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Honor Ethics

Category Archives: honor code

Honor in the Modern World: Interdisciplinary Perspectives

29 Thursday Sep 2016

Posted by dan demetriou in announcements, history of honor, honor and international relations, honor and international studies, honor and political philosophy, honor and war, honor code, military ethics, philosophy of honor, political science of honor, social psychology of honor

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Dan Demetriou, Laurie Johnson

I’m happy to report—somewhat belatedly—that Honor in the Modern World is now for sale!

Edited by Laurie Johnson and me, the book is probably the most interdisciplinary study of honor yet. We are very grateful to our contributors—many of whom contribute to this blog—for their excellent and highly original essays.

After a century-long hiatus, honor is back. Academics, pundits, and everyday citizens alike are rediscovering the importance of this ancient and powerful human motive. This volume brings together some of the foremost researchers of honor to debate honor’s meaning and its compatibility with liberalism, democracy, and modernity. Contributors—representing philosophy, sociology, political science, history, psychology, leadership studies, and military science—examine honor past to present, from masculine and feminine perspectives, and in North American, European, and African contexts. Topics include the role of honor in the modern military, the effects of honor on our notions of the dignity and “purity” of women, honor as a quality of good statesmen and citizens, honor’s role in international relations and community norms, and how honor’s egalitarian and elitist aspects intersect with democratic and liberal regimes.

The table of contents can be see on Amazon, along with lots of sample viewing. Consider ordering a copy for your school’s library, as the book includes essays useful for philosophers, political scientists, historians, international relations scholars, psychologists, and military academicians.

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Mike Austin raises the issue of the postgame handshake

25 Friday Mar 2016

Posted by dan demetriou in honor and sport, honor code, honor in contempory media, honor in the news, philosophy of honor

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Commissioner's Directive, Kentucky High School Athletic Association, Michael W. Austin, post-game handshake

Mike Austin (Eastern Kentucky) is one of the top philosophers of sport. In a recent blog post for Psychology Today, Austin notes that Kentucky high schools are now being advised to discontinue the practice of postgame handshakes.

Sports and the Postgame Handshake   Psychology Today

As reported by the Lexington Herald Leader,

The Kentucky High School Athletic Association has issued a “Commissioner’s Directive” advising schools not to hold organized post-game handshake lines because of too many fights and physical conflicts.

“While it is an obvious sign of sportsmanship and civility, many incidents have occurred … where fights and physical conflicts have broken out,” according to the Commissioner’s Directive that went to schools on Tuesday. “Unfortunately, the adrenaline and effort required to participate in the sport sometimes seems to deplete the supply of judgment available to participants.”

According to the missive, more than two dozen fights in the past three years in Kentucky have broken out at post-game ceremonies. Although athletic and school officials were buzzing about the order Tuesday afternoon, Commissioner Julian Tackett downplayed the order, saying it was “much ado about nothing.”

There are no rules requiring the post-game handshake, and too many times, there hasn’t been enough supervision to stop conflicts during the ceremony. Students can still shake hands with other players voluntarily.

“You’re on notice, if you’re going to do this, you’re going to be accountable,” Tackett said.

Austin asks a number of questions about the handshake ritual that directly appeal to honor:
Sports and the Postgame Handshake   Psychology Today
You can contribute to the online discussion here.

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David Harsanyi: “Bring Back Dueling”

20 Saturday Feb 2016

Posted by dan demetriou in honor code, honor in contempory media

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David Harsanyi, dueling

Admit it: every once in a while you think it…

Bring Back Dueling

 

 

 

 

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The rape of Lucretia: an ancient dilemma of honor

18 Thursday Jun 2015

Posted by dan demetriou in history of honor, honor code, honor in literature, philosophy of honor, stories of honor

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honor and rape, honor killing, Lucretia

Moral dilemmas make for compelling stories. Should we nuke this city to stop the virus from spreading? Should we derail the train to save our child caught on the tracks? Honor-dilemmas used to be a favorite type of moral quandary. One legendary honor-dilemma in particular has inspired artists and storytellers for millennia: the rape of Lucretia.

parmigianino_lucrezia_romana_1540

The Roman noblewoman Lucretia lived in 6th century B.C., in the final days of the Roman Kingdom. As Livy tells the tale, she welcomed the Roman prince Sextus Tarquinius into her home while her husband and father were away at war. Taken by her beauty, Tarquinius stole into her bedroom in the middle of the night and begged Lucretia to sleep with him. She refused. He threatened to kill her, but she remained unmoved. At last Tarquinius threatened to kill Lucretia and a male slave, arranging their bodies so that she “might be said to have been put to death in adultery with a man of base condition.” As this threat touches Lucretia’s reputation, she accedes.

After Tarquinius leaves, “exulting in his conquest of a woman’s honour,” Lucretia calls her husband and father back from battle, and in tears tells them how she “lost her honour” to the prince and that they, “if they are men,” will avenge her. The men swear to punish Tarquinius and they do their best to support Lucretia, assuring her that her honor hasn’t been besmirched. But Lucretia is disconsolate and declares,

“Though I acquit myself of the sin, I do not absolve myself from punishment; not in time to come shall ever unchaste woman live through the example of Lucretia,”

at which point she brandishes a hidden dagger and stabs herself to death (as depicted in the banner art of this blog). Appalled, inspired, and outraged, Lucretia’s menfolk revolt against the ruling family and help found the Roman Republic. Continue reading →

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Should conscientious writers use scare quotes around the phrase “honor killings”?

07 Saturday Jun 2014

Posted by dan demetriou in anthropology of honor, honor code, honor in contempory media, honor in the news, philosophy of honor

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Pakistani human rights activists protest against the killing of pregnant woman Farzana Parveen for marrying a man she loved. Photo: Getty

Since honor killings are so-called, they present honor theorists interested in rehabilitating honor with perhaps our greatest rhetorical challenge. One strategy would be disassociating honor with honor killings: to say that they are honor killings in name only, but not in fact. As part of that strategy, we might decide to put scare quotes around the phrase “honor killings.” A recent, excellent article on honor killings by Aisha Gill exemplifies this liberal use of the scare quote approach.

[A note for non-writers and students: using quotes to mention a phrase qua term (as I did two sentences ago), and using quotes to draw attention to a term (as I do in the next sentence), are different from using scare quotes, which signal that you’re not endorsing the attitudes that might come with a sincere use of the quoted term.]

So this post isn’t devoted to condemning honor killings so much as making a “meta” point. Suppose a writer

  • Condemns honor killings,
  • Finds them even to be dishonorable, and
  • Wants to communicate both her condemnation of honor killings and yet her endorsement of the importance of being honorable.

Such a writer will inevitably contemplate using scare-quotes around the phrase “honor killing.” I want to argue that the scare-quote approach is incorrect.

My argument is premised on the claim that the word “honor” really is a descriptive term. It is not like “justice,” which is a “morally thick” term that has both descriptive and normative content. “Honor,” at least in the sense being used in the phrase “honor killings” (both in the mouths of those who condemn it and those who approve of it) simply refers to esteem, good standing, respectability. And these things supervene on the opinion of the honor group. Honor killings really are done for honor. Not faux-honor, but actual honor. Thus, using scare quotes around the phrase “honor killings” is not correct, even for a writer of the sort we’re imagining.

Objections and replies

OBJECTION: But these killings are not honorable—in fact, they’re dishonorable!

REPLY: Agreed. But honorableness is not the same as honor. Honor is analogous to wealth, or any other goodie (pleasure, freedom, candy, whatever). A capitalist thinks capitalist principles correctly say how the goodie of money should be gained and distributed. A socialist thinks socialist principles say how the goodie of money should be gained and distributed. They both see money as a goodie, but they disagree about the “ethic” that governs that goodie.

Honorableness concerns the correct way to get and distribute the goodie of honor. Unfortunately, honor theory is undeveloped at this point, and there are no handy names such as “socialism” or “capitalism” to denote different comprehensive and integrated theories about what’s honorable. All you and I know right now is that, whatever the correct theory is, it doesn’t permit honor killings.

Thus, the conscientious writer we’re imagining holds that the ethic governing honor says that honor shouldn’t be given to those who kill helpless, usually already-victimized girls and women. But just as it would be silly for a socialist to announce that, say, managing hedge funds isn’t about money but rather “money,” it would be incorrect, even for the conscientious writer above, to say that an honor killing isn’t about honor but “honor.”

OBJECTION: But we’re trying to shame people out of the practice of honor killings through our writing, and using scare quotes around the phrase helps drive home the message that we condemn honor killings.

REPLY: I think that this strategy perpetuates shallow and ultimately unpersuasive talk about values. No capitalist is (or should be) persuaded out of his capitalist beliefs by calling his money “filthy lucre”: that filthy lucre still pays the bills. And I doubt any proponent of honor killings will be persuaded out of his ancient beliefs by calling honor killings “honor killings,” especially when his honor group continues to honor him for what he does. The debate needs to turn to the ethics of honor. What are the principles that should govern our distribution of honor? Who should we honor, and why? These are questions about the meaning “honorableness”: “honorable,” like “justice” and unlike “honor,” is a morally thick term.

If I’m right about this, here are examples of correct usage:

“According to the U.N., 5,000 women are slain in honor killings every year.”

“These ‘honorable’ killings are often carried out by the victim’s family.”

“The so-and-so believe these acts to be honorable because of such-and-such.” [Acceptable because belief is a propositional attitude, and whatever you put in its scope isn’t an assertion of its truth.]

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Dairy Queen hero Joey Prusak, and the honorableness of protecting the weak

23 Monday Sep 2013

Posted by dan demetriou in honor code, honor in contempory media, honor system, social psychology of honor, stories of honor

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prusakAt a Minnesota Dairy Queen last week, a blind customer pulled out some money and accidently dropped a $20 bill. The customer just behind quickly picked up the bill and pocketed it. Joey Prusak, the Dairy Queen server, saw what happened, and directed the second customer to return the money. She refused. So Prusak expelled her from the restaurant, and gave the blind customer a twenty from his own pocket. Appreciative customers alerted Dairy Queen management, and Prusak’s story has gone viral.

Interestingly for our purposes, Prusak’s story is being described in the language of honor.

Yahoo: “Dairy Queen Employee’s Honorable Actions Praised Online”

DailyMail: “Honorable: Joey Prusak, 19, said that returning the money to the blind man ‘felt like it was the right thing to do’”.

Webpronews: “Honorable Dairy Queen Employee Does the Right Thing”

I think honor researchers have a lot to say about the “extra” condemnation we feel when someone wrongs a vulnerable party, and why we tend to call “honorable” those who protect the weak.

Continue reading →

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Honor’s roots in male-male competition

30 Tuesday Jul 2013

Posted by dan demetriou in anthropology of honor, biology of honor, ethology of honor, evolution of honor, honor and sport, honor code, honor in literature, honor system, philosophy of honor, social psychology of honor

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Some social psychologists have recently proposed taxonomies of the fundamental moral sentiments . . ..The emotions and practices of honor—esteem, contempt, respect, deference—developed, it is reasonable to suppose, with hierarchy in troops of early humans. Is honor, in this way, atavistic? It’s not a worry we can immediately dismiss.

–Kwame Appiah, The Honor Code, pp. 183-184

Some sort of moral pluralism—at least on the psychological level—is increasingly probable: a recent consensus statement by a number of cutting-edge moral psychologists affirms Jonathan Haidt et al.’s hypothesis that there are multiple building blocks of morality, each with its own evolutionary history.

Notably, Haidt’s taxonomy recognizes only one moral foundation that concerns rank: authoritarianism. But we have ample evidence in, say, athletic or academic rankings, that some rankings are not authoritarian. Also notable is that none of Haidt et al.’s (currently six) moral foundations has norms rooted in sexual selection, which is enormously influential in shaping behavior in many species, including us. Third, as Haidt’s taxonomy expanded, it lost the ability to account for shame and contempt, one of the “big three” condemnatory affect pairings that Moral Foundations theory was designed to accommodate. Fourth, Haidt sees his “harm/care” foundation as based in maternal instincts. This raises the question: could there be an ethos that is based on some sort of adaptive challenge males might have faced more often?

I think the honor ethos is one of these innate moral systems, and that honor fills all four gaps in Haidt’s theory.

Continue reading →

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Jews and honor in literature, pt. 2: honor vs. purity

01 Saturday Jun 2013

Posted by dan demetriou in honor code, honor in literature, honor system, philosophy of honor, social psychology of honor, stories of honor

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As discussed in the previous post, O’Brian’s Richard Canning, despite his aptitude and desire to be a naval officer, was excluded from the world of martial honor because he was a Jew. Thus, the naval officer Stephen Maturin strangely honors aCanning by noticing Canning’s insult and challenging him to a duel. The theme of Jews being shut out of the world of honor is also quite prominent in Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe. This time it is a Jewish woman, Rebecca, who is barred from assuming the social station her talents and natural nobility entitle her to. In this post, I focus on the way religion and notions of purity differ from the warrior-aristocratic norms of honor, and note how Scott skillfully uses medieval anti-Semitism to contrast these two ethics.

Continue reading →

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Jews and honor in literature, pt. 1

31 Friday May 2013

Posted by dan demetriou in honor code, honor in literature, honor system, stories of honor

≈ 1 Comment

The relationship of Jews to honor should be discussed more (it’s broached here and there by William Ian Miller, but I don’t know of a sustained discussion of the topic). Anyway, I thought I’d take note of a couple fictional episodes that deal with the issue. I’m not sure how much they shed light on Jewish themes in particular, but they do illuminate the characteristic way honor (at least on my way of looking at honor) understands respecting another person. They also show how honor is particularly good at overriding ingroup/outgroup, us/them mental frameworks, which of course play such a big role in anti-Semitism.

H.M.S. Surprise, by Patrick O'BrianThe first episode comes from The H.M.S. Surprise, the third novel in Patrick O’Brian’s Aubrey-Maturin series (of Master and Commander fame). Our protagonist, Stephen Maturin, is in love with the mistress of a wealthy Jewish merchant, Richard Canning, and proposes marriage to her. Canning overhears and, in a fit of jealous rage, deals Maturin a savage open-handed blow. The offense is not apologized for and Maturin, although bearing no animus toward Canning as a person, asks a Marine captain to be his second and demand satisfaction on his behalf.

Continue reading →

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Lord Jim and the Costa Concordia disaster

12 Wednesday Dec 2012

Posted by Peter Olsthoorn in history of honor, honor code, honor in literature, honor in the news, philosophy of honor, stories of honor

≈ 6 Comments

Next month it will be a year ago that the cruise ship Costa Concordia sank (resulting in the death of 30 passengers), and that Captain  Francesco Schettino was arrested for abandoning his passengers.  “It’s a matter of honor that the master is the last to leave. Nothing less will do in this profession,” said Jorgen Loren, chairman of the Swedish Maritime Officer’s Association, in a reaction. I am certainly not the first to see a similarity between the unhappy captain and the story of Jim and his lost honor in Joseph Conrad’s novel Lord Jim (1900). Continue reading →

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Recent events:

Kansas State mini-conference: "Perspectives on Modern Honor"

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Honor and Ethics Mini-Conference

Contributors

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Recent posts

  • Two new books on honor by contributors Tamler Sommers and Craig Bruce Smith
  • Jordan Peterson on the play/honor (agonism) ethic
  • Honor and the Military Photo Scandal
  • HonorShame.com write-up of Honor in the Modern World
  • “Ethics for Adversaries” blog

Contributors’ Books

Johnson and Demetriou's Honor in the Modern World

Peter Olsthoorn's Honor in Political and Moral Philosophy

Joe Thomas' Leadership, Ethics and Law of War Discussion Guide for Marines

Anthony Cunningham's Modern Honor

Laurie Johnson's Locke and Rousseau: Two Enlightenment Responses to Honor

Peter Olsthoorn's Military Ethics and Virtues: An Interdisciplinary Approach for the 21st Century

Tamler Sommers' A Very Bad Wizard

Lad Sessions' Honor For Us

Andrea Mansker's Sex, Honor and Citizenship in Early Third Republic France

Laurie Johnson's Thomas Hobbes: Turning Point for Honor

Shannon French's The Code of the Warrior

Sharon Krause's Liberalism With Honor

Robert Oprisko's Honor: A Phenomenology

Graham Oddie's Value, Reality, Desire

Paul Robinson's Military Honour and the Conduct of War

Jim Peterman's Philosophy as Therapy

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