Pluralism, Tolerance, and Relativism
It’s very popular to state that there exists no universal truth or moral code which governs or guides individual and corporate behavior; rather, we act and react within particular conventional, social systems of morality, and therefore culture is relative. Philosopher James Rachels summarizes the very fundamental claims of cultural relativism in The Elements of Moral Philosophy:
- Different societies have different moral codes.
- There’s no objective standard by which we can judge one social code better than another.
- Our own society’s moral code had no special value; it’s one among many.
- No universal ethical truths exists, thus no moral truths exist that govern all people at all times.
- Actions within a particular culture are deemed right or wrong by consensus.
- It’s disdainful to judge another society’s conduct by our own standards.
Adopting a culturally relativistic perspective then is seen as a mark of tolerance in pluralistic societies. How then should we react to the practice of female circumcision? Most recently, twelve year old Egyptian girl Badour Shaker died in June after the procedure was performed on her by a physician for the equivalent of a mere $9.00. Startlingly, 97% of married Egyptian women reported to UNICEF in 2003 that they’d undergone genital mutilation. (An ancillary, but no less important, story was under-reported last week: “Turkish boys circumcised at a local butcher’s shop”.)
So, what think you? Are group and personal morality relative? Is it supercilious to judge others’ cultural practices through the lens of our own? What then are the limits of tolerance? If there are limits to the tolerance of corporate cultural and individual subjective practice, can relativism be valid? Leave a comment by clicking the link above.
Comments
Leave a Reply