]]>“Rights” are a moral concept — the concept that provides a logical transition from the principles guiding an individual’s actions to the principles guiding his relationship with others — the concept that preserves and protects individual morality in a social context-the link between the moral code of a man and the legal code of a society, between ethics and politics. Individual rights are the means of subordinating society to moral law.
Every political system is based on some code of ethics. The dominant ethics of mankind’s history were variants of the altruist-collectivist doctrine which subordinated the individual to some higher authority, either mystical or social. Consequently, most political systems were variants of the same statist tyranny, differing only in degree, not in basic principle, limited only by the accidents of tradition, of chaos, of bloody strife and periodic collapse. Under all such systems, morality was a code applicable to the individual, but not to society. Society was placed outside the moral law, as its embodiment or source or exclusive interpreter — and the inculcation of self-sacrificial devotion to social duty was regarded as the main purpose of ethics in man’s earthly existence.
Since there is no such entity as “society,” since society is only a number of individual men, this meant, in practice, that the rulers of society were exempt from moral law; subject only to traditional rituals, they held total power and exacted blind obedience — on the implicit principle of: “The good is that which is good for society (or for the tribe, the race, the nation), and the ruler’s edicts are its voice on earth.”
Well, it is hard to me to respond to your latest post, since it is so long and I don´t know where to start. But I think there is an idea that you repeat over an over: separate morality from the sphere of politics, they are (or must be) differenciated realms. If you do not, you may fall under totalitarism, under a society “anybody who thinks differently will be suffocated”.
I think the historicall evidence suggest the contrary. The great totalisms of the world were completly amoral. In their ideologies the only things that mattered were what were considered “political”: power in the case of fascism, or simply the welfare or the teleological development of some conception of history (as it happened with the vulgar marxism spoused in comunist regimens).
It can be the case, anyways, that a conception of morality can be imposed over the rest of the population and turn to be autocratic. But that is the whole point we are discussing here: the contents of that morality, that like or not, are coming to the political discusion always (even as a denial of morality as modernity pretends). And I am not willing to leave that discusion to conservatives, comunitarists, medievalists as you call them, nor statists of any sort. Freedom is primordial in a political speech, but is not sufficient (or will you like a society where patriarchy and traditional roles for women and men are considered acceptable? Or you think the state is the only enforcer of such evils?).
]]>Well, how do you feel about concepts like “courageous,” “generous,” “wise,” “just,” “kind,” “cruel,” “insensitive,” “cowardly,” “feckless,” or even “asshole”?
Because I’m a virtue-ethicist, so for me all those virtue-terms and vice-terms are moral concepts.
]]>On dialectical grounds you are absolutely right. If I was writing philosophically, I would probably use precisely this approach. I did use it in the past when I tried writing for a Randian audience.
Why I don’t now: because I don’t get anything when I invoke the word ‘morality’. Once you use the world, you give everyone else in the room a conversational precedent to invoke the same degree of seriousness in standards, which leads to more trouble than I can possibly deal with.
Yes, if we’re going to save the world, we will inescapably have to come to a common conception of morality which promotes all of our flourishing. In the broadest sense, morality is simply (‘simply’?!) about the question as to how we are to spend our brief time in this world. But when most people talk about morality, they mean interpersonal relations, which is to be an significant but relatively small department of ethics proper. And the deeply engrained notions which people have as to how we should relate to one another grate so deeply against my happiness and sometimes survival that I just do not want to encourage morality-talk. And I’m on strike. I don’t want to save the world, which apparently prefers its mindless tribal barnyards to liberal civilisation. Let them have what they want and pay for it. I’d rather accept their designation as evil than fight with such a wretched lot for the concept of good.
Lockean contractualism, instrumental reason, etc., etc., are every bit as limiting as you say (yes, I’m familiar with the Frankfurt School, and have some appreciation for Habermas). But the functional intersubjectivity involved in substantive reason is a very rare thing and requires a great deal of trust. When you try to open whole socieities to that kind of relation- which is the moral inspiration behind much communitarianism, socialism, and especially Medievalism, what you actually get is a collectivist hole with no spiritual privacy and death by suffocation for anyone who thinks differently. The realistic alternatives are instrumental reason and substantive unreason: a society of grace and charm and rules and customs and gods which can only be maintained by locking down the minds of the young. If you are to liberate the exceptional to be the exceptional you much liberate the unexceptional to be the unexceptional. I’d rather have a society which watches television than one which goes to church. Especially because the latter society will throw rocks at me, and I don’t find the supposed nobility of martyrdom worth serious spiritual consideration.
Therefore, my personal rule number one in life is to keep dealings instrumental until trust and mutual aid is proven. The sole occasion in which I’ve made exception to this principle has resulted in one of the worst emotional episodes in my life. Back in the early modern period, people like Spinoza, Descartes, and Voltaire made frequent statements about how nice it was to live in relatively tolerant places like Holland where people would just go away and mind their own frickin’ business. Secular Judaism’s internalisation of this lesson has subsequently become the cultural backbone of liberal civilisation in the West. America’s wide implementation of certain implications of this principle will be remembered (as will the horrors of its empire) for millenia.
Strauss identified modernity as a civilisation founded on low but solid ground, whose architects were unpalatable realists such as Machiavelli and Bacon. I agree with Strauss in this analysis, and go further to disagree with Strauss that this modernity should be preserved against attempts to refound civil society upon any conception of the heights. This project which can only lead to totlitarianism. I deeply believe in cultivation of human excellence, but believe that this must be an affair of individuals and of civil society… and as a feminist I don’t much trust civil society either (or Descartes, or Bacon, etc., etc.). I very definitely defend a substantive concept of reason. Charles’ and Roderick’s ‘objective happiness’ however doesn’t make much sense to me.
Please, aspire to goodness. Better yet, aspire to greatness, which is much more interesting. But keep it out of politics- not just out of the legislatures but out of all discourse purposely intended to effect the unavoidably shared elements of social life. Private galleries should be carefully ornamented; public buildings sparsely and trnasparently functional. Ideal human relations almost never coincide with those civil institutions which promote social peace- you can have both, but try to do both at the same time and the same respect and the result is a mess. I’m a liberal, and like Toqueville I think you pay a price for liberal democracy, and that price is the often uninspiring reality of the commercial republic. Pursue the true, the good, and the beautiful. But place them under a restraining order to remain fifteen light years’ distance from political philosophy. The fountainheads of genius, if made a matter of public conversation, produce the terrors of fascism.
Now if you wish to speak of human virtue, classical virtue, moraline-free virtue, in private, and free from power, and on your own time, then I respect you greatly for doing so. Please, all power to you. I would like nothing so much as to see more stature in this world- call it ‘moral’ stature, if you like. And that includes statures which I don’t find attractive and don’t wish myself to emulate. Charles and Marja are both, by every evidence, supremely moral persons. I don’t want to live that way, but I admire and respect and depth of their lives, the degree to which they’ve dedicated themselves to their projects. I merely hope that the intensity which their examined lives bring them is matched in joy.
I want also to live deeply, to live thoughtfully, but not the same way, the way that lets you find old wooden cups and ride unicorns. Perhaps the ultimate reason I’d call it amoralism is this: for Roderick, Charles and Marja the concept of ‘morality’ seems to do an immense amount of their decision-making work. In my life, it’s an idea I rarely consult, or which I try not to consult. When I find myself worrying about whether an action is ‘moral’ qua moral I immediately step back and start checking my premises. Usually the answer I come back with, without the use of moral ideas, ends up agreeing with what my liberal friends would call morality- but not because of morality.
In fact, virtually the only occasions where I do find myself forced to rhetorically lean on moral concepts in when dealing with the bigotry and oppression which liberals focus most of their energy on. The primary reason I’ll go beyond my own preferences to support other things liberals morally want is precisely because they do more than I can rightfully ask of them my by own values in cases crucial to my own flourishinh. Morality as a treaty, if you will, with a mutually beneficial compromise. I’ll go a fair way with what others say they want from me if they’ll get my back against patriarchs and fascists. So if by ethics you mean social contract ethics- then sure, I’ll sign, as long as the rules aren’t applied prejudicially. But I see this as a matter of politics or law, a ‘civic ethic’, which doesn’t qualify as virtue in any very important sense of the term. Virtue to me is about ideals, and the only public ideal I want to defend is the perfection of a lack of public ideals. I think that’s called ‘individualist anarchism’.
I get that other people see things differently, which is fine. My slant of reasoning may have a lot to do with my own strict Anglo-Catholic upbringing and the fact that the specific evils I find most threatening are overwhlemingly of Christian origin. I also suspect things may look very differently to those more comfortably rooted in a web of communal relationships. I never really understood before coming to New Zealand what it was like to have a home, or what people loved when they talked about family. I’m starting to now, and makes me much more able to love this world. I find myself caring more and more about ‘voice’ and less and less about ‘exit’. It’s a nice thing to start to feel a little civilised.
But I can never forget or forget to reserve my right of exit- for no culture, despite its superficial tolerance, can ever be trusted to deal justly with those who won’t partake in its cultic communions. And no one who thinks can ever authentically do this, until perhaps the day comes when nations and religions exist no longer. Perhaps the difference between myself and the gallant revolutionaries I often find as friends is that I’m not holding my breath waiting for that day. Until the revolution comes, I wish to live in this unjust world. One can aspire and worship without seeking a barricade.
Roderick-
I’ll take a look at the lectures once I’m back in New Zealand. It’s great fun to watch how you can stretch a single hour on internet access into five by jumping on- and- off line, but it doesn’t work with long videos.
I look forward to figuring out how you manage to combine what works out as a perfect Randian egoism with a peculiar fondness for the word ‘duty’. I know that there are pre-Christian ways of framing the concept which aren’t so bad, but I never loved the Pagan virile gravitas trip either, nor would I imagine do you.
Everyone-
I reread my earlier exposition on (a)morality… and, um, I didn’t realise I was under that much morphine. The trouble is that I can write without much use of my eyes, but reading and thus proofreading is painfully disorienting with this Darth Vader thing over my nose. ;) I humbly submit to a razzie for worst self-editing ever. Apologies.
]]>Thanks for the plug. There are handouts therefrom.
]]>I would find it very helpful is others, especially Rad Geek and Roderick Long, could breifly sketch out the nature of their own broad ethical views in ordinary language.
Roderick has a wonderful series of lectures that do exactly that. Well worth a listen but, at about 15 hours of content (less if you are only interested in the ethics core), it’s not exactly what one would call brief.
]]>As of now, I am too exhausted to fully contribute something precise about it to the discussion. Suffice it to say that my conception of what is immoral makes the potential for a “die or be moral” situation rather remote. What can I say? I have loose morals in the conservative sense ( :
Marja, Charles, Roderick, and everyone else: let’s keep this discussion going!
The ball’s in your court.
]]>Nah, the term’s unsalvageable. We need another term to avoid confusion. Like, um, moression. ;-)
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