whether we just too easily forget every thing we learned in Kindergarten about dealing with other people...

Right after my son deployed to OIF 2, he called on the Satphone and referred to "Hajis." I asked if he knew the meaning of the word and pointed out he was insulting about a billion people. Told him he ought to forbid his Platoon using the term, period and try to get the rest of the Bn to quit. He did that, with some success -- but that was one Bn out of 12 or more...

Just plain old common sense -- we have a bad tendency to not engage our brains before we talk. We have really created as many problems as we've solved. We're getting smarter but it really didn't have to be this hard.