LAWLzoR

What morals/ethics have changed? Which ones are changing now? Which might change in the future?

1) Just as a heads up, morals and ethics of an entire society are very hard to the change. This is because we're rather defensive about what we know and what we don't know. If we don't know something, but have always felt like we knew, we would feel stupid and gullible if it turned out to be false. However, as time passes, things change. That's just the gist of society. It's almost a paradox. Changing morals of a society is very difficult, but they change with the pass of about every decade or so.

Onto the question however, the morals that have changed are ones we don't really thing about today, or are still existing in the fight for. Women's rights, rights of minorities in countries where certain people are minorities, animal rights, even the idea of "men" and being "manly" are being questioned and have been questioned. But what's more important is why these things have changed, and how they mattered back then and today.

Morals or other ideas similar change because of lots of individuals. For example, let's take the Spanish conquest of the Americas, and the Women's Rights movement in the United States of the 20th century. The Spanish conquest started with a lot of support. Support from the kings, the people who explored, and even the Pope gave the conquest reason to happen. However, at around the turn of the century (17th century) people started questioning the treatment of the people who already lived there. During the conquest and colonization, many native people died due to disease and war, not to mention the mistreatment by the people who have enslaved them. Individuals questioned these actions, and from then, with pressure from other individuals, the Spaniards were forced to at least stop the enslavement of the people, and the mistreatment of them. This is also how the Atlantic Slave Trade was stopped by the English around the 1840s or so. The same happened with Women's Rights. Individuals who decided to break the status quo questioned the actions of society. With support of many others, and eventually the nation itself, women gained the right to vote, equal treatment in the work place, and equal treatment from the government. These still matter, because just like how I said in part one, how we treat one another often says a lot about us. Are we for egalitarian societies? Where everyone is treated justly and equal? Or are we for aristocratic systems, where only the minority rules, and the majority are stuck under the system? Let's stop reading form the Communist Manifesto and move to question two.

2) The main ones that are changing now are women's rights, rights for minorities of any and every kind, how the government should treat its people, and the idea of "masculinity" (although the the last point has been argued for longer than right now). But why are these things changing? Just like in question one, it's because individuals (or an individual) have spoken out against the status quo. People start thinking about what they're really doing, and what what they're doing really implies. This is why keeping "inferior" people uneducated is effective. They don't know anything except for what they have experienced, and will think nothing of it. As soon as they learn about what's happened, what's happening, what will happen, and other required prerequisites, the "inferior" people will rise up. This is why (in the USA) slaves, women, and other minorities did not receive a good education. Please note: there are other ways of keeping people suppressed other than lack of education, but the one I noted seems to be a way that has been used rather commonly.

But also, how will these changed affect us? How does our treatment of others, and what we do with people matter to us? Assuming the whole world live in a place where blue skinned people were discriminated against, why would it matter that those blue people get rights equal to everyone else? There are many answers to it (even the "It doesn't matter at all" answer) to this, but my explanation would have to be that we all share this world together. You, me, blue people, red people, every color of the rainbow practically. If we are to prosper together without much violence, it would be really affective if we all took a giant step forward towards less discrimination, hatred, and other social suppressors. Again, whatever your answer may be, that is the answer for this.

3) What morals will change in the future? This is a very genuine question, because it's often difficult to predict the future. Weather, the economy, politics, fashion, even down to what hair you will have in the future is often difficult to predict. You might plan for one thing, but something happens, and now you must adapt to what has been thrown at you. However, if I were give my guess as to what will change (why it matters, why it changes, and how it affects us are all in the previous two answers) are probably views and treatment of homosexuality and those of that sexuality, women's rights, and treatment of minorities.

Lastly, I want to discuss why those three things sound familiar to today. It's because the full fight for equal rights doesn't really have an end, and by that I mean it doesn't have an agreed end. When did the fight women's rights end? There's still some dispute whether or not they're equal, or if they're treated "more fairly" than men. No matter what the answer is, morals and ethics will keep changing through history. Today will be 1,000 years ago sooner or later. 1,000 years ago went by rather quickly, right? That's how people 1,000 years in the future will think about the 21st - 30th century. What we do today is the stepping stone, or the hurdle we place for ourselves tomorrow. It's up to us to figure out which one we're placing down.

Thank you very much if you got all the way down here! Please suggest future lessons or talks! Thank you Noremac for the inspiration of this lesson/talk. See you lovlies later! My fingers hurt.