Customer Reviews

The New Golden Rule: Community And Morality In A Democratic Society

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My eyes glazed over in places, and I had to struggle to finish the book, but on balance believe the author provides a learned introduction to social ethics and the topic of how morality, community, and democracy are inter-twined.

My over-arching note on the book is that information can and should be a moral force, and a force for good within any community.

The author's bottom line is that morality must be inherent in the individual--it cannot be imposed, only taught--that those who consider themselves religious are not necessarily moral, and that politicians cannot be neutral on moral relativism, or they open the door to moral extremists.

Among my notes in the margins, inspired by the author: cannot turn responsibility into duty; citizens failing to be socially responsible can open the door to tyranny; anarchy comes with excessive autonomy--deviance allowed is deviance redefined as acceptable; communitarians may be an alternative to the extreme right, something is needed with the collapse of the democrats; organizational morality is important--should corporations be allowed to degrade and exploit humans in the name of "neutral" economic values?; shared values are the heart of sensible sustainable policy making; laws can inspire corruption and crime; inherent morality is the opposite; many policies (e.g. transportation, housing, education) do not provide for social impact evaluation; no such thing as "value free" anything; monolithic communities harm the multi-layered community.

Given seven layers of dialog, from neighborhood to national, it is possible to have every citizen participate in a national dialog in the course of a single day. This makes it irresponsible for any of us to accept a political process that claims to be value neutral while opening the door for extremists. I have said this, but this excellent book documents it: you get the government you deserve. Participate, or lose it.

The word 'free association.' As in, societies, plural. The author posits a singular 'the "S"ociety, as if such were inevitably formable, as by forced association, and then proceeds to speak for what is best for 'it.'

Society, from the latin, socius: ally, known companion, as in, we freely choose our socius under a model of free -association.- In the American political context, we enjoy the tools of all of the 1st Amendment -- including and especially free speech, to clearly identify ourselves to each other for the purpose of selecting our socius, to define friend from fool-- no matter how we define friend, no matter how we define fool. If we do not actually have that freedom, then in fact, there is just one singular "S"ociety, and we are chosen for it before our birth. That distinguishes totalitarianism from individual freedom. We are one nation, composed of many societies, dedicated to our mutual freedom -- ultimately from each other.

Those of us with more or less stronger influence by our atavistic herd mentality genes rail at the hairshirt of individual liberty unequally. In America, barely yet, it is still possible to freely form societies, plural, under a model of free association. We have yet to concede Durkheim's lament (that ancient mankind has for centuries mistaken the totem 'God' for "S"ociety/the tribe, that "S"ociety is the True God, the state is its proper church, and it is the proper function of the state to 'socialize' the population via the machinery of state: exactly what we should expect in any Theocracy.

A reason for the appearance of such a more muscular 'R'eligion over a hundred years ago can be found by reading Scott Nearing's "Social Religion" from 1906, available on Google Books. Traditional 'R'eligions weren't muscular enough about pursuing Jesus' mission here on earth, and so...

Durkheim, prominently, in his summary of Religious Formes:

"Society is not at all the illogical or a-logical, incoherent and fantastic being which has too often been considered. Quite on the contrary, the collective consciousness is the highest form of psychic life, since it is the consciousness of consciousness. Being placed outside of and above individual and local contingencies, it sees things only in their permanent and essential aspects, which it crystallizes into communicable ideas. At the same time that it sees from above, it sees farther; at every moment of time it embraces all known reality; that is why it alone can furnish the minds with the moulds which are applicable to the totality of things and which make it possible to think of them."

The New Golden Rule, indeed. Now a brand new Holy Ghost has a seat at the table of mankind-- equally abusable for political leg lifting as the last Holy Ghost. Do unto "S"ociety as you would have it do unto you. After all, the collective consciousness is the highest form of psychic life, since it is the consciousness of consciousness...