I like to think I follow my ethics the majority of the time, and that those ethics lead me to do what is right. But I am the first to admit that I am an egocentric teenager and that I make plenty of mistakes (then again, my dad says I'm a "fifty-year-old in an eighteen-year-old's body", so perhaps I sometimes have a more mature view of the world and can more readily put others first. It is difficult to define myself because, as Allie said "[y]ou can't make a general statement like that" as how a person thinks or acts varies from situation to situation and over time. And I am quite certain this parenthetical aside has you completely confused and off track. I apologize - please refer back to the previous statement). Fortunately, I am usually a fast learner and am quick to realize when I am in error. Then it is just a matter of altering my mindset or behavior to avoid making the same thoughtless errors again. This often takes time - I am reminded of Julia who stated: "I am certainly ready to formulate my own philosophy. If I had the time, that is." This resonates with me, as in our hectic, goal-oriented culture we seldom have time to stop and think, to just enjoy life. In his book Sabbath, Wayne Muller eloquently articulates this problem, describing how "a "successful" life has become a violent enterprise. We make war on our own bodies, pushing them beyond their limits; war on our children, because we cannot find enough time to be with them when they are hurt and afraid, and need our company; war on our spirit, because we are too preoccupied to listen to the quiet voices that seek to nourish and refresh us [...]" (2). With all that we push ourselves to do, we cannot put our "all" into what we truly care about. We get confused, turned around, and lost along the way. Even the most idealistic people can, when busy and distracted, solve problems "frantically, desperately, reactively, and badly" (Muller 3). So I believe that although the goal is to help others, we must also take care of ourselves. Otherwise there is no joy in life, no sense of purpose or energy that motivates us to help others enjoy the world.
While my belief in ethical behavior as enhancing the living experience (human and other) is not original, it is still my own. My parents, books, and many other members of society have influenced my morals in the sense that everyone needs to be given knowledge about the world and exposed to different views in order to form an opinion (for how else would we come to believe anything?). But as Kant held, each person must freely develop his or her own principles of morality. I choose what I agree with and believe in - if I was forced into thinking or behavior, it would not be ethical because it would be done for the wrong reasons.
As both Sarah and Allie expressed, intent matters. I would take it one step further and say that both the intent, or the "end", and the methodology, or the "means" matter. The intent alone does not justify the means. In Crime and Punishment, Raskolnikov's desire to save the world from a human parasite did not justify his killing of Alyona Ivanovna. Intending to give someone a gift, but stealing from another to be able to do so, is also immoral. But neither does the means forgive a selfish goal. Simply coming to a favorable result, however good that result may be, is not moral if it is done for all the wrong reasons. But again, as mistakes are inevitable and help us to learn, this situation is not necessarily evil or detestable. And I strive not to judge others whose circumstances and upbringing (a key component in cognitive and moral development, as I learned in psychology) are unknown to me. What gives me the right to feel morally superior when I have had an essentially idyllic childhood free of trauma and hardship? Nevertheless, I believe an individual should strive for good as it is generally understood.
For me, some of the most important concepts involved in moral behavior are compassion, honor, and respect (as formal as that sounds, permit me to explain). Compassion allows us to see others' points of view and understand how our actions will affect them. From this should come a desire to act in ways that will help, and not harm our fellows. Honor involves not only acting honorably (for example, not cheating to get ahead of our peers) but also honoring what we say we will do. If I commit to something, I am determined to accomplish it, and in the way I say that I will do it. It is not only common courtesy but it is also a matter of trust - I want people to be able to rely on me. And by respect, I essentially mean treating others as I would like to be treated (yes, those elementary school teachers knew exactly what they were talking about when they reinforced the "golden rule"). What right do I to ruin someone else's day at my own whim? I tend to view unfavorably those that unthinkingly ruin mine.
Morality is rooted in rationality as opposed to emotion, another belief I share with Kant. Those people who hurt others must not take the time to reason through to the impact their actions will have. Emotions such as anger and fear tend to distort reason and, it follows, concepts of good. But as I said before, feelings such as compassion have their place in morality, as they give us a reason to do good. The object is to maintain a rational understanding of basic right and wrong that can overrule emotion when emotion is unreasonable and threatens goodness or others' happiness. In essence, we should use emotion as it encourages us to do good - such as when I am motivated to give back to the world by my gratitude to all those who have made my own dreams possible - and disregard it when it seeks to lead us astray. I will end as I began: a young and still very much inexperienced girl trying to make sense of the world.
There is in fact a sociologist who made the theory that people act according to their situation. So if a girl sees a long lost friend, she acts how she thinks she should. And if some guys gets flipped off, he returns the gesture because that is what he thinks is appropriate. It actually makes a lot of sense, really. That Muller quotation interested me, also. I agree that our world is so fast paced that maybe if most of us slowed down a little bit, it would give us more time to be moral and rational. There should rarely be an excuse for being amoral, but a fast paced life forces us to think less and cram more. I just remembered that Solomon Asch did that interesting study with the lines and students. He found that about 30% of the students conformed to the experiment even though they were skeptical. Does this perhaps mean that we could conform to ethics, also? You write the truth when you say we need to be exposed to a lot in order to be able to form our own opinions and ethics. I just hope that our society is not so close minded as to restrict us from that right, leaving us only to be able to conform.
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