Bill Maher said something once that has stayed with me ever since

[jhrobbins]

He said that he did not believe, as many PC folks did, that cultures were morally relative and that they were not necessarily bad or good - they just were the culture of a particular people. He said that this was wrong - that cultures were morally bad or good depending on the way they treated their people - all of the people; women and children included. He went on to say that as long as we operated within this neutrally moral spectrum, we would not be able to honestly address contemporary issues. (my paraphrasing of him)
Thoughts?

[madeline_con]

1. Hard to say...

There have been cultures who would put the infirm to death, or leave the injured "for the good of th tribe".

Morality depends on a lot of factors, ad I truly believe it's relative.

For instance, some of the stricter societal norms we see in certain cultires (like veils, isolation and harsh punishment for women), are designed to preserve the family unit.

As brutal as they may seem, they have served as a way to ensure that men are raising their own offspring, and that women stay "off the pole".

[aquart]

2. Let's just say that if Taliban men are tortured and killed, I'm fine with it.

Any man who uses society or personal strength to subdue and enslave a woman has fallen off the evolutionary tree for me and I want him extinct.

But that's just me.

[jhrobbins]

12. I agree (to a point), but my point is that it is the culture and not the

'him' that is ultimately responsible for the subjugation of women (children, 'those other folks', etc). SO, my point still remains are there cultures that are 'better' than others given some moral code that we have understood for centuries, whether we choose to define it or not. Otherwise , how could we even have a conversation about moral relativism if there were no standards - tacit or implied.

[katsy]

3. Who would be the judge of morally good?

Would America be judged good or bad by the way it's rulers (yes, rulers) treat the people?

China? GB? Sweden? The UN?

Or would Muslims be the judge? Christians? Hindus?

Maher's statement implies there exists a "righteous" judge. Who is that judge?

[jhrobbins]

10. Isn't what is morally upright and morally repugnant sort of like

that old saw about pornography - 'I can't really define it, but I know it when I see it'. I'm just saying that I think it is a tad specious to say we cannot define what is good and what is bad - surely someone can come up with some standard.

[katsy]

19. A standard of ethics or morals?

Here's an interesting discussion:

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Ethics_vs._Morals

Again, who would apply this standard? People of character or social customs? If customs, whose customs?

It's an interesting problem considering the diversity of cultures.

[Warren DeMontague]

14. I think the ruler to use is the freedom of INDIVIDUAL CITIZENS to make their own decisions, run

their own lives, choose their own religion or lack thereof, do what they damn well please with their reproductive systems, bloodstreams, and bodies- make their own calls as to whether and how to exit this world in a pain-free manner when terminally ill. What citizens choose to say, read, watch, wear, or who they choose to have sex with if they're all consenting adults should not be the business of the government. Furthermore, I think other arbitrary critereon, such as whether a society provides basic protections to workers, a liveable minimum wage, decent public education, sanitation, infrastructure, and health care to all citizens apply. I think a society has a basic responsibility to protect the collective air, water, soil and environment of its citizens.

Those are the criteria I would use, I would apply them to any society. Unfortunately ours currently fails in many of these areas.

[Marr]

4. I've heard that argument before, and unfortunately...

it usually ends up with the person advocating the repression or annihilation of this culture or that culture, because it's simply "bad" or "inferior". It becomes nothing more than a floral arragement atop the usual nationalistic pile of shit, if you'll pardon my language.

I've yet to hear a person say something like that, and then follow it up with any of our own society's shortcomings. They point to the poor or disenfranchised in some nation like Iraq and say, "see? Look how miserable their people are!" and never so much as glance at places like New Orleans.

[jhrobbins]

13. Certainly not Bill Maher - he is as critical of us-U.S.- as anyone else

[nashville_brook]

5. he's like Capt Kirk -- to hell with the Prime Directive

:evilgrin:

some cultural *practices* are indefensible -- female genital mutilation comes to mind. but, i can't go so far as to condemn the whole culture.

[Jade Fox]

6. All cultures contain stuff that needs to be....

put in the crapper, and all of them contain great beauty and wisdom. That's my take on it.

Of course we need to make moral judgments about all cultures. It's just that so often the ones doing the judging are the worst sort of moral relativists. Examples: Christian Fundamentalists negatively judging Islamic Fundamentalists. Take away the labels, and both those "cultures" have more in common than not. And how about the many people in this country who decry the violence "inherent" in Islamic cultures while advocating US backed torture, all without seeing any contradiction in that.

The folks that scare me are the ones who believe that a given cultural activity is wrong or right depending on which culture is doing it.

[stillcool]

7. I am pretty convinced..

that people are the same...everywhere...they've just learned different things. I don't believe any person or culture has cornered the market on morals. It is far too easy to criticize others without first understanding yourself. Those individuals who make up a culture are born the same way I was...innocent. The geographical origin of birth is inconsequential to me. As they say, there's lots of ways to bake a chocolate cake...and none of them are 'right' or 'wrong'.

[jhrobbins]

11. Yeah, but the end result is still 'chocolate cake'.

[stillcool]

18. yupper....it's only life.. n/t

[Catchawave]

8. Yes, cultures are important to understand....

Bush needs to be taken to task for not understanding mid-eastern culture. Do they want a "democracy" as bad as he (cha-ching) wants it for them?

Today I watched the nauseating news loops of Iraqis, again dancing in the streets, to celebrate Saddam's execution. And wondered. Are these people signed up to protect their new democracy?

I agree with Bill, the only person I know of fired as a result of 9-11.

[Greyhound]

9. To paraphrase Winston Churchill's comment on democracy...

Western European culture is the worst culture on earth, except for all the others. Further, the American version of it spawned the idea of adopting and adapting the best aspects of others into it.

There is a reason that ours is the culture that takes over and supplants the pre-existing cultures wherever it is encountered, the ideal of individual liberty and the rejection of class position is appealing to every human being, with the exception of those at the top of the pyramid. The idea of cultural relativism is utterly toxic, clearly, others are far worse.

[Warren DeMontague]

15. I say fuck Theocracy- whether it's one run by the Taliban or Pat Robertson. nt

[etherealtruth]

16. I agree with Kofi Annan

It was never the people who complained of the universality of human rights, nor did the people consider human rights as a Western or Northern imposition. It was often their leaders who did so. -- Kofi Annan, United Nations Secretary-General

or

The connection between women's human rights, gender equality, socioeconomic development and peace is increasingly apparent.
-- Mahnaz Afkhami



http://www.betterworld.net/quotes/humanrights-quotes.htm

A very interesting perspective:
http://www.worldpolicy.org/journal/tharoor.html

Human rights are not merely a wwestern construct that we wish to impose on the world; they are a universal right.

[EFerrari]

17. I think I remember him saying this. And I remember being

interested in the proposition.

There are some things that are wrong or what we might be able to think of as "inhumane" in general -- clitorectomy comes to mind. Wrapping women in shrouds. Leaving babies out to die. Putting your elderly out on the ice.

Some things seem to me not to be relative, so I suppose I agree with him.

[Cleita]

21. Some man called into one of the radio talk shows last week

and I wish I remember the specifics, however, in general the topic was about Dafur and what we should do. An African man who called in seemed to me to have the best solution. Surely, we can't stand by and watch a genocide or other atrocities being committed against certain underclasses, but we shouldn't be getting into a family argument as outsiders either.

His solution was that we don't go in and take over another government, but that we should support the factions within that nation that are trying to make change. Like we should be supporting the democratic factions in a totalitarian society, whether if it's with money or a place to escape to in order to regroup. In the case of women being treated badly in Afghanistan, there is an organization of Afghani women who want to bring change called RAWA. They need our support so that they can bring their political agenda to the front in their country.

This seems to make the most sense to me.

[EFerrari]

22. RAWA has done important work. To tell truth, I've been afraid

to check in with them for a long time. :(

[Cleita]

20. So I guess we should invade everyone whose culture is

different from ours because maybe they have underclasses based on various criteria, whether sex, ethnicity, or the amount of money one has. If this is the case then we really need to start with our own first before we start cleaning up other people's cultures.