The Subjectivity of Moral Objectivism

The one moral principle that matters

What is moral subjectivism? Is it the notion that no singular, universal, and objective morality applies to all, everywhere, all the time? Or is it the subjective application of a given moral principle, depending on convenience and utilitarian “greater goods”?

Subjectivity morality

Regardless, everyone is a moral subjectivist, as you’ll realise by the end of this article. I truly wish morality were objective; then we wouldn’t have to argue over what is right and wrong, or even go to war over which moral framework is to be applied in lieu of the other. If morality were objective, it would be easy to identify. It would be easy for all of us to agree on what is moral. It would also be easier to apply, because there would be no ambiguity about what is ethical and what is not.

But it is suspect to claim that “objective morality exists” when it just so happens that this “objective morality” is the sum of moral principles that you conveniently hold.

There are as many moral frameworks out there as there are living people.

It’s funny how no one will ever claim that a moral framework they don’t hold dear is objective. You don’t get to choose what objective morality is. If you get to choose it, then it ceases to be objective.

Morality is a higher ideal, perhaps the highest. However, it is important to understand that morality is a subjective concept, not an objective absolute. Human consciousness created morality. If all humans disappear right now, so does morality. Plants and animals cannot conceptualise morality. Sure, some animals can display compassion, but that is selective and is in no way bound by universally applied moral principles.

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We pick and choose our moral framework, which means we accept there is no objective one. And then we make up stories that our preferred moral framework is somehow given to us by “God”, presuming to speak for “God” — the ultimate hubris. What are the odds that the “universally objective God-given moral framework” just happened to be your personal one?

We choose the moral framework that best suits us. Otherwise, we’d be open to considering different moral frameworks.

Subjective application of morality

And then there’s the arbitrary interpretation and application of allegedly “objective” moral principles. Even religions that supposedly provide clear “God”-given moral principles (under threat of eternal sadistic torture, no less)… those morals are as vaguely and subjectively applied as every other moral framework.

Every single religionist has their own personal idea of what their religion’s moral framework is about, what it means, when and where it is applied, and how much it is applied. Even if they consider their moral framework objective, they subjectively adhere to it. Show me one person who has first found and proven one objective moral framework that covers all considerations, and then show me how he is 100% consistent with it.

What morality is

Why do we choose morality if it isn’t enforced via the threat of torture by a deity, or if it isn’t objective? First, I direct you to a piece I wrote on the subject:

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Morality has two great benefits:

1. It grants us identity, purpose, and meaning

2. It facilitates social cohesion, provides social status, and it improves relationships

But I fail to see how a single set of moral principles can objectively exist or be objectively applied. This is why moral frameworks depend on our individual experiences, personal characteristics, and social influences.

We choose the moral framework whose principles we represent best, thus extracting identity, purpose, and meaning in an otherwise meaningless existence.

You might say that meaning extracted from arbitrarily devised morals is meaningless… and you’d be right. But it’s the best we’ve got.

Once you lose the morals you represent, the values that define your identity, crippling depression takes you.

Hypocrisy

The irony is that the subjectivity of morality is mostly evident in those who religiously insist on “objective” morality, the moralists, the pontificators, the sanctimonious holier-than-thou Spanish Inquisition here to point out everything you’re doing that is wrong, the subtly implied inference being that they are doing everything right.

Even voluntaryists such as I are moral subjectivists in that they adhere to their moral principles subjectively and conveniently. All of us, me most of all. Why? Because we still choose to participate in the state, buy stuff using the state’s monopolistic currency, which means paying the hidden/indirect taxes embedded in every price tag, supporting the war-addicted system of global banking and statism.

Despite our smug attitude of moral superiority, we directly fund the state, empowering it, obeying it, complicit in its slave mastery and mass murder. What would be the alternative if there were no square inch of stateless land on the planet? To either live like animals in a jungle or to kill ourselves. That would be the moral thing to do if we objectively adhered to our moral principles. Yet we don’t do it because we choose to selectively apply our morality, depending on convenience.

We bend the knee to tyrants so that we avoid being brutalised. But this is moral subjectivity in that we don’t objectively honour our professed moral principles, regardless of subjective excuses and arbitrary exceptions.

The danger of objective morality

Every single person totally convinced of “objective morality” feels justified in using violence to enforce it. If you feel that your moral framework is “God-give” (as deluded as delusion gets), then there is absolutely nothing stopping you from committing the vilest of atrocities to force others to abide by your preferred behaviours.

The dangerous idea of “objective morality” is what empowers the state: coercive, threat-based, centralised government. Moral objectivism is why most people on the planet are statists, believing that it is OK for random government bureaucrats to make arbitrary laws, interpret them as they see fit, apply them whenever they feel like it, and “justifiably” use violence for the utilitarian “greater good” of supposedly “objective” morality. Morality doesn’t get any more subjective than that.

Key takeaway

There is subjectivity in “objective morality” as well as in our adherence to our professed moral principles.

However, if there is one objective moral principle, that would be non-coercion. Why? Because no other morality can exist without this one first.

If morals can exist, then non-coercion is the mother of all morality.

If anything is done to you against your will, without your informed consent, then it is immoral. Why? Because, if we are to accept morality as a valid ideal (albeit it being a human-created concept), then we must also acknowledge that no moral principle can exist under coercion. At best, threats, intimidation, and even brainwashing can only promote a pretentious performance of morality, not a deeply held, embedded, and self-motivated drive to be moral.

For morality to be true, you must have the option to not be moral and get away with it, and still choose to be moral.

This is why any coercion to be moral is pointless. At best, coercion or morality only buys you a temporary and indignant performance, a pretentious act of faux morality only when you’re looking, while fostering hate towards the morals you are so trying to enforce. And when the people you forced into pretending to uphold your morals get into a position of power, guess what they’ll do to your morals. Good job!

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Thank you for reading.