Morals and the Left

I  am going to ask a serious question and I don’t want people to just think “of course” or “of course not” because I’m really not sure. And when I speak about liberals or conservatives, they are generalities. There are many conservatives who are also steadfast libertarians, so they might have different views than religious conservatives. That being said…

First, think about morals. Morals are basically what is acceptable by people in a culture or not; basically the difference between right and wrong. So my question is:

Do liberals have morals? And if so, what are they; or where is the line?

The timing of me asking this is because of the gay marriage debate. I have argued that I support homosexuals having legal rights like filing dual tax returns and hospital bedside visitation, but not be “married.” I have even suggested that states should begin issuing “civil union licenses” and let churches deal with marriage. I thought this was a good compromise, but wasn’t enough for some of my liberal friends.

Then I thought about the term “pro-choice.” I’m for all kinds of choice. But I think liberals are actually “pro-abortion,” not “pro-choice.” This is a very important distinction. I have 2 daughters. When they are old enough to date, I hope they choose to go one group dates. I hope they choose to not get in the back seat of a car. I hope they decide not to engage in sex. I hope if they fail to make those choices they at least choose to use condoms. Those are all choices. Make the right choice in any of those and an unwanted pregnancy won’t occur 99.7% of the time (or whatever the failure rate of condoms and the pregnancies that occur due to that is.) But those are all choices. They are all moral choices: do you personally think it is right or wrong to do those things?

When a woman is raped, the choice was taken away, same with incest. So the choice to abort that fetus is the only choice the woman is given. So that becomes their choice. But at least at that point they would have a choice.

Liberals, in general, are opposed to the death penalty. But when it comes to potential lives, they are ok with aborting a fetus that in most circumstances will become a person within just a matter of months. But some guy in Connecticut who breaks into a house, kills a wife and her kids after raping the females, dismembers the bodies, etc., this guy somehow deserves to continue breathing.

Even when it comes to the morality of poor people there seems to be a big difference between conservatives and liberals. I think conservatives want to help people who can’t help themselves, but liberals seem to want everyone to get help no matter what their station is. I had a friend who argued that a farmer in Nebraska making $20K a year should have the same insurance as a hedge fund manager who makes $1M a year. Why should they both get the same insurance? Because it’s fair. What’s fair about it? Is it fair to take money away from the rich guy and give it to the poor farmer? Liberals seem to think so. And, be clear about this, we aren’t talking about health care, we are talking about insurance. I don’t think it’s realistic for everyone to get the same care simply because doctors are people and therefore have different abilities. My doctor here in Alabama might be great, but if I need a very specific spinal surgery that only a handful of doctors in the US can perform, well, I might not get the “BEST” care available. Do I want the best care? Sure. But I also understand that just isn’t possible in every circumstance.

The past year has seen the Occupy movement say that there needs to be fairness for everyone when it comes to finances. That sounds like a moral argument. Everyone should play by the same rules. That is what they say. But if you were to ask what those rules are, they seem to say that the rich need to have their money taken away and given to the poor. How is that moral? By that argument the only moral thing would be to be a truly Marxist society where each person is given what they need. Everyone works, everyone succeeds. I guess if you want to argue for that system you can. I just have a hard time believing that human nature allows everyone to work as hard as they can and that they will only take what they need.

I also wonder about the moral stance of immigration. Wouldn’t it be nice if everyone could come to the United States and have the same freedoms we have here? Well, sure. But it simply won’t happen. But you know what could happen? People in other countries could demand from their leaders to have the same freedom and rights that Americans have (or at least had in the past, but that’s a different argument.) Most liberals say that everyone in America should have the right to be here, how they got here be damned. But if your first act in coming to this country was by definition breaking the law, how can you morally say that they should stay here. Or would the argument be that the law itself is immoral?

I have heard people say that the Iraq war was not only immoral but illegal. And President Obama said that the Afghanistan war was (is?) the “right” war. But there are many liberals who think that war in any situation is immoral. I saw a bumper sticker in the San Francisco Bay area that said “I’m already opposed to the NEXT war.” So for that person, no war is moral, no matter what the circumstance. I tend to think most liberals slant towards that point of view.

So it makes me wonder, what morals are there on the Left? Are there any? If morals are what is right or wrong I’m confused because I hear the left say that it is immoral not give money to the poor. It’s immoral to not to allow gay marriage. It’s immoral to go to war. It’s immoral to arrest illegal immigrants.

But what is moral for a liberal? Is it moral to kill a fetus? Is it moral to take money away from someone who got rich within the framework of the societal system? Is it moral to let illegal immigrants get citizenship simply because they were able to sneak into the country while those who came legally have to wait years (and decades) to get their citizenship legally? Is it moral to force religions to recognize unions that they see as inappropriate? Is it moral to fight for gay marriage but say polygamy is simply wrong? Is it moral to defend your home with a gun? Is it moral to kill someone who has murdered? Is it moral for the government to take someone’s private property because the government “really, really wants it?” Is it moral to say Christians and their beliefs don’t matter while bending over backwards not to offend Muslims? Is it moral to allow one country to produce a nuclear bomb when it has vowed to commit genocide against another country? Was it moral to kill one man who was responsible for over 3,000 deaths in one coordinated attack in New York and Washington, DC? Is it moral to kill one man if it were to save the lives of hundreds? Thousands? Millions?

Is there any morality on the left that can be easily recognized or is it all just whatever the collective Left comes up with on any given day?