The Golden Rule

We’ve all heard of the golden rule, and it may seem difficult to refute, but there are actually some problems with the golden rule.

“The Golden Rule is the principle of treating others as you want to be treated.” (Wiki)

Here’s the main problem; what if the way I want to be treated is not the way that others want to be treated? Some people like tough love, and others prefer gentle warm-heartedness. If I can see that my friend needs encouragement, but I know that in the same situation I would need discipline, and I choose to discipline my friend instead of encourage them, I would technically be acting according to the golden rule. This seems obviously wrong, and must be addressed.

In history thus far, Immanuel Kant has done the best job of clarifying the golden rule so that these kinds of problems don’t come up. He calls it the Categorical Imperative (CI). The CI roughly states;

“Act only according to that maxim whereby you can, at the same time, will that it should become a universal law.” (Wiki)

This is like the golden rule in that it’s a universal maxim, but it’s not exactly the same. The main solution here is the phrase “universal law.” To me, this means anyone who is in my situation, with my knowledge, with my personality, body, and all other variables, would act the same way. Let’s go back to the first example. I see my friend is in need of encouragement, and I imagine myself in their situation, I could imagine that I would benefit more from discipline than encouragement. Following the CI, I would say that it’s better to treat my friend how they want to be treated, than how I imagine I would want to be treated if I were in their situation. So, it seems the CI solves that problem.

There’s one meta-problem here though. Ethics is boring! I don’t want to be constantly moralizing every single action as if it’s universal law! What I’ve done is combine the best parts of both the golden rule and the CI to form a new universal rule, what I’ll call the Ethos Maxim:

“Treat others as they appear to be; acting in each moment as if our perception is true and accurate. In hindsight, meditate on the accuracy of our perceptions.”

In the same example, I would simply encourage my friend because that’s what they need in that instant. In hindsight, I might learn that they were acting like they needed encouragement, but would have benefitted more tough-love/discipline. After learning that new information, my perception and knowledge of my friend would likely change a bit, and in a future scenario I may act differently. Even so, in any future scenario, I would only act based on what I was perceiving and knowing at that moment.

I hope you can see how this way we can combine a universal maxim with the cultivation of virtue of character, so we have a simple rule to follow in every instance, and at the same time have a way to improve ourselves in the long run. As our perception and knowledge improves, it becomes easier and more obvious how to best act, in any situation.

Guys, I’m not gonna lie, there’s one simple reason why I’m sharing this, and it has nothing to do with any fancy pants ethical philosophy. It’s a very real problem in my life that causes me spiritual suffering. The moral/spiritual dilemna I often face is this; how do I treat others who are so broken as people, and fallen as souls, that I sometimes struggle to even see them as human? I wish this was a problem I didn’t have, but it’s real, and I have to be honest with myself and find a way out of this hole.

What I’ve learned to do from study and practice is really simple. I treat others as they appear to be, exactly as the Ethos Maxim above dictates. So, if someone looks like, sounds like, acts like a pig, but they have a human body, to me, that means they’re mostly a pig, and I treat them mostly as a pig. This likely sounds horrible to you, but you have to really imagine this dispassionately first. I don’t care about pigs or any other kind of animal. In fact, I like pretty much all mammals. If I saw a pig walk across the street, I wouldn’t be at all concerned. So, “treating someone like they’re a pig” is to me, not necessarily problematic. It’s the same with “sheeple.” Someone who sounds and acts like a sheep, but they are in a human body, is to me, mostly a sheep, and I TRY to treat them accordingly. Here I emphasize try, because when I actually correctly follow the Ethos Maxim, it works! Remember, sheep are gentle creatures, they are no threat to anyone!

The problem for me comes when I expect too much of others. When I treat someone as a fully fledged adult, while they are saying things so immature/stupid that most children wouldn’t say, it’s really a kind of injustice. It seems nice to be nice to everyone, but if niceties get in the way of higher virtues like honesty and education, they should be dropped. We must accept that everyone goes through this journey at different speeds. When we treat people as they are right now, and not who we expect them to be, we are actually respecting and honoring them. For many in the situation I’m referring to, they don’t want to be EXPLICITLY reminded of their degraded state, but deep down, they know who they are, and want to be treated honestly, as we all do.

Here’s one example of a time I did this, and it worked beautifully. I was at a hostel in New Zealand, talking with some college kids staying there. I don’t remember what the girl said, but my first reaction was something like, “wow, that’s dumb and obviously wrong.” Instead of instantly responding, I looked carefully at her face. I saw that she was smirking, and what she was really doing was trying to see if the boys would submit to her. This had nothing to do with forming a logical argument, and everything to do with a cute young girl acting like a cute young girl. So I said, “Awwww, she so cute ain’t she.” Something like that. She smiled and  blushed, no one got offended, and life went on. Many young women may have gotten offended by that, but because in that moment I saw the truth in what she was doing, and responded to her truth, and not my truth, she appreciated it.

This post is already too long, so I’ll stop there, and maybe come back to this later. Write in a comment and let us know what you think!

Stay Wise,

Ethos