Morals - First Draft

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A friend of mine asked me to answer a 7 questions sheet.
Here are the answers.
It's still a first draft, but I guess it has the main ideas that I wanted to say.
I hope you might
Enjoy



1-a.) What do you consider to be important moral values?

The On-line Merriam-Webster definition for moral is:
moral
Function: adjective
Text: 1 conforming to a standard of what is right and good
Synonyms ethical, moralistic, noble, principled, righteous, right-minded, virtuous
Related Word good, right; conscientious, honest, honorable, just, scrupulous, upright; chaste, decent, modest, pure
Contrasted Words amoral, nonmoral, unmoral

My personal insight about morality relates to what is fair. As such I would define that a moral person is someone who has an overall of view of any particular situation and is able to act according to what the person reason calls for.
I fell that I must go back a bit.
Moral values depend clearly on the upbringing of each subject. For instance, my Portuguese education finds it abhorring to serve a dog as a main course, while a Chinese person would consider it to be a common meal in every day life.
In Portugal, we have a strong Christian influence; therefore, we are bounded to the 10 commandments of Moses and teachings of Christ, to define our morals. Obviously, by avoiding the 7 Deadly Sins one can be said to be acting according to Christian Morals. Hence by avoiding:

Pride is excessive belief in one's own abilities, that interferes with the individual's recognition of the grace of God. It has been called the sin from which all others arise. Pride is also known as Vanity.

Envy is the desire for others' traits, status, abilities, or situation.

Gluttony is an inordinate desire to consume more than that which one requires.

Lust is an inordinate craving for the pleasures of the body.

Anger is manifested in the individual who spurns love and opts instead for fury. It is also known as Wrath.

Greed is the desire for material wealth or gain, ignoring the realm of the spiritual. It is also called Avarice or Covetousness.

Sloth is the avoidance of physical or spiritual work.

Opposed to this come the Virtues, that supposedly are the building blocks for a moral person. Directly, one can be moral according to the Christian Religion if he has:

Faith equals belief and trust. It can also be said that a person, living in accordance to fidelity, loyalty and who has sound conviction of its reasons, without falling into a blind fanatic behaviour, is someone who has faith. The distinction is hard to make sometimes.

Hope comes with desire, followed by the belief that something will happen. Hope is also reliance in someone, leading to great expectations towards someone or something. Personally, I find it more moral to have great expectations about someone than something, although something might indirectly reveal an outcome of a expectation I had about someone.

Charity is a synonym of generosity, a benevolent gesture towards someone who truly needs assistance at given point. It is also usual to define it as a merciful act where one is being helpful to another. Many times people see it as a negative thing to accept charity or the mercy of someone; it’s probably a common dispute between charity and pride!

Fortitude this virtue is often confused with pride, when in fact means strength, courage, endurance and resoluteness. This virtue is essential to overcome a particular hurdle to a self or another.

Justice is the ability of being impartial and fair, to be able to pass an equal judgement regardless of the parties involved. The persons who are just are often called righteous able to dispassionate towards a given argument. Justice it’s all about truth.

Temperance involves the self-mastery art of one to restrain the emotional urges through reason, sobriety and frugality.

Prudence often comes with wisdom, allowing to a person to be careful, vigilant. A prudent person is someone who knows to be discrete and thoughtful at same time, henceforth being prepared for what things may come.

However, all that is too much is, nevertheless, too much, by taking all these virtues to an extreme one might fall into the deadly sins category.
I truly believe that if a person takes time to put in practice all these virtues in a most balanced way, then a person will find the harmony that ultimately will lead to a moral path.


1.b) What are your strongest morals?

Personally, I believe that moral goes hand in hand with a simple principle, respect. Yet, this principle is very difficult to cope if one tends to be selfish.
I would say that if I say I respect a person then I won’t interfere with that person’s space through aggression, manipulation or any kind of devious thought that I might have.
In my own way, I try to be just, that’s why must of time I fell that I thrive to be selfless and prudent.


2) What would you define to be a "good" person? a "bad" person?

Immediately, I could say that a good person is someone that follows all the virtues in harmony, while the bad person chooses the path defined by the 7 deadly sins.

In more general terms, a bad person would be someone who would live to it’s own agenda, without realizing the consequence of his actions towards others. Worse, a really bad person is someone who is aware of the nature and the outcome of his behaviour and chooses to pursue with what he has in mind.
Opposed to that, a good person will always define what actions to take while considering what’s good for the majority while minimizing the consequences of the actions to the minority who will suffer from the outcome. A good person will conveniently define its steps towards solving problems in the best possible way. In contrast, a bad person will create problems, without caring for the detriment of the ones involved.


3) How important is family?

Once I have read somewhere that family are the group of friends that we are given upon birth, which he don’t choose. In the current society, family comprises the main structure in transmitting the fundaments, the rules in which our civilization is build upon. A stable society depends on the conformity of its members.
Family plays the role of early programming. The offspring are raised according the family morals. The definition of morals might vary with the accordance to each one’s importance. For instance, there might be families who find it more importance to be just, while others are more love based.
I find that family is essential in transmitting knowledge and wisdom, as such this will help the newborn define it’s own moral behaviour towards the community that where he now belongs to.


4) How important is religion?

I see religion as an ancestral part of the society, created to explain all the questions that leaped the common sense, such as the beginning and the end, the why and the how of life. Meanwhile, as the years went by, religion assumed the teaching role in the western societies. As such, the Christian church controlled the first schools and universities.
The same type of behaviour can be seen in other societies, where the teaching role of the predominant religion is only emphasized through the behaviour of the members of that particular society.
Nowadays, religion is facing a battle with the freedom of speech while bound to the principles of the rules of the past. I believe that religion has important principles to teach to all, in order to help define a moral more appropriated to all, where the virtues can be equally put in practice without prejudice to anyone. However, the dark chapters of some religions in the past make a crescent part of the population to doubt on the fair role of religion in today’s appropriate morals.
Bottom line, I believe religion has an important role in society as a teaching tool where all can benefit from the knowledge acquired.

5) Is bettering the community important to you?

I believe that the community as a whole has an enormous potential in overcoming social and political difficulties, that everyday seem to be a growing as a cancer in modern society. For instance, the ability to blame it one someone else instead of taking charge to solve a particular issue is a common behaviour that one can see just by observing.
I believe that the community can be bettered if there is a way to aware people to the potential they have as a group to produce changes for the best. People become immoral, when they assume that the responsibility for the problems of the community depends on someone else. This is a typical sloth example that no doubt leads to immoral behaviour.
I believe that the modern communities lack education at many levels, which reflects the negligence towards particular issues that corrupt the world in such a sad form. In a large measure it all comes down to respect – a two-way autoroute that leads to accomplishment through selfless actions.

6) How would you personally handle a conflict with your parents?

I love my parents, but most of times I forget that they are who they are.
I have a better understanding with my mom than with my dad whose advanced 73 year old age makes him a more demanding sort of person. I feel that my father is old not because he has lived the hours he did but mostly because he assumed a lay back posture through out the last 20 years of his life. My mother is an hectic person that despises sloth in the most pure form.
A typical way to solve a problem or a conflict is to approach them individually, as they are distinct in their nature. So to deal a problem with my mom, I would talk to my dad, and vice-versa. Usually, they talk about it before I face the one who is directly involved. Therefore, it is usual to talk to them about conflicts and realize that they already have a view or a point towards it. With my father I lose my temper easily, while with my mom I respect more.


7) Are there any barriers in your everyday life that prevent you from resolving conflicts?

I am a very passive person, which makes me difficult to cope with conflicts. I feel that as I get more involved with people, I learn to be more assertive and I am more alert in ways to avoid conflict instead of solving them.
Throughout my adolescence years I developed a self-pity attitude and a low self-esteem, which resulted in many personal depressions towards facing particular problems.
In my everyday life I try to avoid these thoughts as they make me my own worse enemy.
Usually, I try to solve problems by simplify them to there basic sense, however there are moments where I don’t seem to be able to decompose a problem to it’s simpler building blocks, that poses as a major barrier in overcoming conflicts.
I try to be a person full with virtues and assume a positive attitude towards all in general. Usually, I use humour to soften the atmosphere of a conflict site. I find it to be beneficial if I use humour and then simultaneous present a solution to ease the conflict.
A common barrier that I have is to tell people what to do, when I have to. How to explain people the need to do and make my argument stick, particularly when I feel that I am right. In the past, I would assume that it would be better not to argue any more and let anyone have it their way.
I tend to be oversensitive to people with people for whom I develop a great friendship.
Despise is the worse thing anyone who I call a friend can do to me. It shuts me off to a primordial state of confusing and sadness.
Many other barriers come to me everyday, but I try to solve them day-by-day, by believing in me while being true to myself.


cocasman@zmail.pt