This is why people don't do nice acts anymore

Have you ever asked yourself why people seem to be getting more mean, less considerate of others, and less inclined to go out of their way (even a little bit) to help others?  If you currently volunteer or do randomly thoughtful acts for others, you probably understand exactly what I'm talking about.

Consider this example: 
In my apartment complex, the parking the upper half of the lot has no marked lines and parking is tight.  All the cars assigned to park there could not do so, because people were parking every which-way, not knowing how else to do it.  This problem can be easily solved.  I went and bought wood stakes, wrapped them in brightly color tape, measured out the parking widths and hammers the stakes into the ground on either die of the parking spots.  Easy.  If one took a couple second to look at the set-up, you could see where all seven cars were to park.

The results were sad.  At first, no one could figure it out.  After about two days, most everyone was parking between the posts and things were getting better.  Then, someone (without leaving a name or contact information, of course) posted on the front on the apartment door that they thought "it didn't work".  That's it.  No constructive feedback, no explanation of how "it didn't work", no thanks for the attempt to make parking easier for everyone and assure everyone got to park when they came home from grocery shopping.  The only thing the person could do was bitch that it wasn't good enough and that's all.

Okay, so I posted on the front of the apartment, since I could not go talk to this person (no contact information remember), that 1) yes, the parking was tight; 2) if they would like to go re-measure and move the stakes, that's fine as long as everyone had the same space for parking; 3) I thanked the person for noticing the effort to make the parking better for everyone and for their feed back.  Results?  Well, for a couple of days, everyone was parking just fine.  It even got slightly better.  Then, last night someone went and knocked all the stakes down.

Why?  What purpose did this serve?

This is just one example of many where attempting to help others results in bitching and negative response.  Time after time when volunteering or doing something nice, I hear complaints, negativity, and no effort on their part to provide constructive feedback or willingness to do something themselves.  American society is becoming more and more focused on "me, me, me!" and fails to think about the affect on others.  Why and how did this happen?  How can this attitude be changed?

Don't get me wrong, there are a few nice people out there!  When someone say "excuse me" or are polite to me in someway, I'm always surprised.  Almost always, this is an older person (40+).  Hopefully, the people who are willing to realize that being polite is important don't get too bitter with the world.  Thanks to all those who give a d*mn.

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