In Which 'Morality' proves to be too big a topic for a blog

Have you ever wondered about how much of an effect the people you know and talk with have on your lexicon? Obviously we all try to talk in a way which is appropriate for the situation (so we wouldn't always choose the word "lexicon" for instance), but it's weird when you notice those things that you and your friends say and always take for granted. This happened to me on Friday. I have a friend who used to always describe his team's soccer losses as "moral victories". In his case this was almost fair, since the other teams had the unfair advantages of talent, training, being-Sydney-FC-that-one-time, etc. Problem is, I never even noticed that I'd absorbed the use of the word "moral" as an almost meaningless adjective until Friday. I claimed (obviously spuriously) that my hat was "morally superior" to some other hat. Which is clearly stupid. Problem is that this had become a thing I just say without my even noticing it.

Naturally, this then devolved into an argument as to whose hat was superior and more specifically whether it was possible for a hat to be "morally" superior to any other hat not obtained by crime or similar. I don't know how it happened, but I managed to end up arguing the clearly untenable position that they could, and mine was. (Note: it really is a pretty awesome hat, you guys). This was difficult on the grounds that it's difficult to have a bantering argument when you have absolutely nothing to argue because you are absolutely wrong.

The problem is that in this situation, the only thing is argument ad hominem, basically. So it ended up in a possibly even more foolish debate as to which interlocutor was the more moral person. That's pretty much not somewhere you ever want to go, conversationally. Either you're arguing that you or that your opponent is in some way a genuinely bad person (so as to be "morally" not superior), and then the fun wears off about as fast as you'd expect.

So that was pretty silly.

But even though it was yet another case of attempted social suicide by yours truly, it still raised an interesting point: how can you judge the moral worth of a person? What, in fact, is morality per se? (Now seems like a good time to note that I'm aware that greater thinkers than I have thought about this, this is just an idle musing, because that's what we do here. And also, a girl's got to think of something to write about, and I went with carefully not thinking through the obviously innocent hyperbolic humour of emails and suchlike last week, and that wasn't really super successful). The dude I was arguing (for want of a better word) with claimed that he was the more moral person because of being Christian and virginal, and I wondered: is morality an external thing, bestowed by religion and an honour code handed down from God or the gods, or is it more an adherence to your own standards? (Obviously, given that I was busy wondering these things, we can take it as read that I had no better counter arguments than "Oh yeah, well... ha." Neither of these issues proposed as the lynchpins for morality are points on which I can make these sorts of sweeping claims. Also, I have an allergy to making the sorts of personal remarks it takes to really commit to arguing against that sort of thing. “Well, I think, from what very little I’ve seen, you have some dubious attitudes about people in general and also sometimes you seem just a trifle thoughtless. But I do think that on the whole you’re a good guy” is both much too strong and much too weak, all at once. And I can’t just argue pro-myself instead of arguing against him because “Yeah, well I try to be nice to people, even if it is not always particularly successful because sometimes I am accidentally thoughtless or carried away. Also someone told me I was ‘cruel’ that time, so maybe it’s just wildly unsuccessful. I guess that could be a thing. Anyway, I like to think of myself as someone who tries.” is desperately weak.)This at least is an advantage of religion and black-and-white sweeping claims. You don't feel that you need, in good faith, to qualify them to death.

I suppose the whole point of religious faith is that you basically have your answer to that point (the one before those brackets: “is morality internal or external?” who those of you having difficulty keeping up). But are personal values not still important, even if not, according that viewpoint, as vital? I suppose that Holy Writings of various kinds have been thorough enough that that there really are official positions on what the Right Thing is in most situations. Still, I would argue that there are always new situations, so that some degree of autonomous decision always has to be undertaken. There are no Biblical writings dealing with how to deal with Facebook dramas, for instance, except maybe analogously. And then you have the problem of interpretation. So everyone is, to some extent, a law unto themself. Plus, it’s maybe worth acknowledging that once you have accepted the precepts of your religion as your personal moral framework, you still need to make the effort to adhere to that, so it’s not just free “morality” points. Folks get at least as much cred for doing right by their external frameworks as their internal ones. Maybe more, since a lot of those things will tend to be more challenging to what you might personally prefer to do, either on the basis of moral dilemmas or on the basis of that-chick-is-totally-slammin-maybe-it-would-be-ok-to-have-just-a-little-bit-of-sex-now.

Plus, if you think that moral frameworks are internal (as I think we can agree that they must be, to some extent), then where do they come from? A lot of that is just acculturation and the ideas of your society and possibly the Disney movies and Sesame Street viewing of your childhood. (I read a thing once about how watching Sesame St really does make small children better people, if by better people you mean “people who try to accept differences and be nice to people and suchlike and also people who can recognise the letter F”.) Looks like it’s a combination of factors. Like any 5 year old (especially a Sesame St viewer) could have told me 300 words ago.

The problem is that even if you decide to go with an internalised moral framework, lucky is the person who can claim never to have broken their own rules. There are things which are absolutely part of my moral framework and standard which I've been hazier on than I ought, and there are points where, although I can categorically state that I have never wavered, I've hardly been challenged. (Like, I’d never cheated on anyone, and never would, but I guess I’ve been complicit in others’ cheating. By accident, I hasten to add. Also, I’ve never really had anyone try to seduce me into cheating on someone, so maybe it’s cheap of me to be smug about something I’ve never had to try hard to achieve.) So, for instance, it’s difficult for me to say “I may not adhere to a specific religious code, but I make it a very definite point to try not to judge people on the basis of their beliefs and religion (or age/sex/sexuality/creed)” without, in all honesty, having to add “unless their beliefs are ‘obviously wrong’ or mean or I don’t like them.” Which makes it a difficult point to argue. So sure, I think that most of the modern religions, as generally understood, are pretty good. But I’m not in favour of people who like the idea of female circumcision, or stoning homosexuals, or Nazism or whatever.

I guess that’s sort of the central tenet of my “moral framework”. Be nice to people and try not to object to them doing things you would not do yourself if it doesn’t hurt anyone. It’s that second bit where I come into some conflict with a lot of religion, because my idea of what’s victimless is different to the ideas of a lot of those guys’. Plus, once you add an omniscient loving God into the mix, there’s suddenly a whole extra way to hurt someone. If there’s a being who can see/hear your thoughts and who has strong ideas about a lot of issues, then you can easily hurt their feelings by thinking inappropriately lustful thoughts or blaspheming in your mind or whatever. So that’s a bit of a difficulty.

I was going to have a whole second half of this discussion here, but I fear that this post is already a trifle top-heavy. So that’s all for now, and I’ll pick up this line of thought in my next post, probably.