I have been reading a series of novels written by a Southerner and had something of a light bulb moment. In a place where manners are so very important it seems that niceness is not. Where religion is almost required, goodness is not. I began to wonder how much these things are correlated. It seems that both religion and manners are a lazy man's way of fulfilling the imperatives of human's social nature. If you have a rule book to follow on what defines you as a 'nice' and a 'good' person, you do not actually have to do the work of what it takes to be either of those things. If you follow the rule "Do onto others as you would have done onto you" making those decisions become even easier. "Oh I would just love to have those ruby earrings to go with my red dress! I'll get them for my cousin for her birthday!" One doesn't have to think that the cousin not only doesn't have a red dress, she doesn't have enough money to take her child to a doctor. If one places the burden of right and wrong on a 'god' then one doesn't actually have to think about ones own obligations. One tithes, wipes one's hands and is done with the entire issue. I have friends both religious and nonreligious who work very hard at trying to make society a better place for all people. This is not to say that religion or manners precludes a person from being both good and nice. What I am saying is that a great many people use it as an easy way out of a hard task.