Cultural Relativism

Paper Summary:

This paper discusses the topic of morality. Specifically, it asserts that a decent human being is not one who accepts transient consensus about what attitudes are normal and what practices are unjust. If anything, what counts as a decent human being is the independent moral decency to ignore transient consensus and societal attitudes to whatever extent transient consensus and societal attitudes obviously violate objective principles of fundamental fairness, equity, human empathy, and decency.

From the Paper:

"Considering the way that social convention arises in the first place provides another reason to reject the suggestion that social convention is a reliable determinant of what constitutes moral conduct and what distinguishes it from immoral conduct. Among a small isolated group of people, (such as a group of 20 individuals stranded on an island), social convention probably does reflect true majority consensus. Not that majority consensus necessarily corresponds to morality, but that would be the only possible logical basis for defining morality through social convention at all. Even in a group of 20 individuals, it is still possible that the minority position is more moral (objectively) than that of the majority, but at least the majority position does, in fact, reflect the desires of the true majority."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Douglass, F. (1995) Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass. New York: Dover.
• Kluger, J. (2007) What Makes Us Moral? Time Magazine; Vol. 170 No. 23, Dec. 3/07 (pp. 54-60)
• Taylor, R. (1989) Freedom, Anarchy, and the Law: An Introduction to Political Philosophy. Buffalo: Prometheus.

More papers on Cultural Relativism:

• Analytical Essay # 123383 : "The Philosophy of Cultural Relativism"
• Book Review # 127746 : "The Challenge of Cultural Relativism"
• Term Paper # 127778 : "God, Morality and Cultural Relativism"
• Essay # 40179 : "Cultural Relativism in Philosophy"

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