Prior to the
holiday season, a dear friend was alarmed at something she witnessed while
visiting Disneyland. She had watched the
Santa Claus Parade on Disneyland’s Main Street and it was the song “Santa
Claus is Coming to Town” that she found – as she put it – “creepy”.
The part of the
lyric that bothered her most was;
“He
sees you when you’re sleeping,
He
knows when you’re awake.”
You see, my friend
is Jewish and has had very minimal exposure to Christmas traditions and songs,
so imagining a bearded stranger peeking in the bedroom windows of children was
disturbing to her.
Beside being
charmed by her fresh perspective, her observations got me thinking about
imposed morality; moral behaviour elicited through a promise of reward or threat
of punishment, and continual monitoring by a supernatural being …
“He’s
making a list and checking it twice,
Going
to find out who’s naughty and nice.”
Most religions are enforced
through a system of reward and punishment in a post-death judgment ritual, and many
offer heaven or hell as the two alternative final destinations. We must answer for our “sins”. So, the message is; If you are “good”
then you will go to heaven, and if you are “bad” you will go to hell. Catholic-based religions add the third locale
of “Purgatory”
where your sins will be stripped away through a painful purification process.
In the Islamic
faith system, when men die – especially while killing the enemies of Allah -
they will be rewarded with 72 virgin sexual slaves and an eternal erection. Not sure what the women get, although some
Islamic Clerics claim that upwards of 95% of the occupants of hell are women.
But can morality
that is derived through threat of punishment and reward truly be moral? If one believes that he must live by rules of
conduct imposed by a powerful and judgmental supernatural being, can he claim
true morality? Or is he just following
orders out of fear?
There have been
hundreds of studies that clearly demonstrate that punishment does not achieve
the purpose it is intended for. Punishing
children for “bad” behaviour can result in two probable outcomes; In the
first, the child learns to lie about and conceal their actions in order to
avoid punishment; In the second, the child becomes so fearful of punishment
that they are paralyzed from taking healthy risks that can aid in their
development.
On a societal
level, the best indicator that punishment doesn’t work is that if it did, we
wouldn’t have prisons – all citizens would have learned “right” and “wrong”
in childhood through being punished at home and at school.
There is also the
question of how we can define “good” and “bad” behaviour in a
universal way. Most religions have a set
of rules that dictate these concepts, yet in real life they are often not so
clear-cut.
For example; Lying
is a sin. Yet during the Nazi occupation
during WWII, if the Gestapo arrived at your front door to ask; “Are
there any Jews living here?”
Would you lie? Or would you tell
them about the Jewish family living in your attic whom you had given protection
to?
Even more striking are
challenges to the 10 commandments such as; “Honour thy mother and thy father”. What if that mother or father was abusive to
their child? What if a parent sexually
abused their child causing long-term psychological harm? Is that child still required to “honour”
that parent?
There also is the
question of interpreting scripture. One
of the prominent arguments by the Christian right is that gay marriage should
not be allowed, this according to book of Leviticus. Yet most Christians don’t follow the rest of
Leviticus’ rules; That men aren’t allowed to shave their beards; That they
should never work on the Sabbath; That it is okay to own slaves so long as they
come from a foreign country; That having bacon on your cheeseburger is a sin.
Historic scholars
understand that the laws laid down by Leviticus were an attempt to strengthen
the tribes of Israel by protecting individuals from disease, promoting
propagation, and ensuring that members maintained their identities as Jews.
But when we are
faced with ancient laws that are no longer applicable in our modern world, who among
us gets to choose which are imposed and which are left behind in the annals of
history where they belong? Most
religions have appointed clerics or religious leaders - [some self-appointed] - who claim authority to make these
decisions; Pastors, Reverends, Priests, Rabbis, Mullahs, and so forth. Yet even with a mortal religious scholar
making moral decisions, it is still expected that the individual should comply
with that imposed morality.
As a Humanist, not
only is morality an active exploration and learning experience for me, I also ascribe
to Eric Ericson’s concept of syntonic
and dystonic to describe actions or
events and their relationship to people.
If something is syntonic, then it is beneficial to a person [such as lying to the Gestapo]. If it is dystonic, it negatively impacts a
person. To live as a Humanist requires
thoughtful consideration of all points of view – it is an active philosophic process
that does not rely on following an imposed set of rigid moral rules but rather
by following one’s reasoning, knowledge and empathy for self and others.
When I engage in
this internal debate, I am often reminded of a statement made in “The Grapes of Wrath” by John Steinbeck; A preacher, who had become
disillusioned by the suffering he saw during the Great Depression, came to the
realization that he no longer had answers.
He said that all he really knew was; “Anything living is holy. Anything that hurts it is a sin.”
Personally, I think
that’s a pretty good place to start.
