Honesty and Faithfulness

It's morally desirable for people to be honest and faithful to their promises in general. There may be some exceptions -- which we'll discuss below -- but by and large we expect people to tell the truth about the past, to make pledges sincerely, and to be faithful to promises made regarding the future.

Partly, this is because we need to be able to trust people in order to live our lives in all sorts of ways. Trust, in other words, is important partly because of good consequences it brings. We can't function well if we can't trust others, we have to do everything for ourselves, which makes all sorts of things impractical.

But trust is also intrinsically valuable. It's a component of friendship, which is also important. At the very least, violations of trust -- betrayal -- have an intrinsic sting to them beyond just the bad consequences they bring (e.g., of not being able to trust that person in the future). Having been fooled, betrayed, deceived, or finding that we've misplaced our trust and confidence in someone certainly feels like a bad thing in it's own right.

Is Honesty Always the Best Policy?

Honesty and faithfulness are morally good, but they exist among many other morally good things. And sometimes they take a lower priority. There are cases when honesty is perhaps the wrong policy, or when promises we've made ought to be broken.

For instance, "white lies" -- lying in cases that cause little harm or avoid hurt feelings -- might be a case of acceptable dishonesty.

But there are even clearer cases of appropriate lying: in Germany during the rule of the Nazi Party, people frequently lied in order to keep Jewish people hidden from the authorities, who would have sent them off to concentration camps. These lies were altruistic lies. They helped keep Jews from suffering horrible injustice and suffering. (The philosopher Immanuel Kant has been famously criticized for denying the existence of altruistic lies in his case of the Inquiring Murderer.)

Similarly, sometimes it is better to break a promise than to keep it. If someone tells in you -- under the condition that you promise not tell anyone else -- that they know about someone being sexually abused, then it's probably best to break the promise. This is a case of a secret that ought not be kept.

This is just to say that sometimes another moral consideration outweighs honesty and faithfulness. And, of course, sometimes promises themselves wind up being in conflict, and you have to break one promise to keep another.

But we always have to be careful about lying or breaking a promise. Are we doing so to achieve some moral, altruistic goal? Or are we just crafting a self-serving exception so that we don't have to go to the trouble of being honest and/or faithful to a promise?

Honest and Faithfulness in Politics

In politics, people frequently accuse their opponents of being dishonest: they say their opponents believe in the "big lie" theory, or say that their opponents "will say anything" to get elected.

And, of course, politicians frequently misrepresent and caricature their opponents with name-calling, and use false anecdotes to illustrate a "broader truth". And then they kid themselves by saying it's only their opponents who are playing fast and loose with the truth.

It's this lack of honesty that is probably the chief reason we are so cynical about our political leaders. It might be more accurate to say that this lack of honesty is why they have earned our cynicism.

After all, one of the things we insist on when we say that "character counts" in politics is that we want our politicians to be honest with us and faithful to what they promise they'll do.

Conclusion

The issues of honesty and faithfulness pervade most everything we do, and they're perhaps even more prominent when it comes to how a democracy functions.

Freedom, Liberty, and Autonomy

Freedom is one of the moral considerations we most frequently refer to when we discuss moral and political matters.

Freedom of or from What?

But, what is meant by "freedom"? Freedom of what? Freedom from what? There are lots of things that people would like to be free from: fear, hunger, illness, old age, poverty, pain and suffering, death and so forth.

But, when we talk about freedom, we're typically talking about the freedom to rule your own life, to run your own affairs. Freedom from tyranny, freedom from someone else telling you what to do, the liberty to choose and to act as you please. In other words, we're talking about autonomy (i.e., "self-rule").

In particular, freedom is typically understood to include rights that were enshrined in the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution: freedom of speech, the right to assemble and freedom of association, freedom of religion, etc. And the political philosophy of libertarianism -- AKA, "classical liberalism" -- is based on the notion of individual freedom.

We expect that we should be allowed to think and speak as we please, to choose our friends and who we associate (or don't associate) with, to choose when and where (and whether) we want to move, and to do what we want to do and be free to trade and exchange with others as we wish.

Your Liberty Vs My Liberty

One qualification on freedom is that one person's freedom often conflicts with another person's freedom.

My right to swing my arms around ends with your nose, so to speak. I might want something, but I can't take it from others without their consent.

"Consent" is a key term, here. When it comes to liberty, any number of actions are judged appropriate or inappropriate based on whether the people involved give their consent or not. Kidnapping, rape, murder, and torture are violations of freedom (at least in part) because people don't consent to them.

Liberty Vs Other Moral Considerations

Also, liberty is one among several moral considerations. And, like any moral consideration, it might sometimes be outweighed by another one.

Good Samaritan laws, for instance, are an example of laws that take the position that -- at least in some circumstances -- you are not free to refuse aid to a person in need. Typically, these are circumstances where a person is in urgent need of help and it's only a minor inconvenience for someone to do so (for example, it would only require calling 911, the emergency services).

There are also cases where we restrict people's liberty for their own sake. We don't let children or people who are mentally impaired do what they please, often, because they would likely harm themselves (and maybe others, too).

And, in practice, we often allow some violations of (or compromises on) our privacy, property, and autonomy. For instance, we allow police to enter our homes and search our belongings, so long as they have reasonable cause and a warrant in order to find someone or something that poses a threat to others (e.g., a murderer hiding out from the authorities).

How Do We Get Freedom?

And, as always, there are empirical questions about what policies do the best job of securing freedom.

Again, children are a good example: is their liberty best served by letting them do what they want, or by forcing them -- frequently against their wishes -- to go to school, to eat healthy food, to get painful vaccinations and medical services, etc?

How do we maximize liberty? Just by leaving others alone at any given moment? Or, occasionally, by making them do things in the present that will make them more free in the future? Does liberty concern our actions in and of themselves, or also the consequences of our actions? (In other words, are libertarians deontologists or consequentialists?)

And, as with most moral considerations, there's the dilemma of whether it's OK to do a bad thing in order get something good? For instance, is it OK to murder one person in order to secure the freedom of a dozen more?


EXAMPLES AND ANALYSIS

"Your right to swing your arms ends just where the other man’s nose begins."

-- Legal philosopher Zechariah Chafee, Jr., June 1919, in the Harvard Law Review article titled “Freedom of Speech in War Time”. Chafee was quoting an unknown judge, and variations of the quote seem to go all the way back to temperance advocate John B. Finch in 1882.

***

"They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety."

-- Benjamin Franklin, Memoirs of the life and writings of Benjamin Franklin, 1818.

Comment: This is sometimes rendered as, "Those who sacrifice liberty for security deserve neither", or, "If we restrict liberty to attain security we will lose them both". Is this true, though? If you compromise on liberty for the sake of some other moral consideration, you don't deserve liberty?


(The list above is not intended to be a comprehensive record of all relevant examples.)

Culpability and Guilt

Culpability is a moral consideration related to justice. It concerns how we respond to guilt and innocence. As with need and merit, culpability concerns equitable treatment, rather than equal treatment. That is, we give extra consideration to those who have committed crimes or harmed others.

What this consideration amounts to is quite simple and intuitive: we believe that -- if a crime or harm is committed -- all and only those who are guilty of committing that crime should be punished, condemned, or in some sense be held responsible for it. Those who are innocent, who did not commit the crime, should not be punished or held responsible in any way.

Culpability is sort of the flip side of merit. You could say it's merit versus demerit. In the same way that we praise and reward people who do good -- as we do when responding to merit -- we also demand that those who do bad be held responsible and punished. And, of course, we also insist that those who have done nothing wrong have nothing wrong done to them.

This leaves a lot of subsidiary issues to consider, such as whether and how the guilty should be treated. The Civil Debate Page goes into some of these issues in the sections on defiance and punishment.

Culpability and Other Considerations

Frequently, we have to weigh the moral desire to punish the guilty (and only the guilty) against other moral considerations.

For instance, we often think that it's OK for the police to hold a person in jail prior to trial, effectively punishing them before they've actually been found guilty of any crime. Criminal suspects are typically remanded in custody if they might pose a risk to others: If you're pretty sure you've captured a serial killer, it seems unreasonable to allow them to roam free -- potentially killing more innocents -- until they've been convicted of their previous murders.

(Generally, though, we demand that there be substantial evidence of guilt before suspects are remanded, which is another bow to the drive to leave the innocent unpunished. Hence the burden of proof requirements in the justice system, and the admonition that we treat people as "innocent until proven guilty".)

Similarly, we often face a quandry when it comes to handling sex offenders. It is believed that they are very likely to commit such crimes again. In order to prevent them from doing so, it is often suggested that significant restrictions should be put on them even after they have served out their sentence. On the one hand, this seems like a good idea, if it really does serve to prevent them from committing further sex crimes. On the other hand, however, it also seems like it amounts to punishing them for crimes that they have not (yet?) committed, future crimes for which they are (so far?) innocent. And this runs counter to our moral desire to only punish the innocent.

Culpability Versus Culpability

And, of course, we often have to prioritize between different levels of culpability.

To use yet another example from the criminal justice system, sometimes a person who is guilty of a crime is granted immunity from prosecution (or is allowed to plead guilty to a lesser crime) in exchange for testimony that will convict someone who is guilty of greater crimes. These plea deals are often considered justified -- if somewhat unpalatable -- since we are giving up on defying and punishing a lesser offense in order to secure the punishment of a more serious offense.

Likewise, another reason for remanding suspects in custody is to make sure they don't flee and evade trial, depriving us of the process that assigns guilt. We're willing to risk unjustly detaining an innocent person in order to make sure a guilty person doesn't flee the justice system altogether.

And, just like -- in the name of compassion -- we give more attention to a person in greater need than the one in lesser need, we give more attention to the person guilty of committing a greater crime or harm than one committing a lesser crime. If a police officer sees one person making a littering violation and another person committing a murder -- and he can only chase one of them -- of course he should go after the murderer.

Conclusion

So, the role culpability plays in our moral reasoning can be quite complicated. But the basic moral intuition itself -- defy the guilty, leave the innocent alone -- is fairly straightforward.

Justice and Fairness

Justice -- or fairness, as people also refer to it -- is a very significant moral consideration. It amounts to giving people what they deserve.

What this means in detail, though, is complicated and controversial.

Equality and Equity

Generally, though, two things that justice demands are clear.

One is that we should treat people equally. That is, we shouldn't give certain people extra consideration or status for arbitrary reasons. If I get thrown in jail for a certain crime, you should get equal punishment if you commit an identical crime. Same crime, same punishment. Equal pay for equal work. Equal harm, equal compensation. Reciprocity is another way that equality arises: I'll treat you the way you treat me.

Some of humanity's greatest moral efforts have focused on equality. In particular, attempts to push for equal rights under the law, to end discrimination based on race, gender, religion, etc., are based on the ideal of equality. Racism and aristocracy are chiefly objected to on the grounds that they put one race or one family ahead of everyone else arbitrarily and for no good reason.

But, on the other hand, justice also seems to demand equitable treatment. That is, we should treat people differently when there is good reason to do so. People guilty of murder should be treated differently from people who are innocent of it. People who are sick or in need deserve different treatment from those who aren't. The person with the more serious injury goes to the front of the line at the emergency room. The person who works harder should get paid more.

With this in mind, we can identify at least three respects in which we demand equitable treatment for people: need, merit, and culpability.

Need

People who are suffering, who are deprived of freedom or resources, deserve more assistance than those who are not. The Civil Debate Page expands on this in the section on aiding the needy.

Merit

People who work harder, who achieve more, or who make greater sacrifices or contributions for the sake of others deserve more consideration, praise, and gratitude that those who do less. The Civil Debate Page expands on this in the section on merit.

Culpability

People who are innocent of wrongdoing deserve to avoid blame and punishment. People who are guilty of wrongdoing deserve to receive (proportional) blame and punishment for their misdeeds. The Civil Debate Page expands on this in the sections on culpability and defiance.

Conclusion

Of course, these different considerations -- need, merit, and culpability -- often come into conflict with each other (and even themselves), resulting in moral dilemmas:

• A drunken driver crashes into another car, causing himself a potentially fatal injury, and a severe but survivable injury to the other driver: if we can only help one person, should it be the drunken driver, or the innocent victim?
• In return for a pardon, a criminal offers to hand over information sufficient to secure the arrest and conviction of people who have committed more serious crimes: should the government accept the offer?
• Should a scholarship go to the student with higher grades, or the student with less money?

These questions are difficult to answer. But, with a greater understanding of the moral elements and considerations that play a role in such questions, we can have more productive -- more respectful, more dignified -- discussions and debates about matters of justice.

Merit

Merit is a moral consideration related to justice. It concerns our response to excellence of various kinds, how some people deserve reward, gratitude, and praise for achievements and accomplishments they have made that others have not.

As with need and culpability, merit concerns equitable treatment, rather than equal treatment. That is, we give extra attention to those who have done more or given up more.

There are several ways in which we consider merit. We'll look at them briefly:

Contribution

In assessing merit, we often look at how much people have contributed. For instance, those who have worked harder, or who have made a greater (positive) difference in the lives of others are considered to have greater merit.

How exactly we measure this is controversial. There's an instinctive inclination to use the "sweat of the brow" test: just see how hard a person has worked, how much effort they've put into a project. But hard work doesn't necessarily mean productive work. There is such a thing as "busy work" that takes a lot of energy and occupies a person's attention, but that does not really result in much of a gain for anyone.

Better, then, to look at the actual benefits that result: Were lives saved that would otherwise have been lost? Were lives improved in a way that otherwise wouldn't have happened? Were people protected from need or harm?

These are the things that we look at when we evaluate people's contributions. And, naturally, the greater the contribution, the greater the merit. All else being else being equal, philanthropists who contribute millions are credited with greater merit than those who give only a few dollars.

Sacrifice

Another way of looking at merit is to consider the sacrifice that was made in order to improve the lives of others.

Again, the "sweat of the brow" test comes to mind -- that is, how much energy, time, and effort was invested. But, again, this depends on the work actually yielding some benefit to someone else.

Sacrifices can be small -- such as giving an hour of one's time, a small donation of money, etc. -- or large -- giving one's very life for the sake of others. Philanthropists who donate millions are contributing a great deal, but -- since they typically remain wealthy even after their donation and are not left in economic hardship -- it's not clear that they have made a great sacrifice. People who give to the point of putting themselves in hardship, or who die for the sake of others, are given the greatest merit of all.

Achievement and Excellence

There is another sort of merit, one that comes under the more generic description of achievement or excellence.

For instance, people who demonstrate athletic or artistic excellence -- who win at sports or at spelling bees or have other such accomplishments -- have earned greater merit. It's not quite the same sort of merit as when someone donates a kidney or funds cancer research, but it's not insignificant, either.

Response to Merit

How do we respond, morally speaking, to merit? It varies in different circumstances, but there are examples we can look at to draw broad lessons.

The moral response to merit typically involves things such as praise, gratitude, and reward. We often give praise to those who make great sacrifices, contributions, or exhibit excellence. And we generally (though not always) do this publicly in the form of medals, trophies, parades, etc. We also offer expressions of gratitude to those who have made contributions and sacrifices. Again, sometimes these expressions are made publicly, sometimes privately.

Sometimes we go further, and respond to merit by giving rewards. In the same way that we give aid to the needy, we give rewards to the meritorious.

Controversially, this can mean rewarding someone for the good they have done by excusing them for the bad that they are guilty of. But this is almost always a difficult decision, as we don't want to send the message that, by doing good, people can earn the right to (or at least get a free pass for) doing bad.

Examples

Merit pops up in our lives -- as well as in political and moral discussions -- in lots of ways.

People insist that tax rates reflect the right of people to keep the money they have earned through their hard work. People ask for more pay when they believe they work harder or contribute more, or offer skills that are more scarce or in greater demand (and therefore more valuable). People who have sacrificed more -- or risked more to potential sacrifice -- ask for more reward.

We often give greater expressions of praise and gratitude to police, soldiers, firefighters, and medical workers, on the basis of the greater contributions they make and/or sacrifices that they risk. At the same time, we often worry -- probably correctly -- that we still don't do enough to separate these people out for the greater consideration they deserve on the basis of merit. Although these are all paying occupations, the pay they get is rarely comparable to the benefit they provide or what they risk losing.

Conclusion

Merit, then, is central to our thinking about justice. And justice, in turn, is central to our understanding of what is right and wrong, both morally and politically.

Personal Responsibility and Agency

One of the most difficult and pervasive moral dilemmas has to do with what we as individuals are responsible for. Are we responsible only for what we ourselves do, or for what happens in general, regardless of who does it?

A Moral Dilemma

Imagine you find yourself in this situation:

While traveling in the wilderness, you encounter a grim scene. A group of armed bandits has captured 20 people from a local village, and is about to kill them. Even though they are murderous towards the local villagers, they are overjoyed at your presence, because they are hospitable to outsiders. To celebrate your arrival, they offer a bargain: they will free 19 of the villagers, so long as you do the honor of killing one of the villagers. If you turn down the offer, the bandits will kill all 20 villagers.

Now, you know that murder is morally wrong, but what does that mean you should do in the above situation?

Agent-Relative Morality

One position is to say that morality is agent-relative, meaning that you -- the agent -- are only responsible for your own conduct. "Murder is wrong" therefore means that your job is to make sure that you, personally, commit as few murders as possible. So, in the above situation, you face two courses of action, one involving no murders committed by you (i.e., declining the bandits' offer), and another which involves you committing one murder (i.e., accepting the bandits' offer). Zero is less than one, so you should decline the bandits' offer, according to the agent-relative view of morality.

Agent-Neutral Morality

Another position is to say that morality is agent-neutral, meaning that you -- the agent -- are responsible for whatever happens, regardless of who does it. "Murder is wrong" therefore means that your job is to make sure that as few murders occur as possible, without worrying about who commits those murders, you or anyone else. So, in the above situation, you face two courses of action, one involving 20 murders (i.e., declining the bandits' offer), and another which involves only one murder (i.e., accepting the bandits' offer). 20 is more than one, so you should accept the bandits' offer, according to the agent-neutral view of morality.

What to Do?

So, should you accept the bandits' offer or decline it? Which is the correct view about morality?

This is a dilemma, because there's something to be said for both of these views: if you turn down the offer, you can remain blameless, because it's the bandits who are doing the killing, not you. But that means there are now 19 dead people who would have lived if you had taken the bandits' offer. Of course, that would mean the blood of the one victim is on your hands, not the bandits'. However, the price of keeping your hands clean is paid by the 19 people who get executed … and back and forth. We get caught in the tussle of a kind of ends and means reasoning that is both very appealing and very frightening.

The situation I've described is, admittedly, a hypothetical one that we're not likely to encounter. But the opposition between agent-relative and agent-neutral views of morality pops up regularly in real life:

• Is it acceptable to murder, say, Hitler, in order to prevent all the murders he ordered?
• Should we go to war to save the lives of innocents from a tyrant, even if going to war means we ourselves will inevitably kill innocent people?
• Should democratic countries trade with non-democratic countries in order to undermine the dictators who run them in the long-term, even if that means supporting and being complicit with their crimes against innocents in the short-term?

Conclusion

Part of the reason these particular issues are so difficult is because they involve this more general dilemma between agent-relativity and agent-neutrality.

So, even knowing that something (e.g., murder) is morally wrong, it's still not necessarily clear what action we are required to do.

Forgiveness

Forgiveness is one of the most important, complicated, and poorly understood moral concepts there is.

Just like we have an obligation to defy the unjust and harmful things that other people do, we have an obligation to resist, oppose, rebuke, and undo the unjust and harmful things that we ourselves do.

Basically, we have to try to reverse the harm that we've done -- that is, try to restore things as best we can to the way they were before we did whatever harm we did -- and to redeem ourselves -- that is, fix whatever flaw in our character led us to do that unjust or harmful thing. You can't receive forgiveness without any effort: you have to earn it through some process of atonement.

How precisely this is to be done in any given situation is difficult to say. There are lots of different degrees and ways in which we mistreat one another. Some of them are minor (e.g., I'm late for lunch with a friend), some of them are severe (e.g., I kill someone), and some of them are intangible (e.g., I cheat on my spouse, or lie to someone who has put their trust in me).

There is probably no simple formula that can cover all these diverse cases, but it looks like the following things play important roles:

Admission of Guilt

It's important that you admit that you did something wrong, and do so to the person or people you harmed (rather than just confessing privately to yourself that you screwed up).

Apology

Related to the above, there should be an expression of sincere remorse or regret for the harm you've caused, something that demonstrates a true understanding of how you've mistreated others, and expresses sympathy with the pain that you have caused.

We have to be careful with apologies, however. There's a selfish tendency to think that all you have to do to earn forgiveness is apologize (which is not often the case), and to give apologies motivated by regret for having gotten caught (rather than motivated by remorse for having caused harm to someone).

Restitution and Making Amends

We have to do our best to undo the harm we've caused, or give compensation for it. Sometimes this is easy: if I break your $100 table, I should at least fix the table or give you $100. But, if I kill someone, I can't bring them back, and I can offer very little to replace them.

Similarly, if I cheat on my spouse, the intangible harm I've caused is very difficult to undo or compensate for. I don't mean to say that acts such as murder or adultery are unforgivable, but they are certainly not easy things to undo. If it is possible to earn forgiveness for them, the process involved is likely to be arduous and slow.

Redemption and Changing Our Character

We have to rid ourselves of the flaws in our character that led or allowed us to do the unjust thing that we did, so that we don't do it again. Perhaps we were greedy, or careless, or ignorant of how to respect others. Whatever, we should work to replace our vices with virtues.

This can take a lot of time. For instance, if I've betrayed somebody's trust in me -- by lying or not keeping a promise to them -- it may take a while for me to prove that I'm worthy of being trusted again.

Other Aspects

With respect to forgiveness, there are also obligations for those who have been harmed.

For instance, if someone has done everything that can reasonably be done to earn forgiveness, then it's wrong for us to withhold it. It is tempting, as a victim, to torture the people who have harmed us by refusing to forgive them no matter what they do. But this is itself an unjust, selfish, and harmful thing to do.

Likewise, when you've forgiven someone for something, you shouldn't bring it up in order to criticize them. Any mistake they've been forgiven for is a mistake that has been addressed and put in the past; it is unfair to bring it once again into the present.

It's also important for a victim to not hold a grudge against the person who has harmed them, whether or not that person has earned forgiveness. The worst thing a victim can do to themselves is to fester on and on about how they've been mistreated, refusing to make any success or progress in their lives until the person who has treated them unfairly apologizes and makes amends. If anything, it's just poor planning, because it's clear that many people just aren't going to live up to their obligation to reverse or repair the harm they've done.

Even with these rough guidelines in mind, there's an awful lot left unclear regarding forgiveness:

• Is it possible to earn forgiveness for irreversible harms (such as murder, or adultery)? Can forgiveness only be given in such cases, not earned?
• What role, if any, does punishment play with respect to forgiveness? Is it necessary for me to be punished in order to earn forgiveness? What purpose is punishment supposed to serve?
• If I forgive someone, must I also reconcile with them (that is, retain the same relationship I had with them previously)? I forgive my spouse for cheating on me: does that mean I must remain married to them?

Conclusion

None of these are easy issues. But they are enormously important ones, because it's impossible to go through life without mistreating others in some way or another, intentionally or unintentionally. And it's just not acceptable to say "well, shucks, we're all human, we all make mistakes" as if that settles the matter.

Yes, we're clearly capable of making mistakes, but we're also clearly capable of taking responsibility for and repairing those mistakes in significant ways. And that's what forgiveness is all about: undoing the mistakes we inevitably make in how we treat one another.

Defiance

Someone asked Confucius: "What do you say to the idea that we should repay evil with kindness?"
Confucius replied: "Then how will you repay kindness? Repay evil with justice; repay kindness with kindness."

-- The Analects of Confucius, chapter 14, verse 34 (sometimes listed as verse 36).

We don't just have an obligation to avoid harming or treating others unjustly; we also have an obligation to prevent others from doing harming or treating others unjustly. Not only should we keep ourselves from doing anything wrong, we should also defy the wrongdoing of others.

While it is controversial how far this obligation extends (see the entry on personal responsibility), it seems clear that we are responsible for more than just our own conduct. Not only do I have an obligation to not murder people myself, I also have an obligation to try to stop others from committing murder (by calling the police, at least, if not stopping them personally).

Defiance Vs Love and Kindness

It is often said that we should respond to evil with good, to hatred with love:

"You have heard that it was said, 'An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.' But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also."

-- Jesus Christ, Matthew 5:38-39, NIV.

And:

"Repay injury with kindness."

-- Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, Chapter 63 (some translations omit this passage).

There is something to be said for encouraging forbearance and forgiveness, and not giving in to feelings of blind revenge.

But, as the quote from Confucius at top expresses quite well, this runs the risk of failing to treat good differently from evil. If we repay injustice with kindness, what are we going to repay kindness with? What do we have left over in order to reward and encourage good deeds, if we are responding with kindness to bad deeds? Good and evil, kindness and harm, are different, and they need to be treated differently.

By resisting the injustices that other people are committing, we do a variety of good things: we stop the harm they are causing in that moment; we prevent them from doing harm further down the road; we send a message to others that similar behavior will not be tolerated, and; we make it less likely that the victim will create a further injustice by over-reacting to the mistreatment they are suffering (as victims sometimes do when they believe them must fend for themselves all alone).

How to Respond to Evil, Injustice, and Harm?

There are lots of different ways to defy the harmful, unjust, or evil things that others do, though knowing which is appropriate in a particular situation is another matter of controversy.

Among the options available for responding to people who are guilty of harm:

• verbal criticism;
• public protest;
• some form of separation from or ostracism of the perpetrator;
• taking away their property;
• perhaps even violence.

These are all options, in principle. Punishment is a common response.

The natural reaction is to retaliate in kind: you hit me, I hit you back. And this response does have something to be said for it: it's proportional ("you get what you give") and educative ("now you know what it feels like"). But, it's probably not the appropriate response as often as we think it is.

Moreover, there is a question of how much we are expected to sacrifice in order to defy injustice. A phone call to the police doesn't seem to be too much, but what is? Are we expected to risk -- or to actually give up -- our own lives in order to resist the harm that others are doing?

And, as always, defiance is one moral consideration among many others that we have to take into account, and it's not always clear what the consequences of our defiance might be.

Conclusion

So, while we have an obligation to defy injustice, the way in which we should do so is a matter of debate.

Authority and Example

It's one thing to know that you're supposed to do; it's another thing to actually do it. This distinction -- knowing versus doing -- is an easy one to recognize, but it often gets lost in the heat of political debate.

We have an obligation to do two things: to learn the difference between right and wrong (that is, to be a moral authority), and to do what is right and avoid doing what is wrong (that is, to be a moral exemplar).

Being a moral authority is not easy, because there are many different moral considerations, and they sometimes pull us in different directions, and because it's not always easy to predict the world and how it behaves or responds to our actions. The answers to moral and political questions are often vague.

But we can nonetheless do much to increase our understanding of the different moral considerations and dilemmas we face, even if it is difficult to come to clear and uncontroversial moral answers in every situation.

We should do the right thing -- that is, be moral exemplar -- in part to avoid doing anything wrong, but also to set a good example. Our conduct should inspire others to see that doing the right thing is possible, manageable, and feasible (ideally, that it can be done with a smile and without regret).

Our knowledge is supposed to inform our actions: we're supposed to do what we think is right, and not do what we think is wrong. But, of course, we sometimes fail to do this. We either do something we believe we shouldn't have done, or don't do something we believe we should have done. In other words, we fail to practice what we preach.

This often results in charges of hypocrisy. And, certainly, saying one thing while doing another is an inconsistency that needs to be resolved. But we shouldn't immediately conclude that because someone doesn't practice what they preach means that what they preach is false. Somebody might be failing as a moral exemplar, but that doesn't mean they're failing as a moral authority.

Aiding the Needy

Need -- and having compassion for those in need -- is a moral consideration related to justice. It concerns our response to suffering and want. As with merit and culpability, need concerns equitable treatment, rather than equal treatment. That is, we give extra consideration to people who are suffering or needy.

We have an obligation to help others who are in need. This obligation is influenced by a variety of factors.

Different Kinds and Degrees of Need

For instance, severity and urgency play a role. The more severe someone's suffering (and, therefore, need) is, the greater a priority it is for us to aid them. In the emergency room, priority is given to those who are in greater pain or more likely to die without treatment.

Another factor is helplessness. A greater priority should be given to those who lack the ability to fulfill their own needs. For instance, an infant and I may both be hungry, but I'm an adult: I have the money and mobility to go to the store or the refrigerator to help myself. An infant, on the other hand, has no such ability. (And, left on their own, they may eat something that does more to harm them.) So, of the two of us, the infant deserves more actual help in the name of aiding the needy.

Still another factor has to do with one's culpability or responsibility for being in need. It's one thing if I can't pay my bills because a burglar has stolen all of my money; my need is then largely someone else's fault. But, suppose that, instead, I can't pay my bills because I've lost all my money gambling: I might need precisely the same amount of money (i.e., the severity of my need is the same), but my right to ask for assistance from others doesn't seem as strong, because it's really my own fault that my money is gone. I could have held on to it if I had behaved responsibly, rather than losing it in a game of chance.

Illustrative Examples

It's clear how the above considerations make it difficult to come to clear judgments about how much we should give to whom:

Suppose you have two patients, one who is in excruciating pain -- but it is not a pain that will effect their long-term health or functioning -- and another patient, who is in only mild pain -- but who will lose an arm or lung if they do not get treatment right away. Who should you help first?

Suppose a family -- say, two parents, two children -- are destitute, and about to lose their house for lack of money. But, the reason they have no money is because the parents lost it all gambling. Should you give them any money? If you don't, the children suffer for the irresponsibility of their parents. If you do, you're shielding the parents from their failure to behave responsibly (worse, the parents may go on to gamble away the money you give them). What do you do?

Another: a drunk driver hits a child, and both are injured. The driver needs immediate attention, or he will die. The child needs immediate attention, or he will lose a limb, though he will not die. The driver's need is more severe, but the child is suffering through no fault of their own, whereas the driver was behaving irresponsibly. Supposing you can only help one, who do you help?

Another: suppose that an elderly driver hits a child, but this time it is purely an accident, and neither of them is at fault. Each needs immediate attention, or they will die. If you can only help one, which will it be?

This last example introduces still more considerations effecting our duty to render aid: each individual has a past history and future prospects for their own individual happiness, as well as a past history and future prospects for contributing to the happiness of others. The child hasn't had much of a chance to live life at all; the elderly driver has. The child also has more potential to be of service to others in the future; the elderly driver has less, given that they would die of old age soon. But, suppose the elderly driver is a gifted doctor whose research could help alleviate disease. Or, suppose the elderly driver is a philanthropist who has spent his life making sacrifices in order to help others. What if he says, "I've been making sacrifices all my life in order to help others, and all I want now is to live a couple more years of life. Haven't I earned that?" As a matter of merit, does he now deserve to live more than the child? But, then, the child hasn't lived long enough to contribute significantly to the lives of others, so is it a fair comparison?

Conclusion

I know that these situations appear artificial, but they are really not so different from what we face in real life. We have an obligation to help, but we simply can't help everyone. Therefore, the only way to treat everyone equally is to not help anyone at all, and that's a terrible conclusion to reach. We must help, but we're going to have to set priorities with respect to who we should help first, and whose needs can wait.

Unfortunately, the considerations that we appeal to in order to set these priorities -- severity, helplessness, culpability, past merits and future prospects (and maybe even more that I haven't mentioned) -- aren't straightforward. In fact, they may actually make it even tougher to sort things out.

So, while it's very easy to say "Help the needy!", it's far more difficult to say how we should do so, and who should get priority over who else.