I think it’s undeniable that we have a lot of evil in the world today. It seems to be increasing, and the wheels appear to be coming off all around us.
It has gotten to the point, that we refuse to identify evil as such for fear of offending someone. It seems that the very idea of a moral framework is offensive and should not be spoken of in polite company.
[1]
I suppose that we should start with a question….
What is the definition of evil?
We see its product everyday, at least those of us who still allow ourselves to identify it when we see it. But what is the definition of evil? What causes all this product?
We know what the dictionary tells us [2] on the matter. But notice, please that every single definition that the dictionary offers is called judgemental, outdated, racist, homophobic, etc, by those seeking to separated from a moral framework.
But here is the problem. Can we identify evil as such and counter it absent that moral framework? For my part the answer is No.
My search on this topic began some years ago while rereading an old New York Times article ironically placed in the lifestyle section, as regards evil.
I was intrigued that the article suggested among other things that the psychiatric community was lothe to call something evil, for fear of being judgemental, and supposedly thereby losing their clinical objectivity, their detachment. Yet, even the article noted that occasionally psychiatrists are forced into using the label for a lack of something else that they could conceivably attach an action or a behavior to.
I regard this if nothing else as a tacit admission that evil objectively exists as such. I regard as somewhat less implicit from this that there is also such a thing as an objective good. After all, you can’t have a definition of one without having a definition of the other.
Let’s take this to the extreme, so that the difference is easily noted. I personally consider Western society, Western culture and the values that inform it to be the pinnacle of mankind thus far.
. But one of the things that I noted in that article, and I have often noted since is the educated being reluctant to regard it as such….And I believe this reluctance is a step on the path to our own destruction. Particularly, if you can’t allow yourself to identify good when you see it you’re clearly not going to recognize its counterpart.
Europe is certainly the coal mine canary. But frankly I regard the UK is only slightly less so.
What was once a moral certitude even in the UK, has been regulated out of business and its passage hasn’t even been marked by the citizens of the UK Who until recently couldn’t have cared less.
Now there are some who do, as an example, observe the Scramble for firearms in Germany, which is being overrun by Muslim invaders masquerading as refugees, but I fear it is too late to stop the destruction. There’s far too much in the way of law created specifically to separate the people from that moral certitude, too much damage done the culture for it to survive for long.
The answer to the dilemma is not coming up with a new definition for the word evil, because the old one is entirely correct. The answer is to allow ourselves to have a moral framework again, as we once did.
Oh, I am quite sure that there are many who will not be happy with that statement. But it is the only logical conclusion to draw.
Certainly, the political left would be among these, but also those who believe that there is an objective morality. I regard the former as a major part of the problem that we currently have. And so, I will disregard them entirely, except in dismissal.
As to the latter, I dare to propose a line of thinking. That being that while I agree there is in fact an objective morality, what drives our perception of morality is largely based in the cultural. In other words, every culture that has come a long has to a large extent had its own morals, it’s on ethics. To some degree, this has involved religious beliefs, and the rest, common practices.
But, do you remember above where I mention that Western civilization is thus far the pinnacle of mankind? I dare to suggest to you that the reason for this is that despite the outcry of its detractors, Western civilization has arrived at a place that is the closest to what some would call objective morality.
Understand me clearly, here. There are some imperfections in its cultural perception of moral and immoral, but the very reason for Western civilization’s wild success, is because they have managed to get closer to the answer of what objective morality is, than has any other culture.
I would argue further, that government didn’t have a blessed thing to do with that level of success. Rather, it was the culture that drove that success. This was recognized in a tacit way by Jefferson when he wrote…
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…
These were not values of government that Jefferson’s talking about here. These values were not governmentally arrived at, issued from some lofty place, by some governmental hack who managed to get himself elected or appointed to one thing or another. These are values of the then -new American culture. Neither values arrived at by a long and sometimes hard experience. Found by people simply living their lives and noting what works and what doesn’t. What advances mankind and what doesnt. And thereby what is good, and what is bad.
Notice, please, that I have not mentioned as yet the judeo-christian epic on which Western society is unquestionably based.
I dare to suggest to you that the very reason that Western civilization advanced as far as it did up until about 80 years ago was because that embedded in the way of thinking of Western society was a moral certitude. That moral base informed us as to what was good and evil.
We are now faced with a mortal enemy… Islam… that also has a moral certitude. You cannot defeat such an enemy without having a moral certitude yourself.. which unfortunately Western liberals have regulated out of existence. And without it, how do we identify good and evil collectively?
The only way we’re going to survive this is a return to that moral center that brought us to where we were 70 or 80 years ago.
And I wonder if we can do it.