Moral Variation

As a navigator, I am well aware of the use of variation and deviation in compass courses. Variation is the difference between true north and magnetic north and is different as you move around the world. Deviation is the difference between magnetic north and what the compass reads and is caused my magnetic properties close to the compass. We frequently talk about a moral compass, and I believe that a person’s moral compass is also subject to variation and deviation. We are all aware of the deviation aspect of this, but tend not to look at the variation. I believe that the United States moral compass is suffering from variation that came about so slowly that most of us haven’t seen it happening.

We used to hear a lot about “Family Values”, the less we talk about values the more we seem to be ignoring two basic ones that come from the God of Abraham: Lying about our neighbors, and speaking evil of others. Because pundits have found that they can make a lot of money by creating fear and anger, they can only continue to do this by demonizing individuals. I can’t imagine anyone going into public service to do evil. People that go into the public sector generally do so because they want to improve the lives of others. Just because we disagree with their beliefs or methods doesn’t make them evil. Unfortunately it is easier for the media to profit by printing gossip than by discussing the issues that are actually the sources of disagreement. If we ignored “The Nattering Nabobs of Negativism” while monitoring our own words, we would do much better as a country.