A Different Slant on Moral Relativism

The right thunders nonstop about the left's "moral relativism." Meanwhile the left thunders nonstop about the right's "hypocrisy." Well, they both have a point about each other. Neither seems to have a mirror in their house, though.

Actually, as far as I can tell neither left wing nor right wing zealots give a fig about the truth. Instead they divide the world into what I call "Goodfacts" and "Badfacts"–straight out of Orwell's Brave New World.

Goodfacts are pieces of information which might be true or false, but which, if accepted, promote the zealot's agenda. Badfacts are the reverse.

Extra points for Goodfacts which are exactly true but taken out of context, such that if you considered the context you'd go the opposite way. De- or Mis-contextualized Goodfacts are Extra-Goodfacts.

BTW I use the terms "right wing" and "left wing" because the terms "Liberal" and "Conservative" have become Goodfacts themselves that have largely lost contact with what they meant denotatively.

Example of a Goodfact: "The economy is booming and employment's at an all time high. Therefore anyone who complains about the economy is just a leftie who hates America."

This enshrines a right wing Extra-Goodfact. It is true that the economy is booming, and it is true that employment's high. But it's also true that less than 1% of America's richest have appropriated nearly all the increase in this booming economy. This expropriation of the improvement in the GNP has actually reduced the economic circumstances of the median American wage earner. Not by a lot, but enough to make this the first recovery from a recession in which ordinary wage earners have not prospered.

And while employment is high, so is overwork--people are being forced to labor more hours per week than those in any other advanced country, with the possible exception of Japan.

There's more, but suffice to say here that when you add in other equally true facts (Badfacts to right wingers) you get a very different picture.

Now here's an example of a Goodfact for the other side: "Undocumented immigrants."
The left loves this one. In just two words this Goodfact (from the left wing point of view) tilts the playing field of the debate.

"Immigrant" is all of our ancestors (yes, even our Indian ancestors--they didn't evolve here; they walked over the Bering land bridge during glacier advances that lowered the sea level). "Immigrant" is hardworking, honest, humble, courageous, devoted to family.

"Undocumented" hardly sounds illegal. Sounds like you just left your papers in a drawer at home. Together they imply what's needed is for us to supply these honest, hardworking folk the documents they in the country they want to inhabit--ours.

However. The problem is that while "immigrant" applies to many of the people described this way, it does not describe those who don't plan to settle here, but who plan instead to return to their home country after earning some money. Such people are international migrant workers, but they're not immigrants. Look up "immigrant" in any dictionary.

Also, a certain number of border crossers come here to commit crimes. That's a Badfact.

Even if such people intend to settle here permanently I have trouble calling social parasites like these "immigrants." They're criminal trespassers. Of whom 280,000 have been convicted of serious felonies and currently reside in federal prisons at taxpayer expense. Of whom uncounted others are in state prisons and county jails. It wouldn't be much of a stretch to estimate that a million foreigners here illegally are currently imprisoned here. Then add in all the ones who haven't been caught, and who are busily engaged in human sex trafficking, immigrant trafficking, drug trafficking, robbery, rape, murder, identity theft--and don't call ID theft a victimless crime unless you talk to some of the victims.

So you can't call them all immigrants. Many are, but many aren't.

Likewise "undocumented" isn't necessarily true. After all, if someone has a Mexican birth certificate they certainly are documented. The term doesn't specify the nationality of the documents. An alien visiting here from a country we don't require visas from wouldn't have American documents--he'd have his own country's passport--yet he wouldn't be considered undocumented. And if someone has a phony socieal security card, they're documented--it's just a false document.

OTOH "illegal alien" means a foreigner who's in this country illegally. You don't have to know whether they intend to reside here permanently. You don't have to know whether they have various documents establishing their identity (legally or otherwise). But "illegal alien" is a Badfact by left wing standards, because it has a whiff of...well, illegality. Right wingers consider it a Goodfact for the same reasons, but in this case the denotation of the term is actually correct.

Fellow centrists, I hope this helps you in dealing with the whirly-eyes, whatever wing they cling to. BTW have you noticed that some of the wackiest zealots formerly belonged to the opposite wacky extreme? Bush's favorite philosopher that he actually follows is right wing fundamentalist Marvin Olasky (pictured above)--who used to be in the Communist Party.

Makes no difference intellectually. He's still floating in the world of Goodfacts and Badfacts.