The Full Oliver Friendships

"Bryce, you didn't ask me if get to see all my boyfriends this week," I said with a smirk. 

Our youngest child, Bryce, processed that statement and then smiled. 

"Dad, do you get to see all your boyfriends this week?"

"Yes, Bryce. Yes I do."

That's become a running joke with our family, especially with our kids, Beatrice and Bryce. The fact that I've had close male friends for 40+ years. Three from junior high to high school, one from post high school, and one from college. Sadly, my best friend from junior high passed away in 2025. 

I consider it a term of endearment because I've always loved these men. They've been the dearest of friends even though we only see each other a few times a year. We've traversed the chasm of decades together, through darkness and light, continuously building bridges of friendship, love, and empathy, and a whole lotta laughter along the way. 

There's a current societal narrative that says men are lonelier than ever. That they feel left out of bridge-building when compared to women. The percentage of men with six or more close friends dropped from 55% in 1990 to just 27% in 2021. Men account for nearly 80% of all suicide deaths and are over three times more likely to die by suicide than women.

The resurgence of toxic masculinity is an unfortunate direct response to feeling left out of the life equation. For the first time, there are more women employed than men, and there's a misinformed visceral backlash to this, movements like #MeToo, and more.

I'm grateful that there's hope in male friendships like ours. Men can have strong, positive connections and loving male friendships. Friendships that mentor and support each other. Those friendships reciprocally can and do make other relationships stronger, like those with our significant others and our children and grandchildren. 

So, Bryce and Beatrice, this was a good week with my boyfriends. First, my best friend from college, Troy, traveled with his oldest son and me to Los Angeles to see our favorite band Rush on their new aptly titled "50 Something Tour". A band we've seen many times together over the years, and one we never thought we'd see play live again after the beloved drummer, Neil Peart, passed away in January of 2020. (And speaking of friendships, the members of Rush were also friends for decades, and the two remaining members, Alex Lifeson and Geddy Lee, have been best friends since junior high. We can gratefully relate.) 

Second, my dear friend from high school, Greg, invited us to his and his wife's 60th birthday party. My other two mutual friends, Rob and Craig (and Craig's wife), attended as well. We always know how to "bust each other's chops", laugh until we cry, and unabashedly hug each other tight.

After we returned home from Rush, my friend Troy texted me: The whole trip was a full Oliver. That's our new Rush "inside baseball" term for "it was everything". The same was true for Greg's birthday party and everything we've done together for decades. Our friendships are the "Full Oliver", forever building transcendent bridges.

More Full Oliver:

All the Friendship in Between, with Love

A Spirit Breaking Free

Because There's Always A Promise

A Longing for Loving Connection

What Happens Next

Superman's Love Letter

Men of An Influencer Age

Making a Dent

A Long-Term Well-Being Win

Men of a Stand-up Age

Men of a Vulnerable Age

Able-Bodied Grateful

Men of Our Present Age

The #MeToo Guys

Men of a Women's Age

Men of a Consequential Age

Like Men Knowingly Bound to Their Future

Because That's How It Works With The Guys That Work

Big Heart Love to My Class of 1984

Men of An Unremarkable Age

Being What Happens Next

Retro K: A treasure trove of golden memories friendship has forged

A Long-Term Well-Being Win

My best friend Robby of 45 years always likes to tell the story of how he almost wasn't part of our long-term friend group. The one that keeps getting together year after year, decades after high school. We first met in 7th grade, and while we became best friends later on in high school, my best friend in 7th grade at the time, Brad, saved Robby from being bullied in wood shop class. Back then I was a skinny, asthmatic, shy, and fearful kid, not a hero, and was relieved and grateful with Brad's intervention. I was also grateful that Robby and I befriended each other through goofy humor and the music of Cheap Trick, Kiss, and many other rock groups at that time.

Our long-time friend-group origin story birthed sometime between our sophomore and junior years in high school. That's when, Robby jokes, he was "included" in our group of friends. It wasn't like one day he got a pass, or any of us for that matter. We had already been amalgamating into this cohort for a few years, based on mutual affection, trust, support, shared interests, communication, respect, humor, and more. 

The thing with me was, I struggled to exclude others. Even when I probably should have. Beyond Robby, my other close friends back in high school, and family, I've had many acquaintances and friends from many differing backgrounds. From college to work to other parents of kids ours go to school with. What I know now, but did quite understand then, was that there was always something to learn from others, friends or not. Sharing knowledge and experiences with one another was how I grew as a person and how it's shaped my life awareness and belief systems over the years. Still is.

The hard part was and is the adulting. My nature was always to be liked, and to exclude others was to not be liked. That can get you in trouble when you're in middle and high school, always trying to please, with it only to backfire on you when you do and say the wrong thing to people about other people. Mercy me I had some failures there.  

But as I failed, grew,  and evolved, there were some difficult adulting decisions to make -- getting a divorce and ending an old friendship from our long-time friend group, just to name a couple. I had to learn boundary-setting and how to exclude others when it came to my own happiness and well-being, sanity and safety, and unfortunately not always empathically either. Conversely, I had to learn that I wouldn't always be included with others and their activities, even when hubris shoved my empathy and understanding to the ground like a bully and said, "What the hell?"

And now our teens are learning about inclusion and exclusion with their own friend groups, and like most normal teens, they want to be liked and included. They need their own space, too, and boundary-setting is new to them and a struggle, but we listen and provide parental and our own experiential feedback. We tell them they don't always have to include, and they will be excluded, and that's okay. 

Boundary-setting and exclusion for well-being and safety is one thing, but exclusion based on fear, ignorance, prejudice, and to purposely hurt can lead only to painful isolation, loneliness, or worse, for both perpetrator and victim. That's a lesson for us all. 

But if they have enduring friendships based on mutual affection, trust, support, shared interests, communication, respect, humor, and more, then it's a long-term well-being win for sure. As I've written before, I'm grateful for the dear inclusive and loving friendships I've had over 40 years now. Blessings to them. I wish the same for our teens as adults. 

The Safetyists

"The snakes and arrows a child is heir to

Are enough to leave a thousand cuts

We build our defenses, a place of safety

And leave the darker places unexplored..."

–Rush, Armor and Sword

They found me at park near our house. I saw them drive up on the street, park and get out of their car. They stood there for a moment, probably collecting themselves on what to say to me, what to ask me. My behavior had been more and more emotionally erratic during my senior year in high school. They had no idea as to why. Not many people did, not even my closest friends at the time. 

And it's not that they wouldn't have listened if I tried to explain what was happening. They would've, but I couldn't do it. I couldn't articulate it. Not until that moment at the park. Earlier we'd been at some event inside an auditorium, which I believe it was another in a series of high school graduation events. Before the event had started, I had fled.

My parents came and sat across from me. I talked and cried. They listened and cried. I told them how alone I felt. How I didn't want to be here anymore. How crushing the stress and the anxiety was that I felt. How uncomfortable I'd get in groups and how I needed to get out and go far away. I didn't tell them everything then, but I told them enough. They had no idea this was how I had been feeling or why. 

Decades later, and my wife Amy and I have our own children. Two girls, now 10 and 12. Since October of 2018, we have a family meeting each week where everyone is encouraged to speak freely. After we share something about each other we've noticed over the past week, giving each other compliments and sharing what we're grateful for about each other. Then we move on to discussing managing our emotions, providing support, positive communication -- and safety plans. After that, it's share time, where the girls can discuss anything they want. 

We practice Kidpower every single day, empowering each other with emotional and physical safety skills, boundary setting and more. Amy and I are now taking a Positive Discipline course together, which is designed to teach young people to become responsible, respectful and resourceful members of their communities. Amy had taken a class two years ago, which is where she got the idea of the family meetings. These are all things that we can do. 

Being able to speak freely without judgement isn't easy to do today in our society. The isolating impact of COVID-19, along with the social upheaval of the past year and continued polarized shaming and blaming, it can really suck being an adult or a child these days.

Which is why we make it so safe to talk to each other about all these things. One positive thing about this past year is that we've become closer as a family. We speak freely without judgement, respecting each other's boundaries and keeping each other safe. We do get eye-rolls and sighs sometimes when we review being emotionally and physically safe with the girls, but we know it will pay dividends for them living a healthy life as adults with healthy relationships.

And just the other night during dinner:

"You guys are safetyists," said Beatrice.

"What do you mean?" I said.

"You want us to be safe."

"Well, yeah. We do. That's okay, right?"

"Well, yeah." 

"And we want to be safe, too."

"Well, yeah." 

"So, we're the safetyists."

"Well, yeah." 

And so it goes. #BhivePower

In All My Available Light

"I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them. I shall use my time." 

—Neil Peart, Ghost Rider: Travels on the Healing Road

Every time I look back on it, I can't believe I said no to Rush. It was our sophomore year in high school, 1981, and one of my friends, a budding musician himself at the time, came up to me one day and asked me if I wanted to go to Fresno to see the sold out Moving Pictures tour. Which, according to my new fancy-schmancy Rush: Wandering the Face of the Earth: The Official Touring History, was June 7, 1981, and tickets were $9.50 in advance.

$9.50 -- and I told him I couldn't afford to go. That was a lot for a high school kid in 1981, but I'm sure I could've scrounged up the money. The truth was, believe it or not, I wasn't quite the fan then that I eventually came just over one year later when Signals came out. I did already dig all the big hits from Moving Pictures and some of the earlier albums, and knew that Geddy Lee (bass/keyboards), Alex Lifeson (guitar) and Neil Peart (drums/lyricist) were amazing progressive rock musicians, but I wasn't quite the huge fan yet. Plus, I didn't think my parents would let me go to a concert yet either and was afraid to ask them.

"No, his mind is not for rent
To any god or government.
Always hopeful, yet discontent
He knows changes aren’t permanent –
But change is..."

However, something was brewing within me during those formative teenage years, something that would connect me more and more with Rush's music. The stormy angst of lower middle-class white teenage-land, the longing to succeed, to be the best in everything I did, to be liked by everyone no matter what, and to never fail. Ever. At any and all costs. The pressure I put on myself then combined with growing up in a broken family, domestic violence and sexual abuse circled me like a category 5 hurricane.

"Look in
To the eye of the storm
Look out
For the force without form
Look around
At the sight and sound
Look in, Look out, Look around..."

I felt safe in the hurricane's eye for the first two and a half years of high school, until the high winds drove me into the brutal storm. Anxiety and severe panic attacks ensued, my grades suffered (I had been a straight A student until my senior year), and the dreams of going away to college crumbled, at least until a year after high school graduation.

"Growing up it all seems so one-sided
Opinions all provided
The future pre-decided
Detached and subdivided
In the mass production zone..."

I rarely talked about what I experienced at the time with anyone, even my closest of friends, and definitely not my family. I was close to my mom but I couldn't articulate what was happening inside me -- that I didn't want to be what everyone wanted me to be at the time, and in the years after high school. That I desperately needed to heal the scared and broken child inside me, so afraid to become the me I longed to be. My withdrawn anger turned to depression and even further anxiety.

"Anger got bare knuckles
Anger play the fool
Anger wear a crown of thorns
Reverse the golden rule
Then you learn the lesson
That it’s tough to be so cool..."

But no amount of reading (including the Bible, Orwell, Fitzgerald, Conrad, Lee, Ellison, Baldwin, Salinger, Faulkner, Golding, Steinbeck, Swift, Woolf, Hemingway, Huxley, Beckett, Kafka, Lessing, Poe, King -- Martin Luther and Stephen -- and so many more), nor the music and lyrics of Rush, or the unsure but kind words from my family and friends could fully console me. Much anxiety, let downs and failures later, my awakening to being me and living life on my terms would take another 15 years to be fully realized.

"When we lift the covers from our feelings
We expose our insecure spots
Trust is just as rare as devotion —
Forgive us our cynical thoughts..."

The music and lyrics from Rush did help along the way, though. Neil Peart, the drummer and primary lyricist and eventual writer of non-fiction works such as The Masked Rider, Ghost Rider, Traveling Music, Far and Near, Roadshow and many others, inspired me to be a better human, to be independent yet inclusive, pragmatic yet hopeful, loving of self and others, and to be present and always be adventuring and learning, to keep living a full life.

"If I could wave my magic wand
I’d make everything all right..."

I didn't see Rush for the first time until May 24, 1986, in Sacramento, California. General admission then was only $16.50 and it was another sold out show. I was with my best friends from junior high, high school and college. The hot valley sun beat up on us that day, although we were feeling no pain, that's for sure. The show was fabulous and I never in my life have seen musical prowess on stage, then and now, all coming from three individuals. Ever since that first concert, I've seen them many times with the best of friends, and each show has elevated me to new emotional and spiritual heights.

"Against the run of the mill
Static as it seems
We break the surface tension
With our wild kinetic dreams
Curves and lines —
Of grand designs..."

Neil's words definitely contributed to my spiritual therapy over the years and solidified my fandom for sure. Especially from the albums Signals, Grace Under Pressure, Power Windows, Hold Your Fire, Presto, Roll the Bones, Counterparts and Test for Echo. However, all the albums now are important to me today pre- and post-Signals (yes, I keep saying albums, because I'm old school that way), each of them inextricably linked to so many moments in my life.

"I believe in what I see
I believe in what I hear
I believe that what I’m feeling
Changes how the world appears..."

And then in 1997/98, Neil's daughter and wife passed away within 10 months of each other, and for many of us devastated fans, that was the end of Rush. Even his bandmates Geddy and Alex thought it was over. But it wasn't, and after reading Ghost Rider, Neil's healing road that included riding 55,000 miles on his motorcycle throughout North America, Mexico and South America, helped to bring him back to life. He remarried, had another daughter, and Rush played once again, giving us all another four albums, many live shows and a few more books. Plus, there are these fantastic documentaries available as well: Beyond the Lighted Stage and Time Stand Still (a true love letter from fans).

"Surge of energy, spark of inspiration
The breath of love is electricity
Maybe Time is bird in flight
Endlessly mocking
Here we come out of the cradle
Endlessly rocking
Endlessly rocking..."

I never got to meet Neil; he was wary of the public eye and not comfortable around fans. I did get to meet Geddy, though. That was quite a treat. Last year one of my work trips to Toronto aligned with Geddy Lee's book tour promoting his collection of electric basses (titled Big Beautiful Book of Bass). He interviewed on stage and then did a book signing. I even got to fist-bump him after he signed my book! Maybe one of these days I'll get to meet Alex.

"He's a rebel and a runner
He's a signal turning green
He's a restless young romantic
Wants to run the big machine..."

My last show was with my best friend from college in San Jose on July 23, 2015, where tickets started at $49 each (although ours were a lot more than that). My friend was sure he saw Neil riding his motorcycle outside of the arena earlier in the day, although I'm not sure it was him (but we can still wish it was).

Shortly after that last tour, Neil said he was done and the band officially retired. And that was it.

Years pass and then I'm on my way to see my dear friends of 30-40+ years in early January, 2020, when my nephew texts me:

I’m sorry to hear about Neil Peart.

What? I thought. That led to me calling my wife and asking her to look up this news online.

"I'm sorry, sweetie. Yes, he passed away. It says he had brain cancer."

"Suddenly —
You were gone
From all the lives
You left your mark upon..."

I tried to voice text my friends to tell them the news that Neil Peart was dead as I was driving, but Siri couldn't get the words right, so it kept coming out:

Which, in a strange fandom way for many, he was. I hope other fans find humorous solace in that. As I wrote recently, listening to favorite old songs (and albums) is just like looking at faded cherished photographs -- the visceral memories attached to each are forever bound to our hearts. We relive them through our ears of today, the past pleasures and the pain, one song at a time.

"Run to light from shadow
Sun gives me no rest
Promise offered in the east
Broken in the west
Chase the sun around the world
I want to look at life – 
In the available light..."

This morning we were up early, as my family always is, and we drove down to the ocean just before sunrise to catch the birth of a new day. Glorious in rich burning colors, the glowing sliver moon basked in its birth along with us. We held each other, because every day we live our best lives, my wife and daughters, a loving promise we make to each other without compromise.

Neil Peart's life and work has always inspired me to chase the sun around the world and look at life in the available light. To not waste my days just existing, but instead, to use my time well.  Sometimes I can still feel broken, and darkness can creep in, and yet, I keep working on living my best life in all my available light, ample with love and respect for myself, my family and for others. Amen.

Thank you, Neil. 

"The treasure of a life is a measure of love and respect

The way you live, the gifts that you give

In the fullness of time

It’s the only return that you expect..."

The #MeToo Guys

"I said if love has these conditions
I don't understand those songs you love
She said this is not a love song
This isn't fantasy-land
Don't go too far..."

–Rush, Cold Fire

In that moment, all I could think about were the times I pushed myself on another woman. Not physically, thank goodness, but emotionally, yes. Plus, the pining that followed when I was left with nothing consensual; when I was left with nothing but rejection. Every single time a memory of a little self-inflicted cut that healed still left its scar. The scar of how I dealt with it and her, more than being told no. The difference between fantasy and reality.

"I remember every time I went too far," I said aloud.

"Me too," one of my friends said.

"So, both of you tell me," I asked two of my friends. "You both have daughters. Have you talked with them about consent? Especially when they were teenagers?"

Both friends nodded and said yes they had.

"Thank you," I said, thinking of my own daughters, almost 9 and 11. "No means no. And yes when changed to no means no."

"That's why I'm never running for office," one friend said.

We just nodded. The hormonal rage of teenage angst doesn't stop when we hit 18. Sometimes we keep making the same mistakes as adults, with too much emotional subjectivity in our decision making.

Our discussion then devolved into a circular argument about when we grew up, it was a different time, and these things happened. But every generation grows up in a different time, and these things still always happen.

The last time I got together with my friend of 40+ years, we'd had discussions about the #MeToo movement, patriarchy and the damage that too many men, especially white men of privilege, have wrought on society, women, children and other men of varying backgrounds and ethnicities.

And yet, it's still been hard for us to unravel from the rationale that "we just can't do or say anything anymore," that we'll be next on the empowered female super bullet train out to the boonies to be ostracized and left for dead.

But that's not really true. We can do better by our children, though, both girls and boys, because girls can and do make ill-fated emotional decisions as well, consensual or not. There are guidelines for us all to teach and to follow. We're in this together, to be better together.

There's a simple Kidpower message that states:

Each of us has the right to be treated with safety and respect and the responsibility to act safely and respectfully towards ourselves and others.

My wife works at Kidpower, teaching kids, teens and adults safety skills. I'm also a Kidpower padded instructor who teaches self-defense skills.

In a previous post, I shared that one of the many Kidpower instructors I admire (besides my wife, of course) inspired me with this analogy:

When we're literally on fire, we're taught to -- Stop, Drop and Roll -- to extinguish the fire.

But why are we on fire in the first place? What happened to cause the fire? What things can we do to prevent these fires in the future? To make ourselves safer? To make our families safer? To make our communities safer?

Self-defense skills are important, but consent even more so and so important to teach our children. And our teens and even us as adults, but we should definitely start with our children.

According to Kidpower, children can start to learn the following boundaries and safety rules to ensure positive consent for touch, games, and affection as soon as they can talk, and these rules stay relevant throughout their lives:

Touch or games for play, teasing, and affection should be:

1. Safe so that no one gets hurt
2. OK with Each Person so that each person says “yes” (people who are scared, sick, drunk, or otherwise impaired cannot say yes; people who say yes without enthusiasm, or while turning away are not saying yes…)
3. Allowed by the adults in charge
4. Not a secret so Others Can Know, because abusive behavior thrives in secrecy

Having skills for protecting and respecting healthy boundaries in daily activities starting as a child is essential to preventing sexual abuse and assault, and ensuring consent in sexual activities as adults.

I had such a good time with my friends. We only see each other once or twice a year, and the fact that we've known each other for decades, and even through all our mistakes, we all want to do better, to be better men, husbands and fathers. And especially for those of us with children, we have and want to instill the values of personal responsibility and consent. We are the #MeToo guys, and I want my daughters to know that there are men young and old who can, will and are doing better when it comes to consent, safety and respect.


Other past posts about these friends of mine:

• Men of a Women's Age
• Men of a Consequential Age
• Grown Men Friends and Fathers
• Like Men Knowingly Bound to Their Future
• Because That's How It Works With The Guys That Work
• Men of An Unremarkable Age

No Matter Their Truths

I simply asked her to turn off the tv so she could read.

"No," she said.

"Beatrice, turn the tv off, please," I said.

"No."

"Beatrice, turn if off."

"No."

"If I have to get up and turn it off myself, then there won't be any tv tonight."

Now, I usually get to the threatening of natural consequences much sooner than my wife Amy, and much gruffer than her, too. Yet, in this same moment, I was also on the phone with my best friend.

"Dad is cracking down," he said to me over the phone. "You're raising the sass."

"Yes, I know," I said. "Here I come, Beatrice."

"Beatrice," Amy said. "Please go upstairs to read."

"I turned it off," Beatrice said, right then turning off the tv.

"Okay, then read," Amy said.

"Beatrice, you're so sassy," I said.

"Don't call me that in front of people."

She finally read while I finished my phone call, but I could tell that she was upset about being called sassy. Later she'd tell her mom that she felt bad that she made me mad, and I'd apologize for calling her sassy.

Whatever the context, both girls have found their young voices and they push it more and more these days. Push it in the sense that they challenge us -- more me than us (my perception anyway) -- and talk back and say no.

No, no, no.

All the time. Well, a lot more of the time these days.

And we -- more Amy than me actually -- empower them both to speak up and speak their truth, to challenge and push back.

Then I pushed back. I felt disrespected when they talked to me that way, that they're empowered to talk to me (us) this way. So I got mad spoke my truth. Bryce got upset that mom and dad fighting, which we told her we were talking about it and not fighting, and Beatrice was still upset about being called "sassy" at that moment.

Maybe not the best defense, but I am fighting against millions of years of biological, cultural and religious evolution and systemic misogynistic white male privilege and patriarchy. No matter how "woke" I feel I am, I still struggle to differentiate between feeling disrespected by my own children and raising empowered children, children who are now girls and will be young women someday and have to stand up to the still frothing male privilege that won't think twice about disrespecting them, harassing them, assaulting them, or worse.

These are the growing pains our children go through, young women and men alike. But there is a difference between being blatantly rude, being a bully, being disrespectful and being a confident human being with a balanced sense of compassionate respect and justice. God knows how full the world is of rude today.

We want our girls to live their truth and speak their truth, while ensuring to research it, corroborate it, challenge it, validate it, and not at the expense of others, no matter their truths. To communicate truth calmly and respectfully while not being afraid to speak up when others' truths impact and infringe on respect. That's a tough balance to aspire to reach, and yet aspire to reach we will.

Assuming Otherwise

The smell was horrible. I knew immediately it was the two men shopping near us, one in a wheelchair, the other with a small dog on a leash. No matter where we stood, anywhere within a few feet radius of them and their pungent body odor smell hit us. By the looks of them, I assumed they were homeless, maybe part of the nearby encampment.

I had been grocery shopping at Trader Joe's with the girls in tow. My wife Amy was away doing a Kidpower training for the day. The girls and I were finishing up the shopping when our oldest, Beatrice, frowned and wrinkled her nose.

"What's that smell?" she said, a little loudly. Our youngest, Bryce, seemed oblivious and ready to be done with shopping.

"Shhh," I said. "I know it smells. Let's just finish up and get going."

"I know what it is. It's those poor people," she said, looking at the two men.

I didn't think they heard her, and I knew Beatrice was just saying what popped into her head without adult bias and judgement. We'd been talking about our local homeless situation with our girls since last fall, so she was equating homelessness with being poor, which wasn't wrong, but not all people who struggle to make ends meet are homeless. And we'd been there during the great recession, struggling and almost becoming homeless ourselves.

Later, when we were home and Amy was back from her Kidpower training, I brought up what happened to discuss as a family.

"What you said wasn't wrong, Beatrice. But the words weren't exactly right; not all poor people are homeless," I said.

Beatrice listened, but I could tell she thought she'd done something wrong.

Amy spoke up. "It's not about right, Beatrice. It's just about being respectful of how we address people we don't know and what's going on with them. You were just saying what you thought without trying to be mean, and that's okay."

"Okay," she said and nodded slightly.

"Right," I said. "And we don't want to say those things too loud so they can hear and make them feel bad. You were just making an observation to me."

"Yes, there are too many people without a home or shelter or running water, so they do smell because they can't take baths or showers like we can everyday," said Amy.

"This is why there are really important organizations in town that are doing there best to help homeless people," I said.

We went on with the rest of our day, but we didn't lose sight of the greater lesson. We talked about it again during our weekly family meeting to ensure that we respond appropriately and with respect in situations like the one at the grocery store and the homeless men, when we don't know them or assume to know their story based on what we see or smell.

And because the girls are getting older and more aware, we then expanded the conversation to include if they were with a friend who was talking badly about another person they knew, and trying to sway them into talking badly about the person. Amy role played with the girls on how they should respond and not to participate in the belittling of others just because we don't like them (when we may not even know them), or because someone else doesn't like them (when he or she may not even know them), or because we assume something about them when we really know nothing about them, only basing it on something we heard.

It's about time we start assuming otherwise.