Apparently, under the Sarbanes Oxley regulations, this questionnaire will insure that every individual will act ethically.
It strikes me as odd that we have come to a point where we need to do this every year!
Are there really adult people in the USA who are not elected officials who do not know that things like stealing and lying are wrong?
And do we need Sarbanes Oxley laws to tell us what is and isn't wrong?
Didn't Charlton Heston give us all of the rules we need in that Cecil B. Demille classic?
We already had all the laws we need.
As much as Bill Maher likes to ridicule them, the Ten Commandments cover pretty much everything.
In fact, there was an obscure fellow from Nazareth named Jesus who even gave us a simpler law...the Golden Rule.
Remember that one?
Something about doing unto others?
But something has happened in our society over the last half century.
We've perfected our ability to rationalize our behavior.
In a specch he mad in the nineties, Alan Keyes tied this back to the legalization of abortion. After all, if we could rationalize the murder of an unborn innocent, what other behavior would we not be able to rationalize?
I agree with Dr. Keyes that abortion is unjust and immoral, but never took the next step in reasoning that he did.
Keyes said, "If we are killing our babies today, it is not just because of our lust, and not just because of our indifference, and our desire to achieve our agendas at every cost and indulge our own satisfaction and give in to our own fears."
What other behavior could we rationalize?
Look at the last several decades!
Increase in drug usage.
Increase in random violence.
Proliferation of casual sex to the point that sexually transmitted diseases were running rampant.
The above behaviors are not the problem, they are the symptoms.
The problem we are dealing with is a moral problem.
Fifty years ago, we did not have a lot laws governing the above behaviors, nor were these behaviors problems.
The fundamental discipline that was prevailing in our society all those years ago has broken down.
We have a moral crisis.
That IS the problem.
BRAVO!
ReplyDeleteI've really got nothing substantive to add. We have tossed out God and His commandments. We have chosen entertainment over education; lust over love; style over substance; and greed over goodness.
We have turned our backs on our neighbors, our fellow men, and said, "Just give me my slice of the pie; I want all I have coming to me."
Oh, we're going to get all that's coming to us alright.
It's no mystery to me why America is on her last legs. No mystery at all.
~ D-FensDogg
'Loyal American Underground'
Yeah Stephen...we're rats on a sinking ship.
ReplyDeleteAnd Alan nailed it.
We are slaves to lust, our desire to achieve our agendas at every cost, and indulging our own satisfactions.
As pillars of salt, Americans may actually make a contribution to the world!
EXCELLENT! I agree completely. Making a better world is simple enough, in theory; it requires just that each of us listen to and honor the voice within. That inner sense provides an unwavering moral compass, yet a little at a time, we've--as a society--inched further and further away from common decency, from honoring the voice within.
ReplyDeleteThat voice recognizes injustice and motivates action. It doesn't sit by and watch suffering, it doesn't condone theft or disloyalty or warring. It is within every one of us and could guide us, if we simply choose it over the other lazier, more selfish voices that we learn to obey.
As far as abortion, I've long thought that the growing acceptance of it is representative of our hideous decline. Abortion is as clear a wrong as exists, yet it is legal, and seemingly moral people will stand and fight for it to remain so.
Sadly, Beth, my father tried to convince me that apathy towards abortion was the biggest example of our decline back in the late 70's, and it took me almost twenty years to realize how right he was.
ReplyDeleteAs a society, we rationalize our immediate gratification in every way.
And we are worse off because of it.
Larry