There is a line of argument has become very common – and initially it seems quite persuasive.  The question is asked: who is to choose which values?  And if everyone has their own perspective, then maybe it should be down to each individual to choose their own standard to live by.   For example, after the England football manager told his players to behave themselves ‘off the pitch’ to set a good example for the children, one columnist wrote:

“Many have been shaken by the recent sordid revelations about the private lives of footballers, golfers and other sportsmen, and they have wondered if our commitment to liberalism has taken us too far in the direction of license and moral anarchy.  But when we support an employer or, indeed, anyone who seeks to inflict his own views upon those within his orbit, we arrive not at stability but at chaos.  After all, whose morality is sacrosanct?  Who chooses the criteria of what is to count as ‘an example’?  Capello?  Lord Triesman?  The late Mary Whitehouse?  Max Mosley?  For every football manager, every centre half, every human being, there is a different perspective.”[1]

More notoriously, Richard Desmond, owner of the Daily Express, said to the Levinson Inquiry on press behaviour, "Ethical, I don't quite know what that word means...we don't talk about ethics or morals because it's a very fine line and everybody's are different". [2]

There are, in our view, four key fallacies to this kind argument, frequently made though it is, and they need clearly to be understood.

What we can agree on

The first is that, while it is true we can’t all agree on absolutely everything, this does not at all mean that we can’t agree on anything.  Just as we wouldn’t dismiss doctors just because they can’t cure everything, so, in the moral field, we must get the maximum value out of what we can in fact agree on.  And that includes  some very fundamental things.

For example, can we not agree that the strong should not ride roughshod over the weak?  Would we not all censure a ‘loan shark’, who dupes a poor person desperate for money into borrowing at 2,000% interest?  Would we not say that vulnerable, trusting children should never be taken advantage of?  Would we not say that someone who preys on the elderly with scams or fraudulent offers of help is doing something deeply immoral?   If we can agree on these things, that is surely deeply significant.

Similarly, could we not agree that a man getting a young lady drunk to take advantage of her, or pretending to be in love and then breaking her heart, or anyone betraying the trust of a friend, or spending all the household money on gadgets while the children lack for basic necessities – that all these things would be classed by a massive majority of people as ‘wrong’?  There are, to be sure, areas of disagreement, but that must not stop us running with those areas where there is broad agreement.

Is nothing wrong?

Second, we can turn the question around and ask: is there absolutely nothing that a proper ‘liberal’ would regard as plain wrong?  Is there nothing of which we would say: “that goes too far”?  Is there no limit whatsoever to the kind of graphic violence, for example, that should be served up as entertainment (including, for example, ‘snuff movies’, where real people are filmed being beaten up and killed, and then the film is shared for its entertainment value)?  The problem with the libertarian argument is that, because it claims that we have no locus to interfere, it does open the door to extremes of behaviour that even libertarianism’s proponents find unacceptable.  But, at the point at which these extremes come into view, the libertarians have given away the right to do or say anything about it.  Therefore, if there is anything at all that as a community we would be unwilling to accept, then we must once and for all give up the argument that nobody has the right to “inflict their views” on others.  We must have that right as a community; it is the mark of a civilized community that we should do so.  (More of this in “Is there such a thing as society?”.)  The only question is how and when we exercise it.

How children learn

Third, there is the question about how people – particularly children – learn values.  Young children are repeatedly told to say please and thank you, taught not snatch toys from others, not to hit other children, not have a tantrum every time they don’t get their own way, and so on.  Children that are not so taught grow up as ‘spoilt brats’ and are impossible to live with.   And so there is a process of ‘imposing one’s views’ (if you like to call it that) and ‘conditioning’ the child to grow up in a way that is civilized and considerate towards others.  It is a process of ensuring that the child imbibes a moral system, quite naturally, with its mother’s milk, so to speak.  And the process continues as the child gets older, goes to school, and later turns up for work.  We are ‘socialized’ and that process moulds us into social beings, as opposed to the un-tamed animals we could otherwise become.  All this is the explicit and implicit molding of character, that itself depends on some kind of a notion as to what constitutes “good character”.   As a community, we must have such a notion, or we will come to see rather more of bad character than we had bargained for.  As, in fact, we have.

Thus, celebrities – including footballers – do “have to be an example for the children”, because the children will, self-evidently, copy what they see their heroes do.

Swayed by convenience

Fourth, the libertarian model forgets that we have a huge conflict of interest.  Will I select my moral codes according to what I believe is right, or will I sometimes be swayed by what is convenient to me, even if I might know ‘in my heart of hearts’ that it is not right?  After all, morals are supposed to put a brake on what I might want, by appealing to a higher tribunal – what I ought to do (whether I want to or not).

Letting me be the sole judge of what is ‘right’ in my conduct is akin to letting exam candidates mark their own exam papers.

A classic story is instructive, here.

“There were two men in a certain town, one rich and the other poor.  The rich man had a very large number of sheep and cattle, but the poor man had nothing except one little ewe lamb that he had bought.  He raised it, and it grew up with him and his children.  It shared his food, drank from his cup and even slept in his arms.  It was like a daughter to him.  Now, a traveler came to the rich man, but the rich man refrained from taking one of his own sheep or cattle to prepare a meal for the traveler who had come to him.  Instead, he took the ewe lamb that belonged to the poor man and prepared it for the one who had come to him”.

The story, from 2 Samuel 12 in the Bible, goes on to tell how King David, on hearing the story, “burned with anger against the man”.  Most of us would feel the same way.  But the story was told to David because he was in fact doing something quite similar.  David’s outrage against the fictional character in the story was then used to let David realize how outrageous his own conduct had just been.

In other words, we need and external code or reference point by which to judge our own conduct.  Without it, we may continue to congratulate ourselves that we are living a good life, never facing up to our own faults.   It’s easy enough to do!

On the subject of bringing up children, it is often much easier not to confront bad behaviour, to avoid conflict, to let them get away with it.  Easier in the short term: storing up trouble for the long term.  In modern Britain, it has similarly been easier not to confront difficulties and potential disagreements about ethics and just leave it to the individual.  But this, too, was only easier in the short term, while we still lived on the basis of habits formed by pre-existing moral codes.  As those habits have worn off, for lack of reinforcement, we are now seeing the extent of the trouble that we have been storing up for ourselves.

Next: Is there such a thing as society?