|
Let me begin by telling the story of a crisis that occurred in our community a decade or so ago, and the responses and non-responses of various sectors within our community. The crisis came in the form of a small "cult" whose members were devoted to violent persecution of those whom they considered to be inferior to themselves in some manner. This cult group was a member of the racist and anti-semitic church known as The Aryan Nations. They had nurtured and spawned a small group of "Nazi" skinhead youth, who were attempting to recruit members within certain youth subcultures - primarily through violent intimidation; "Join us, or we will torture and beat you". As their numbers grew, they became more brazen and began committing acts of vandalism, assault and intimidation against Jews and their Synagogues, Muslims and their Mosques, Gay and Lesbian persons and their bars and cafes. Eventually they went to the home of a retired broadcaster who had exposed some WW2 nazi collaboraters in our community nearly four decades ago, and ended up poking out one of his eyes with a stick.
During the eighteen months or so when all those attacks were taking place, there was much media frenzy about the attacks and the groups who might be responsible for them, and various civic and religious leaders said; "Isn't this terrible" and then generally attempted to blame popular culture and moral relativity and failure to instill discipline and respect for elders in todays youth - for these tragic events. And then did absolutely nothing about the situation.
Fortunately, resistance to the Aryan Nations Skinheads was percolating within the youth subcultures. A number of small groups, groups of friends for the most part, formed and took some kind of name to denote their position, such as Skinheads Against Racial Predjudice or Punks Against Predjudice. Over time, these groups came together under the old leftist moniker of "The Anti-fascist League". The people involved in this group ranged in age from 15 to 25 years of age, and all were involved in social subgroups that aren't usually associated with a strong sense of morals and ethics; atheists and agnostics, punk rock fans, queer youth, and so on. I know this to be true, because I was one of them and they were, for the most part, my friends and social associates.
The initial impetus to oppose the Aryan Nations Skinheads probably was one of self-defence. It was our subcultures that these violent Nazis were trying to recruit from. However, none of us had personally suffered at the hands of the Nazi Skins at that time, and our concern quickly moved out from our own "community" and embraced all those who were being victimized. We patrolled around Synagogues and Mosques, for example, and did our best to rouse members of all kinds of religious communities to join us in taking action to oppose this threat to the community. For the most part we were told to "ignore them and they will go away". HAH! We did not take that advice. Instead, we assumed control of the security for the clubs where young people went, banned the Nazis and educated our peers about the evils of racism, so they couldn't recruit. We brought in punk youths from across the country to infiltrate the Nazi Skinheads and gather information for us. Our infiltrators were at serious risk - I have no doubt their lives would have been in danger had they been exposed, yet they volunteered and performed admirably. We were able to obtain evidence proving the involvement of specific Nazi Skinheads in specific attacks and turned that over to the police, resulting in several arrests. The Nazi Skins responded by hunting us down when we were alone and assaulting many of us in 6-to-1 attacks. I personally had my ribs cracked and suffered a concussion during one attack. We were not scared off or deterred by the threat of violence and continued our efforts to expose and frustrate the whole network of racists and bigots involved with this Aryan Nations cult.
Eventually there was involvement by the broader community in opposing the cult and it's gang of thugs, but not before we embarassed these other sectors into becoming involved by generating so much publicity that no one could pretend not to know what was really going on anymore.
What motivated us to do what we did? What ideology were we following? What ethical and moral code propelled us? Nothing - nothing but compassion and empathy. Compassion, empathy and reason are all that many people need, to act in a moral and ethical manner. Formal codes of morals and ethics, especially those of churches, religions, and states, provide pre-made guidelines of behavior and threats of punishment for failing to meet them, for persons who do not have the inner qualities of compassion and empathy or who are so undisciplined and impulsive that they cannot regulate their own behavior on their own.
There can be many reasons why people might fail to develop a sense of compassion and empathy for others, but it is often true that the tenets of religious faiths acted out with sincerity by parents in regard to their children, renders those children incapable of generating genuine compassion for others and also incapable of genuine SELF-discipline (although often very capable of obeying commands and orders given to them by others). This process ensures that the static unchanging moral and ethical precepts of the faith will be required by large numbers of those who were born into it. They will need to be told quite precisely HOW to be a moral and ethical person, and will simply refuse to believe that anyone could behave morally and ethically toward others if they didn't have some kind of external framework to operate within. Since that would be impossible for them, they project and believe it to be impossible for ANYONE. That is not the case, however. And if a situation arises that their memorized moral and ethical system cannot give them precise directions for responding to (such as the sudden appearance of a Nazi cult in their community), they will do nothing at all and remain paralyzed as events overwhelm them.
|
Origins of moral & ethical behavior