Thursday, January 28, 2010

Why I am a libertine (1)

Let's cue up my good friend and confidant Aquinas (whose feast day is today):


Well-ordered self-love is right and natural.
He's right. Now, immediately, the question is, "What does well-ordered mean?"

And the answer we will give will differ widely depending on how we understand morality. I would even say that only someone who embraces virtue ethics can give a satisfactory answer here. Why? Because virtue ethics is about teleology. Okay, big word, but what it means is that your life should be aimed at something. I'll try and explain what this is by first explaining what it is not in terms of an example.

Here is the example. First year university, everybody is drinking and celebrating and letting loose a bit. There is a party in the common room and someone has put a porn DVD on to play and both women and men are watching. (As you probably have guessed, this is an actual case.) Would it be right or wrong for you to join in?

If your idea of ethics is based on duty the answer you give will apply now and for always. If binge drinking or watching porn is wrong it's wrong for everyone at all times. You might find reasons to mitigate. If you think it's wrong you still might say a 19 year old has a bit more of an excuse because they have less life experience and are more susceptible to peer pressure than a 39 year old and therefore you might be less severe in your censure. But you can't approve.

And here comes something really odd. People who believe that morality is a matter of doing your duty have to do one of two things. Either they have to say that desires are irrelevant and the only thing that matters is duty (so being well-ordered is also irrelevant), or they have to say that in a well-ordered person duty and desire tend to be the same thing. So, to become well ordered you have to make a distinction between false and real desires. You don't really hope the young woman bends over again so you can see her breasts, you would prefer to respect her as a human being (even if you're pretty sure it isn't an accident that she chose that top and that bra).

The problem with this notion of "well ordered" is that it defies our self knowledge. I'm sorry, I really do want to see your breasts. I'm a polite and civilized guy so I keep it to myself and I don't stare or hide in the bushes outside your bedroom window but if you reach down to pick up the napkin you just dropped and your shirt falls open, I'll steal a glance and I will feel nothing but pleasure at the sight. Trust me on this, it has happened before and I hope it happens again.

If your are a consequentialist, the answer to the question of what is well-ordered is going to be based on outcomes. In the example I have given, those will be psychological. Is it healthy? This is probably where most current Catholic moral thinkers sit. "Well ordered" to them means the way a psychologically well-adjusted human being acts and they will worry about the ways that alcohol or pornography might upset your adjustment point as it were. And they will also spend a lot of time and pixels convincing you that much of modern culture is making people unbalanced psychologically and, therefore, morally. (Not just Catholics, by the way, liberals and libertarians have exactly the same concerns they just have a different answer about what the adjustment point ought to be and tend to think that it is moral restrictions in the broader culture rather than moral laxness that make people unbalanced.)

So, we're back at the dorm in first year. What does our typical Catholic moralist say? They say, look, if you slip up that's okay provided you confess your sin but you have to get this under control. And getting it under control means doing it the right way. Drink and enjoy your drink but don't enjoy it too much. And if you find you keep failing, well then cut it out altogether.

That's not a crazy way to think. Being a well-adjusted human being is a huge blessing and if you suspect you have a drinking problem, you have to do something about it. But this thinking has significant limitations. Consider arguments against porn. Your Catholic moralist can't say, go ahead and enjoy the porn just don't enjoy it too much. No, they have to say don't enjoy the porn at all because it will make you a badly adjusted human being. That is why you don't have to read far into much contemporary Catholic thought about porn before you will hit the term "porn addiction". And, again, it would be no laughing matter to end up addicted to porn just as it is no laughing matter to end up addicted to alcohol. But most people who use porn or binge drink don't end up addicted to either.

The problem with this notion of well-ordered is that it defies our knowledge of others. There is no clear causal relationship here. And people who do end up addicted to alcohol, for example, seem to be suffering from a disease. And just as six people can walk out into the rain and only the one who already has contracted a flu virus will suffer, so it seems that lots of people can use porn or binge drink and suffer no negative consequences whatsoever. And people aren't stupid; they can see that most people don't suffer serious psychological or moral consequences from doing these things so they ignore moral teaching based on that understanding of what it means to be "well-ordered".

In virtue ethics being well-ordered means developing the character and habits you need to become the person you ought to be. Along the way, we might quite reasonably say that everyone ought to have certain experiences. That these are part of our moral development. And we can even acknowledge that we will make mistakes (that is do things that no one ought to do at any age) and learn from them rather than just suffer negative consequences.

And? Well, and a lot of stuff but short answer, I think that sensual pleasures are an essential part of becoming human. There are real risks and dangers in pursuing these things but I think God intended us to experience comfort and pleasure here on earth. These things don't just make us feel good, they remind us of God's plan for us. Eating good food, drinking wine and other alcoholic beverages (the first mouthful of cold beer on a hot day is gift from God), even if it means getting drunk sometimes, and seeing beautiful women and having sex, even if that means getting really worked up about it, are things that help us to become what we are supposed to be.

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