Moral blindness is a philosophical way of talking about people who have either lost or never had an understanding of right and wrong. Charles Dickens introduces us to Oliver Twist in Victorian England and helps us see how the natural moral compass can be completely compromised. Mafia stories capture the destruction of innate goodness through a reward and punishment cycle that is as diabolical as Dickenson’s Fagin. Oliver Twist rises above the criminality of his world and reminds us that moral blindness is a temptation not a fate.
In our own day, the war in Ukraine reflects the moral blindness of the man who started it. He has shared this blindness with the Russian people by telling them, day in and day out, that this is a just cause and that Western Europe is the real aggressor. Without a free press, this lie goes unanswered. By now, however, many Russians have come to know the depravity of their president and the real story behind Russia’s unjust war against Ukraine.
Turning to the United States, it is very hard not to suspect moral blindness in many places. The punishment for transporting and selling illegal drugs is prison. When those drugs like fentanyl cause death, drug providers may be found guilty of some level of homicide. In both cases, arrests, prosecutions, and convictions are the steps that deal with this horrendous form of criminality.
For the past number of months, boats have been blown up in the Caribbean with the deaths of all on board. These boats have been suspected of carrying illegal drugs that would eventually end up in the United States. Historically, the Coast Guard would interdict these boats and take appropriate action. Sometimes, there would be drugs; sometimes there would not be. The current policy of our government is to assume that all boats are carrying drugs. As their obliteration is being ordered, we have to wonder whether the officials in our government understand that they have taken upon themselves the roles of accuser, judge, and executioner. The number of people who have died in these Caribbean deaths is fast approaching 200 souls. Might this be an example of moral blindness?
Recently, the world has been shocked by the number of Iranians that were killed in the streets of Teheran for demonstrating against the ruling government in January. These killings are reminiscent of Tiananmen Square in 1989, when the Chinese military opened fire on thousands of pro-democracy demonstrators. The most recent public hanging of three notable Iranian dissidents has been equally shocking and deplorable. And for the past four years innocent civilians have been targeted by Russian missiles and drones in Ukraine. All of these deaths are being universally condemned.
The moral question before us may be very simple. Is there any real difference between and among the invasion of Ukraine, the Caribbean executions, and the Tiananmen Square/Teheran killings of innocent civilians? To label these as examples of moral blindness does not come close to identifying these losses of human life as tragedies on a grand scale.
Etiquette and international law have the same enforcement mechanism. They depend on people of character to do what is right. The United Nations and the International Criminal Court are very limited when the issues before it are the wholescale violation of human rights in any country or by any country. This enforcement mechanism, therefore, is woefully inadequate to address the kinds of terrible things happening throughout the world today. Without international law and standards of conduct for legitimate democracies, we are faced with a world where ‘might makes right’. Mutual assured destruction becomes internationalized and the world’s precious resources get gobbled up in an arms race that creates greater fear and even greater poverty.
Real diplomacy with real diplomats and an international consensus that wars and violence only bring about more wars and less security need to prevail. The inability to see this is real moral blindness at a time when clear moral vision seems to be in such short supply.
Msgr. Garrity is a Senior Priest of the Archdiocese of Boston and former pastor of St. Mary’s Parish and High School in Lynn.
