Stringencies among the Jewish People

http://www.torah.org/learning/jewish-values/law2.html

I thought this was a good excerpt on what it is to be someone who tries to put others to be beyond the letter of the law and be more strict. To me today, this is still reflected in alot of jewish communities where by someone may not like that your family member is say working in a hospital on shabbas or other exaggerated way that the law is applied.  True it is good to have a day of rest, but a hospital is not for your own benefit but for the benefit of others who are sick. (yes this was a contention in my family as my mother is a medical technologist and I had another really "stringent" person asking me when my mother would quit working on the weekends and encouraging me to discuss this with my familiy member). 
To me today, alot of wickedness is going on in the name of our "religious ways" and this causes much harm among the people of our nation.
I was once attacked by a fellow telling me that he thinks he saw me in the mall over the weekend once. (in the past I may have in fact done this on shabbas. Today I still might but it is not my shabbas priority).  I have lived in fear of going to a less than kosher restaurant as someone would remark that I am not adhering to the laws.  (I say that you can indeed go to a restaurant- any and order what is meeting our dietary laws as best you can.  This means no pork of course, but salads and other vegitarian meals are fine.  Even if you had chicken that was not properly slaughtered, I would not be the one to say it will destroy your relationship with G-d or your way of life).
So I thought I would post this article here on this blog.  Enjoy the reading and I hope that if you are a person who wants to adhere closely to the True Laws of Moses (as you would desire if you really wanted to live a rich jewish life), you would not be so stringent among all the many who do not even in many cases know the laws and do not adhere to them as specifically as you did.
According to this article, this is a reason that the Temple was destroyed in 70 CE.  So think about this next time you are in Jerusalem and you are throwing rocks at the cars that pass by on Shabbat.
I am concerned with the increasingly prevalent stringencies that are existing in our nation and unless you are trying to be a leader among our people who is say a rabbi to dispell our laws and values to our people, you should simply be careful to adhere as best you can to our laws. 
To the rabbis I say this:  I expect you to do your job to your creator.  To uphold the ways of our people and to teach as well.   But if you want me to be compliant with your choices, you better respect our laws as well. And on that note I will say that I have been perceived as being stringent in certain settings in the past and I will testify that my own "stringency" was an attempt to secure a kosher environment in light of the lax rules of our rabbinate in some situations.  This is a problem for any religious jew (such as being around people who do not dress accordingly in a very intimate personal situation).