[Xmca-l] Re: Appeal for help
Andy Blunden
ablunden@mira.net
Tue Jul 5 03:15:10 PDT 2016
I understand what Elinami and you, Carol, are saying. My
unwillingness to acknowledge this idea without qualification
is that the idea that "honour" is such a factor in the
self-consciousness of people not from liberal-individualist
capitalist societies is associated with the denigration of
other cultures. Suicide and depression (when not leading to
actual suicide) are at almost epidemic levels in these
liberal-individualist societies. Why? Well, that's too big a
question, probably, but the feeling of aloneness, the
feelings of uselessness, powerlessness, isolation and the
meaninglessness of life for many in the "west," is really
not a lot different from "loss of honour". But generally
throwing acid on your wife or killing your son-in-law are,
not, thank heavens, seen as ways of restoring meaning and
coherence in life in our countries.
Families, yes, the family is the most important project in
the lives of probably most people. And no, it will be a week
before Australians know what government we shall have. Last
time it took 17 days. Was such a pleasure watching the
Conservatives discovering that not everyone loved them.
Rob, yes, you are talking about my topic here. But instead
of saying: "the project has very definitely shaped the
virtues its proponents hold," I say the individuals express
the virtues (or lack thereof) of the project. And in virtue
ethics, a natural virtue which allows people to do bad
things, which they would not do if they could exercise moral
wisdom to control their actions, are imperfect, they are not
really virtues. "Fools rush in where angels fear to tread"
for example.
Andy
------------------------------------------------------------
Andy Blunden
http://home.mira.net/~andy
http://www.brill.com/products/book/origins-collective-decision-making
On 5/07/2016 7:25 PM, Carol Macdonald wrote:
> Elinami and Andy
>
> Perhaps, as a fellow African, I can tell Andy that this is
> definitely stronger in African than in Western societies.
> But I am going to go a step further. In totally Islamic
> societies (not for example UK or USA) there is even a
> higher, or perhaps I should say more virulent sense of
> honour, so families might commit honour killings, if they
> perceive the honour of the family to be sullied. As a
> woman I feel very strongly against the killing or burning
> or acid attacks on young women who want to choose their
> life partner.
>
> I know we all feel a little sensitive about islamic issues
> right now, so perhaps we can move on to blood feuds in
> traditional societies (for example in Polynesia).
>
> Any what is the status of the family as a project? It
> certainly takes its character from the larger culture of
> which it is part, but may be either fluid or completely
> rigid. Is it constructed anew with every wedding or
> partnership.
>
> Carol
>
> PS I think the Aus elections might be a case of two many
> "virtues" chasing the same electorate. I expect we will
> know the outcome today.
>
> On 5 July 2016 at 08:14, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net
> <mailto:ablunden@mira.net>> wrote:
>
> I think this is true of *all* cultures, Elinami.
>
> Andy
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> Andy Blunden
> http://home.mira.net/~andy <http://home.mira.net/%7Eandy>
> http://www.brill.com/products/book/origins-collective-decision-making
>
> On 5/07/2016 4:08 PM, Elinami Swai wrote:
>
> Dear Andy. Coming from gender studies, the
> concepts of 'family honor,'
> and/or 'culture of honor' come to mind where a
> person's identity
> depends largely on family and culture.
>
>
>
> On 05/07/2016, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net
> <mailto:ablunden@mira.net>> wrote:
>
> Comrade and friends, I need some help.
>
> I am setting about developing a new approach
> to virtue
> ethics. Virtues are everywhere taken to be
> deep-seated
> attributes of a person's character; my aim is
> to make the
> starting point instead from virtues defined as
> deep-seated
> attributes of a project, which you can take to
> mean "social
> context" or "system of activity" if you wish.
> I don't need
> advice about issues and problems of ethics,
> but it is in in
> the nature of virtue ethics that it always has
> strong
> implications for psychology as well as social
> theory, to the
> extent that I think I can make a great deal of
> progress by
> calling on psychological data.
>
> Can people point me to research(ers) about how
> a person's
> character changes with social context (e.g.
> home/work), any
> evidence of the well-known phenomenon in which
> a person
> promoted above the ability suffers a moral
> degeneration; any
> suitable and reliable data about the differing
> character
> (not just preferences or cognition, but
> virtues) of people
> from one culture or another? or similar
> information about
> changes in a person's character following
> their emigration
> to another country?
>
> URLs appreciated, or whole books, I don't have
> access to a
> university library or JSTOR.
>
> Thanks
>
> Andy
>
> --
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> Andy Blunden
> http://home.mira.net/~andy
> <http://home.mira.net/%7Eandy>
> http://www.brill.com/products/book/origins-collective-decision-making
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> --
> Carol A Macdonald Ph.D (Edin)
> Developmental psycholinguist
> Honorary Research Fellow: Department of Linguistics, Unisa
> alternative email address: tmacdoca@unisa.ac.za
> <mailto:tmacdoca@unisa.ac.za>
>
>
>
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