MORE ON MORALS

MORALS

“The greatest tragedy in mankind's entire history may be
the hijacking of morality by religion.”--Arthur C Clarke

What are morals?

What are morals and where do they come from? Who has them and how much do they cost? I know there's someone out there selling them because money buys anything. Some swear they have them but their actions demonstrate otherwise. Most morals are for humans and governed, more or less, towards sex and it seems as though government officials are the biggest abusers of them. However, we won't get into that.

I've searched the web for a week now and haven't found a list of the blasted things so I could pick out the ones to write about; what's in vogue and what's no longer required. There aint no such animal. Although I found out animals have them. Bet you didn't know that, did ya? Well keep reading, I'll show you proof where some of our four legged friends have more moral sense than do some of us two legged animals.

Morals or ethics.

Morals and ethics are sometimes, mistakenly used interchangeably. Here is what I found.

Morals: (relating to issues of right and wrong and to how individual people/life forms should behave).

I don't much like this definition, because what's right or wrong for one group is not necessarily correct for another group. We've been warring over this since we crawled out of the trees.

Ethics (a system of moral principles governing the appropriate conduct for a person or a group.)

I'm satisfied with this definition. Ethics are a collection of morals of which a particular group decides are best for them. Our only problem is, we have too many groups, and each group wants everybody to follow their list.

WHO OR WHAT HAS MORALS?

They say (those smart people who figure out all this weird stuff) that all primates have innate morality. I have no doubts about this. Most everything living is born with inherent traits and abilities. Have you ever seen a baby start crying when it hears another baby cry? This is a show of empathy of which could not have been taught to a newborn. Other things are quickly grasped if not already instilled at birth. Sharing one's food or toys with another, is one. They have demonstrated that even rats show these traits.

Morals differ from one group to another in just about all species. For example, consider us humans, since we are the biggest advocates and users of morals. In some groups, it is immoral to beat one's wife or mutilate their children at birth. In another group, it is perfectly okay to stone to death one's wife because she lusted after someone. At one time, dragging your female around by her hair displayed manliness. Today, this happens rarely, is considered immoral, and not nice either. It kind of messes up a hairdo.

Are humans the only animal with morals?

Not by a long shot. Here are some examples of animals displaying morals.

Leopard kills and eats baboon and then shelters the baboon's newborn

Animals displaying empathy. More four legged animals displaying morals. Be sure to watch this one at the end where it shows the contrast of how humans and animals act in similar instances.

Morals for loaners.

One who is alone rarely needs a set of morals. If you are the only one out there, you only have to do what pleases you. But then, how many species out there are loners? They must make contact with another of their species at least once in their lifetime, or they wouldn't last long.

Orangutans are a species that lead solitary lives and only come together to mate. See, I told you sex played a big part in morals. Ah, what a blissful marriage, yet, this is how some of us intelligent apes do it these days. Men have fun then walk away leaving the female or government to raise the offspring. I think we, as a society, are devolving

Some species of insects have found a solution for this. Spiders, damselflies and praying mantises come to mind. The females or these species don't let their partners get away so easily. They make sure he provides for his offspring whether he wants to or not. She takes advantage of her mate at a most vulnerable time. She kills and eats him as they are mating, and sometimes he's so engrossed in his task he doesn't realize she is eating him. Thinking about it, isn't this how some humans take advantage of their mates in these situations? I could site some specifics, but I'll leave that to your imagination.

When morals are ignored.

In some species, it is okay for a male to kill and even eat all the babies in a group when a bigger, stronger, better male takes over a group. However, this doesn't happen after he takes over. Lyons and some monkeys are notorious for this. I think humans stopped doing it when they moved out of the caves. However, it has happened sporadically throughout history and even recently. This points out that, for some, morals were ment to be broken.

The spoils of war go to the victor. Kill everyone, man woman and child. Save only the virgins for your use. This is exactly what some monkey tribes do when a new male takes over a band. They kill every baby they can snatch from its mother and every young male it can catch. I just watched a video of this and it left me weak with disgust. I'm not putting a link to it here. I don't know whether we copied this from our four legged buddies or they copied by observing us. In any case, it's been going on for a long time.

Where and when did morals originate?

I dropped a few hints above, but let me point out it is a wrong concept one has to be religious to have morals. Neither did we derive our morals from the Bible. They were intact long before the Bible was thought up. Religion, did and still does, promote it more than anything else though. So, to all my religious friends, relax, I won't contaminate you with my heathenish morals. My morals are still intact and I think they are higher than when I thought there was a god.

Morals evolved from life forms as they learned how to function as a group from ant and bee societies to elephant and whale herds. Everyone and everything must practice some kind of behavioral system in order for the group to exist peacefully, or not, in our case. Humans haven't yet learned this. We still act like the savages we were when we left Africa the first time. We are still trying to stuff our ways down the throats of others. We, the dominant species on this little speck of the universe, have gotten piggish and inconsiderate of other life forms sharing this space. Well, that's a little off the subject and is fodder for another article.

Here are some videos I hesitated to include in this article. Warning, they are not nice, but they illustrate what I've been ranting about.

Marines  immorally urinating on the dead Human animals displaying their ignorance.

child repeatedly run over by cars. This is really bad, you may not want to watch it. It left me weak and nauseous. These both are examples of our complete lack of or disregard of our morals. There are lots more examples of the same on the internet.

Writing about morals in a short article is far from adequate. It requires at least a book or two. It is an interesting subject though.

Thanks and have a pleasant day. I welcome all comments. Ray

Pro-choice or Pro-life Republican or Democrat

Where are our morals going?

A woman from the Pro-life Organization called today and asked if I would participate in a survey saying it would take no more than five minutes. Normally, I don’t do surveys on the phone or on the street. I was taking a break from the computer and wasn’t busy so I reluctantly agreed.

Question 1. “Philosophically speaking, would you consider yourself to be a Republican or a Democrat?”

“Well, I don’t know much about philosophy but I’m registered as a Republican. That must have been the answer she wanted, because she continued.

Question 2. “Are you pro-choice or pro-life?” I wondered what being Republican or Democrat had to do with being pro-choice or pro-life; I don’t follow politics. I’m too deep into religion or not being religious. I’ve always heard it wasn’t good to mix religion and politics.

“I’m pro-choice. I believe everyone . . .” click, the phone hummed in my ear. I guess that was the wrong answer and it didn’t even take one minute. I wanted my monies worth, so I continued . . . “should be allowed to treat their body as they see fit.” I went on as though she was still on the line. I seldom get the chance to voice my opinion to someone who doesn’t want to hear it. She’s the one who called me and interrupted my quietude. What got her knickers in a wad?

It’s my opinion, People should be allowed to stuff themselves with whatever foreign substance they wish as long as it doesn’t harm or disturb someone else’s freedom of choice? And they should be allowed to extract any foreign matter from themselves they don’t want or are not capable of caring for. Why don’t people get all upset when someone has big globs of fat cut, sucked and stripped from their bodies? While others have most of their stomachs cut out just because they can’t control their eating habits. After all, I’ve heard it said more than a few times, “a fetus is part of a woman until she gives birth”.

Many now adorn and decorate their bodies with trinkets and inked pictures and figures much like savage tribes of Africa and other places used to do. Some of these youngsters go overboard with it. Some religions believe one should not tattoo themselves or pierce and decorate their body parts with all matter of foreign objects. I wonder how many of these church ladies go to Sunday services wearing trinkets on their pierced earlobes while they denounce others for sporting lip, nose or eyebrow studs. Why aren’t pro lifer’s demonstrating in front of tattoo shops and piercing parlors of the world? These people are defacing God’s temples, i.e., their bodies.

Why should people not be allowed to take any foreign substance or article out of or off of their person that they feel should not be there?

Illegitimate births are getting out of hand and our morals are going down the gutter. If something is not legitimate does that mean a crime has been committed? Watch this video. Typical of most people demonstrating; they only see half the picture. It’s comparable to a mob on the street. They simply follow everyone else, not knowing or caring about what they are actually demonstrating nor do they have a solution to what they are protesting.

Bastard--a person born of unmarried parents

Back in the days, calling someone a bastard incited a fight. These days being a bastard is worn as a badge of pride. “That’s right, man, I’m one of eight in my family and we come from a long line of the same.” Just ask my old man, if you can catch him, he’s one too, and so is my mom.

There are enough bastards roaming this world as it is, not that this is such a terrible thing, but I feel it does indicate a lowering of our morals as a whole. In fact, bastards are quickly becoming the norm rather than the unusual. Makes one wonder how many of these illegitimate births were planned. It’s quite obvious they were not, in most cases anyway.

A 2008 survey shows many countries’ illegitimate births make up over 50% of their births. In the U. S. it’s over 40%. Teenagers make up %86 of these illegitimate births. This too has gotten out of hand. More and more young girls are giving up their virginity at a younger and younger age. It’s the thing to do. Lose your virginity and win a badge.

What is marriage?

Who gets married these days? The norm is to shack up together until they get to know each other instead of the other way round. If they aren’t pregnant yet, they soon will be. How many shack-up-couples make it past a few years? How many make it past a few months?

I’m your man baby come join my harem

Young men can’t keep it in their pants and young women can’t resist their man. Young men pride themselves on how many women they can get pregnant, pay no child support, while the government supports the young women and their broods, and even the not so young women and their broods. They too take pride in their absentee man and turn over their money to him so he has a nice big shinny car to drive and fine clothes to wear. He cannot be bothered by getting a job, mainly because there is no job out there that suits him. Some of these ladies are even proud of how many women their man can service.

So, Pro-life Organization woman, yes, I am pro-choice all the way.

WHERE HAVE ALL OUR MORALS GONE? LONG TIME COMING.

 Morals of Our Past

A few hundred thousand years ago early men began encroaching on each other’s territory. Space became crowded relatively speaking. They traveled farther into new lands in search of new pickings and better hunting grounds. Of course this wasn’t the beginning of morality; it didn’t spring up of a sudden because two bands in close proximity had problems in deciding whose space belonged to whom. It began millions of years earlier and man had developed a set of standards to govern his conduct which had evolved over these millions of years he had been living in groups in trees, on the planes and in caves and villages. Living in groups requires some form of social behavior or rules/morals: This is my mate and my offspring, no one messes with someone else’s mate and offspring, this is my spear and no one messes with someone else’s spear, this is my space within our band, keep out, and one must respect my position in the band as I respect those above me. Living in a group requires one to respect the rights of all in the band whether you are a human or an animal.

If a band or group moved in too close to another, they each had two choices. Probably the weaker or smaller either relocated of stood their ground. Their morals were kill or be killed. Of course the stronger usually won and killed everyone in the weaker band. Or maybe they killed everyone except the females, who they took captive as slaves or for their pleasure. This practice continued throughout history and may still be happening somewhere. There are tribes still living in the jungles who have never been exposed to modern day people. Let us hope they continue without the knowledge of us or our knowledge of them. This is hopeless thinking, for some do-gooder will eventually intervene and force his moral beliefs on them. Anyway, these are examples of some of our early primitive moralities, i.e., tribal and territorial. You stay out of my hunting ground and I’ll stay out of yours. Our early morals were necessary and were a vital part of our evolution. They are still vital but they are a little too diverse.

Some Modern Day Examples

I have a family member; we’ll call him Billy Bob, who is an avid hunter. Hunting brings him great pleasure. He hunts twelve months a year. Bag limits mean nothing to him and he kills indiscriminately. His family could never eat all what he brings down, so being a generous guy he gives away most of his kills. He is full of tails of the hunt. Once I listened to him tell a tale how he once, armed with only a knife, chased a bear up a tree. “I stabbed it right through the throat.” I listened in awe and a little doubt as he spun his tale. It sounded a little dubious because bears don’t normally escape up trees; at least not full grown ones. After a few questions the Daniel Boon story turned from one of awe to one of disgust when he admitted the vicious animal was a scared bear cub. Billy Bob, filled with pride, explained that he had just killed its mother and its litter mate. He dressed out the bear family and gave their carcasses to his friends. He simply killed them for the sheer pleasure of it and had no feelings of guilt or shame. I know he has compassion for some animals. He has a dog and other domestic animals. Wild animals are meant to be killed and eaten.

More Morals and What’s Ahead

1-     Some modern men’s morals haven’t progressed much from those of our cave dwelling ancestors. Our ancient forefathers used to stampede herds of mammoths over cliffs just for a few meals of fresh meat. No wonder the poor beasts went extinct. How many selfish hunters combing the woods to satisfy their wanton lust for the kill would it take before the woods were emptied of life?

2-     Moral beliefs of one man/tribe/religion/country do not necessarily agree with those of another’s. Maybe that’s a good thing, i.e., without all the wars and attempted genocides of ethnic, racial, religious groups or nations throughout history, Earth may have reached and even surpassed its ability to feed our populations. Over the last few decades the world’s population as well as the number of starving has doubled. Are we fighting a losing battle? With all our modern technology we’ve only succeeded in polluting our environment. While some individuals stuff their gullets with enough food to sustain a dozen or more people, yet we haven’t improved our problem of feeding the starving one iota, even in our own country, i.e., United States. 

3-     To continue to exist and preserve our environment, we need to adjust our morals. Some system for controlling our birth rate and maybe reducing our longevity might   be essential. Our views on abortions, same sex marriages and assisted suicides, now scorned by some, will have to be re-evaluated. Maybe death sentences for minor crimes would be an option. We squirm at these ideas but they were practiced in the past and were even popular within religious sects clear up to a few hundred years ago and they did bring about change. Something would have to be installed whether we like it or not. I’m in favor of some now. If you can’t abide by the rules, you’re out, completely out. Your space is needed for someone who will follow the rules. Come to think of it, punishment for crimes is supposed to be a deterrent. Maybe murder could be rewarded. Okay this is getting a little crazy. Let’s move on.  The point is, we cannot continue as we are.

4-     Can you envision a society where every family is issued a plot of land where they must grow what is needed to feed their controlled group of four i.e., mother father and two children, a boy and a girl. China is an interesting country to study about population explosion. Their one child policy was somewhat successful but incited a rash of forced abortions, infanticide and strict penalties. Female babies were abandoned, given away or killed just to have another chance at producing a son. This resulted in a shortage of females. Something would have to be done about that. We have the technology but people keep screaming it’s immoral. China is starting to burst at its seams. In a few generations its people will be flooding into the world. This isn’t painting a pretty picture. You have to admit, morals will have to change.

5-     We don’t seem to be improving in any case. What we are getting good at is learning how to live healthier, conqueror diseases and things to allow us to grow older. Some day being a centurion may be the optimum age for retirement. Instead of retiring at sixty-five, maybe they could issue us a pill that sent us into the other world. The place where lots of people want to go anyway. After all, retired people only put a burden on everyone else. They eat too much, get paid too much and spend too little, take up space and contribute little. I’m being facetious here. I’m a member of this group.

6-     We know how to curb and prevent propagation and yet there are groups that would and do kill an adult who wants to end their pregnancy or even those who aid anyone in the process. They are doing the very thing they accuse others of doing, i.e., taking a life. If they worked as hard as they do, e.g., blocking clinics, burning them down, condemning and killing those who are providing a safer system to aid a woman abort and unwanted pregnancy, for whatever reason. Maybe they could come up with a better solution. No! They would rather stuff their ideas of morality down the throats of others. We won’t discuss what should be stuffed down their throat.

More on Killing Animals

Have you ever hit a domestic animal i.e., dog or cat while driving around ? Or have you ever run over a wild animal while cruising along the country side or in the suburbs? What’s the difference, you may ask? Well, in the first case, most are more apt to stop to give aid because it’s probably someone’s pet, or at least to seek the owner of the injured or dead animal. Or, depending on your morals and/or your pocketbook, you might even take the animal to a vet. Maybe you’re someone whose morals are not so high and you quickly drive off hoping there were no witnesses. Or maybe you are the type who goes out of you way to run over any living thing that gets in your path. In the case of the wild animal you may not even slow down, even though you’re going against your morals. You may have empthy for the creature, but then, it’s just a wild animal so you keep going whether it happened in a residential area or in the country. Maybe you think the damn thing should stay in the trees or behind the bushes where it belongs. Maybe the animal feels the same about us. We are the ones who drove it from its home to begin with. Or maybe you just don’t have the time.

These are all examples of morals. Some may fit you and some may turn your stomach, but they are all morals. Everyone and every group may have a different set of morals and that’s alright and you don’t have to agree with them although you should respect their views. By the way, this is a moral too, one that some overlook even when they think their set of ethics is above reproach or maybe because they believe they are the cream of the crop.

What is the answer to improving our lives, our world and our relationship with our neighbors? It’s in the Bible. And if everyone practiced it, we might have a near perfect world. It has to do with love, and it’s not love your Lord.