Morality
 

I was reading about a game called Fable 2, in that game you're own morality plays a huge part. It got me thinking about morality. Would you say your a good person? What do you think Good and Evil are? Is everyone either good or evil or are they're shades of grey? What's your opinions?

I think that I'm a shade of grey when it comes to my own morality. I think I'm mostly a good person but i can be incredibly horrible at times for instance if I try to help someone and they throw it back in my face chances are i'll become quite nasty to that person regardless of their circumstances. I think it's this spite within me that makes me a shade of grey.

As for Good and Evil, I don't think it's very clear cut. I think most people are a shade of grey while certain people are just plain evil (E.G Hitler) and some are just good (E.G Mother Theresa).

As for the meanings, I think to be truly good you must be truly selfless while the path to evil is led by ignorance and hate. I think that there's more good in the world then evil it's just that the good doesn't got much recognition.

So what's your opinions?

Yeh I agree with you, we never hear about the good! I like to think theres good and bad in everyone, but there are exceptions. I think Im generally good and have good morals but I do bad things aswell. And most people who do terrible things come from a dark dark place and I dont think they started out that way. And I also think that religion has played a bigger part in our values and sense of morality than most people realise, even though Im not religious myself.

I used to be a bad person, not so much anymore. I'd say my own morality is grey, but not black like it was :joker:

Religion definitely has a massive impact on morality whether you're religious or not. Its religion that shapes the law in different countries. The majority of legal laws started out as moral laws in the bible or other religious texts.

I don't think anyone has perfect morals because its a vicious circle. If you are a moral person and will bend or break laws to be moral, then you're breaking laws and possibly moral laws. Then if you follow all legal and moral laws then sometimes it can lead to worse consequences than if you break the laws in the first place. An example is some people might find it moral to kill a serial killer if they had their chance to prevent them killing more people- its only one life lost in comparison to the amount that could be lost. But then some people might find it immoral to kill anyone- and a few extra lives are lost because of it.

Sometimes legality and morality overlap and contradict each other which may put people off being moral.

Moral laws are also subjective despite the founders saying they are objective. Morals differ from person to person, so it has to be subjective.

[/theology essay] :laugh:

Sometimes and can be spitefull and b!tchy but I know the difference between right and wrong like..
I think everyone has good and evil in them but more for some than others

I think of the world as a complex sort of black and white system; you can't be entirely good or entirely evil. That's impossible. The examples given in the OP, Hitler in particular - he condemned millions to death, which makes him a despicable person. But he single handedly ended the depression in Germany, brought Germany out of a financial crisis and was one of the most popular leaders to ever exist in Germany. Mother Teresa left home when she was 18 and never saw her family again and she had to beg in the streets at times - if you take away the "Mother Teresa" from that statement, does that look like the life of a good person?

I think that I'm a mostly good person. Everybody has their pitfalls, but I think most people are good enough to accept when they have made a mistake and usually try to right their wrongs, or at least avoid making the same mistakes in the future.

I'll make my post short and sweet:

I laugh at jokes in bad taste, but I wouldn't actually consider myself doing evil.

I can't believe that you are trying to make out that Hitler did some good and if he hadn't have ruled then people in Germany would have been worse off!

I'm not defending him, those are just facts.

Facts aside, he was a barbaric man who killed millions of jews and plenty of others.

Yes, that is also a fact. That wasn't the be all and end all of Adolf Hitler though, he did some good too.

I also think he was a barbaric man, I am not defending him in any way, but he was not pure evil. Nobody is, in my opinion, everybody has done some good in their lives.

poor Mother Teresa I hardly call begging and leaving her family evil, perhaps she had no choice but to do those things.

Everyone has good and bad in them
I would say I am more evil than good and I am very happy with that
Just one point, I don't think Hitler was purely evil. If you fully believe that something you are doing is right then in my opinion that doesn't make you totally evil. Read Hitlers book, Mein Kampf, and that will show you that he isn't purely evil.

I see we have obeyed Godwin's law quitee early on then :whistle:


How about this one

could Good be defined as what you can enforce with deadlly force as good

Staying with Adolph for the moment

Suppose the Axis powers won WWII and Adolf Hitler triumphed over Europe and was recognised as the leader of the world, even by America.

Would we be saying that the Holocaust was the best thing he did for us, because we would have been conditioned into thinking so? :shocked:

How often do we question some of the things we did by our own side in WWII?

We talk about Dresden and the two atomic bombs, but then people come and say reason why they had to be done. Then there was the internment of innocent people both here in the UK and in the US. (In the US the government actually had to pay compensation)

As for me, I tend to find it is safer to be guided by pure Biblical principals rather than relativism which can shift around so.

The real interesting question is, if nature is "Dog eat dog", where did we get a sense of morality from, we we are nothing but the product of blind evolution?

I dont think nature is "dog eat dog", there is valid arguments that altruism and looking after the "group" rather than pure selfishness "dog eat dog" served an evolutionary purpose. I do agree that religion is woven into our values and sense of morality though, but maybe the creation of religion served an evolutionary purpose...Im getting way ahead of myself now so I'll shut up

I'm not implying she's evil, but I'm showing that nobody can be entirely "good" (or entirely "evil") if you get what I mean?

*brain explodes*

That makes you an inexplicably bad person. :shocked:

I believe that most people are nasty for the most part but obviously everyone has hints of goodness in them. Some people are just better at hiding the bad bits. I believe that truly good people are the minority.

Shet D:

Damn you people and your wiseness. :laugh:

what??? If you fully believe that killing 6 million Jews is "right" that doesnt make it evil???? OMG!! Hitler was a delusional twisted racist end of? Im sure he loved his mother though! A fan of racist literature are we?

well I dont think that shows it, I think your right though everyone has a dark side but lots keep that seperate from their actions, maybe Mother Teresa had days when she thought, I wish this leper would just die its doing my head in! But her deeds were good all the same

I'm sure Hitler did many good things in his life, but I just know how many lives he ended and the fear he brought throughout world war 2, so I don't need to hear about the positive stuff, I really couldn't care less about that.

yeh exactly he mite of walked an old lady over the road once for all we know but it really means jack ****

I remember seeing something on the news. Some old lady saying how nice Harold Shipman was and how he helped her through her illness. She was one of the lucky ones.

A killer is not a nice person. I don't wish to hear about his/her attributes.

Theres a few morally bankrupt on here you'll find!:thumbs: Tho Im not allowed to say that!

I'm sure there are. Hopefully no Hitler's or Shipman's lurking.

I like to think my beliefs and values make me a decent enough person. I try not to treat people in a way that would offend, BUT that doesnt make me all good.

The fact that I have a health issue that at times makes me behave terribly is not good, I can be rude aggressive and have violent outbursts. Does this make me morally corrupt? I dont control this, I have very little recollection of events but still I do them, so does that make me a bad person.

I think the problem with this type of discussion is we al have different morals and standards that we live by and we judge each others responses by our own. I suppose if we were all a little more tolerant and accepting we would judge each other less.

Something that does annoy me is how some people think if your not religious you have no morals... it doesn't take religion for me to understand how to respect people and why not to kill people!

People are only moral because of the law. The law comes from religion.

If we didn't have any rules then noone would know the difference between right and wrong.

:| Was the morally bankrupt thing directed at me?!

Just to clarify - I believe Mother Teresa was a good person, and Adolf Hitler was a bad person. My earlier point was that nobody can be entirely good or bad, for their entire life.

They might of originated from religion yeh... but if you took away religion now. The laws would stay, religion might of introduced morals but they have been passed down now, we don't need religion to be moral.

Only because its been in our culture for hundreds of years. If there was no religion in the first place then we wouldn't have rules.

Morals also aren't universal, in some parts of the world its perfectly acceptable to kill people (again to do with religion) whereas its frowned upon over here. Which culture is right?

But I do agree- you don't need to be religious to be moral. There are plenty of people who are religious but are so obsessed with spreading the word of God that they are about as immoral as you can get (e.g. America's most hated family).

You dont have to be religious Im not either but I think a lot of our values and sense of right and wrong have roots in religion and have been passed down from generation to generation without us really being aware of it

No No No not you! I cant say who but not you me lovely, you dont say anything bigoted or owt! thems who I was having a dig at, mentioning no names as yer know, wasnt from this thread anyway I was just fed up that day lol...:thumbs: You had a point no worries!

I try to be a good person. I would never deliberately hurt anyone, I do a lot for charity, and I try and be kind. I love my family and friends, and would always protect them. But nobody is perfect. Sometimes I can be intolerant of people, and I can be moody. But I recognise that, and I do try and stop myself behaving in a way that I don't like. Yeah - on the whole I think I am a decent person.

Given that he wrote the book, it obviously isn't going to depict him as pure evil.:rolleyes:

True but we are also a barbaric nation thast kills the defenceless in the form of the unborn......

The only difference between our society and that of a Hitlers society is the the chosen taget of barbarism. With Hitlet it was the jews with modern societies it the cold blooded killing of the unborn for no other reason than that of them being an inconvenience......

Slagging Hitler off is perfectly justified but alas accepting our own present barbraic actions are not......

I dont think inconvenience is THE only reason! In fact probably not even high up there on the list of reasons! how you can compare Hitler to some poor women that have made the most difficult decision they will probably ever have to make is frankly astounding