The Challenge of Cultural Relativism*

JAMES RACHELS

James Rache;s. is the a'.tthor of The End ofLift and numerous other articles and books 0:1
the problems of practical ethics. He teaches philosophy at the University of Alabama at
Birmingham.

HOW DIFFERENT CULTURES HAVE in h1& travel8. He had found, for ex-ample, that die
DIFFERENT MORAL CODES Callatian& {a tribe of Indians) customarily ate the
bodies oftheir dead fathers. The Greeks, of OOUille,
DARIUS, A KING OF ANCTE1'"T PERSIA, was in­ did not do that-the Gruks practiced cremation
trigued by the variety of cultures he encountered and regarded the funeral pyre as the natural and
 ]HmM R,uhets: The Chaltenge ofCulturaf Relativism 617

fitting way to dispose of the dead. Darius thought But it Wa$ nor uu!y their marriage and se:mal
that a sophisticated understanding of the world practices that were different. The Eskimos also
rnust include an appreciation of rnch differences seemed to have le� regard for human life. Infanti­
between cultures. One day, to teach this lesson, he dde, for example, was common, Knud Rasmussen,
summoned some Greeks who happened to be one of the most famous early explorers, reported
present at his court and asked them what they that he met one woman who had borne twenty
would take to eat the bodies oftheir dead fathem. children but had killed ten of them at birth. Fe­
They were shocked, as Darius knew they would be, male babies, he found, were cspC"daily liable to be
and replied that no amount of money could per· destroyed, and this was permitted simply at the
suade them to do such a thing. Ther.. Darius called parents' discretion, with no social stigma attached
in 5ome Callati:ms, and while the Greeks !i&tened to it. OM people also, when they became too fee­
asked them what they would take to burn their ble to contribute to fae f.ur.ily, were left out in the
dead fathers' bodies. The Cailata.,•11, were horrified snow to dle. So there seemed to be, in this societ y1
and told Darius not even to mention such a dread• remarkably little respe<:t for life.-2
fal thing. To the general public, these were d.:s:turbing
This story, re.::ounted by Herodotus in his His-­ revelations. Our own way ofliving s:eems so nat·
tory, iilusttates a recurring theme in the literature u:ral and right that for many of us it is hard to con­
ofsocial sdence: different cultures have different ceive of othets living so differently Attd whe:1 we
moral codes. I What is thought rlght within one dn hear of such things, we tend immediately �o
group may be utterly abhorrent to the members of categorize those other peoples as "back.ward" or
another group, and vice •..-ersa, S�ould we eat the "'primitive," But to anthropologists and sociolo­
bodies of the dead or burn themt If you were a gists, there was nothing particularly surprising
Greek, one answer wouid seem obviously cort.::ct; about the Eskim0$. Si.1.ee the time ofHerodotus,
but if you were a Callatian, the opposite would enlightened observen have been accustomed to
seem equally certain. the .idea th.at conceptions of right and wrong differ
It is easy to give additional examples of the from culture to cultur,;, If we assume that our ideas
same kind. Consider the Eskimos, They are a re• of right and wrong will be shared by all peoples at
mote and inaccessible people, Numbering only ail. times, we are merely naive,
about 25,000, they live in small, isolated settle•
menu scattered mostly along the northern fringes
of North America and Greenland. Until the begin· CULTURAL RELATIVISM
rung o f this century, the outsiiie world knew little To many thinkers, th.is obl>ervation-"Difrerent
about them. Then explorers began to bring back cultures have different mor.i.l «xies"-hll seemed
strange tales. to be the key to understanding morality, The idea
Eskimo customs turned out to be very different of urJversal truth in ethio, they say1 is a myth, The
from our own. The men often had more than one <."UStorns of different &ocieties are: alt that exist.
v,ife, and they woulJ share their-wives with guests, These customs cam1ot be said to be "'correct" or
lending them for the night ru. a sign ofhrupitality. "'incorrect,"' for that implies we have: an indepen­
Moreover, \\'lthin a community, a dominant male dent sta:r.dard of right and wrong by whi,;h they
:night demami-and get--rcguiar sexual access co may be judged, But there is no :mch independent
other men's wives. Tbc womeflj however, were standard; every standard is culture-bound, The
free to break these arrangements simply by leaving great pioneering sodol.ogist William Graham Sum­
their husbands and talcing up '"''1th new partners-­ ner, writing in 1906, put the point like this;
free, that is, so long as thcir former husbands chose
not to make trouble, All in all, the Eskimo practice The "righr" way in the \\ray which the ancesrors
was a volatile scheme that bore little rescmbl.ance u&ed and which has been hand«\ down. The
to what we call marriage. tradition is itiJ own w..urant. It is nor hdd -su];,•
618 PART FIVE: MORALffY .A,1'.TI [TS car:ncs

ject to verifiation by experience. The notion another, in the 8¢!1Se thar some of them might be
of right 1$ in the folkways. It is nor outside of true even if others are false. In what follow$, we
chem, of independent origin, and brought to wiH try to identify what is correct in Cultural Rcla­
rut them. In the folkways, whateVer is, is right. tivism, but we will also be concerned to Ck.pose
This i$ becau$C rhey are traditional, and there­ what is mistaken about it.
fore coma.in in themselves the authority of the
ancestr:i.l ghosts. When we co:ne to tl:e folk­ THE CULTVRAL DIFFFRF!'-/CES
ways v;e are at the end of our analys:.s.3 ARGVME=
This line of thought has probably persuaded more CultnrJl Relativism is a theory about the nature of
people to be skeptical about ethics tlian any other morality. At first blush it seems quite pfa,1sib le.
single thing. C1tltur11t Relativism, as it has been However, like all such theories, it may be evalu­
ca.lied, challenges our ordinary belief in the objec• ated by subjecting it to rational analysis; and when
tivitv and universalitv of moral truth. It says, in cf• we anatrze Cultural Relativism we find th;1t it is
feet: that there is n� such thing as universal truth not so plausible as ir first -appem to be,
in ethics,; there are only the various cultural codes, The :first dung we need to notice is tlrnt at the
and r.othfag more, Moreover, our own code has beart of CuJtural Relati\'ism :here is a certain form
no special stan1s; .it is merely one among many.
ef ;,rgumMU, The strategy used by culturnl rela•
As we shaU see, this basic idea is really a <:om� tivists is to uguc from facts about the differences
pound of several different thoughts. It is impor­ between euttural outlooks to a conclusion about
tant to separate the various elements of the theory the status of morality, Thus w e are invited to ac.
lx:<'.tu&e, on :uialyils, some parts of the theory turn cept this reasoning:
out to be correct, whereas othen seem to be mis­
taken, As a beginning, we may distinguish the fol­ (1; The Gree.ks helieved it was '-\Tong to eat
lo'Wlng claims, aU of which have been ml\de by • the dead, whereas the Callitiarn. bclieved
cultural relativists: it \\'ltS right to cat tiie dead.
('.l} Therefore, eating the dead is neither objec•
( l) Diffi:rent societies h.wc different mo� rively right nor objectively ,vrong. lt ls
codes. merely a matter of opinion, which varier;
(2) There is no objective standard that can be from culture to culture.
used to judge one societal code better than
another. Or, alternatively:
(3/ l'he moral code of our own society has no (1) The Eskimos see nothing wrong with in-­
spedal scarus; it is merely one among many, fantidde, whereas Americans believe infan­
(4) There is no "universal trUth" in ethics-­ ticide is immorai.
that fa, there are no moral truths that hold (2) Therefore, infanticide is neither objectively
for aU peoples at all rimes. right nor objectively wrong. It is merely a
(5) Toe moral code of a society determines matter of opinion, whkh varies from cul­
what is right within that society; that is) if ture to ;;u1turc.
the morn$ rode ofa society says that a cer• Clearly, these arguments are variations of one fun·
tam action is right, then that action is d.uuental idea. They arc both special cases of a
right, at least within that society. more ge..--i.eral argument, which says:
(6) l t is mue arrogance fur us to try to ju<lge ( 1) Difrercnt cultures have different moral
the conduct of other peoples. Vite should codes,
adopt :an attitude of toler.mce roward the (2) Therefore, there is no objective "'truth" in
proctices of other cultures. morality: Right and wrong arc only matters
Although it may seem that these six propositions of opinion, and opinions vary from culture
go naturally together, they are independent of one to culture,
 Janus Rathtk: The Chu/Jcngt cfCultural.Ri:lativism 619

We may call this the Cultural Difltrenm Awu­ Rt:fativism prop1"es this ;ttgument, but unfortu­
ment. To many people, it)$ very persuasive. :But narcly the argument turns: out to be fallacious, So
from a logical point of view, is it a sound argument? it proves nothing.
It is not sound. The trouble is that :he condu­
sion does not real.ly follow from the premise-that THE CONSEQUENCES OF TAKING
is, even if the premise i s true, the conclusion still CULTURAL RELATiv"ISM SERIOUSLY
might be false. The premise concerns ¼'tlat people
baliew:: in some societies, people believe one thing; Even if the Cultural Differences Argument is in•
in other soci<:ties, people believe differently. The valid, Cultural Rclativ:ism might still be true, 'What
;ondusion, however, concerns what really is tin would it be like if it were true?
um. The trouble is that this sort of conclusion In Ule passage quoted above, William Graham
does not follow logically from this sort of prerd.se, Sumner summarizes cl:e esStor.ce ofCnkural R.ela·
Comider agafo the example of the Greeb and civwm. He says that th{:"re .i,- no measure of right and
Call;1.t4.ns. The Greeb believed it w-as wrong to eat wrong other than the standards of one's society:
the dead; the Callatians believed it was right. Does "The notion ofrlght is in the folkways. It is not out­
it follow,f1'hm the mere factt:hat tbtydisagrred, that side of t.'";iem, of independent origin, and brought
there is no objective truth in the mattcr1 No, it to test them. In the roli(ways, whate:Ver is, is right."
C.oes not follow; for it could be that the ptacti.:e Suppose we took this seriously . 'What would be
was objectively right { or wrong) and that one or some of the consequences?
the other ofthem tvas simply mistaken, 1. H% Muid M knger say that the wstoms ofother
To make the polm dearer, consider a very dif­ societies are morally inftrt(/r to our own, This, of
ferent matter, In some sodeties, people believe thi; course, is one of t.1.e main points stressed hy Cul­
earth is flat. In other societies, such as our own, tural Rdativism. We would have to srop con­
people believe the earth 1s (10ughiy} sphcricaL demning other societies merely tKcause they are
Does it follow,frinn the mere fatt that the:, disagree, "'different." So long as we concentrate on certain
that there is no "objective truth" in geography? Of examples 1 such as the funerary practices of the
course not; we would never draw such a eondu· Greeks and Ca!latiam, this may seem to be a so­
sion because \Ve realize that, in their beliefs about phistkatod, cnhghtencd attitude.
the world, tht member!> of so.:nc societies might However, we would also be stopp«i from criti­
simply be wrong, There .is no reason to think that cizing other, kss: benign practices, Suppose a sod.­
if �e world i5 round everyone most know it. Simi­ ety waged war on its neighbors for the purpose of
larly, there is no reason to think that if there is taking slaves. Or suppose a society was violently
moral truth everyone must know it. The funda· anti-Semitic, and its leaders set oct to destroy the
mental mistake in the Cultural Differences Argu­ Jews, Cultural Relat.'vism would preclude us from
ment is that it attempU to derive a substantive saying that either ofthese pr:aet.iees was wrong. We
conc!us.ion about a mbject (morality) from the would not even be able to s.ay tlur a so-:4=ty toler­
mere fact that people disagree about it. ant of Jews is better than the anti-Semitic society,
It is lmportant to umiersttnd the nature of±e for that would imply some sort of transcultural
point that is: being made here. We are not saying standard of comparison. The: failure to condemn
(:r.01 yet, anyway) that the conclusion of fae atgu· theu.pras:tkes does not seem "'enlightened"; 011
ment is false. insofar as anything being $UJd here is the contrary, slavery aad anti,Semitism seem
, concerned, it is still a.'1. open question. whether the wrong wheret>tr they occur. Nevertheless, l:f \Ve
cocdusion is rrue. We ,m� malting a purely logical took Cultural Relativism seriously, we would have
point a.1.d �ying that the conclusio::t does 1rnt fol­ to admit that these social practices also arc L-nmune
, lowfrom the premise, This is important, because fro:n criticU11n.
in order to determine whether the conclu$ion is 2, -WC could decide 'Jrhether a,ri,ms are right or
true, we need arguments in in support. Cultural wrongjust by consulting the mu1dard-s afour ff)CUty.
620 l'ART FIVE: MORALITY AKD ITS CJUTJCS

Cultural Relativism suggests a simple test for de­ Kir.g, Jr,, seeks ro cha1..ge hi& society for the better.
tumining what is right and what is \l.Tong: alt one Wit..½.in the. ,;onstra!nts imposed by Cultural Rela­
has to do is a_�k whether the action is in accordance tivism, there is one way thls might b e done. lf a
with the coc!c of one's society, Suppose a resident society is not living up to iw QWn ideais, the re,
of South A{tica is 1wondering whether his country's OOrmer may be regarded as acti:ig for t.½e best: the
policy of a/mrtheid-rigid racial segregation-is .ideals of the society are the standard by which we
morally correct iJ.l he has to do is ad. whether this jndge his or her proposals as worthwhile. But the
policy conforms to his society's moral code. If it "reformer" may not chaUenge the ideals them•
does, there is nothing to worry about, at least from selves, fur those ideal-$ are by definition co::<rea.
a moral point of view, According- to Cultural fu!lativism, then, the idea
This implication of Cultural Relativism is dis· of social re.form makes sense only in this very Jim.
turbing because fev,· of us think that our sodety's ited way.
code is perfect-we can :hink of ways :.r might be These three consequences of Cultural Rt!a­
improved. Yet Cultural Relativism would nm onty nvisrn ]:.ave kd manythi.n1<ers to !'eject it as implau­
forbid us from criticizing rhe codes of other soci­ sible on its face. It does rnake sen&e 5 they say, :0
eties; \r would srnp us from criticizing our own. condemn some pra-rtice.s, such as slavery and anti­
After ail, if ng.ht and wrong are relative to culture, Semitism, wherever they occur. It makes sense to
this nust be true for our own culture just as much think that our own socie:y has made some moral
as for othenL progress, while admitting that it is still ir.iperfect
3. The idta Qf»wralptwgrns is called into duufft, and in need of reform. Because Cultural Relativism
Usually, ·we think u'lat at ica:;t some changes in our says that rh.�e judgments make uo sens,;, the ar­
wciety haYe been for t'le bette:r. (Some, of course, gument goes, it cannot be right.
may have been changes for the worse.) Consider
this example: Throughout most ofl.Vestcm history \VHY THERE IS LESS
rhe place of women in society was very narrowly DISAGREE,MENT THAN IT SEEb,LS
circumscribed, They could not ov.Ti property; they
wuld not vote or hold political office; '\\'lth a few The original impetus for Cu.ltura1 Relativism
exceptions, they were not permitted to have pay• comes from the observation that cultures differ
lng jobs; and generaUy they were nnder the almost dramaticilly in their views of right and \.\<-rong. Bur
absolute control of their husbands. Recently much just how much do they differ? It is true that there
Qf this ha$ changed, and most people think of it as are differences. However, it is easy to over('stiruatc
progress. the extent ofthosed.ifferences. Often, when \Ve ex·
If Cultural fu!lativism is correct, can. we. legiti­ amine what seems to be a dramatic di.ffen:ncc, ,ve
mately think of U1is as progressr Progress means fmd that the cuJrures do not differ nearly as muc..1.
replacing a way of doing things with a hetur way. as i t appears,
But by what standard do WE judge the new ways Consider a culture in whlch people believe it is.
as better? If the old ...,_,ays were in aci:orda.nce with wrong to cat W\\'S, This may even be a poor cul·
the m<.:ial standards of their time, then Cultural ture, in whlch there Mi not enough food; still, the
Relativism '\\"OUld say it is a m!st;tke to judge the.m cow; uc not to be touched. Such a society '\\'OU!d
by the standards: of a different time. Eighteenth· µ,ppellrto have values very different from our cw.n,
century society was, in effect, a d1ffe.rcnt society Bnt does it? We have not yet asked why these
from the one we have now, To say that we have people will not eat cow·s. Snppose it is because they
made progress implies a judgment that present-day believe that after death the souls of humans inhabit
society is better, and that is just the sort of tran• the bodies of animals, especially cows., so that a
scnltural judgment that, according to Cuk.intl Rel­ cow may be someone's grandmother. �ow do we
ativism, is impermissible. want to say that their values are different from
Our idea of social nfonn WJI also have to be re• ours! Xo, the difference Hes else,vhere. The differ·
considered. A reformer such as Martin Lutber ence is in our belief systems, not in our values , We
 James Rath�ls: T't.te Challenge of Cultural RclatiPism 621

agree that we shouldn't eat Grandma; we simply ;;:arualcy rate, the adul.t men who die prematurely
disagree about whether the cow is (or ,;::ould be) far outnumber the women who die early. Thus if
Grandma. male .1.nd female infams survived in equal numbers,
The general point is tills. Many .fuctors work to· the female adult population would greatly out­
getber to produce the customs of a society. The sow nwnjer the male adllir populatfon. Examining rbe
dety's values are only one of the:n. Other matters available statistics, one '.\"titer concluded that "were
such as. the religious and factual belle.ts hdd by its it not for :'emak: infanticide ... there would be ap­
members and the physical dreumstances in which proximately one-and-a-half times as many females
they ::nusr live, arc also important. We cannot con­ jn the ::rverage Eskimo local gtoup as there are
clude, then, merc:iy because customs differ, that food-producing males. "4
there is a disagrennent about ;,aluet. The differ­ So among the Eskimos, infanticide does not
ence in customs may be attributable to some other signal a fundamentally different attitude toward
aspect of social life. Thus there may 1:-ic less dis­ children. Instead 1 it is a recognition that draslic
agreement about values than there appears to be. measures are sometimes needed to ensure the fan;.
Consider the Eskimos again. They often kiU per­ ily's survival. Even tl1t:n, however, killing the baby
fectly normal infants, especially girls. We do not ap­ is not the first option considered. Adoption is
prove of this at all; a p11rent who did th.is .in our common; childless couples ate especially happy to
.ocicty would be locked up. Thus t,\ere appears to take a more fertile couple's "'surplus," Killing is
be a great difference in the values of our two cu!• only the Jut resort. 1 emphasize this in order to
tures, But suppme we ask why the Eskimos do this. show that the raw data of the anthropologists can
The eAp!anation is not that they have less affection be mi6!eading; it can make the differences in val·
fur their children or less respect for human life. An ues bet¼•een cultntes appear greater than they are,
Eskimo family will a.'wa:yl, protect its babies ifcondi­ The Eskimos' values are not all that different from
tions permit. But they UV( in a harsh environme11t, Qur values, It is only that litC forces upon them
where food is often in short supply, A furu:1.amental choica that we do not have to make.
pm�ak of Eskimo thought is: 1'1.ife is hard, and
the margin of safety small." A family may want to
r.owi5h its babies but be unabl.e to do so. HOW .Ai.LL CULTUR.ES HAV"E SOME
As in many "primitive" societies, Eskimo moth· VALUES IN COMMON
er.; will nurse their infants over a much longer pe­
riod oftime than mothers in our culture. The child It should not be .surprising that, despitt appear•
will tal:;e nourishment from its mother's breast for ances, the &kin1m- are protective of their children.
four years, perhaps even longer, So even in the best How could it be otherwise? How could a group
of times there are limits to the number of infants survive that did Mt value its young! Thu; suggests
that one mother can sustain. Moreover, the Eski­ a certain argument, one which shows that all cul­
mos are a nomadic peop!.e-unabie to furn, they tural groups must be protective of their infants:
must move about in search of food. Infants must (1; Huma.n infants are helpkst: and. cannot sur­
be carried, and a mother can carry only one baby vive ifthey are not given extensive care fur
in her parka as she travels and goes about her out· a period of years.
door work. Other hmily memben. can help, but (2) Therefore, lf a gr<mp did not ,;are fur its
this is not always po5Sible, young, the yow.g would not survi�, aad
Infant g.ir4 are more readily disposed of be­ t.hc older membm of the gtotlp v.'OU.ld. not
came, first, in this society the maks are.the primary be replaced. After a while the group would
food providers-they are the hunters, ;1ccording die out,
to the traditional division oflabor-----and it is obvi­ (3) Therefore, anyntltura1 gl'Qup that contin­
ously important to maintain a sufficient number of ues to exist rnllllt ;;:zre for in young, Infants
food gatherers. But there is an important second that are not cued for must be the exc.ep­
reason ;U well, Because the hunters suffu a high tion rather than the rule.
622 l"JJtT FfV'I:,; MOSAL!TY AND JTS ctuncs

Similar reasoning shows that other values must and murder ;1te two examples And in fact, we do
be more or less universal 1maginc what it wouid find these nlWJ in force in ail viable cultures, CuI­
bt: like for a society to place no value at ail on truth run::s may diffi;r in what they regard as 1egi.tirnatt
tdling. When one person spoke to another, there exceptions to the rul.cs, but tru$ disagreement exists
would be no presumption at aU that he 'Nm; telling agairut a background of agreement on the large r
the truth-for be could just as easily be speaking issue-s. Therefor.;:, it is a mistake to 9verestirnate
falsely. Within that society, there would be no rea· the amount of difference between cultures. Not
son ro pay attention to what anyone says. (I ask every moral rule cw vary from society to sodety.
you what time it is, and you say "four o'dock."
But there is no presumption that you are gpeakii�g
truly; you could just as easily have said the first WHAT CAN BE LEARNED PROM
thing that came into your head. So I have no rea· CULTURAL RELATIVISM
son to pay attention to your :answer-in fact, fr1ere
was no point in my asking you in the first place!) At the outset, I said that we wei'<'. going to identify
Comtnunkation would then be extremely difficult, both 'What is right and what is wrong in Cultural
if not impossible. And because complex societies Relativism. Thus far 1 lli1ve mentioned only its mb.
cannot exist without regular corr.munk:ition takes: I have said that it rests -0n an itrvatid argu•
amo:i.g their mecnbers, society would become im­ me.nt, ,;:hat it has ,consequences: that make it
possible. It follows that in any complex society implausible on its f..,ci:, and that the extent of cul­
there must be a presumption in favor of truthful­ tural disagreement W far less than lt imp!ies. Thi.s
ness. There may of course be exceptions to this all adds llt' to a pretty thorough repudiat:io·n of the
rule: there may be situations in which it is thought theory. Nevertheless, it is: still a very appealing
tQ be perm.issibl<,: to lie. Nevertheie�, these will be idea, and the reader may have the feeling that all
exceptions w a rule that is in force in the rodety. this is a little unihlr, The theory must have some­
Let me give one further example of the w.rne thing going fur it, or else why has it been w influ­
type. Could a society exist lU whkh there w.i,s no ential? In fact, l think the.re ts something right
prohibition on murder> Wbat would this be like! about Cultural Relativism, and now l want to uy
Suppose people were free to kill. other people at what that is, There are two lessons we should learn
will, and no one thought there was anything from the theory, even if we ultimatdy reject it.
wrong with it. In such a '1 wciet;', .. no one could 1. Cultural Reiativism warns: us, quite rightly,
iCel secure, Everyone would have to be corn1tantly about the dangeI of assuming that all our p�efer­
on guard. People who wa1tted to survive would e.nccs are ba,;cd on �ome absolute rttional star.-
have to avoid other people a& much as p<)ssiblc, dard. They are not. Ma11y (but not all) of our
This would inevitably result in individuals trying pra;:tic� are merely peo;Ji.ir to our sodety, and it
to become as self-sufficient as poss.ible--after all, is easy ro lose sight ofthat fact. In reminding us of
associating with others would be dangerous. Soci· it, the theory does . a service.
ety on any large scale would collapse. Of course, Funerary practices are one example, The Calla·
people might band together in smaller groups with tians, according to Herodotus, were "men who
others that they could trust not to harm them. But cat theiI fathers"-a shocking idea, to us at !east.
notice what this means: they would be forming But eating the flesh of the dead could be under·
smal!er societies that did admowledge a rule stood as a sign of respect. It could be taken as a
against murder, The prohibition of murder, tlien, symbolic act that says: We wish tltls perron's spirit
is a necessary feature of a.11 societies. to dwell \\-'lthin us. Perhaps this was the under·
There is a general theoretical point here, standing ofthe Callatians. On such a way of think·
namely, that there art S()HU mtwal ruks that aJJ ro­ ing, burying the dead could be seen is an act of
cfrtUs wiJI haw in comman, JM,auu th1JSe mks are rejection, and burning the corpse as positi"v-el-y
mcessary·for society to exist The mies against lyi."lg scornfuL If this is hard to imagine, th.en we may
 Jame; R.uthdt: The CbsJJrng, (;fCuJrur«l Rrlativinn 623

need to have our imagirui.tions stretched, Of For Ifanyone, no matter who, were given the
course we may feel a visceral. repugnance at the opportunity of choosing from amongst all the
idea of eating human flesh in any circumstances, natioru of the world the set ofbdie& wl»ch he
.But what of it/ This repugnance may be, as the thought best, he would inevitably, after earcful
relativists. say, only a matter of what is customary consideration 9f their relative merits, choose
in our patticu!ar society. that of hi:s ovvn country, Everyor,e without ex­
· ,eption believes his own native emtoms, and
There are many other matters that we tend to
think ofln terms of objective righc and wrong, but the religion he was brought up in, to be the
that arc really nothing mo.re than social conv;;n­ bci.t.5
tioru, Should women caver thl!'ir breasts? A pub­ Realizing this can result in our having more open
li.;Jy exposed breast is scandalous in our society, minds, We can come co understand that out feel­
whereas in other cultures it is unremarhbie. Ob­ ings ace not necessarily perceptions of the truth­
jec!n...::ly speaking, it .is neither right nor wrong-­ they may he nothing more than the result of
there is uo objective reason why either custom is cultural conditioning. Thus when we hear it sug·
better. Cultural Relativism begins with the v.:11u• gested that some element of our social. code is ,wt
able insight that many of our practici:s 11-re like really the best, .and we find ourselves instinctively
t'.m$--Chcy are only cultural products. Then it goes n:sining the suggestion, we might srop iind re­
'I..V!ong by condud.ing that, because mmt practices member th.is. Then we may be more open to dis­
-are like this, all must be, covering the truth, Tuilatcver that might be,
2, The second Jes.son has to do with keeping an We can understand t:he appeal ofCulturai .Rela­
open mind, In the course of growing up, each of tivism, then, even though the theory has serious
us has acquired some strong feelings: we have shottcomings. It is an attractive theory because it
learned to think of sorne cypes of conduct as ac­ is based on a genuine insight-that many of the
ceptable, and othe:.ro we have learned to r<:gard as practices and attitudes we think so natural are re­
simply unacceptable. Occru;ionally, we may find ally only cultural products. Moreover, keeping this
those feelings challenged, We may encounter insight firmly in view is important if we want to
someone who claims that our feelings are mis· avoid arrogance and have open mi.nds. Thc:S< arc
taken. For example, we may have been taught that important points, not to be taken lightly. But we
homosexuality is immoral, and we may feel quite can accept these points without going on to accept
um:omfortable around gay people and see them as the whole theory.
alien and "different."" Now someone suggests that
this may be a mere prejudice; that there is nothing
e'!lil about homosexuality; that gay people are just NOTES
people, like anyone else, who happen, through no
choice of their own, to be attracted to others of 1. Herodotus, The H-i.mrirs, translated by Aubrey
de Selincourt, revised by ,\. R. Burn (Har­
the samt sex, .But because we feel so strongly mo.:1ds:worth, Middlesex: Penguin Books, 1972),
about the matter, we may find it hard to truce this pp. 219-220.
seriously, Even after we listen to the arguments, we 2, Information about the Eskimos was taken from
mav still have the unshakable feeling that homo· Peter Freuche:n, BrmJ. efthe }:sllimos (New Yotk: Faw­
sex� must, romehow, be an ur.savory lot, cett, 1961); and E. Adamson Hoebel, Tht Law of
Cultural Relativism, by st:re:wing that our moral Primitiv;; Man (Cambrldge: Harvard University
Pres.s, 19&4), Cnapter 5,
views can reflect the prejudices of our society, pro­ 3. William Graham Sumner, Ff)fkway1 (Boston:
\-ides an antidote for this kind of dogmatism. Ginn and Company, 1906), p. 28.
When he tells the story of the Greeks and Calla~ 4. H0<:bel, ffl l,aw 6/Primitive Man.
t:ians, Herodotus adds; 5, Herod.oms, Thi IImet"irt.