Ethics in the extreme

My brother sent me a 'spork' several months ago. A spork is a half fork, half spoon. Frank was afraid that the measure of a man was how he ate his cole slaw. He was afraid that my humanity might be adversely affected by my lack of the appropriate tool.

This issue arose when I confessed that I had eaten a helping of cole slaw with my fingers when the waitron at Captain D's served me my meal from the little window in the side of the restaurant and omitted a proper eating utensil for the cole slaw. Or any eating utensil, as far as that goes.

At any rate, Frank sent me a spork, and I have not been utensil-less while driving in my car since that time. Thank you, Frank.

I have a mug which I bought in the MLK Museum in Atlanta. The mug has a quote from Martin Luther King, Jr. printed on the side. The quote discussed the ethical measure of a man. I will paraphrase: The measure of a man is more acurately taken in times of stress.

The sense of that quote, of course, is that the ethical actions of a human being are more accurately measured when that person is called on to respond to a situation in a time of stress rather than at his leisure.

If I am sitting in my chair at home and consider what I might do when confronted by an ethical quandry, the exercise is purely academic, since there is no outward pressure seeking to affect my actions in one way or another. If I ask myself whether or not I would steal from my neighbor, while sitting in my chair in the comfort of my home, my answer that I would not is not worth as much as if the question arose when something of my neighbor's possession was near at hand and it was within my power to take it from him without harm to myself. Tangentially, If my neighbor's possession is within my grasp and others are attempting to convince me that stealing the same is the right thing to do, my determination that I should not do so is also quite different.

In the 60's, the decision to support an African-American's civil rights, when my neighbors were attempting to justify the effort to hinder same, was quite a measure of the ethics of a European-American. In 2008, however, the decision to support these rights has a different character when it is basically universally accepted. I believe that this measure is what Martin Luther King Jr had in mind when he made the statement.

On the other hand, I am reminded of the ethical question as to whether or not stealing to feed one's family is morally wrong. In Les Miserables, Jean Valjean steals to feed his family, to save his family from starvation. He is imprisoned for his theft. The question becomes whether or not he should have been punished at all. Was the theft ethically wrong in its context?

One might argue that a theft enacted in an effort to protect one's family from starvation was not ethically wrong under certain circumstances, just like one might say that a murder is not ethically wrong if enacted to protect oneself or another from the threat of deadly harm. Most of us believe that a killing in defense of one's self or others is not a murder at all.

So the ethical question of how factual circumstances effect the ethical nature of our actions might have two completely different effects on how we define or consider the act. To use King's example, an ethical decision made in the comfort and leisure of our ease is not worth nearly as much as the decision when there is countervailing pressure to act unethically. On the other hand, I think it is universally accepted that an unethical act may be considered appropriate, and maybe even ethical under certain fact situations where the circumstances allow us to act to preserve the safety of ourselves or others.