realwhiteknight
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quote:
ORIGINAL: leadership527
quote:
ORIGINAL: realwhiteknight
The issue is where we draw the moral ruler. Society has one, individuals have ones which difffer from the average. American society used to have a much higher one that it has today. Really? Perhaps by that you mean during the good old days when sending children into coal mines to die of black lung was considered morally superior? Or was it the era when we decided that anyone with a black skin was sub-human? Perhaps it was the good old days when it was not possible to rape your wife?
I agree that each individual has a moral compass. In addition, society has some sort of amalgam. It's less clear to me that the overall average "goodness" has changed significantly across recorded human history. I try to be good. Most people I know fit that description.
I have a general theory that people were 'better' in at least certain times in the past, largely because they valued the things I value, more than people seem to today- at least most of the intellectual elite seemed to. The 'they' that sent kids into coal mines were not those who had no options but the rich coalmine owners and those who had political power in society. Not the poor. Racism is based only on greed and power, what one can get away with, not prejudice. I believe the majority of people were not virulently racist or morally defunct, it was a select few which messed everything up for everyone, and the majority of people because they had it so difficult realized early on what is important in life and acted accordingly. Those who had an easy time of it and were sheltered from the pain of others found it easier to ignore it, as it would otherwise be too overwhelming. People were ignorant and stupid, and desperate, not naturally bad.
Know the story of the Buddha? When did he become enlightened? It wasn't as a sheltered, rich prince- the evils and suffering of the world purposely and specifically hidden from him. He was blind then. Happy, content, and free. But blind. A funny thing happened one day, and he saw something he wasn't supposed to see. He's sees something ugly- an old woman, infirm, dying. So he investigates, and learns that this is what the world is full of, and that it is nature, and that it is terrible. So he needs to get away and learn how to fix it. Then he goes on his travels...he searches, he is unhappy. He finds enlightenment eventually. Under a tree? Or something to do with a lotus leaf? If I understand correctly, it is about peace, self-awareness, and acceptance of what can not be changed. The tragedy of life. He needed to be in touch with the nature of life first before he could transcend it.
People today desperately live with blinders on- as everyone wants to- but now we have the technology and the social OK to do it...anything we can do to be comfortable and be blind and complacent to the suffering of others and the nature of life- mortality. No one knows what death is anymore, it's covered up, hidden away in hospital wards, picked off the street, romanticized and manipulated on tv. No one wails or grieves in public. No one values intimacy or communal solace anymore, it is replaced by pornography and the next big thing which is nothing more than a series of images and sensations. Books and articles and videos. Everything is thrown at us and we react. We do not create any longer. Everything has been done. We aren't expressing ourselves but our images. Everything is virtual. Anything that makes us feel safe, that draws us away from authentic experience, not towards it. Anything and everything to cover what lies below, what we fear (sometimes what we fear is what we really want). Except, what we fear, is the only authentic experience.
So people in the past were more naked to life's truths simply because things were harder for them. This made them either worse than they would be today, but most people- who are naturally good- were better than they would have been today because there were less distractions from 'direct experience' not mediated or interfered with - i.e., moments of communal ritual, loyalty, peace, friendship, intimacy, fortitude, spirit, inner strength, nature, death, sickness, pain. So I think *individually* people were generally more moral, yes.
P. S. - there was a major genocide that occurred in the last ten-fifteen years with no one but a few Belgians trying to curtail it and currently there are still so-called 'detainees' here in the U.S. as well as drug dealers serving jail sentences 16 times longer than that of some child molesters , so let's NOT get up on our high moral horse of contemporary era superiority, please. 
< Message edited by realwhiteknight -- 8/3/2010 7:50:20 PM >
_____________________________
I carry a log - yes. Is it funny to you? It is not to me.
Behind all things are reasons. Reasons can even explain the absurd. Do we have the time to learn the reasons behind the human being's varied behavior? I think not. Some take the time.
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RE: Chivalry among BDSM Community & society of Western ... - 
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