Morality - Doing Good

What is the definition of Morality? Secular and/or religious view. No writings, just some questions to see your own reaction as you read on:

- If you are a social worker in India and helping the poor but you are an aethist, does it mean you will go to hell?
- If you earn a high salary to feed your family, but your job is a scientist to push out drugs to the consumer market, without having fully tested them, are you moral?
- If you are a private banker, and you are helping to grow the portfolio of wealthy customers, knowing a huge chunk of it is dirty money, are you moral? Did you know a guy blew the whistle on this and got promptly fired?
- Can you be a monogamous swinger? Is it moral?
- If a guy cheats in a marriage, but is a good father and husband (brings home bacon, treats them very well), is he moral?
- If you are a drug runner to get money to buy milk for your baby, are you moral?
- If you are involved in prostitution (giving or receiving end), are you moral?
- Do you think a lesbian couple with a happy good kid are moral people?
- If your mother is an alcoholic, do you think she is moral? Can you still love her?

- If you kill a person in self-defence, protecting your baby, are you moral?

- If you steal office stationery, are you moral?

- If you cheat in a test, are you moral?

- If your foetus is tested to be abnormal and you choose to abort it, are you moral?

- Euthanasia - right or wrong?

- Cloning - right or wrong?

Moral Standards

As you read the above list, I hope it starts you thinking about how you view the world and yourself. The above is just a small list. Too many times, people just argue and argue when it's really about grey areas that doesn't have a standardized definition anyway.  Individual moral standards does not always equate to societal moral standards. And even societal moral standards are not consistent.  It's grey and varies from different scenario to different scenario.  

Looking at Morality with Different Eyes

And it gets more complicated.  How does one view morality?  Through a secular view?  Through religion?  Through philosophies?  Through the legal system?  A convicted thief, stealing milk powder for his baby is penalized by the legal system.  But his intent was good.  Morally, how do u dictate whether what he's done is right or wrong?  

Morality can also be expressed through the eyes of philosophies.  For example, Charles Darwin's concept of evolution and natural selection, if looked at, in a purely scientific point of view, can justify what would be considered wrong by most people's standards.   People don't do evil, they are just what they are. The fittest survive.  Hitler is not evil, he's just a guy with a glib tongue, who has a personality disorder, born in the right time to ensure his "destiny" was carried out. He was the fittest.  Another example would be peodophiles and serial killers.  Are they mentally ill?  Or is what they are doing wrong?  If they are condemned as wrong, they will remain as such.  But if the cause of their behaviour is mental illness, then their treatment would be different.  It would be to medicate them with drugs, lock them up, etc. Condemning them would only make them worse.

To summarize, morality can be viewed through many eyes, whether it's religion, philosophies, legal, etc.  And standards vary.

Personally

So what do you choose what's best for you?  Personally, at this point in time, I have taken a side, albeit skeptically on an intellectual basis. I do believe though, you have to choose a point of view.  This is to ensure some consistency and order in an individual and society. 

I've made a conscious choice to see life through rose-tinted glasses (romantic view); and act accordingly through this view. To believe in the innate goodness of people, which forms the basis of humanity.  I think there is a reason for all human beings doing unacceptable things (unacceptable as defined by the majority of society's realm of acceptable behaviour).  They mostly become bad due to circumstances (most of the time, not loved enough), reasons (7 sins of greed, lust, pride, wrath, gluttony, sloth, envy), and are sick (mental illness that create serial killers). I don't think anyone really deliberately chooses to be bad.

To simplify, one can look at the sunset and admire its beauty. Or, one can view the sun as a bright star that happened to be near enough to earth to be viewed.  I choose to see the sun in its beauty.