Public versus Private morality

[Malva]

What do you attach greater importance to?: public morality or private morality?
And what do you think it is the interpretation of a society whose youth attaches more importance to public morality than to the private one?

[Kadu]

What do you attach greater importance to?: public morality or private morality?
And what do you think it is the interpretation of a society whose youth attaches more importance to public morality than to the private one?

Care to exemplify, please.

[Malva]

I probably didn't succeed in expressing myself clearly.
In a nutshell: young people that are demanding about public morality and permissive about their private life.

[Treffie]

I think I worry about public morality quite a bit, but really it's just an excuse for me to moan.:) As for private morality, I realise that it's been instilled in me by my parents from a young age and I'm quite secure and content knowing at what level my standards are.

[Malva]

No worries, kadu.

Public morality is often referred to as moral and ethical standards that are enforced in a society, by the law, the police, or social pressure, and applied to public life, to the content of the media and to conduct in public places. Public morality usually involves the regulation of sexual matters, which include prostitution and homosexuality, but it also addresses the issues of nudity, pornography, the acceptability of cohabitation before marriage, and the protection of children (Wikpedia, 2006).

[Jamt]

Private morality is the thing we go to hell for, so it matters, or should matter a bit more for me.

[Kadu]

Since i consider myself an Humanist i would say that these quote reflects quite well my mindset regarding ethics/morality.
Which are transversal to the public and the private domain.


Humanists endorse universal morality based on the commonality of human nature, and that knowledge of right and wrong is based on our best understanding of our individual and joint interests, rather than stemming from a transcendental or arbitrarily local source, therefore rejecting faith completely as a basis for action. The humanist ethics goal is a search for viable individual, social and political principles of conduct, judging them on their ability to enhance human well-being and individual responsibility, ultimately eliminating human suffering.

Source (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secular_ethics#Humanist_ethics)

[Osweo]

Private morality affects those closest to you, upon whom you can have the most devastating or beneficial effect. I don't believe in hell, but I know how people can make each others' worldly existence a hell on Earth.

Public morality is more superficial, when considered on an individual basis, but in reality, it is something which operates en masse and can dictate the fates of entire civilisations, ultimately conditioning the public and private lives of millions of individuals. The entire ethos of a culture is set by the millions of little actions that occur due to people's conception of public morality. This makes the difference between a supportive integrated society and a dog-eat-eat free-for-all.

So you can't really consider one more important than the other.

There's also a third sphere; that within the individual, in his deepest heart of hearts. If there's something wrong there, if his conscience gnaws away at him, if he sullies his ... soul, I might even say, then there's one life - one unique entire way of experiencing the whole universe - that has not reached its potential. This individual self-assessment, self-measure, is the combined result of both the person's public and private life, so the two cannot be untwined. For me, I look at my own conscience, and don't really consciously divide my actions between the two spheres in the Opening Post. If it's 'Right', it's right! Isn't this what most people do?

But what do I know? I should have been asleep hours ago... ;)

Alana, I don't really understand what you're saying about young people in particular. What are you thinking of here? Examples work better for me than abstract notions.

Heh; are we still young? :D
By the way, that new avatar is nowhere near as beautiful as the last one, cariña... :whistle:

[Malva]

Alana, I don't really understand what you're saying about young people in particular. What are you thinking of here? Examples work better for me than abstract notions.
Gosh, am I so bad at expressing myself?! :(
Young people in Spain, according to a study, can justify a negative behaviour (except for gender violence which is so sensationalist and is considered public) in their private life more easily than in their social life (terrorism, vandalism)...

[Svipdag]

The topic is the problem. If there is a difference between public and private morality, it exists because public morality is hypocritical. If a person in the public eye needs to conceal his/her private life, the image which he/she presents to the public is a lie, a facade, a mask.

We have seen a classic example of this recently. The image which Tiger Woods presented to the public was that of an admirable, "squeaky clean" athlete, a worthy role model for the young. Behind the mask, lurked the reality of a man with the morals of an alley cat, a womanising Don Juan of an adulterer.

The worst examples of the contrast between private "morals" [if they even deserve to be so called] and public "morality", the lying hypocrisy of the public image, is provided by those clergymen, especially televangelists, who preach a strict, harsh, Abrahamic morality to others and are themselves
adulterers, seducers, or paedophiles.

If as they claim, God is all-knowing, their private conduct gives the lie not only to their preachments, but to the sincerity of their religious faith. Nor are
politicians any less hypocritical [a truism almost unnecessary to state.].
Only children who still believe in Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy trust the public utterances of our elected officials.

In the sense in which I have used the words in this post, public morality is
NO morality, it is a tissue of lies, evasions, half-truths, and hypocrisy.