Civility is expected, respect is earned. That being said, not respecting someone and disrespecting them are two different things.

I chose the closest answer because it wouldn't have been my exact answer. I tend to SHOW respect to others, at least until they give me a reason to stop. That doesn't necessarily mean I truly respect them. Actual respect does need to be earned.

I agree, disrespect is earned, but then again so is respect. So I need a fourth option like 'always demonstrating respect'; in my mind, i separate respecting and being respectful.

You see I suffer from a common yet not universal Canadian malady identified as terminal politeness. LLOL

Seriously though, i always try to be respectful, demonstrating respect, especially if i dislike a person. I do it for me, because that's I how feel. All people in my book deserve to be shown respect, even those who look or sound like they don't, and maybe, especially for those. That's my view of what a functional human acts like. Those i actually don't respect are still human, and deserve to be shown respect, or total avoidance, whichever fits.

Nothing is served by disrespecting a person even if on some level, you believe they deserve it. What would i be trying to accomplish by disrespecting someone, i asked myself a long time ago, and sometimes have to repeat these days; ego satisfaction? People nearly never learn from being dissed so it can't be about teaching others how to behave.

My actual respect for an individual is as others have said, dependent on their behaviour including their words. I trust that the person i've met is respect-worthy until they prove they aren't. That's when avoidance kicks in. Trust but verify is my default behaviour.

I remain neutral with new people , but trust and respect both have to be earned through interactions over time.

I marked neutral because I have some conditions. Everyone gets the same amount of neutral, basic human decency to start. This is respect in a way, but not a positive gross of it unless they’ve earned it. Just a bit of benefit of the doubt but not risking anything huge on it. Like surfpirate said, probably better to call this default a position of civility. I’ll extend politeness until they reveal that they don’t deserve it. Both disrespect and my utmost respect have to be earned based on the merits of their behavior and reputation though.

I think civility is often confused with respect. I am civil to all the people I meet until I get to know them a bit and then I start to develop either a respect for them or a lack of respect for them depending upon what they say and what they do. Civility is not respect but simply the social graces that hold society together and keep us from sinking back into barbarism.

I agree completely...Everyone deserves the right to be respected. When they have done something to lose that respect, they show that they don't care whether they have your respect or not. Their decision was to not give you the same courtesy. When I've lost trust and respect for someone, I can never interact with that person the same way again. [Also, I am notoriously bad at accepting an apology from someone. There are countless times in my life when I've forgiven some major transgression (say, big enough to destroy my marriage), only to have the person turn right around and do something as bad (or even worse)... If the person is truly sorry, they won't let it happen again. If they do it again, then their apology wasn't valid in the first place. I've lost good friends and even family members because they couldn't stop being disrespectful...]

It's all about your worldview. Expect people to be good and respectful, treat them accordingly and 99% they'll do exactly that.