This is the moral of the story:
"The idea that moral viewpoints acquire their importance from the groups that utter them rather than from their content is to some philosophers, a misguided attitude. In the old days of western culture, the dominant viewpoint was the one held by some, but not all, WHITE MALES, and for most white males as well as for OTHERS that was enuf to make the viewpoint "correct". churches and political groups occasionally take the same attitude: The identity of the group is enuf justification for the correctness of its view. Today, we also see this same viewpoint applied socially by certain groups: if you are a member of an oppressed group, your viewpoint on right and wrong is valuable just b/c you are a member of that group, and if you are not, then your viewpoint is irrelevant. THIS FORM OF RELATIVISM WHICH GRANTS THE IMPORTANCE OF A VIEWPOINT ON THE BASIS OF GENDER, RACE, AND CLASS, MAY BE AS MISPLACED AS ONE THAT DENIES THE IMPORTANCE OF CERTAIN GROUPS , JUST B/C THEY ARE WHO THEY ARE. Such an attitude, the arguement goes, reflects the logical fallacy of the ad hominem arguement: YOU ARE RIGHT OR WRONG B/C OF WHO YOU ARE, NOT B/C OF WHAT YOU SAY OR WHAT IS REALLY THE TRUTH. In Jim Garrison's words from the Oliver Stone movie JFK, "I always wondered in court why it is b/c a woman is a prostitute, she has to have bad eyesight". MEANING, B/C SOMEONE THINKS SHE IS A PROSTITUTE, WE CANNOT TRUST HER TESTIMONY. CAN YOU THINK OF ANY OTHER SITUATIONS IN WHICH A PERSON'S IDENTITY ALONE WOULD DETERMINE WHETHER HE OR SHE WAS RIGHT OR WRONG. teens, perhaps?
gina.
