When we are born to this world, we all find rules acting in our society. In some or most cases, though, we realize that some of the contemporary rules in our society hurt us more than they help to solve our problems. Sticking by rules to the latter is advised, but where we realize that they cause more hurt than benefit, then there are compromises that come handy with respect to the following of the rules. A society that makes no compromises is likely to be a disenfranchised one, have homeless individuals and one that has individuals living in what is referred to as an “animal farm”, where some animals believe they are more deserving than others. This society can be really inhumane sometimes. Inhumane in the sense that the perceived lesser people in the society are strangulated and executed for unjustifiable reasons and for reasons that some elements within the society are convinced are embedded in the prescription of norms (Audi, Robert, 2005).
Making compromises allows us to deviate a little from the norms for the sake of safety of the humanity. For example, if every street mugger or every murderer must be incarcerated in prisons, then the likelihood is that our prisons are going to be overcrowded because of the many individuals who find their way there. When this (overcrowding) happens, then many more social problems have been invited inside the prisons. Beds could be few for instance, thereby making it necessary to share them (Moore, G.E., 1903).
Other problems could include difficulty in providing the basic needs adequately including proper medical care, food to the prisoners. The prisoner could also end up in unlawful practices such as sexual assaults on other inmates and this spreads diseases, plus the inmates could end up killing one another. The moral minima that suits this case is relativism, which requires that we begin to classify these prisoners, by telling who committed more serious and grievous crimes than who, and on this basis, provide judgment on who should get lesser punishment and who should do hard time in the cells. This helps to solve the situation because the petty offenders could leave the prisons after short periods and leave behind the capital offenders. When this happens, the overcrowding is far eased and the number of prisoners that is left is a manageable one.
Moral minima therefore just allows things to happen in ways that dignify and help retain the sense of humanity in the society. I agree with Lenn Goodman in his argument that the society needs certain moral minima, so that we slightly deviate from the norms or compromise the met rules in order to create threshold for a dignified human existence. We should never kill because we found the art of killing at birth and therefore must continue it, rape only because we want to satisfy our sexual desire and we feel that rape is the only way to do this, take away other individuals’ property or alienate them of their rights because of self-centeredness or because of want of prosperity. The sakes for which we do certain things do not provide ethical justifications for doing them.
Nothing should ever be done for the sake of doing it. These sakes sometimes hurt. If the existing rules do not care about killing, rape or alienation of basic rights or is just lax about them, then we certainly need to come up with the moral minima that make us understand that these practices are not good (Moore, G.E., 1903). This judgment could be arrived at by asking oneself certain essential and very pertinent questions. For example, before one engages in any morally unfair act, say murder or just killing , they should ask themselves whether it is because they think that the person they intend to kill just doesn’t deserve to live or killing them is going to solve some problem. The answer to this question goes a long way in justifying the killing act or not. It helps in judging if anything we are just about to do is morally justified or right.
All this calls for is compromise of our convictions. We could be convinced that there is no problem alienating people of their rights, but then we should look at the flip side of this whole which exposes what is right or wrong about it. We cannot have in place things that only allows for the survival of the rich but which we understand are morally unfair. Everyone deserves to lead a decent lifestyle and this should never be jeopardized for whatever reason. The rich aren’t very many, the poor are and we can not kill many people at the behest of just a few dominant elements. This sets up a bad precedent to the coming generation and when it comes, it can’t do better than pick the situation from where we left it and this bad society keeps on transferring from one generation to the next.
In conclusion, Goodman suggests and I agree that we should never be extremely judgmental about certain things because being judgmental leads us into doing things that leave others in vulnerable situations. In making judgments, we cannot just have two extreme positions in from which to view the case. We may need to establishment a middle ground that slightly deviates from the normal perceptions. Everyone deserves to be in respectable positions and these respectable positions must never be compromised for the sake of compromising them.
Audi, Robert (2005). The Good in the Right: A Theory of Intuition and Intrinsic Value, Princeton University Press.
Moore, G.E. (1903). Principia Ethica, Cambridge University Press. Ross, W.D. (1930). The Right and the Good, Oxford: Clarendon Press.
