Monday, July 26, 2010

"We All Make Mistakes” - Enter the New Morality

A hulking, pro football player, after beating his girlfriend, said to the press, “I just made a mistake.” He did not admit he committed a violent crime punishable by law, an act grievous enough to send him to jail. He only admits he made a mistake. To compound his arrogance, he added with emphasis; “We ALL make mistakes.” The insidious implication here is that you and I must be equally guilty since we ALL make (these kinds of) mistakes. We most likely have done things equally as grievous.

NFL Quarterback Michael Vick, proven guilty of vicious crimes with his dog fighting business, exclaims in his long-awaited press interview, “We all make mistakes, I was immature.” He has not committed a serious crime - he just made a juvenile misjudgment - at 25. However immature he claimed to be, he went to prison and served time for his inexcusable immaturity.

Dan Patrick of Fox Sports who often interviews these criminals has picked up the slogan when he himself used it to explain his own misbehavior, “EVERYONE makes mistakes.”

Even the preachy moralist Bill O’Reilly, on Fox TV claimed, after he paid off a litigious female co-worker claiming sexual harassment, “We ALL do wrong things, all of us,” re-enforcing the new collective guilt. And now, politicians have adopted this new line of moral reasoning when caught perpetrating serious professional transgressions. These people are not the kids next door, but our political leaders, media commentators, athletes and roll models.

This is the alarming New Morality. By implication, we ALL have made serious mistakes ALL our lives, and continue to morally ‘slip up’. Is the only difference, those who get caught?

Look up the word mistake: a slip-up, a gaffe, an oversight, misstep, or momentary failure, according to Thesaurus. No indication of criminal behavior.
Now look up criminal: illegal, scandalous, unlawful, illicit, and immoral. Is there not a great gulf between the two?

Those who have led a good, morally-guided life - never harming anyone, never stealing, NEVER committing a serious crime, are very alarmed at this criminal prevalent disregard for the written law.

You may think this is a stretch, a meaningless exaggeration, but the prevalent use of this expression has serious moral implications. In our enlightened modern-day society, the media is telling us – no one is really guilty anymore.

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