Legality ≠ Morality
The FBI/iPhone encryption case, Edward Snowden’s leaks and now today’s Panama Papers… Recent events convey more than ever that societies need to continue to explore the decoupling of legality/illegality from morality.
The talking point from the establishment on the Panama Papers scandal is “tax avoidance is legal, and so therefore it’s morally ok ¯\_(ツ)_/¯”
The FBI is legally allowed to subpoena Apple to force them to provide encryption assistance on that iPhone, so some quarters argued it was immoral for Apple to be so standoffish.
Snowden’s revelations demonstrated massive amounts of illegal activity occurring within unaccountable government departments — but he did so in an illegal way and therefore was vilified so publicly and by so many as morally corrupt (despite there being no ‘morally right/legally ok’ way for him as a contractor whistle-blow).
If I want to download a TV program or film via bit torrent that was only shown in my native UK, that’s illegal. But how is that immoral?
It’s healthy for there to be a tension between legality and morality, lets just not make the mistake that the two terms are interchangeable, less our morals become defined by those who are perhaps the least placed to judge…
