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What Is Ethical Relativism

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What Is Ethical Relativism
Ethical relativism is the theory that morality is relative to the norms of one's culture. That is, the moral norms of the society practiced depend on whether an action is right or wrong. But, the problem with moving from cultural perspective to cultural relativism is rather than saying, “we need to understand the morals of other cultures,” it says, “we cannot judge the morals of other cultures,” regardless of the reasons for their actions. The same action may be right in one society but be wrong in another. Thus, you cannot judge another's culture if you do not understand it. You would have to be apart of the culture to comprehend motives and beliefs to judge them. It is the only way you can understand as someone of a different culture. As cliche as it is, it's almost like they can't know any better. …show more content…
When things like this happen in our culture there is often outrage and news coverage for a week or so. I have little tolerance for any sort of behavior like this to another human being. However, it becomes gray when you try to inflict judgement or punishment from, let's say, an American standpoint. It does not work because those brought up in the Pakistani culture do not possess the same sort of thought process as someone born and raised in America. They were not brought to have the same morals and expectations we have in American culture. For example, in the Catholic church to consider something a sin there must be full knowledge and complete consent. But, this could mean they do not have full knowledge of immoral things they're doing - so can we call them

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