Motley Moose – Archive

Since 2008 – Progress Through Politics

psychopathy

The Amoral Psychopath

Some of the discussion about universal standards of morality in the Haiti thread and Cheryl’s diary got my mind wandering down a familiar but, of late, not oft visited path. It occurs to me that it has largely fallen out of my consciousness because I have no one with whom to discuss such ideas. Maybe moose can provide me with some insight.  

As a child, before I knew terms like cultural relativism and anti-realism, I was already of the opinion that morality was largely subjective and certainly not absolute. I don’t know that I ever thought there were universal standards of right and wrong. It seemed apparent to me at an early age that everyone’s “morality” differed, even if only in subtle ways, and as I learned about history and other cultures, I only became increasingly entrenched in that viewpoint. I still believe that people are neither inherently good nor bad — that possibly, in fact, our natural condition is largely amoral — and that what we call morality stems primarily from two sources: Fear and societal norms. Actually, that can be simplified even further. I could just as easily say that morality is spawned from fear alone, since I believe fear to be the impetus behind the establishment of many social norms and cultural standards of morality.