"Family is Everything"
Mood:  not sure
Topic: Life
"Family is everything." I've been hearing that a lot lately. I hear it from people I respect as well as people I don't respect. Mostly I have been hearing it as a rationalization for the inexcusable behavior of a few people.

Family is everything, that's the reason I should look the other way while a member of my "family" who without morals, without ethics, and without remorse literally wreaks havoc on anyone and anything in their path. Family is everything. That's the reason I should remain silent while other members of my "family" treat people poorly simply because they either don't like them or don't agree with them. Hell, at times they treat someone poorly just for the sport of being mean. I am told that in the end family is all I have. That may or may not be true. Either way there are absolutes in this life that override the ridiculous notion of "family right or wrong."

I can't check my ethics at the door just to make other people comfortable with their rationalizations or excuses for immoral or unethical behavior. I will not sacrifice my integrity or my morals in order to "keep the peace." Asking me to do such a thing is not only selfish and wrong it's just not what my idea of a "family" does. While factions of my "family" may believe that giving a free pass to reprehensible behavior by one if it's members is what family does, I believe the exact opposite is true.

I hold my family to a higher standard. I expect more of them not less. Allowing, rationalizing, and eventually endorsing reprehensible behavior simply because you are related to someone may in the end say more about you than the person who is actually producing the behavior.

Our virtue is not measured by whether or not we turn a blind eye to something that is clearly wrong for the sole reason that a family member is involved in it. Again the exact opposite is true. The true measure of a person's virtue is when they can stand by what is right regardless of the circumstances or who is involved. There is no virtue in tailoring your ethics for the sake of comfort.

Aristotle said that virtue was something we learned. How will a misguided family member ever learn virtue when the family tailors it's ethics to fit it's rationalizations? Keeping the peace is a noble pursuit but not if it means removing all morality and ethical standards in order to achieve it. Any "peace" achieved by lowering your standards is not peace at all. It's chaos.

The superior man thinks always of virtue; the common man thinks of comfort.
--Confucius

"The high minded man must care more for the truth than for what people think."
-- Aristotle

Flu, finals, and other fun stuff...
Mood:  spacey
Topic: Life
This past week was a doozy, I had 2 finals at The Ohio State University as well as a nice nasty cold. Needless to say, I haven't been writing. I will get back in gear in the next couple days. There is much to discuss.