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https://nitter.net/PeterSinger/status/1722440246972018857
No, the art does not depict bestiality, don't worry.
Is there any thought on socialist meta-ethics?
Seems like deontology (predetermined rules = ethical, eg. divine rule) is aligned with pre-capitalist modes of production.
Consequentialism (results = ethical, eg. number line go up) seems capitalistic
Is there one proposed for socialism? The third major meta-ethical category is virtue ethics, but that is as broad as deontology and consequentialism put together. Still it seems to fit, that the socialist citizen is free to produce and live as they see fit, which may be some form of eudaimonia. In short, it is about improving oneself over time through one's habitual actions ie increasing virtues
Deontology and consequentialism are both cringe compared with virtue ethics. As socialists, we understand that the ultimate purpose of intellectual work is to change the world. This means that any ethical system needs to:
Understand how most people currently act
Understand how most people ought to act
Have a practical means of getting people to move from acting how they currently act to acting how they ought to act
Deontology and consequentialism exclusively focus on 2 to the exclusion of 1 and 3. Cool, you've definitively proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that it's okay to fuck animals. Too bad the rest of society thinks you're a complete pervert and the anarchovegans have organized community defense to ensure your lecherous hands will never touch an animal. Explaining your reasoning isn't stopping the anarchovegan enbie from breaking your arms and kicking your teeth in. Now what? What's the game plan, chief?
Virtue ethics does not have this problem because unlike the other two, virtue ethics is much more grounded and understands that ethics is inexorably linked with human conduct, which is often times messy and contradictory. It understands that people need both guidance and accountability, that reading a bunch of books wouldn't make you a moral person, but that you must practice what you've read out in the real world and face the many challenges of living an ethical life in this messy world, that the good aspects of a person must be cultivated with the bad aspects culled. In short, virtue ethics is dialectical while the other two are not.
Great comment, appreciate the effort. Any thoughts on Rawls Theory of Justice? I'm curious to hear your thoughts.
i would tend to agree that virtue ethics is most compatible with socialist/marxist principles. i think the definition of virtue and the doctrine of the mean can apply aptly to the life of a socialist citizen, one that is without excess or deficiency. it would be a vice to live in excess (e.g america with cars, being filthy rich, etc) but it would also be a vice to live in deficiency (no human should live in poverty or not be able to have access to basic needs). and hopefully, a proletarian state would enforce this too, preventing the vice of excess (wealth redistribution) and of deficiency (providing to all workers).
Oh yeah applying virtue to society itself is a smart move! Less individualistic and more in line with a dialectical approach to radicalizing and organizing. Along the lines of Maoism maybe
The takes on virtue ethics are interesting to me, as I see myself becoming more and more consequentialist. Like, I'll talk to someone or overhear a conversation and it's all about doing the right thing or being a good person, all of which usually seems ineffectual and ego-focused amidst the non-existent Leftist movements of the West and the ticking time bomb that is climate change. I care less about whether an action makes any specific individual a good person than what the action accomplishes, particularly to advance working class or decolonial interests. Both virtue ethics and deontology, at least as I see them manifested in my circles, seem largely subsumed into consumer ethics.
They each have value as analytical lenses to judge difficult situations with, I suppose.
FWIW there are different flavors of virtue ethics, which is what I was alluding to about its breadth.
For instance there is one they call target-centric virtue ethics, which I interpreted as a consequentialistic virtue ethics, or in simpler terms: RPG character grinding. The definition of virtue is based on how much you can improve some score in your character like a game, which could be something like always answering a cry for help, putting your good/evil metric in the green zone.
I also think there's another degree of freedom in who is the patient of action. Usually ethics focuses on an ethical agent, but I also care about who is affected. It might be more important in fact that I improve someone else's life, and only secondarily improve myself doing so.
Maybe this could be an area of ethics relevant for you? "A good leftist is one who improves the material conditions and interests of their comrades"