Censorship and Moral Development

So, I just finished a paper for a Philosophy class, and I'm actually fairly content with it. I thought that people might be interested in seeing what happens when I take some time in my writing (and proof read). As always, thoughts (including disagreements) are warmly welcomed.

[begin actual paper]

What is the nature of censorship? When most people hear the word, they likely think of governmental regulations on the flow of potentially offensive materials into the public sphere. Censorship of this sort is incredibly controversial, but it is only one example of a much broader concept. Active censoring bodies exist in smaller scales in all parts of life. For example, parents wisely filter the materials their children have access to. Meanwhile social groups in all walks of life condemn certain behaviors or materials, providing a passive filter of dissuasion. Our legal and penal systems could also be understood as passive censorship. However, we must be careful to understand that not all censorship is external. After all,any time we act to manipulate our surroundings and remove certain influences, we are truly censoring our own environments.

So, what is the purpose of this sort of self-censorship? How is it related to censorship of the first sort? Fundamentally, this second form of censorship, the individual censorship, seems as though it is an active rejection of those things which influence us in ways we find undesirable – those things which lead us towards becoming people other than the people we feel we ought to be. We censor our environments in hopes of developing the sorts of characteristics – including moral characters – we feel are appropriate. In a very real way, the various forms of external censorship would seem to serve the same purpose. By actively or passively censoring our environments, others attempt to prevent us from developing traits that they would consider undesirable. This notion is clearly understood in The Republic, where Plato advocates censorship to an extreme extent in the education of his Guardians and Rulers. They are to be told no stories that would lead them to believe that there is lasting value in injustice so that they will not be tempted by it or value it themselves. They are only to listen to music that embodies the spirit and manners of courageous and just individuals so that their souls will be stirred only in that direction. In this way, they will develop a just character, and just actions will logically flow from that. My question, though, is this: Can individuals who have been coerced externally into being people characterized by seemingly moral behaviors really be said to be moral individuals? I, for one, am not certain that they can, and I will explain why I hold this opinion in the arguments that follow.

First of all, we must make an attempt to say what morality is, or at least what it means for an individual to be moral. We have said that living a life of morality is simply “living the sort of life creatures like us were meant to live”. I like this definition. It's slippery and makes it hard to declare definitively what is or is not moral, which I think is important in discussing something that deals with value systems and, as such, is inherently controversial. I also believe it to be a good definition because, as Christians, we believe that there is a certain sort of life that we, as children of God, are meant to live. We are meant to live the sorts of lives that God intends for us. So, it can be said that a moral person is one who lives the sort of life intended by God.

Once we know what it means for an individual to be moral, we need to investigate what it means for an action to be moral. We discussed two ways of describing which actions were moral and came to the conclusion that “act-based” morality – the belief that the moral standing of an action belongs to the action itself – was the inferior ideology. On the other hand, we came to a general consensus that what we called “agent-based” morality – which says an act is moral because it flows directly from a morally virtuous character – was a generally superior understanding of morality in regards to actions or behaviors. However, so long as we are taking the will of God into account when describing what it means for a person to be moral; I think we can come to a better description of what it takes for an act to be moral by taking God into account here, as well. I think that we need to describe morality in regards to behaviors as those behaviors that are characterized as being most in line with God's plan for creation. This may seem like I am pulling hairs. In particular, it would seem that a morally virtuous person (particularly by our definition) should have goals in line with God's plan; but by continuously aligning morality with the will of God, we can create and improved sense of direct connectedness between morality at different levels.

Among the chief benefits of removing morality entirely from individuals is that we can eliminate many of the dangers of relativism. There is obviously room for disagreement as to what God's intentions for creation are specifically, but I think that revelation is clear enough that, if we limit ourselves to broad terms, we should be able to reach consensus. As such, let us assert that God desires that all of creation should flourish and be redeemed to what it was before the fall. I will also make the additional claim that it is God's intention for this restoration to be brought about by agents of creation, namely humanity, and that they choose to participate in it freely.

This leads me to my chief argument that a moral character formed entirely, or even primarily, by external pressures cannot be said to be a true morality. If we want to abide by God's intentions as stated, then we must actively choose morality for ourselves. This doesn't seem to be possible if we are never truly presented with the option to choose its opposite. In order to illustrate this point more clearly, I will revisit an anecdote that we used in class.

Suppose we have two men. Both have celebrated many years of faithful marriage, never committing any acts of infidelity towards their wives. The first man is continuously tempted towards infidelity, but holds places of honor in his community that would be gravely jeopardized were he to engage in such lurid acts and be caught. So he resists his immoral tendencies in order to preserve his good standing. The second man merely never considers the act. In class, we used this story to characterize the superiority of agent-based versus act-based morality. There was a unanimous agreement at the time that the second man, in his freedom even from temptation, was the morally superior individual. Yet, I believe that this could be debated depending on what we define as the cause of this freedom from temptation.

Suppose, for a moment, that the second man has somehow been made entirely unaware that adultery is even an option. Suppose that, somehow, his environment has been affected in some extreme way so that he doesn't even know that there is potential for immorality and sin in the intimate company of every woman he encounters. Can he then really be said to be freely choosing to enact God's will for creation? If he doesn't know that there is a choice to be made, I, for one, would argue that he can't. As such, while I would agree that this man may be morally superior to the man who avoids sin entirely out of love for himself, I still don't think that he is a properly moral individual. Ultimately, I think that there is something to be said for the first man and his actual confrontation with temptation.

Before I can describe how the second man can exhibit true morality, I think that we first need to nail down a single definition of temptation. In particular, I see a need to differentiate between a knowledge of the potential for immoral behavior in a given situation and the actual desire to engage in the behavior. Let us call the first of these temptation and the second enticement. In order for the second man to be truly moral, he needs to know the temptation of extramarital relations. He needs to be aware of the ways he could potentially derive benefit from immorality without being remotely enticed by it. There must be no effort in his resistance of immorality even if he could avoid all personal consequences, for his aim cannot be to benefit only himself but all of creation.

How is it possible for a person to know the fruits of sin, though, if it is entirely against his disposition to embrace it when confronted? It may seem somewhat radical, but my next claim is that true moral character, for human beings at least, does not need to arise from purity, but will more often be the fruit of penitence. It is not merely enough to be told that something is bad and to be avoided. We are called not to avoid immorality, but to reject it outright. We must recognize why it is an aberration against creation as God intends it. We must hate immorality as God hates it. With the possible exception of instances of extreme evil, this takes experience. We may experience the sin as a victim or a practitioner; we may experience it directly or indirectly; but we need to see the ruin that immorality brings to creation in order to properly denounce it. To make sure that my implication is not confused, let me directly state that I am not claiming that it is sufficient to have experienced a sin in order to despise it. I do claim that in order to properly despise a sin, it is necessary to have some personal experience with it.

Complaints could certainly be leveraged against this claim. Notably, it would seem that we should never condone participation in immorality, even if it leads to a genuine love of morality. Similarly, most would argue that we should never wish the pain of victimization on anybody. I find it difficult to disagree with either of these claims, but we live in a world where escaping sin's grasp is not a possibility, and I will always maintain that it is more important to learn from our failures and the pain around us than to obsess over never failing and turn our eyes from the ugliness that pervades the world. I feel that the lives of the Saints provide ample evidence in my favor.

My final claim also relates to the importance of experience. Creation is immense, and we are called to experience it – to know the beauty and the ugliness present in it. In the article we read by Bloom, he expressed concern with regards to the development of individuals who grew up finding their soul's delight in works created by blatantly immoral individuals. While I recognize the danger here, I would say that, given the state of the world, it is not entirely undesirable. It is incredibly important that we recognize that good works can come from seemingly less than good people. This is an inherent part of grace, and learning how to differentiate between the artistic and redemptive qualities of an action or a product and the moral character of its perpetrator or creator is an essential part of living in this world as a true Christian. We cannot simply reject that which is created by immoral people as being inherently unworthy of our admiration and still claim to have respect for the intrinsic goodness of God's creation.

At this point, I should recognize the value of censorship in various forms. I think that active censorship, such as that practiced by parents and even governmental organizations, is necessary to a point. While it is important that we struggle with the reality of sin and evil once we are mature enough to do so, there is no reason not to prevent undeveloped, impressionable minds from encountering evils they are not yet ready to understand within the greater concept of our mission. I am simply arguing that not allowing a person to hear certain words or view certain acts does nothing to help them understand why they are destructive. If we control our environments too strongly, we run the risk of preventing these developing individuals we are trying to protect form developing the righteous indignation towards immorality that is required to truly work to end it. Worse yet, we can keep them ignorant of the very existence of immorality in their midst.

Similarly, I believe that passive censorship in the form of legal penalties or social consequences also plays an important role in society. We are creatures of community, and the attitudes of our peers rightly ought to influence the way we change and grow to fit the microcosm of the world we help to define. Similarly, not everybody can be counted on to develop a truly morally virtuous character; sometimes we need to merely encourage behavior that is generally in line with that of a moral individual. However, we can cross borders here, as well. By too actively trying to push people away from certain behaviors or influences, we can prevent them from understanding why the influence is wrong. Moreover, we run the risk of failing to engage in parts of creation, which allows us to miss some of it's God given beauty and/or leave our work of restoration incomplete.

Ultimately, though, I believe that the problem with extreme censorship in terms of moral development is that it encourages the formation of an act-based view of morality. If we allow others to form our environment and our perceptions of reality. we may develop a character that consistently chooses the morally “correct” option, but we will understand our actions as being moral because they follow certain patterns. If we don't understand the purpose of our behaviors relative to at least a vague notion of God's will (either directly inspired by a recognition of God's status as our benevolent creator or simply through the blessing of grace), then can we truly be said to have the character of a moral individual? I don't believe that we can. As I have stated in places already, I believe that a moral character needs to arise from a sober and personal understanding of sin's impact on creation. A perfect moral character shares in God's hatred of sin and evil and works not to avoid it because it is wrong, but to eradicate it because it is unnatural. Passion requires experiential knowledge, and this, fundamentally, is what censorship denies us.