NOM

I just read an article explaining why so-called Christians are acting so hateful and UNChristlike. It talked about vertical and horizontal morality. Vertical morality is that morality comes from a top authority figure, while horizontal morality thinks about the effect on other people. So, these so-called Christians or rightwing MAGA who are willing to execute homosexuals see themselves as obeying God’s commands no matter the effect on others. While those with horizontal morality are thinking about the harm done to not just the person executed but their loved ones and not thinking about how homosexuals are sinners and deserve death. It is the “because God said so” group opposed to the love your neighbor crowd.

This concept of two different kinds of morality really explained a lot to me. Starting wit Kolhberg and his levels of morality and why I didn’t fit at ANY level because y morality is based on how things I do affect others, not on some set of rules. Most of the women I talked to agreed with me, that the highest level should be based on how our actions affect others, while most of the guys claimed it should be based on an internal set of rules, and seeing as we were in Utah, they said God should give us that set of rules. But, …but…but God gave us the rule of love your neighbor and THAT is what I am doing. And what the heck are you doing saying “internal” rules that come from an external God? And that seemed to be why Kolhberg, sexist pig that he was thought that women almost never reached the top level. And why so many women think men are such selfish jerks. For men, morality seemed to be all about “me” and yeah, to me that is selfish. While women make morality about others. See, women are actually more moral than your average man and Kolhberg was just too male to see women’s superiority- take that men and see how you feel having gender differences make you not as good. But, yeah, Kolhberg and his blindness aside, it is just a gender difference, and even then, not everyone fits into this gender stereotype.

But looking at this from the perspective of two different forms that morality can take, Kolhberg saw vertical morality, but thought it becomes internalized. Remember he said level 3 or 4 (or something like that, it has been 600 years since I was in a psychology class and I am really trying to forget) was when you base your morality on an external authority. This version of looking at it being the definition of vertical morality. And then the top level being missing with this horizontal/vertical way of looking at things, but when you internalize your set of chosen rules. So, no longer doing it because God said so, but doing it because you picked it as your own rule.

But the problem with Kolhberg is that the “rules” gotta come from somewhere and if you just blindly accept God’s rules or the government’s rules as your own, then how is it different from it being just because God said so? But basing your rules on harm to others, you really can write your own rules. So, shouldn’t THAT be the highest level? But Kolhberg didn’t even see it as a possibility.

So, anyway, second thought with this definition of two kinds of morality is it explains SO much about religion. Jesus was a horizontal morality kind of guy in a vertical morality kind of religion. So, the vertical morality leaders got rid of the rabble rouser. And people really like the cut and dried rules of the vertical morality. They don’t have to THINK about the effect on others, just look at God’s list of rules. Boy that is SO much easier than loving your enemy.

And I look at TBMs and us apostates and yup, the apostates lean very heavy into the horizontal morality crowd while TBMs are all about rules straight from God. Probably all of us here are horizontal morality people.

The article mentioned Abraham and how he was “good” because he was willing to break a commandment…..um, I mean obey God. Abraham put following God as top commandment no matter if it went against all the rules and all logic and harmed his most loved child. Someone with horizontal morality would have told God to take a long walk off a short pier, because I am not hurting my child. They would put preventing harm to others as top commandment above obeying God.

Anyway, I would love to link the article, but iPads won’t do that and I don’t even have a computer. But it is a HuffPost article so it isn’t behind a paywall and if you are interested, you should be able to pull it up by looking for key words, like “vertical morality.”

Interesting thoughts.

Like prob must people, I never liked the story of Abraham and Isaac, and would have told God or whoever to F off if they asked me to kill my child.

It's a very interesting story near the beginning of a long book that sort of establishes the "right" morality, obeying the ultimate authority--God--even if he asked you to do something heinous. A somewhat similar story shows up early in the BofM where Nephi murders a guy cuz God tells him to. Scriptures are full of this vertical morality and its no wonder, since the men writing most of it wanted/ needed justification for the immoral s#!t they wanted to do.

I suspect that the majority of wars and murders since the advent of this concept we call religion are directly related to this concept we call religion--men doing what the f#@% they want and saying it's under God's authority or command.