Hi!

I’m Martha Wallis, and for today’s vlog we’re going to talk
about and answer the question “Can you be ALWAYS morally right
and fair all at the same time?”. Let’s start off with a sample
situation.
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Imagine you are a judge and there is a person in front of you who
is sure that he has raped a child. So, as a judge, you are sure that
he really committed that crime. However, the problem is that he
has done it so professionally that he has left no trace of himself or
any evidence at all. But both you and I know that the accused
really did this and the child himself is testifying that this man
raped him. But there is no clue or evidence to accuse him.
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Since in order to be a fair judge, you have to accuse someone
based on clues and evidence, you cannot accuse this person
properly because you do not have specific evidence about his
accusation. What do you do? Can you be fair and let go of this
man that you are sure of from the experience and from the words
of that child to be free, or do you trust yourself and judge him? As
a result, you could not always be fair. Accusing him and charging
him for the crime may have been the right thing to do, but
sometimes being fair always means not doing justice to those who
have less evidence than others.
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To understand this more, let’s define first the meaning of the
terms. According to Merriam-Webster dictionary:
 FAIR (adj): 1(a) marked by impartiality and honesty, free from
self-interest, prejudice, or favoritism. 1(b)(1) conforming with
the established rules.
 MORAL (adj): 1(a) of or relating to principles of right and
wrong in behavior [ethical]. 1(c) conforming to a standard of
right behavior. (TM emphasis added)
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If one examines the definitions, then several assumptions become
apparent when employed in the question…
(a) Each of these terms is characterized by adhering to a standard
(a set of rules).
(b) Although the rules applying to FAIR appear to be a subset of
those applying to MORAL, they are not totally contained therein.
(c) Because they are not totally contained, we have two rule sets
with a disjunction in elements. The condition exists where only
some attributes are in common.
The disjunction regions show us that the AND condition can be
achieved only some of the time, but not always.
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So, my answer to the question would be NO.
One cannot always be morally right unless they have all the
information, all of it. To be fair is to be consistent with being
always morally right. A morally wise and just agent would be
predictably fair. A being who is morally right as a perennial state
cannot act unfairly by definition, because an always morally right
person seeks the resolution that is best reasoned and best
considers the interests of all those involved, in an impartial
manner.
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People aren’t perfect and don’t have supernatural powers, where
a characteristic of good moral judgment being consistently right
or most reasonable is ideal. Events in life don’t turn out as we
may have expected.
One cannot be right morally all the time, because in some cases,
“you” may not truly understand the case. Not assuming and not
meddling could be the morally right and fair thing to do, for
example.
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Sometimes doing the right thing will result in taking losses,

such as being fired from a job, which has consequences not
only for oneself but for one’s family. This is “unfair” to the
family. Or, as a more direct case of acting unfairly, in the
military, an officer’s moral duty is to perform the mission
with minimum casualties. Sometimes that means singling out
a particular individual or unit to take on a high-risk action for
the sake of the others. That is “unfair”, but such cases of
unfairness are unavoidable in an unfair world, and is the
morally right and necessary action.
So, even though there are many situations where being fair
coincides with what is morally right, there are also many
counter-examples where the ideal of fairness is over-ridden
by higher moral imperatives.

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In conclusion, in a perfect world, what is morally right would also

be fair and just. Unfortunately we live in an imperfect world
where understanding of morality and justice remain incomplete.
Whatever capacity for moral reasoning one might have does not
in itself make for morality. Humanity remains a work in progress,
alas uncomfortably slow!
That’s all. Thank you for listening.