Individual morality and ethics, and their place in modern society
Our responsibility to our fellow man
*This post contains graphically violent imagery and accounts of holocaust survivors
“The way in which a man accepts his fate and all the suffering it entails, the way in which he takes up his cross, gives him ample opportunity — even under the most difficult circumstances — to add a deeper meaning to his life. It may remain brave, dignified and unselfish. Or in the bitter fight for self-preservation he may forget his human dignity and become no more than an animal. Here lies the chance for a man either to make use of or to forgo the opportunities of attaining the moral values that a difficult situation may afford him. And this decides whether he is worthy of his sufferings or not.”
-Viktor Frankl
Every individual has a moral compass; a set of guidelines instilled by family, society, religion, and experiences. Groups may argue over minutiae, but the broad arc of morality has many common threads. We should treat others kindly, we shouldn’t steal, we shouldn’t kill.
In a nation like the United States, we place a very high value on individual freedom. We are allowed to worship as we want, and say as we please, without fear of government repercussion or enforcement. Sometimes this means tolerating views and beliefs we not only disagree with, but ones we find disgusting on some level.
Healthy debate and discussion of ideas is paramount to democracy. It’s how we work out our differences and find the aforementioned common ground. We, in whole as a society, discard the minutiae, and give our fellow man the space to do and say as they please.
Our first responsibility
I firmly believe our first responsibility as human beings is self improvement. Gaining a better understanding of our own mind, along with habits that encourage high performance, allows us to navigate a difficult, and often emotionally unsettling world. Life is difficult, and anyone who claims otherwise is selling something.
The process of gaining deeper levels of self awareness is a long and arduous task. It requires strength and bravery, as we often don’t like the things we encounter when doing thorough inventories of our character. This is lifelong work. As our situations and circumstances change, we need to continuously bring our thoughts back to our behavior and what we can do to make a positive impact.
Our own behavior and actions carry weight far beyond ourselves. Think of yourself as a stone thrown in the water. Your action ripples outward to affect those around you, and every other person has their own set of ripples. It’s endless out into the world, and our actions (or lack thereof) carry repercussions.
Basic conclusions
The line of reason can easily be drawn that in order to maintain our own happiness and success, it is important to nurture those characteristics in others. After all, we’re communal creatures, and a society is benefited by having productive, happy citizens.
So why is it that there are groups who still preach hate rhetoric and carry racist, bigoted belief systems? The desire to destroy a portion of the population is self defeating. Crushing the richness of a culturally diverse society creates a situation where people are expected to conform to an acceptable standard. It punishes individuality and personal freedoms by dictating a set of rules that must be followed at all costs.
Personal motivation and societal ethics
We use personal motivation to be successful in our lives. With the conclusion that helping others achieve their goals is beneficial to ourselves, it must also be said that in order to make this a realistic path, we are obligated to speak up against those who would stand in its way. Remaining solely focused on selfish gains easily leaves doors open for people to abuse power and subjugate others.
If we are to truly be our best selves, and encourage others to do the same, we must not tolerate violent belief systems. Just as we would remove negative voices from our personal lives, we must expel groups and factions that hold any ethos that relies on violence, xenophobia, and bigotry.
This isn’t a suggestion, it’s an obligation. If you are truly committed to making your life amazing, you must reject and oppose anything that wishes to deny that opportunity to others based on superficial differences such as skin color, religion, or sexual preference. You can’t believe that everyone has the ability to achieve greatness if you are willing to make exceptions to that rule.
The consequence of silence
Everyone knows that if you don’t fix a small leak in the roof, it will grow, and if left in disrepair, the entire roof will cave in. Those interested in self improvement know that if you don’t fix small issues within yourself, they too will grow and cause much greater problems. The same can be said for society. If there is a small problem, it must be addressed and corrected, or there can be serious consequences.
Like minded individuals group together. This is no secret. We find those we identify most with and spend our time with them. When someone harbors hatred for others, they will surely find people who share those feelings.
The mindset and reasoning skills of an individual are different than those of a group. Discussion of ideas and finding common ground is far easier one on one. You can convert a racist through long term reasoning and discussion. In large groups, there is no reasoning. Like any other belief system, they only strengthen each other’s resolve.
There have been numerous psychological studies on mob mentality and deferring responsibility in group settings. They all point to the indisputable fact that people will pass the buck when given the opportunity. Most people will try their hardest to avoid leadership roles and responsibility. Unfortunately, studies also show the same results even in life or death situations. (SOURCE)
This is why it is important to vocally oppose all forms of racist propaganda. It is not simply freedom of speech. It is not fascist to shut down white supremacists and racial purists. If we are to lift ourselves and others up, it is required of us to confront in every way those that would push us down.
This isn’t about semantics of what constitutes free speech, or the paradox of tolerating intolerance. This is about why a society that values the freedom and safety of individual citizens cannot allow hate groups to form and mobilize. If given a platform, they will always subjugate and oppress any opposing voice.
The takeaway
It is a benefit to all to encourage diversity in society. It encourages growth in the economy, arts, and sciences. Diversity creates communication between people and allows us to explore the realms of philosophical thought.
Bigotry and intolerance ultimately carry out to human atrocity. It has played out in the last century, and the echoes of the ghosts of Auschwitz, Dachau, and Treblinka still roam those silent fields.
The horrors of Nazi concentration camps is being forgotten. Prisoners were beaten to death, torn apart by attack dogs, and burned alive. Babies were thrown alive into open pit fires, shot in the back of the head, or simply cut from their mother’s womb with a bayonet before she had a chance to give birth so she could watch it die. People were forced to dig their own graves. They were dismembered, injected with chemical cocktails for research, or put into pressure chambers to see how much the human body could withstand before the skull would cave in. They were stripped of their possessions, their names, and their dignity.
This is the path of intolerance. To be an uplifting force in the lives of others, we cannot hold ambiguous morals or centrist ideas of the value of allowing hate speech. If we are to consider ourselves good people, then it is our moral obligation to oppose bigotry and racism with all available tools and methods, because it happened once, and it can happen again.
“It’s hard for you to understand. It’s hard for the world to understand what human beings can do. Some families [were] wiped out. Nothing. All killed. Towns after towns, all killed. No names. Nothing. I want the young generation to know about it, what did happen. Because it could come again. I never thought it was going to happen to me either.”
-Philip Riteman, Auschwitz survivor
