WHAT IS RIGHT?

What is right can be judged by different people or communities differently based on personal moral
values, religious views or rules set by people in a particular community or organisation. What is right can
be perceived based on their consequences, motives or the action itself.

Consequentialism is the believe that the outcome or consequence of an action justifies it. For
example, your friend runs a business and has been evading taxes and somehow it comes to your
knowledge what he has been doing. Now as a good citizen, it is your civil duty to report him to the
authorities so that legal actions can be taken against. But as a friend, it is your duty to protect your
friend and his interest. You know if you rat him out, he could lose his business, incur serious fines and
probably go to jail for it, and it could also mean the end of your friendship if he finds out you were
responsible for it, and not reporting it makes of you an accomplice. You find yourself in a conflicting
position where you need to choose between being a good and honest citizen and being a good and loyal
friend. This is a situation where it feels like there is no right decision to make due to the consequences
each will have. Both seem right and wrong at the same time, make a choice between protecting a friend
and upholding the law. And it now boils down to personal morals and virtues. Someone will say your
loyalty is to your friends, and so you must protect them and hence choose to say nothing. Others will say
as an honest person, you must report every fraudulent activity so that the law can take its jus course.
But there really is no right decision to make.

If we look into motive; it is the reason why someone will act in a particular way or carry out a
particular act. Let’s look at another scenario, in the movie Avengers Endgame, Thanos the intergalactic
warlord set out to destroy half the world in order to save it from extinction. His motive was preventing
an imminent extinction of all life due to the fast-growing population and scarcity in available resources
to feed this population. His argument was if he erased a part of the population, the surviving population
will ensure continuity of life hence preventing extinction. His perception of what is right was guided by
what he knew would be the end result. Now if we look at his motives, they were justified, he wanted to
ensure continuity of life, he wasn’t doing it for any selfish purpose. But looking at the consequences,
people lost loved ones, which could have led to depression and possibly a worser outcome than what he
intended. The act of killing in itself is considered bad. But his motives were right but it doesn’t make
what he did acceptable or right even though it could have been the only solution. If we take another
scenario, a man works for a dubious politician who makes his wealth by embezzling funds for public
contracts. He steals from him in order to give to the poor and needy who are being taken advantage of.
His motives are right, trying to return to the less privileged what has been stolen from them, but does
this make stealing in this case right? Stealing is still stealing, which is still frowned upon.

Looking into an act itself, an act may be simply be considered wrong or right, based on rules set
by the society, the communities we find ourselves in, our personal virtues and standards we set for
ourselves. What may be considered right in one community be considered a sacrilege in another
community. For example, in some Muslim and African communities, it is believed that when a child
starts menstruating, she is ripe from marriage and hence is sent into marriage at a very tender age. This
is considered right in this type of community, but in the western culture it is considered a crime which is
punishable by law. If we look at personal standards, to some people, lies telling is right or wrong
depending in the situation, meanwhile to others it is just plain wrong to tell lies irrespective of what.

The notion of what is right varies with time and place, person and race. It all comes down to our
personal believes and the principles we uphold.