Social judgment

“ We make our selection according to our social tastes and aspirations, and sometimes those social tastes may include a certain amount of moral judgment. But that moral judgment need not make us interfere; if it keeps us at a respectful and kindly distance from those whom we cannot regard with full charity, it keeps us sufficiently out of mischief. ”

“ But that does not serve for science. The next best thing that I can do in the way of rendering it is to appeal to another word which has a popular sense, the word Judgment. Let us say that there exists in every society a general system of values, found in social usages, conventions, institutions, and formulas, and that our judgments of social life are founded on our habitual recognition of these values, and of the arrangement of them which has become more or less fixed in our society. For example, to be cor [209] dial to a disagreeable neighbour shows good social judgment in a small matter ”

“ I believe that a comparison with the kindred value judgments in economics supports the doctrine that in judgments as to the good as well as in those as to right, there is no product of any simple faculty, but rather a synthetic process in which the social factor is prominent. A compelling motive toward an objective and universal judgment is found in the practical conditions of moral judgments. Unless men agree on such fundamental things as killing, stealing, and sex relations they cannot get on together. ”

“ The result of the rational basis is to bring moral precepts to the test of rigorous demonstration, and to secure them against all danger from discussion, by showing that they rest upon the laws of our individual and social nature. By knowing these laws, we are enabled to form a judgment of the influence of each affection, thought, action, or habit, be that influence direct or indirect, special or general, in private life or in public. ”

“ Here a word must be said about the subjective aspect of society, which, in its objective aspect, as we have seen, is merely the struggle and process of adjustment. What is the relation of adjustment to sympathy and to understanding, to communication and to concerted purpose, to the evolution of a social constraint through which the community controls and shapes the individual, to cooperation and to social organization? ”

“ That which, when we become capable of reflection, we term conscience, consists in pleasure in forms of action furthering the welfare of society—forms gradually moulded to habit with the development of social relations,—and in a corresponding pain at the realization of having failed of such action; the knowledge of the demand, by society as a whole or by a part of society, of action in accord with the general welfare, and the sense of the justice of this demand, constituting the feeling of obligation and duty. ”

“ The modification of men's moral natures, caused by the continuous discipline of social life, which adapts them more and more to social relations, is therefore the chief proximate cause of social progress. ”

“ It treats of the relation of social psychology to political science, jurisprudence, economics, history and sociology, analyzing the psychological assumptions underlying the behavior of men living in social relations. ”

“ We remind our young people from time to time that conventions established in sophisticated society have usually a sound basis in social experience, and the cultivation of the minor morals of good manners develops consideration for others. ”

“ By the time we find ourselves here we are caught in a network of customs and attitudes, the major directions of our desires and interests have been stamped on our minds, and by the time we have emerged from tutelage and reached the years of discretion when we might conceivably throw our influence to the reshaping of social institutions, most of us have been so molded into the society [190] and class we live in that we are scarcely aware of any distinction between ourselves as judging, desiring individuals and our social environment. ”

“ Every one of our actions, whether we wish it or not, exercises some influence on other human beings in the social community in which we live. By our conduct we help to uphold or undermine the principles on which the various social institutions are based ”

“ For Society fearlessly to admit the full and open advocacy of that which it disapproves is the finest proof I can imagine of its moral stability, and of its faith in the social principles it lives by. ”

“ Waiving personalities then, we take this opportunity to remark that it is possible to serve the cause of justice and to promote the common weal without begging social questions, and without joining in vulgar denunciations of social factors which after all may prove to be social blessings. ”

“ It is settled by opinion, prejudice, and preference, not by knowledge, skill, and tact.
It is for this reason that the ethical or political problem takes precedence of the technical and persuasive problems, both in the management of subordinate institutions, and in the exer- cise of public coercion. Men are, first of all, creatures of desire. The individual may choose to use his control of his fellows in industry, in the family, in the church, for self-aggran- dizement, for political power, for social promotion, for philan- thropy, education, or religion. ”

“ But, as I have pointed out in the Introduction to my Social Psychology, those who approached these problems were generally stimulated to do so by their interest in questions of right and wrong, in questions of norms and standards of conduct, the urgency of which demanded immediate answers for the practical guidance of human life in all its spheres of activity, for the shaping of laws, institutions, governments, and associations of every kind ”

“ Are men on the whole sane, or hysterical, or possibly paranoiac, in their attitude toward real and possible social conditions? Are the postulates of our social introspection valid or invalid? Have we learned all that can be known about the antecedents of present conditions, about the standards by which these conditions should be judged, about the type of future conditions toward which it is rational to aim, about the means at the disposal of man for the creation of a different social order? ”

“ Of course it is possible to undertake to regard the moral law, or such objects as justice, in the same light in which we have just been viewing the facts that result from social law and from convention. ”

“ Out of rights grow duties; the first of which is to live an honest, truthful, self-loyal life, acting and speaking always and everywhere in accordance with the laws of our being, as revealed in our own physical and mental organization. It is by the light of this fact that we must look upon all social requirements, whether in dress, manners, or morals. All that is fundamental and genuine in these will be found to harmonize with universal principles, and consequently with our primary duty in reference to ourselves. ”

“ SOCIAL WILL AND SOCIAL HABITS.—Within the province of the social will fall what may not inaptly be called the habits of a community—ways of acting acquired largely without premeditation and followed to a great extent through mere inertia. The province of the social will is a broad one. Deliberate choices; those half-conscious choices analogous to the unheeded expressions of preference which fill the days of the individual; impulses and tendencies which scarcely emerge into the light—all are expressions of the social will. ”

“ DO YOUR PART.—Do your part, and be a man among men. Assume your portion of social responsibility, and see that you discharge it well. If you do not do this, then you are mean, and society has the right to despise you just as much as it chooses to do so. You are, to use a word more emphatic than agreeable, a sneak, and have not a claim upon your neighbors for a single polite word. ”

“ It gives habits of analyzing the aims and motives of men, and the means they employ to attain their ends, i.e., it gives insight into character and hence makes social adjustment easier.
(b) It develops tolerance for the opinions, convictions, and ideals of others, and tends to prevent hard, dogmatic, and uncompromising judgments and attitudes.
(c) It gives appreciation of the civic and political institutions of to-day—their origin, development, and purposes—and hence teaches the rights and obligations that are inherent in citizenship. ”

“ But these examples are enough to show how much even the most original minds, not only may, but must, owe to others; for the social law of our nature applies no less to the intellect than to the affections. ”

“ Rash indeed, would be the man, who, if required to dispense, not only with law and usage, but with all religious faith, all distinctions as to the moral worth of types of conduct, all sense of duty, all pride and self-reverence, should undertake to build an orderly and stable society on the spontaneous sympathies and social instincts of men. ”

“ Both grow out of the necessities of our existence and relations. We have individual rights based on the fact of our individual being; and we have social duties resulting from our connection, in the bonds of society, with other individuals who have similar rights. ”

“ Which is better?—to proclaim with our lips rules of conduct which none of us really follow, and to denounce those who show that the rules which the best-minded among us really strive to follow are such as tend most to improve the condition of the body social, or frankly to recognize the just and equitable rules of conduct which after all are the real guides of the actions of all well-meaning men? ”

“ The conditions of moral conduct are, then, so different as to forbid any attempt to compare the innate moral dispositions of primitive and civilised peoples; and all we can do, in order to arrive at an opinion, is to consider whether the conditions have been such as to favour the evolution of the moral disposition, the innate basis of the social tendencies, during the nation-making period. ”

“ From history and philosophy and custom, we pass, therefore, to the force which in our day and generation is becoming the greatest of them all, the power of social justice which finds its outlet and expression in the method of sociology.... ”

“ MAN'S MULTIPLE ALLEGIANCE.—We have seen that each man has his place in a social order. This order is the expression and the embodiment of the social will, which accepts him, protects him, gives him a share in the goods the community has so far attained, recognizes his individual will in that it accords to him rights, and prescribes his course of conduct, that is, defines his duties or obligations. ”

“ Laws and opinions of particular groups, group morality, individual morality, even inertia, and a long list of more subtle and often capricious reactions are channels through which social purpose finds expression. ”

“ Such difficulties of thought regarding moral distinctions, motives good and bad, conflicts of conscience, the justice and expediency of laws and governments, as usually arise as people begin to reflect seriously upon the ways of the better social life, have been considered, besides many practical questions regarding self-control, elevation of feeling and thought, and the part of wisdom in every-day affairs. ”

“ Its invariable foundations are (1) the need we have of each other, and our social instincts, (2) the lasting and indestructible idea and sentiment of right and justice. The need and instinct, of which he finds many proofs, begin society; justice crowns the work. ”

“ They do this through the desire for approval and the fear of disapproval. These are powerful social forces, and we shall naturally endeavour to win them to our side if we wish to realize any social purpose. When I say that the morality of conduct is to be judged by its probable consequences, I mean that I desire to see approval given to behaviour likely to realize social purposes which we desire, and disapproval to opposite behaviour. ”

“ Let those who would study well this social question, or who in public trusts are charged with its solution, be most careful here. Every motive in the minds of these people, whether of instinct, desire, or duty, must be addressed. ”

“ The opinions and feelings of mankind, doubtless, are not a matter of chance. They are consequences of the fundamental laws of human nature, combined with the existing state of knowledge and experience, and the existing condition of social institutions and intellectual and moral culture. ”

“ Nevertheless, whether actually existing or only approached, we must here recognize as hypothetically possible a state in which these primary moral laws are conformed to; for the purpose of observing, in their uncomplicated forms, what are the negative conditions to harmonious social life. Whether the members of a social group do or do not co-operate, certain limitations to their individual activities are necessitated by their association ”

“ But, without dwelling upon this view, we may apply the analogy to society. Whatever morality precisely means, and whatever happiness means, it clearly indicates what we call—and I think that it is no mere metaphor—a healthy state of society. ”

“ They arise, as the individual's conception of the society on the well-being of which his own depends, and of the constituents of that well-being, becomes wider and fuller; and they are embodied in the laws, institutions, and social expectation, which make conventional morality. This embodiment, again, constitutes the moral progress of mankind. This progress, however, is only a moral progress in so far as it tends to bring about the harmony of will and reason, in the only form in which it can really exist, viz. ”