It’s quite popular in some circles to claim morality is in decline. Those who assert morality is in decline very seldom understand they are only thinking about a very few aspects of morality. No, they like to claim morality is in decline across the board.
Nothing, of course, is more ignorant of moral history than to claim morality is in decline across the board. If one wants to make sweeping generalizations, then it would actually be closer to the truth to assert that — overall — public morality in the United States (and not just the United States) has become increasingly more humane over the last 100 years.
Here are just a random handful of the things society has become less tolerant of over the last century: Police brutality, public lynchings, racial and ethnic discrimination, sexual discrimination, child abuse and child sexual molestation, the death penalty, and even drunk driving.
And here are a random handful of the things society has become more tolerant of over the last century: racial and ethnic diversity, sexual orientation, sex, and individual lifestyle choices.
A century ago, society was overall less humane, more tolerant of anti-social behavior, and much less accepting of any kind of diversity than it is today. So, where is the moral decline that some folks like to harp on?
It seems most people who harp on moral decline have chosen to focus on a very few aspects of our changing morality that they themselves do not accept. For instance: They are opposed to accepting gays into mainstream society. Or, they are opposed to legal abortion. Because of their focused opposition to those and a few other things, they conclude that society is in moral decline and even that civilization is about to come to an end.
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Simply technological progress has left far behind moral progress; an evolution which is necessary soon or late
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Hear, Hear. Spot on, Paul!
It’s a process I think, and (as an eternal optimist) I think we’re on the right track of redefining our ethical borders.
To say that we are morally declining is so invalid. Comparing our moral standards with the past? As a woman? Sure there are things that are seriously wrong in society but one cannot expect the global mind to change in one day.
That new invention, Blogging, helps a lot. Got us all back to writing…
Hi Liusky! Welcome to the blog! I agree that technology progresses much faster than our moral sense, but I am still encouraged by how much moral progress we’ve made over the last 100 years or so.
@Purnima: I think you are very right to point to blogging as having great potential for creating a more humane world. For instance, it seems to me that it’s usually the elites and not the common people who want us to go to war against each other. And the elites have always had their voices heard. But now, with blogging, the voices of common people are out there to be heard.
However at the same time one cannot say that people have become wiser. liuksky is right, our moral sense as a whole has not kept up with technological change.
For anyone interested, I just deleted a long post left by someone calling herself “Maggie May” because the post was plagiarized from a work available on the internet. Please post your own thoughts on this blog and not plagiarized material from some other author.
While I agree great leaps and bounds have been made in many moral areas; one need only take a trip to a local supermarket to see evidence of the biggest area of moral decline that any civilized person should be able to acknowledge, regardless of religious or political persuasion. That area is the respect for others. How can we have declined in this area when we’ve made so much progress in the realm of tolerance? Simple we’ve forgotten that just because we tolerate something doesn’t mean other people do or have to.
A simple, and clear illustration of this that I see almost everyday is grown adults that think nothing of cursing aloud in crowded store around children or whoever. People think that because cursing is ok with them that everyone else should be ok with it and pay no mind to other people and their feelings.
We may have become more tolerant of each-others differences in some important areas, but with that tolerance has come a mentality of “everyone should be ok with how I want to be, so I can do what I want, when i want, where i want”. This is not true moral progress as it shows no respect for anyone but ourselves.
We must remember and respect that there will be others whose views differ from ours and there is a way to be yourself in a grown-up mature manner that doesn’t unfairly impose on those that don’t share your opinion or values. Restraining yourself is not censorship, it’s just respecting others. Most would not find it acceptable for a racist bigot to begin spouting hate speech in the middle of a crowded mall, though he has a right to his opinion. So why is it ok for another individual to use speech that is equally offensive to someone else? It’s not. If we are all truly equal regardless of race, religion or gender, then we must respect them all equally and sometimes that means showing restraint.
In a society that increasingly moves towards an attitude of moral equivalency (your morals are as good as mine). We need to remember that if we are to really be “tolerant” the conservative or less accepting as ourselves, have just as much a right to not be accepting of things as we do to be accepting. We would be wise to remember the words attributed to voltaire: “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it” It goes both ways and if we don’t respect the “loyal opposition” we become worse than the racist bigot.
Thank you for some very interesting comments, Kev!
I believe that the most people’s interest in decreasing the morality of society is moving at a much faster rate than my ability to tolerate said people….how do I keep up???
it just goes to example the looming threat that’ll be plaguing us with our children…it’s an upfront problem that isn’t taken seriously, and it’s fucking us backside due to our society’s damn lack of character ,moral fiber, and dignity…we’ve come so far together…but going from calling girls tramps for wearing skirts an inch above the knee to standing idly in the face of civil debauchery is something my 20 year old self shall never expose my children to.I mean, it was actually in my lifetime where ‘hell’ was hard to hear in the media and now you have ‘bitches’ walking the streets and your 5-year-old child could point it out while no one takes proactive steps needed to handle this situation…it’s all an affront to respect! And without knowing it, our offspring will smuggly look at us, and call us ‘bitches’ for letting it happen. Thanks for the read dude. -Melo *ventilation complete*