Successful Relationships Reading Corner
In this week’s blog we wrote about the only way that works: the Golden Rule. These articles have some wonderful discussions on this topic.
The Golden Rule is a post from the author of “Ethics and the Golden Rule” “Let’s consider an example of how the rule is used. President Kennedy in 1963 appealed to the golden rule in an anti-segregation speech at the time of the first black enrollment at the University of Alabama. He asked whites to consider what it would be like to be treated as second-class citizens because of skin color. Whites were to imagine themselves being black — and being told that they couldn’t vote, or go to the best public schools, or eat at most public restaurants, or sit in the front of the bus. Would whites be content to be treated that way? He was sure that they wouldn’t — and yet this is how they treated others. He said the ‘heart of the question is … whether we are going to treat our fellow Americans as we want to be treated.'”
He also has a great chronology.
Living the Golden Rule/Applied Ethics “Applied ethics studies moral issues (like lying and stealing), or moral questions in specific areas (like business or medicine). People who study applied ethics, while searching for ideas to help live better lives, are often relativistic—arguing that values vary depending on the point of view of the observer. The golden rule answers both concerns. The golden rule is a useful tool for moral living that also counters the relativism (since it’s a globally accepted norm that can be defended rationally).”
Philosophical reflections on the golden rule “The Golden Rule serves the needs of educated and uneducated people alike, and stimulates philosophers to codify its meanings in new formulations. Given the equal, basic worth of each individual, the rule implies a requirement of consistency; as Samuel Clarke put it, “Whatever I judge reasonable or unreasonable for another to do for me; that, by the same judgment, I declare reasonable or unreasonable, that I in the like case should do for him.” In addition, the Rule carries implications for social, economic, and political matters. In one form or another, with interpretations that differ and overlap, the Rule is a precious word in the shared language of our world”
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