on the edge

Morality is linked with liberty, that’s the main argument of my girl friend’s recent post on her blog. To strengthen the argument, she pointed out some examples from day-to-day activities which can be categorised as ‘wrong’ or ‘immoral’. Despite mentioning the reason why such acts can be considered ‘wrong’ or ‘immoral’, the argument still appears fairly commonsensical to me, therefore, is worth of question.

In an ideal world, moral authority is supposed to be built on a mutual understanding and common interests. That is to say that one party can not claim to have the ultimate moral authority because, say for example, their set of rules ‘originated’ from the omnipotent, thus, leaving them uncontested and unquestionable. What is considered to be the truth, therefore, has to be based on the shared view – if some people do not share the same view, truth can not be imposed.

In the world we live in, manufacturing consent is an ambitious task, therefore leaving us in a fuzzy realm how to justify right or wrong. It even applies on a daily basis. Stealing can be considered ‘wrong’ or ‘immoral’ because it infringes someone’s right to property, but how can you justify stealing is wrong if a person is stealing a loaf of bread to survive? How about to accidentally murder someone as a self-defense reaction? Things can not be viewed as pure black and white. Even in some ‘heavy’ cases like mass murder, rape, or child abuse, where the verdict from a common sense viewpoint is nothing but ‘wrong’ or ‘immoral’, you can still argue that these cases could have remained undecided (say a person who committed mass murder has a history of schizophrenia). Even if opposing the argument would make me look inhuman and ruthless, so be it, because to me the key is reasoning and contextual.

Don’t get me wrong, as I do not oppose the idea of having a set of morality to follow. It is as a matter of fact a profound idea. However, blatantly following a certain premise to judge a phenomenon without taking any consideration of its broader context is plain absurd to me, even if this was meant to answer the inquiry refusing a prescribed set of morals from religions.

(I am so hungry now. Thinking is a heavy sport and energy consuming)

Oh, and I am still spiritually lost.