Making sense of New York's Monstrous New 2109 Through-Birth Abortion Law: How cultures normalize crimes against humanity
Why do crimes against humanity come to be view by the societies perpetrating them as act of virtue? This is a question that has presented itself to us time and time again through human history and now does so anew in the New York law allowing up-to-birth abortion.
Actions like this on the part of legislatures illustrate well how acts, any acts, no matter how inherently reprehensible, barbaric or inhuman, can be and are normalized in a society to the point that they come to be viewed as not only as acceptable but as virtuous.
This is accomplished in part by veiling the true nature of the acts under descriptions that consist of virtue bearing euphemistic language, such as, in this case, speaking of "reproductive rights," a modern parallel to the old South's cry of "States Rights," or in high-sounding but inherently contradictory cliches, like "women's lives matter," which is not of course taken to apply in the case of unborn women. We saw this in the South during slave times, in Nazi Germany under the Nazi's and now in our own country since Roe v. Wade.
Interestingly, as easy as this kind of perversion of reality is to accept and even celebrate when we are dealing with the blindnesses and normalized barbarisms of our culture, we are still able to somehow see through and even feel self-righteous in our condemnation of similar behavior on he part of other cultures who indulged in similar acts in the past.
When one observes the dynamics involved in such anti-human actions it is easy to come to the conclusion that for a large portion of humanity, morality and moral argumentation is, at heart, nothing more than a thinly veiled self-serving pretense. And while that is certainly the case with some, and even perhaps many, I am convinced that it is not true so for all. The true situation, I suspect, is made more complicated by the social nature of beliefs about morality. People really do take for granted much of what they hold to be right or wrong on the basis of what they have always heard and what they are rewarded or punished by those around them for thinking and believing morally justified or not. Once a crime against humanity becomes normalized normal people will embrace it regardless of how monstrous and out of step with the entire history of human morality it might be. Even meaningless justifications like, "This is where we are at as a culture now," now suffice as seemingly adequate justifications.
We come into the world and very quickly learn what we are supposed to embrace as right and what we are to reject as wrong. We are rewarded for expressing our agreement with what the society takes for granted is right and conversely marginalized and punished for expressing disagreement. But when definitions have been subverted so that positive evil is called good and good evil things become more complicated. Since in the nature of things people have a need to think of themselves as good, while at the same time engaging or approving normalized evil it becomes necessary for them to redraw the narrative so as to make themselves out to be the good guys in dong what they do, while at the same time casting those who call the goodness of their actions into question in the role of evil devils. In such case the real motives of everyone involved becomes hidden under a think shadow of perverted narratival revisionism. This is why it isn't enough to settle for describing crimes against humanity as simply neutral. One much actually be convinced committing such crimes is actually a positive good, even though one may perhaps go so far as admitting it is a greater good involving a lesser evil.
Once the normalization of some anti-human behavior becomes complete within a culture, then it seems abnormal to question the behavior as anything other than just what's done. Consequently normal people come to imagine that the evil action really is good and those who oppose it are really evil, and as such become almost unconsciously complicit so that even the false supportive narrative is, as it were, built into their constitution, making it hard for them to even imagine that someone questioning the evil could do so rationally and with good motives. An then once the individual has been seduced by the larger culture into engaging in the normalized anti-human activity it becomes harder than ever for them to see the action for what it really is and not try to justify it, and with it, themselves.
Actions like this on the part of legislatures illustrate well how acts, any acts, no matter how inherently reprehensible, barbaric or inhuman, can be and are normalized in a society to the point that they come to be viewed as not only as acceptable but as virtuous.
This is accomplished in part by veiling the true nature of the acts under descriptions that consist of virtue bearing euphemistic language, such as, in this case, speaking of "reproductive rights," a modern parallel to the old South's cry of "States Rights," or in high-sounding but inherently contradictory cliches, like "women's lives matter," which is not of course taken to apply in the case of unborn women. We saw this in the South during slave times, in Nazi Germany under the Nazi's and now in our own country since Roe v. Wade.
Interestingly, as easy as this kind of perversion of reality is to accept and even celebrate when we are dealing with the blindnesses and normalized barbarisms of our culture, we are still able to somehow see through and even feel self-righteous in our condemnation of similar behavior on he part of other cultures who indulged in similar acts in the past.
When one observes the dynamics involved in such anti-human actions it is easy to come to the conclusion that for a large portion of humanity, morality and moral argumentation is, at heart, nothing more than a thinly veiled self-serving pretense. And while that is certainly the case with some, and even perhaps many, I am convinced that it is not true so for all. The true situation, I suspect, is made more complicated by the social nature of beliefs about morality. People really do take for granted much of what they hold to be right or wrong on the basis of what they have always heard and what they are rewarded or punished by those around them for thinking and believing morally justified or not. Once a crime against humanity becomes normalized normal people will embrace it regardless of how monstrous and out of step with the entire history of human morality it might be. Even meaningless justifications like, "This is where we are at as a culture now," now suffice as seemingly adequate justifications.
We come into the world and very quickly learn what we are supposed to embrace as right and what we are to reject as wrong. We are rewarded for expressing our agreement with what the society takes for granted is right and conversely marginalized and punished for expressing disagreement. But when definitions have been subverted so that positive evil is called good and good evil things become more complicated. Since in the nature of things people have a need to think of themselves as good, while at the same time engaging or approving normalized evil it becomes necessary for them to redraw the narrative so as to make themselves out to be the good guys in dong what they do, while at the same time casting those who call the goodness of their actions into question in the role of evil devils. In such case the real motives of everyone involved becomes hidden under a think shadow of perverted narratival revisionism. This is why it isn't enough to settle for describing crimes against humanity as simply neutral. One much actually be convinced committing such crimes is actually a positive good, even though one may perhaps go so far as admitting it is a greater good involving a lesser evil.
Once the normalization of some anti-human behavior becomes complete within a culture, then it seems abnormal to question the behavior as anything other than just what's done. Consequently normal people come to imagine that the evil action really is good and those who oppose it are really evil, and as such become almost unconsciously complicit so that even the false supportive narrative is, as it were, built into their constitution, making it hard for them to even imagine that someone questioning the evil could do so rationally and with good motives. An then once the individual has been seduced by the larger culture into engaging in the normalized anti-human activity it becomes harder than ever for them to see the action for what it really is and not try to justify it, and with it, themselves.
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