The Role Of Morality In Black Mirror

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Recommended: The case for moral relativism

Upon watching the episode titled “White Christmas” in the series “Black Mirror” by Charlie Brooker, one philosophical issue stuck out to me the most. The episode provided a situation which provoked thoughts of its questionable morality. I was brought to wonder whether the situation was right or wrong and why it would be so. After it was brought to my attention that one of the character’s opinion of the morality of the situation differed from my own, I was prompted to take a deeper look at morals. I began to wonder why the characters had differing beliefs from each other as well as myself about the morality of the situation. This question introduced further questions: Are morals something that come naturally to us, or are they created by us? …show more content…

Hume once wrote, “All morality depends upon our sentiments; and when any action or quality of the mind pleases us after a certain manner we say it is virtuous; and when the neglect or nonperformance of it displeases us after a like manner, we say that we lie under an obligation to perform it.” This quote demonstrates his belief that moral decisions are made based on what makes us feel good, what pleases and does not please us - rather than on objective or innate rules regarding morality. This philosophical idea supports moral relativism in that it suggests the subjectivity of morality. Morality is decided by each individual’s feelings, therefore it must be relative to each individual, as everyone does not hold the same feelings. A sadist may consider inflicting pain on someone to be morally correct, since they would enjoy doing so. However, one who does not enjoy hurting someone would consider that act to be morally incorrect - as it would not be an act that was enjoyable or pleasing to them. A sadist and one who is not a sadist having different opinions on what is and is not moral exemplifies the relativity of …show more content…

Moreover, cultures are simply a grouping of those individuals and their system of beliefs. It is evident that each culture is unique in their moral judgments. Philip Hugly and Charles Sayward provided the example of a native Indian and a native Nebraskan having a moral dispute about the killing of cattle for human consumption. In their essay, it was written “Since the judgments of the Indian and the Nebraskan both are in accord with their respective moralities, and each of those judgments is correct in the most fundamental sense of correctness applicable to moral judgments, they are both true,” and this exemplifies the moral relativist’s perspective. The Nebraskan was raised to believe that the killing of cattle is not immoral, due to their culture believing it to be moral. The native of India’s culture believed the act to be immoral, therefore the native was taught to believe the same. The fact that each of their cultures did not agree on the morality of killing cattle supports the concept of moral relativism, since each culture believed they were morally correct - but neither could prove they were. We can conclude from this example of moral diversity between cultures, amongst many others - that morals must be relative to cultures. If they were not, killing cattle would not be “wrong” in some cultures, but “right “ in others - and neither would things such as

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