0004. A Good Life? In This Economy?
One of the things I hope to accomplish, should the Lord tarry, is modeling how to think through ethical questions in our era. My argument for this approach is based on a theory. Our discomfort with ethical questions results from our insecurity, a distrust of ourselves and others, which discourages us from talking through our problems out loud. I hope to show, with humility and integrity, that these conversations are possible and meaningful, regardless of how scared we might be to change our minds. I seek to model what these inner conversations can sound like to anyone, so I am going to err on the side of plainer language and explaining myself thoroughly and intelligently without condescension.
Today, I am going to lay out a question, which I’m then going to dissect. Along the way, I am going to be trying to construct a framework of questions and logical tests that I can then apply to other problems I encounter. I doubt I will be finding solutions to every big question we have, but I am hopeful that thinking deeply will help us ask better questions that get us closer to the real answers.
Every day, I ask myself some variation of the same question: Is it possible to make a truly moral decision? In spiritual terms, I wager that there’s no more pressing question before us. This question can turn people into nihilists and terrorists, depending on the conclusions they draw. In a quest to be a moral person who makes moral decisions, I have made a truly maddening habit of asking this question of every conscious decision I make. I usually conclude that, well, no, it’s not really possible, but if we don’t try to make moral decisions, then we’re consciously making the situation worse - and that, I believe, is indefensible.
The difficulty of the question reflects the complexity of our world. The ripple effect of even our smallest actions seems to defy the laws of physics. We certainly suffer from moral cost inflation. In this “economy,” our individual moral currency can barely pay the rent. I see this most in myself when I am a consumer, especially in the age of climate change. Buying an avocado in winter or driving a car or owning a phone is to contribute, directly or indirectly, to environmental, thus social, collapse. No object produced by the systems of our age is excused from some sort of contribution to the ecocidal quagmire in which we find ourselves.
Moral cost inflation means that we lose perspective. When it’s not possible to be a totally moral and good person, it begins to feel like we are operating in a vicious, violent world with both hands tied behind our backs. No one else is trying as hard, it always seems. Why keep trying this hard if I’m just holding myself back and letting others take advantage of my good intentions?
If I start feeling resentful of my moral responsibilities, it won’t be long until I start equivocating. Is x really worse than y? If a is bad, then doesn’t that mean b through z are bad, too? Anywhere we draw the line cuts somebody. Sometimes it cuts someone I know. Sometimes it cuts me. At what point do we no longer have the right to be the arbiter of right and wrong? Who amongst us isn’t fallible?
The question of fallibility deserves a lengthy digression. Here, it makes sense to push back and question motives: “fallibility” sure sounds like an excuse designed so that I can keep doing whatever I want. We have to accept that people are flawed, as a rule, and that they will make decisions that are selfish and spiteful regularly and often without thinking. If I swing the other way, however, and demand moral purity of every decision I make, I have to ask whether it’s possible to make the morally-pure decision every time. I gotta say, I really don’t think it is. There’s actually no way for me to purge my life of imperfect characters; I can only evaluate each relationship as it offers itself up for consideration. I can’t separate myself from the sinfulness of the world as long as I am a person, never mind a person who lives among other people.
If everyone’s morally-compromised, we can ask a historical question for perspective: are we today perhaps especially morally compromised? In the era of climate change, for example, doesn’t ordering a pair of shoes from China do more damage than, say, the forges that equipped the Babylonian empire? Don’t even our smallest actions seem to have an outsized impact? Perhaps. But the solution to those problems is systemic and not in any one individual’s hands. And on the level of the individual, the only scale on which 99% of us can make a meaningful decision, our turmoil over these decisions is likely not extraordinary in human history. The complexity of our world is systemic and made up of systems, but we have always been torn – that is, unfortunately, just the human element at play. As long as there have been humans, they have had the capacity to be morally conflicted.
Any conclusion that excuses action, however, isn’t thoroughly examined enough. Humans have always had the ability to be morally conflicted – so what? Is that an excuse to never experience moral clarity, or for moral clarity to never fluctuate over time? If we accept that we can have better judgment at some times than others, we can learn what it feels like when we’re clear-eyed and when we are not. If I don’t always have to be right, I can learn what it feels like to be wrong, and that can teach me when and when not to speak.
There’s a more painful question here: does demanding moral purity of every interaction strengthen me or my causes? When the interaction is toxic, the answer feels clearer – poison is poison, and the cure for poison is not to take more of it. But outside of toxicity, when it would be bearable except that I’m too annoyed, sensitive, or angry, the answer is likely no, and it’s a decision borne of futility. When rejecting a person, a cultural object, or a shift in ideology for any reason besides toxicity, I am probably disengaging selfishly, without thinking about my actions in context of a larger strategy – when to engage, when to disengage, when to push, when to yell, when to drop my grievances, when to ask more of myself, and so on.
So, we live within systemic problems that we cannot fix as individuals, but we are still making decisions that have outsize impact. While we cannot change systems, we do have the power to two major things: firstly, to change our impact; secondly, to train ourselves in preparation both for the world to come and the world we want to build. From what am I doing? to where am I going and what am I trying to do?
Over the next few entries, I will test these ideas on some modern-day ethical dilemmas, showing my thought process the whole way. I will be looking for new perspectives on particularly tangled problems. I am excited advance my own thinking and, perhaps, yours. I am hopeful at our prospects.