False Amorality

Pro-Christian people and anti-Christian people have common ground, despite protests to the contrary. They both have the distinction of caring at all about the topic. They both have important rallying points. They both have persuasive leaders and throngs of followers. They both must tussle with life's trials, whether physical, monetary, emotional, or relational. Most obviously, they're both human.

Not nearly as obviously, they hold some of the same beliefs about each other! A perennial example of this is the charge of "amorality", the belief that the other group has no (valid) morality. Having no morality is different from being immoral. An immoral person may be aware he or she has violated a moral, while an amoral person goes one step further by not acknowledging a moral's very existence or rationale. Amoral people are convincing bogeymen because they dare to deny the moral fabric that helps define one's understanding of personal and social reality.

Although someone who holds to a relatively looser morality may be prone to suspicions of amorality as defined above, someone with a relatively stricter morality also is. The amorality just operates in the opposite way. If someone can be amoral by ignoring moral codes out of disrespect for sensible principles, why can't someone be amoral by adding moral codes out of respect for nonsensical principles? To the atheist, theistic morality has no basis, so anyone who practices a theistic morality has no true morals. From the atheist's perspective, religious people are "amoral" and inspire the corresponding level of queasiness. An atheist may express this queasiness through a statement like "religious fundamentalists can't be reasoned with". Of course, "reasoned with" in this case may really mean "converted to my belief system" and the concept of "reason" may really be "reductionism", but this language confusion merely reiterates that the "amoral" chasm runs along fundamental lines.

Regardless of whose viewpoint the accusation of amorality (in the broadly-inclusive sense described here) comes from, clearly the accusation reinforces rather than bridges rifts between the accuser and the accused, who sincerely believe in one or the other. After all, if I state that you have no morality (likely in unflattering terms), or that your morality is worthless (again, likely in quite unflattering terms), we have nothing productive left to say on moral topics. Discussions about morality only apply to moral agents. Debates don't go anywhere if one or more debaters refuse to concede any points advanced by others, or even bother to listen. An assertion of amorality is a method to rebuff conversation.

Fortunately for people who want to keep a dialog open, perceived amorality is false more often than not. The distinction between real and false amorality can be subtle to spot, for anyone who hasn't tried:

• Self-deception is more durable than steel. When a person loudly denounces any fixed standard of morality, the proclamation will be contradicted a few minutes later--as soon as that person is the victim of an immoral act. The selfish and/or manipulative will pull a con and refer to it as the shameful consequence of the sucker's foolishness, but will change their tune after the spoils are "unfairly" stolen by a double-crosser. Morality is present in people's beliefs no matter how they hide from it, and also no matter what they say to the contrary.
• Another entirely unsurprising (to Christians) indication of the falsity of amorality is what happens in practice when people purposely choose to live by it. (The paradox of making a rule to not live by the rules shall be passed over.) Those who choose amorality tend to have trouble not "accidentally" running into the need for morality later. A household with no rules about chores except "if you see something that needs doing, do it" sounds deliciously laid-back. Depending on the level of commitment to community and the spiritual maturity of the household members, perhaps a set of monks, it might even work. For less disciplined and caring people, it might work temporarily. Isn't it incredibly naive to imagine that a household randomly picked out of a street would function this way for a significant length of time? The lazy would be lazy, the industrious would be industrious, the controlling would be controlling, the pushed-around would be pushed around. Morality isn't arbitrary. It's how human behavior works. Taking a more important example, couples who live together like husband and wife, yet eschew "outdated" marriage out of lust for independence, will find their own feelings betraying the depth of the bond. Part of the need for a marriage-level of commitment is to prevent the emotional, financial, and familial pain caused by either party tearing apart the relationship at will.
• The danger of exposing someone to a differing morality or (sub)culture is the ease of mistaking, without any maliciousness, radically strange morality for amorality. Modesty is a prime example. Just because the customary clothing of a society covers up more or less than one's own doesn't imply the society has no concept of modesty. In any case, the problem in dressing provocatively is the sins of thought and action it incites, not the specific amount of the body it displays. Or consider swearing. It's only natural to assume that someone who casually swears about everything has no morality about what he or she says. He or she may have picked up the habit of swearing to attempt to convey that very impression, in order to seem threatening or free of scruples. But assuming amoral language use wouldn't necessarily be correct. The continually swearing person possibly could be very careful to not insult the weak, for instance. He or she could be the type who, in spite of saying that people should talk however they want, would without hesitation take offense at certain abominable statements. Swearing can demonstrate an appalling lack of respect for God and humanity; it must not be condoned. However, swearing is not an infallible mark of actual verbal amorality.

Amorality is not a helpful label to apply to people. It's not productive for reconciliation. It's not accurate, most of the time. In the Christian mindset, it's inconsistent with the universal love Christ preached and gave. He didn't damn people for knowing not what they did. He connected with them at their needs, at a point they understood, thereby enabling them to realize the worth of Him and what He offered. Then He told them to 1) repent, 2) follow Him. An "amoral" person may be more ready to hear the truth than the description would suggest.