Swadharma

First, many thanks to everyone who showed up to the discussion on the sources of Dharma! I learned a lot from listening to everyone, and certainly many things that I had left in the background came forward and demanded to be addressed.

Before I dive into a new thought for this week, I wanted to reiterate the working definition of “morality” that we tentatively agreed upon, and in doing so quickly summarize what I remember of the discussion. (Please feel free to correct me, and to mention all the other details I’ve forgotten! I would feel terrible if I left someone out.)

• As Aneesh put it, a person’s moral framework is his/her view of the world, a system of determining what is “right” or “wrong” to the person.
• As Madhura expressed it, this view of the world can, may, and perhaps even should change with time.
• As Anjali’s and Sarvagna’s points about Two-Face and his coin of destiny showed, there is a distinction between what a person decides is moral and how that person goes about deciding what is moral. It is perfectly possible to go through life choosing our path at every moral fork by flipping a coin; what matters is the commitment we make to following through with the outcome of the coin flip.
• Indeed, as Sarvagna argued, the choices one makes of what situations to “flip a coin for” are themselves moral, reflecting an underlying “moral compass”, so to speak. (Evolutionary ethics / moral universals, anyone?)
• And finally, as Priya’s question at the beginning of the discussion revealed, what is “moral” here is what each one of us regards, whether consciously or subconsciously, as absolutely fundamental to our understanding of the world itself.

As discussions go, this was a substantial step forward, and I’m glad we got to discuss it in detail. There are two other questions, however, that we did not get enough time to address in the discussion after we discussed this idea of morality:

1. How does this system of morality fit in with our understanding of Dharma?
2. What happens when two different systems of morals clash?

I want to open up discussion on Question 2 in the particular context of an individual’s personal system of morals clashing with what his particular social context agrees is moral. I emphasize this context because it brings up the thorny question of cultural and moral relativism, and I want to see if we can address it in a dharmic context. I present two scenarios, and I’d like to hear your opinions on both of them.

Scenario the First:

A person sincerely believes that all red-headed women over six feet tall are spies trying to engineer a takeover of his country, and mounts a systematic campaign to kill them all. Society, shocked by his obvious insanity, locks him up in a mental asylum forever.

Scenario the Second:

A person sincerely believes that those who support and enforce untouchability are immoral and evil, and mounts a systematic campaign to kill them all. Society, shocked by his obvious insanity, locks him up in a mental asylum forever.

Is there a distinction between these two scenarios? If so, on what philosophical or moral grounds do you distinguish between them? To what extent is your response universalizable (if, that is, you think it should be)? And is there a role for Dharma here?

I look forward to reading your comments.

Related posts:

1. Introduction, dharma(s) and meta-dharma
2. “Dharma, protected, protects”
3. Living Morally Without Universal Morality
4. Hinduism, Aristotle, and the Dilemma of the Train
5. What are we waiting for?