Tyler Vela

Apologetics Research Paper

Moral Relativism:
Lifting Ourselves Up By Our Own Coat Collars

If I were to say something such as “I cannot speak a word of English,” not

only would you look at me like I was a fool, I would be speaking a fallacy. It would

be quite apparent that the sentence just uttered from my lips would be a self-

defeating thought. By its very existence it refutes its own reality. I obviously

speak at least seven English words. This is an illustration of Relativism in

general. Relativism is the concept that all truth is relative to some structure of

thought or singular experience. Rather than speaking on English, relativism

would say, “there are no absolute truths.” The reason that this would be a self-

vanquishing proclamation ought to be equally clear. Either this statement about

truth is false, and some absolutes do, in truth, exist, or all truth is indeed relative

which would make the statement that “all truth is relative” a relative statement but

asserted in an absolute manner, making it false. Which means it could either be

absolute or false. So why believe it? You shouldn‟t. If it is still not clear that this

concept is false, consider the fact of 1+1=2 or, “I think therefore I am.” Although

this basic form of relativism is clearly false, other forms are not so easily diffused.

Religious relativism is a bit more persistent, although I think again provably false.

(Where atheism and theism coexist, contradictions abound.) The form of

relativism I will be addressing in this paper however, I consider to be the most

firm standing of the set. This manner of relativism of course is moral relativism.

Moral relativism states all moral actions (or amoral actions), from lying to

helping a little old lady across the street are derived, prescribed, and practiced

within a cultural framework. This means that in America we have moral norms

and aberrations that vary from those of Japan, the Congo or the Australian
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Aborigines. This, says the moral relativist, is due to the varying cultural

developments within the assorted societies. It seems to me that the main, if not

the only basis, for moral relativism is the mere fact that each society has its own

moral code. This does not seem to be a very solid foundation for a moral system

however. Let us think of an experimental maze in which there is only one

achievable path that will lead to the outlet. Any other path taken will lead to an

insurmountable obstacle. Let us also assume that this maze will take more than a

lifetime to finish, even if the voyager chooses the one correct path. This assures

that only the person watching the test, with full knowledge of the maze and of its

paths, will know if the traveler chose the correct path from the onset or not. Does

the mere variety of choices from the commencement mean that no choice will be

a correct one? No, the fact that there is a multitude of choices does not mean

that there is no reason to choose one or another. So does a mass of moral

frameworks necessitate relative moral truths?

Before I move on I would like to point out the falsehood that so many

people come up against when discussing moral differences. This deception is the

idea that there is a gigantic gap in the moral structures of the different cultures

from around the world from all times. Christian Apologist and scholar C.S. Lewis

writes:

If a man will go into a library and spend a few days with the
Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics he will soon discover the
massive unanimity of the practical reason of man. From the
Babylonian Hymn to Samos, from the Laws of Manu, the Book of
the Dead, the Analects, the Stoics, the Platonists, from Australian
aborigines and Redskins, he will collect the same triumphantly
monotonous denunciations of oppression, murder, treachery and
falsehood, the same injunctions of kindness to the aged, the young
and the weak, almsgiving and impartiality and honesty. He may be
a little surprised (I certainly was) to find that precepts of mercy are
more frequent than precepts of justice; but he will no longer doubt
that there is such a thing as the Law of Nature. (Lewis 106)

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 With that said, let us proceed as if it hadn‟t because many will, for some

reason or another, not believe it. Let us continue with the notion that major

differences do exist, because that is the general platform from which moral

relativist chose to debate from. And even from there, I believe that their theory

will still plummet.

Although I believe moral relativism is overall a false theory, it does have a

couple of truthful points. In general, our moral framework is based on the culture

that we are brought up in. We start thirty paces into the maze. And unlike the

maze, no single framework has it completely accurate, and I would argue that in

general no single framework has it completely mistaken. Nevertheless, this does

not mean, like I have said before, that moral truth or truths do not exist or cannot

be found. I argue that just as we see some people as being amoral within our

own code, some moral frameworks are simply amoral within the absolute moral

law. I will attempt to show that if moral relativism were the only viable choice, we

would lose all right to judge others of their obviously egregious actions. (If you

disagree that I can call them wrong then consider the torture, rape, and murder of

babies for fun or simply Nazi Germany and wonder if you could stand by the

concept that no one can call an action completely immoral.) Moral relativism

fights against our intuition and our common sense. We have an innate duty to

justice and mercy yet within moral relativism, justice falls to the wayside. C.S.

Lewis once said this:

Unless there is some objective standard of good, over-arching the

Germans, Japanese and ourselves alike whether any of us obey it
or no, then of course the Germans are as competent to create their
own ideology as we are to create ours. If „good‟ and „better‟ are
terms deriving their sole meaning from the ideology of each people,
then of course ideologies themselves cannot be better or worse
than one another. Unless the measuring rod is independent of the
things measured, we can do no measuring. (Lewis p101)

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 Two points I would like to extract from this assertion by Lewis are these;

first, it is key to notice where Lewis states “whether we obey it or no.” This means

that in our society, we judge many people. We look at pedophiles, rapists,

murderers, and men like Dahmer and Bin Laden, as extremely immoral. We

recognize that they do not comply with the moral measuring rod that Lewis spoke

of. But does their disobedience to those morals mean that they are not objective

but subjective to culture? People break the speed limit every day. Does that give

us the right to look a policeman in the eye and tell them that we shouldn‟t get the

ticket she is writing because that law is subjective? So is it not possible that there

are moral laws that we simply break in the same way that we break our own

legalities?

The second point I would like to discuss is Lewis‟ final statement about the

measuring rod. Unless the moral code is somewhere external to us, meaning not

invented by man, then we are indeed left with the conclusion of moral relativism.

If we do not have an external moral law, then the moral standard was undeniably

derived from men and therefore who is to say which men were correct in their

moral assessments? The moral code must be external to humankind. Lewis later

echoes this by stating this about the relativist:

…he does not fully realize that those who create conscience cannot
be subject to the conscience themselves… If „good‟ means only the
local ideology, how can those who invent the local ideology be
guided by any idea of good themselves? The very idea of freedom
presupposes some objective moral law which overarches rulers
and ruled alike. (Lewis p111)

Francis J. Beckwith asserts three major reasons why moral relativism

must be false. First, he states that if moral relativism were true then we would be

unable to make moral assessments like, “Mother Teresa was better than Adolph

Hitler; rape is always wrong; it is wrong to torture babies for fun.”

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(Geisler/Hoffman p19) And the inclination inside all of us is that Mother Teresa is

actually morally less corrupt than Hitler was, and that this is not only true in our

own framework but in all frameworks. We would have no reason to see one

action as more morally acceptable than another.

Secondly, Beckwith says that if the relativist is going to claim that moral

conduct is individually based, then they will face another judicial impossibility.

That is, what ought we to do when individual moral frameworks conflict? It is

guaranteed that Dahmer had a very different outlook on cannibalism then did his

neighbor who was his victim. Needless to say, there is obviously a conflict of

interest from time to time.

Finally, Beckwith states that if the relativist maintains that morals are

qualified by their culture, then they will arrive full force into three more

impossibilities. The first of these is that it would be self-refuting. He states this by

saying,

…the cultural relativist is making an absolute and universal moral

claim, namely, that everyone is morally obligated to follow the moral
norms of his or her own culture. If this moral norm is neither
absolute nor universal, then cultural relativism is still false, for in
that case I would not have a moral obligation to follow the moral
norms of my culture. (Geisler/Hoffman p22)

The second quandary observed if morals are culturally based, is that there

is no way to impartially decide which culture‟s morals (and even which

subculture‟s norms) we ought to decide from. What is a cultural norm but the

moral code from some dominating subculture? But each subculture can be

reduced down further to the majority in the subculture and then further and

further until we come back to individual moral codes. Think of it this way. We

have a “national” moral framework. However, this is only the common ground

between various subcultural frameworks. Then further, these subcultural

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frameworks are again only the major agreements between the proponents of that

subculture. This can go on and on until we come down to individual moral

systems, which I have already been proven inconsistent with moral relativism.

Finally, without some standard of moral absolutes, there can be no real

moral progress. It would be utterly impossible to say that one culture was even

changing for better or for worse without some standard to measure it by. “Yet

who can reasonably deny that the abolition of slavery in the United States was an

instance of genuine moral progress?” (Geisler/Hoffman p23) We often say that

we have become more morally enlightened and even sometimes say we have

become more civilized or less savage than our earlier counterparts. This is

impossible without moral progress. Lewis also writes about moral progress in his

essay entitled The Poison of Subjectivism. Lewis writes:

If good is a fixed point, it is at least possible that we should get

nearer and nearer to it; but if the terminus is as mobile as the train,
how can the train progress towards it? Our ideas of the good may
change, but they cannot change either for the better or the worse if
there is no absolute and immutable good to which they can
approximate or from which they can recede. We can go on getting
a sum more and more nearly right only if one perfectly right answer
is „stagnant‟.

As a side note, Beckwith also adds that if morals are relative to culture,

then those who we consider to be great moral leaders such as Jesus, Gandhi

and Martin Luther King Jr. are nothing more than advocators of their own

individual moralities, and therefore are bandits raiding the territory of our own

freedom to create our individual moral system.

Beckwith also states that moral relativism is self-destructive because it is

its own absolute. What that means is that it would claim that we ought to be

moral within our own moral structures. But is that not a moral absolute? It

unknowingly contends that everyone ought to be obligated to follow the moral

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norms of his or her own moral communities (Geisler/Hoffman p22). This is a

universal “ought to” that is to be prescribed to all people of all places at all times.

In essence it states, “Doing what is right within your moral code is the right thing

to do.” That is an absolute not to be challenged within moral relativism. If we can

find one absolute moral, then moral relativism must be false. And let us even say

that the relativist says that even this universal is just as relative as the next. Then

what? We are not even proper in doing what is moral in our own moral

framework? If this were true, then we creep nearer and nearer to moral nihilism.

So why is this idea, that moral norms are somehow united with some

mass cultural dictate about how we ought to act, such a popular mode of

thought? I believe it is derived from two dominant rationales. The first, as I have

acknowledged previously, is the sheer enormity of moral constructs varying from

culture to culture. I will explore this in more detail presently. The second of these,

I believe, is the push for tolerance across cultural boundaries. Now tolerance on

its own is not an evil or harmful notion. In fact, it is quite admirable. However, I

will argue that within moral relativism, the very tolerance that it seeks to promote,

actually ends up being abolished.

With that said, let me now address in more depth the idea of variety or

moral norms as a proof for a relative moral system. As I have stated before with

the maze illustration, the mere variety of choice does not negate the possibility

that there is one moral code to which all moral codes ought to measure up to. Let

us for now think of moral A as some moral proposition that is consistent and

believed to be true in the general populous of the United States. If someone were

to break moral A we would not say that it was because they had a different moral

proposition in opposition to A. Instead, we instinctively assert that they are

somehow acting immoral in regards to A. Often the moral relativist will even say
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that the person who commits A simply has a different moral code about it.

However, contrary to that allegation, the accused most likely knows, with the

exception of the ignorant or the deranged, that they did undeniably break the

code. We often recognize that we have been immoral. “There is a difference

between imperfect sight and blindness,” (Lewis p108). Someone can be immoral

within a moral construct, without creating a new moral system. Within moral

relativism I would be wholly justified in doing whatever I felt was acceptable

according to my moral scaffolding, because as I have shown before, in moral

relativism, the culture has no right to judge my moral actions since I can claim

sanctuary in my framework. But we, more often than not, observe the contrary.

Even within our own individual moral laws, we recognize that we do indeed make

immoral decisions and commit unscrupulous acts. Without some moral standard,

we would feel no guilt or remorse over our actions because we would be acting

out from our own morality. But indeed, we often feel such feelings. We feel bad

when we lie to friends. We often feel guilt for our wrong actions. It is possible that

whole moral frameworks are off, is it not? How often have we not felt guilt for an

action until years after when we recognized its grievance? We are not always

enlightened, even in our own morals, to what is right or what is wrong.

We also find that the variety of moral programs works against moral

relativism instead of for it. Consider the basic claim of the relativist in regards to

disagreement about morality: “the fact that there is disagreement means that

there are no absolute truths about morality.” But I say to this relativist, I believe

there are moral absolutes. Has not my simple disagreement with him then made

his own position untrue? After all, his position is that disagreement eradicates

truth. So according to the relativist, he and I would both be incorrect. Hadley

Arkes states,
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 “My disagreement establishes that the proposition [i.e.,
disagreement means there is no truth] does not enjoy universal
assent, and by the very terms of it the proposition, that should be
quite sufficient to determine its own invalidity,” (Geisler/Hoffman
p19).

So if relativism were the accepted moral philosophy, even though it is

false, that leaves us neither here nor there. We must then either have moral

absolutes or else all morality is invalid! What a world that would be! We would

have no reason whatsoever to teach our children that lying, stealing, murder and

rape are immoral actions.

The second reason to endorse moral relativism was for the promotion of

moral tolerance and the elimination of ethnocentrism. After all, who are we to

judge another culture? However, what we actually find is that relativism is only

tolerant of those beliefs to which it decides to be tolerant to and it is again self-

refuting and it destroys, as I have briefly hinted at before, any right to justice for

wrong doings.

To start with, to assume that tolerance is a chief goal of the moral truth

seeker is to assume that it is an absolute good. To be tolerant is to be morally

„better‟ than being intolerant. I would not argue with this proposition but I also

have no issue seeing it as an absolute with in my absolute moral code.

Another reason that relativism is in point of fact anti-tolerance is because it

itself is an intolerant and arrogant position to maintain. It is a system that

Beckwith calls “judgmental, exclusivist and partisan,” (Geisler/Hoffman p25). He

states that if you do not agree with the relativistic claims (not his claims of which

morals are true, but his overall claim that morality is relative) then you are wrong,

so it judges (while claiming not to judge.) Then if you claim to be an absolutist, it

“excludes your belief from the realm of legitimate options” so it is then exclusive,

(Geisler/Hoffman p 25). And finally since only those thinkers who believe that
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morality is relative will be allowed into the “correct thinking” party, it is also

partisan, (Geisler/Hoffman p25).

Tolerance makes sense only within the framework of a moral order,

for it is within such a framework that one can morally justify
tolerating some things while not tolerating others. Tolerance without
a moral framework, or absolute tolerance, leads to a dogmatic
relativism, and thus to an intolerance of any viewpoint that does not
embrace relativism. (Geisler/Hoffman p25)

Finally, without any sense of moral absolutes, there can be no real

rationalization for any judicial action. Whether this be from a cultural or an

individual standpoint, I would not be able to rationally justify saying one action is

wrong. Genital mutilation in Africa would be just as morally acceptable as reading

my children a bedtime story before tucking them in at night. Nazi Germany was

just as right in committing genocide of over six million Jews as I am in feeding the

hungry at the local soup kitchen. After all, who would I be to judge one moral

platform according to my own? This should raise the hair on your back. It is clear

to us, and I would suspect to all moral frameworks, that the slaughter of six

million people, innocent or not, is much more wrong, if not even in the slightest

degree, than loving our children. I‟m sure the officers in charge of the gas

chambers would have much rather been at home with their children than

slaughtering these people in their camps, even if they did approve of their own

actions. Without some system of moral absolutes, it is impossible for us to

evaluate the right and wrong doings of others in our subcultures, super cultures,

nations and then outreaching into the entirety of humankind.

Does the diversity, or seeming diversity, of moral codes really validate a

system of thought that prescribes all morality as relative? If we ascribe to such a

belief system what ought we to do with the blatant and blaring contradictions that

it generates? What do we do when faced with obvious moral wickedness?

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Conversely, would praise still be appropriately given to those who do „right‟ and

promotion for those who do „good‟? Moral relativism is not only self-defeating,

and unsound, it is also intolerant and discriminatory. It purges justice and

removes praise. It has nothing solid to stand on and no reason, even by its own

precepts, to accept it. C.S. Lewis ends his essay with this thought, and since it is

befitting I will end mine with it as well. He states that even while the relativist

assumes no morals are absolute, they, in their daily life, seek leaders of good

morals, trustworthy friends and faithful wives. Lewis records, “But give me a man

who will do a day‟s work for a day‟s pay, who will refuse bribes, who will not

make up his facts and who has learned to do his job,” (Lewis p112). And I

resonate that. As for the moral relativist, let him try to live his philosophy and see

how quickly, though unwittingly, he falls back into the habits of the absolutist.

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