practical, or even made a lot of sense to me at the time. Many make more sense now (but not all). None harmed me in any way.