Moral Decline

[Shane Roach]

Could your grandmother be wrong? Biased? Not remembering the horse manure in the streets before cars?

No. The point is that when you are talking about something as subjective as declining morals, stats on changing crime levels at a time when many things have been made legal that used to be immoral seems a singularly bad way to go about discussing it.

Many laws were bad. It used to be illegal for a white person to marry a black person. This is now legal, and good.

Give me a frickin break already. Is there any subject on the face of the planet that can be discussed without some reference to racism at all?

The junk on the TV is worse than it has ever been. Many college girls consider it something of a rite of passage to try bisexuality. It's absurd to try to wriggle your way out of the idea that modern moral values are deteriorating by trying to claim the decline of racism, which is STILL very prevalent by the way, outweighs all the other moral outrages of our modern society put together.

 

[ChristianCenturion]

Could your grandmother be wrong? Biased?

Bias isn't necessarily bad. Among other things, I am bias against rape and to my knowledge, most people are... well, except the rapists.

Not remembering the horse manure in the streets before cars?

Free fertilizer for the garden.

Many laws were bad. It used to be illegal for a white person to marry a black person. This is now legal, and good.

In some places yes, but not all and not all bad laws had valid reasons based on the alleged source of that reason. Is this your source and standard for morality - what is and isn't legal?
Given that the reference is shown to change over time, it becomes a subjective source of morality.

 

[sinner/SAVED]

Could your grandmother be wrong? Biased? Not remembering the horse manure in the streets before cars?

Smog and acid rain are preferable to organic fertilizer?

 

[crazyfingers]

This whole "Moral decline" thing is really about what different people regard as immoral.

For example:

A fundamentalist Christian may regard allowing gay marriage or gay civil unions to be immoral and see it as moral decline.

I on the other hand see no moral problem with homosexuality and regard the denial of gays the protections of civil marriage as very immoral.

A fundamentalist christian may regard it as immoral for the public schools not to have an opening prayer. I on the other hand would regard it as immoral for a public school to endorse an opening prayer as it would be a violation of equal freedom of religion.

 

[Shane Roach]

This whole "Moral decline" thing is really about what different people regard as immoral.

For example:

A fundamentalist Christian may regard allowing gay marriage or gay civil unions to be immoral and see it as moral decline.

I on the other hand see no moral problem with homosexuality and regard the denial of gays the protections of civil marriage as very immoral.

A fundamentalist christian may regard it as immoral for the public schools not to have an opening prayer. I on the other hand would regard it as immoral for a public school to endorse an opening prayer as it would be a violation of equal freedom of religion.

It seems to me you are trying to hit some hot button issues and change the topic away from general moral decline. You are right that these things signify moral decline for many, but there are plenty of universal examples that have already been touched on, and all anyone can really do in the face of them is deny, deny, deny.

Incidentally, you hardly have to be a "conservative Christian" to be part of the demonstrable majority that has doubts about gay marriage or the demonstrable majority that polls tell us have wanted prayer back in school from the instant it was banned to very close to the present, last I checked. And I only qualify that as close to the present because I can't remember whether the last poll I saw was in 2003 or so. I've never seen a poll on the subject where people were happy with that decision.

 

[ChristianCenturion]

... Incidentally, you hardly have to be a "conservative Christian" to be part of the demonstrable majority that has doubts about gay marriage or...

allow me to check... yes, that is a demonstratable majority :
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2004/nov/04110304.html

And last I checked, voter registration didn't require voting by citizens to be restricted to 'conservative Christian'. Requirements for age, citizenship, etc. yes; political and religious requirements or even asking about social or religious alignment, no.

 

[Phred]

I notice no one has yet defined what a "moral decline" actually is.

.
​

 

[crazyfingers]

It seems to me you are trying to hit some hot button issues and change the topic away from general moral decline.

No. I am describing the kinds of things that I have seen people reference when they talk about whether there has been a moral decline or not.

There are a lot of other examples that I could have given. I mentioned those because they clearly show how different opinions on what is moral and what would constitute decline would drastically change one's opinion on whether there has been a decline or not.

Incidentally, you hardly have to be a "conservative Christian" to be part of the demonstrable majority that has doubts about gay marriage or the demonstrable majority that polls tell us have wanted prayer back in school from the instant it was banned to very close to the present, last I checked. And I only qualify that as close to the present because I can't remember whether the last poll I saw was in 2003 or so. I've never seen a poll on the subject where people were happy with that decision.

Which is neither here nor there. The point is that whether or not one thinks that there has been a deline in morality depends greatly on what one views as immoral.

 

[ChristianCenturion]

I notice no one has yet defined what a "moral decline" actually is.

I agree. I had tried to get the OP to refine the boundaries or at least mention what 'proof' he/she was in search of, but that didn't get a response. :o

 

[crazyfingers]

allow me to check... yes, that is a demonstratable majority :
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2004/nov/04110304.html

And last I checked, voter registration didn't require voting by citizens to be restricted to 'conservative Christian'. Requirements for age, citizenship, etc. yes; political and religious requirements or even asking about social or religious alignment, no.

Which is again neither here nor there. The point is that whether one believes that has a moral decline depands on what one regards as moral and immoral.

 

[sidhe]

"Moral decline" presupposes an objective morality from which one can stray. As it's difficult to impossible to define an objective morality, "moral decline" becomes pretty meaningless.

 

[ChristianCenturion]

Which is again neither here nor there. The point is that whether one believes that has a moral decline depands on what one regards as moral and immoral.

I don't get what you are saying then.
The OP was referring to an opine that he/she hears of society being in a moral decline.
Society as a whole (pending the scope and inclusion of such) dictates what is socially acceptable or unacceptable.
There was a presentable demonstration that the majority rejected a particular issue you brought up as an example and the response to that is simply to divide that evidence down to the individual, thereby negating the show of evidence? I am familiar with dividing the truth down so far as to not make it truth any longer; but that is a ploy, not a sincere search of what is true.

OR are you not dividing that specific issue, but instead dividing the evaluation of moral issues? To which I can agree that one issue does not reflect the whole.

 

[crazyfingers]

I don't get what you are saying then.
The OP was referring to an opine that he/she hears of society being in a moral decline.
Society as a whole (pending the scope and inclusion of such) dictates what is socially acceptable or unacceptable. There was a presentable demonstration that the majority rejected a particular issue you brought up as an example and the response to that is simply to divide that evidence down to the individual, thereby negating the show of evidence? I am familiar with dividing the truth down so far as to not make it truth any longer; but that is a ploy, not a sincere search of what is true.

OR are you not dividing that specific issue, but instead dividing the evaluation of moral issues? To which I can agree that one issue does not reflect the whole.

I am saying that if you want to make the case that there has been a moral decline you must define what moral code you are using. At best what you can do is prove that there has been a moral decline relative to a given moral code. Unless you do, your claim is meaningless.

 

[Shane Roach]

Which is neither here nor there. The point is that whether or not one thinks that there has been a deline in morality depends greatly on what one views as immoral.

Something of a truism, that.

 

[Shane Roach]

"Moral decline" presupposes an objective morality from which one can stray. As it's difficult to impossible to define an objective morality, "moral decline" becomes pretty meaningless.

Morality need not be objective to discuss a decline among people who share much of the same subjective opinion. People can agree to terms, most of them. It is when people demand an objective proof of a subjective thing that things get a little wompy jawed, in my opinion.

 

[sidhe]

Morality need not be objective to discuss a decline among people who share much of the same subjective opinion. People can agree to terms, most of them. It is when people demand an objective proof of a subjective thing that things get a little wompy jawed, in my opinion.

I'd mostly agree with that, save that trying to get a large group of people to even agree on a subjective moral standard is a bit like herding wet cats.

 

[Brimshack]

Those who claim that America is in moral decline are kidding themselves about the morality of its infancy.

 

[Shane Roach]

Those who claim that America is in moral decline are kidding themselves about the morality of its infancy.

What are you doing here? You can't be here! LOL

I instinctively disagree with you....

 

[Brimshack]

(Cue Clint Eastwood Soundtrack...)

 

[SimplyMe]

Those who claim that America is in moral decline are kidding themselves about the morality of its infancy.

What are you doing here? You can't be here! LOL

I instinctively disagree with you....

(Cue Clint Eastwood Soundtrack...)

Is that the music of Paint Your Wagon that I hear? Hmm... is this to prove your point about the morality of America's infancy?