Who's afraid of moral judgment?
By Miguel Guanipa (10/31/06)
At its core, politics is about power; and we rightly demand that those who vie for power, i.e. public office, should at least prove that they are worthy of wielding it. What better measurement to ascertain a candidate’s ability to wield such power than the substance of his or her character?
Character is something that typically (but not invariably) develops in accordance with the periodic influx of life experiences. A person who habitually steals and cheats today may be a transformed individual a few years from now and choose to devote his or her life to more worthy causes. Conversely someone who presently engages in immoral behavior may have been in years past an exemplary model of purity.
These ostensibly human proclivities reflect – albeit imperfectly - a particular moral orientation; thus someone who happens to reflect an inclination towards a particular form of behavior offers only the daily public deportment upon which he or she is judged by everyone else.
This is why when nominees enter the political ring allegations which reflect negatively on the character of an opponent can prove a devastating blow.
This is also why social acceptance is highly coveted, because it offers a shield from the negative repercussions of moral judgment.
Social acceptance is bestowed upon an individual or a group when behavior patterns that the majority once considered unnatural are catalogued into the realm of the normal; this in turn automatically mandates the suspension of moral criticism. But not all kinsmen are subjected to the same moral inventory audits under the current social politesse.
The Deviant Clause.
Take for example those in the homosexual community, which has experienced considerable success in advancing the premise that sexual orientation is not a choice, hence it should not be factored in as a measure of character - or so they want us to believe in spite of the fact that many of them flaunt it with pride.
The upshot of this premise is that some (not all) people’s sexual orientation is allegedly an inborn quality over which one has no control, much like ethnicity or skin color.
Yet homosexuals stop short of saying that sexual proclivities are always consanguine traits among varied sects of diverse sexual persuasions. Specifically when it comes to pedophiles, both homosexuals and heterosexuals (the jury is still out on “metrosexuals”) agree that such people have crossed the line drawn between natural behaviors and disordered sexual practices.
Following their own line of reasoning for what constitutes fair integration, on can argue that this is only because pedophilia is not a generally accepted behavior by today’s commoners. And one could further postulate that pedophiles today find themselves where homosexuals where about 30 years ago: scorned by society because of what is classified by the majority as distinctly perverse sexual tendencies. Hence it is not an exaggeration to predict that in another 30 years (or less) pedophiles could very well enjoy the social acceptance that homosexuals enjoy today, as time and continual advocacy tear down the fragile walls of morality. This is the destined outcome of the misguided choices we make today in the name of “tolerance”.
The Victim Clause.
Others who find themselves propitiously exempt from any type of moral scrutiny are victims of tragedy. Michael J. Fox is only the latest example of a line of agents that liberals often use to advance their causes. The reason is that it is very hard to criticize people who have suffered so much and not be cast as the bad guy in what looks like an impartial debate. Such mouthpieces for the progressives are deemed to be exempt from having to endure any reproach or criticism of their motives.
The Libertine Clause.
Then there are those who are exempt from having to field any character appraisal inquests and the attendant moral judgments by pre-empting that as long as they do not prop themselves up as models of virtue they do not have to answer to any higher moral authority other than their own. In essence they believe that one can not be accused of hypocrisy if one does not claim to have aspired to an idealistic moral standard in the first place.
This is the reason why “feet of clay” revelations about a public figure hereto viewed as a model of virtue is quite the tasty morsel for the news media. Such exposures are often exploited to illustrate the notion that the only people who can always be trusted are those who have not abrogated any high moral ground and have no qualms about airing their dirty laundry; the ones who take pains to project a morally upright front are presumably the greater transgressors in private.
This is the standard worldview of most liberals who can stroll unharmed on the heavily mined terrain of politics and morality, often emerging unruffled by accusations of impropriety since they do not claim to have a monopoly on any absolute standards of morality as most conservatives allegedly do. This principle is projected onto other people groups, such as the insurgents in Iraq for example; hence the hesitance of the media to judge their ghastly atrocities in a moral light while scolding American soldiers when they don’t fastidiously adhere to the minutia of the Geneva conventions.
In a tortured acquiescence within the moral purview of liberals, one of the arguments behind their reasoning is the presumption (although not always explicitly stated) that we are morally superior to them, hence we should always behave in such a way that makes our homeland patrons proud; let them behave like the savages they are – just don’t call them savages in public; it’s immoral.
This prevailing value judgment criterion often puts the conservatives at a great disadvantage.
Take for example the excoriating received from the left by Republican Sen. George Allen when he innocently called a Democratic operative “Macacca”. The senator was denounced as a racist and his numbers immediately suffered. Not so after excerpts from his opponent’s books where released to the public abounding with demeaning portrayals of women and graphic descriptions of pedophilia. Are not the musings of writer at least subsidiary reflections of some obscured facet of his character? I believe they are. Otherwise we would not expect a Dickens to be written with the prurient pen of a Marquis de Sade’s, or vice versa.
Or take the case of Rep. Mark Foley who resigned his post after the disclosure of lurid e-mails he had sent to a young page. The same fate - not surprisingly - did not befall the late congressman Gerry Studds who slept with a 17 year old page, or Massachusetts congressman Barney Frank who hired a male prostitute through a personal ad who later conducted a prostitution ring from Frank's apartment during his absence.
This and many other cases of how the media selectively chooses its role of moral arbiter reveal a trend where conservatives have had to strive for a long time under the tyranny of overwhelming expectations. It is not that liberals fail to acknowledge their human frailty, but that they confess only when it is convenient for them to do so.
The liberal mind habitually allows itself the luxury of seeking solace in the reassuring notion that everyone is prone to engage or will eventually engage in questionable ethical practices that will deprive him or her of the authority to demand accountability from others, hence the overused “everybody does it” mantra they default to when accused of misconduct. Conservatives are generally left to fend for themselves in a stage that is fiercely inhospitable to moral indiscretions of any kind. Observe how a conservative is invariably reviled by liberals for not adhering to a rigorous set of speech and behavioral norms, while a liberal is free to wander with impunity and offered a wide array of justifications within a code they themselves have created.
But conservatives should not bemoan the fact that they are held to a higher standard of ethics, and remind liberals that they have no reason to relish in the fact that the media periodically offers them immunity for their indiscretions, and to recognize that we should all be held to the same standard regardless of party affiliation. After all, since we are all prone to the same failings shouldn’t we also be equally accountable?
This fluctuating benchmark also poses an interesting dilemma concerning the exercise of tolerance, especially by so called progressives, who have insisted in dictating what the guiding principles are that determine the levels of acceptance to which the former can be stretched before it morphs into full-fledged endorsement. For one thing, it shows that we all have certain things that we refuse to tolerate. The question is who decrees what the measuring standard will be for what is to be tolerated. This is the inner sanctum of a predominantly secular milieu into which conservatives are forbidden entry.
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