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The first difficulty is defining
what it means to be moral. Since morals come from
socio-religious-legal rules, what it means to be moral must surely
change from culture to culture and even from time to time in the same
culture. For example, the Anglican Church is about to be split asunder
by disagreement on whether being homosexual makes one immoral. Some
cultures allow a second wife whereas in others that’s immoral.
Similarly, for some people, sex before marriage is immoral and others
not. How does moral education cope with this serious contradiction –
and it is a problem because to be immoral is to be a “bad person”.
The rule of God and/or the State
If morals come from God or the
State how is it possible in a moral education class to allow people to
have an open and free discussion where they can disagree? Firstly,
many individuals brought up in a strict society would not want to do
or say anything against their God or the State out of love or respect.
Others would be too afraid to do so because they might go to hell or
jail. Secondly, it would be difficult for a moral educator to allow a
free discussion on an immoral topic when it looks as if the educands
are coming to a conclusion that the immoral thing isn’t immoral after
all. Thirdly, if something was once immoral and now it is not, or if
it is immoral in one place and not another, does this mean that God
changes His/Her mind or can’t make up His/Her mind? How do we know if
He/She has changed His/Her mind? So how does moral education enable
the free and honest discussion that is needed to get people to change
and be even more responsible?
Instruction
If morals are cast in stone and
have such high authority the only way to teach morals is to dictate
them and instruct. All that is required is to inform about the rules,
explain what they mean in practice and then tell people the rewards
for obeying and the punishments for disobeying. This is not education
and therefore “moral education” is a misnomer. A better name for much
of moral education is moral instruction.
Duplication
In some societies
schools are charged with doing, for example, sex education, crime
education, values education and citizenship education as well as moral
education. Why this duplication? If pre-marital sex, getting pregnant
out of wedlock, stealing, fraud and getting drunk are already covered
in the other educations, why do we need moral education? Indeed, why
have all this duplication with all the various educations? Why not
analyse all the content in all the education, and make one subject.
Since the common thread in all the educations is values, why not call
it “values education”? I have made an attempt at this in the book:
Values education for more effective: moral education, religious
education, citizenship education, health education, sex education,
environmental education, alcohol education, multicultural education,
and personal and social education. Read it and see if you agree or
not with the way forward.
Dr Bill
would be delighted to talk at your next conference or event and give
more details on how moral education would be more effective if
approached from a values education perspective. Contact him on
bill@valueseducation.co.uk
Copyright © 2008 Values Education Ltd
Note to editors. Feel free to use this article as long as the
following details are retained. “A values education article from CAVE
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