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A familiar debate in the philosophy of sport concerns the question of whether fans should seek to be partisans (those who support particular teams or individuals) or whether they should instead adopt the impartial attitude of the purist. More recently, Kyle Fruh et al. have argued in defense of fair-weather fandom, which they understand as a form of fandom that involves adopting temporary allegiances in response to non-sporting considerations. This paper will add a new form of fandom to this discussion: the foul-weather fan. While fair-weather fans adopt temporary allegiances or strengthen existing allegiances for teams when things are going well, foul-weather fans do so when things are going badly. We will argue that foul-weather fandom can be both instrumentally valuable, as it helps to protect valuable sporting institutions, and non-instrumentally valuable, as these fans display concern, empathy, or support for sporting individuals or teams that are going through tough times. We finish by discussing how a specific form of foul-weather fandom may be associated with a distinctive moral danger in putting people in positions where they may become complicit in a club's immorality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The deconstruction of celebrity persona reflects public concerns within rapidly changing societies. Bringing perspectives from de-legitimation and anti-fandom, this paper investigates how Wanwan, a controversial Chinese Internet celebrity (wanghong), was de-celebrified as a bragger, sugar baby, and two-faced traitor by her anti-fans. Anti-fans condemned Wanwan for her self-glorification, sex trading for material goods, and immorality as an elite. Despite demonstrating anti-fan efforts to seek representative justice online, their discourses are problematic for bolstering classist, neoliberal feminist, populist, and moral perfectionist ideologies. A more serious concern pertains to the politicization of personal animosity through de-celebrification, wherein anti-fans try to exploit state power to cancel the celebrities they dislike. In addition to validating a discursive approach that fleshes out (de-)celebrification studies, this paper refines our understanding of the politics of dislike by unraveling the complex socio-political dynamics behind anti-fandom and de-celebrification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing upon deonance theory and expectancy violation theory, we investigate how employees react when their companies engage in corporate social irresponsibility (CSiR) that harms external stakeholders who are not employees themselves. Furthermore, we introduce the concept of perceived internal corporate social responsibility (CSR), which refers to employees' perceptions of how organizational actions and policies benefit them personally. We developed a conceptual model that illustrates the joint influence of external CSiR and internal CSR on employees' perceptual, relational, and behavioral outcomes. An online survey with 417 full‐time US employees revealed that employees tend to evaluate unethical corporate practices holistically, in the context of other factors, such as the company's moral character and internal CSR, rather than based on external immorality. Our study contributes to a deeper understanding of employee reactions to both CSR and CSiR, emphasizing the importance of organizations evaluating the broader ramifications of their unethical actions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper – based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted in 2017 with the Swedish border police force in charge of detecting and deporting irregularised migrants – analyses bordered urban space. It contributes to discussions about moral geographies that are produced through bordering work of border police officers, which sometimes blurs the distinction between external and internal border controls, based on an analysis of three spaces: the port as an "in-between" space of bordering; workplace inspections; and searches of private homes and other types of accommodation, conducted with the aim of detecting morally censured sex work. As I find, officers function as gatekeepers of the nation and its moral values in relation to space and thus map the area of their jurisdiction according to potentially "illicit" conduct of noncitizens. This, in turn, legitimises their gendered, classed and racialised inspection practices even as these practices entrench the perceived "otherness" of such spaces and manifest moral judgements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many persons find it intuitive that being friends with someone with immoral beliefs is wrong as such. I contest this claim, instead I argue that there is nothing necessarily wrong with such friendships. In coming to this conclusion I examine a number of arguments, including two of the most notable contributions put forward by Mason (2021) and Isserow (2018), that attempt to elucidate the wrongness involved in such friendships and find they do not successfully do so. I conclude by offering some arguments as to why such friendships are not necessarily wrong. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research examines social media discourses to unravel how moral evaluation can be used to legitimize and delegitimize state violence. Based on a Colombian case of police violence targeting protesting students at the University of Cauca, this study unravels the role of moral evaluation of social actors and their actions in affirming or contesting state violence. It underlines the use of dichotomies (i.e., "bravery-cowardice," "honesty-dishonesty," and "evilness-goodness"), the attribution of immoral character traits, and inciting negative emotions as ways of attributing morality or immorality to victims and perpetrators to legitimize or delegitimize political violence. It especially underlines the use of religious references in moral evaluations. By examining social media discourses about state violence, this article aims to contribute to a greater understanding of how political violence can be legitimized and delegitimized based on morality and emotions, which can help in developing ways to promote a culture of nonviolence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the COVID‐19 pandemic, behaviours that violated various precautionary policies were recurring. The present research examined how Chinese participants' perception of targets in terms of immorality and dehumanization depends on the target's knowledge of their COVID‐19 infection. In Study 1 (N = 223), we manipulated the presentation of the target's knowledge of their COVID‐19 infection before violating policies and observed that a target who knew they were infected was perceived as more immoral and less human than a target who knew they were not infected. In Study 2 (N = 267), we replicated this effect and further observed that a target was perceived as less moral and human even when they did not acquire knowledge of their COVID‐19 infection until after having violated the policies. Moreover, perceived immorality played a mediating role between the target's knowledge of their COVID‐19 infection and dehumanization, which was moderated by risk perception of COVID‐19 in Study 2, but not by fear of COVID‐19 in Study 1. These findings increase our understanding of the phenomenon of moralization in the context of a pandemic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article grapples with the justifiability of nuclear deterrence in the aftermath of Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine. Disillusioned about the failed promise of nuclear disarmament, as well as other ethical issues inherent to nuclear weapons, Pope Francis has attached the immorality label not just to the use of the Bomb but also to its very possession. This step, which his predecessors hesitated to take during the Cold War and the quarter of a century after the fall of the Berlin Wall, has received considerable attention. However, these assessments precede the war against Ukraine. Given that the regime of Vladimir Putin has repeatedly made nuclear threats in the context of this war, and a Cold War 2.0 of sorts has returned, there is reason to reappraise Francis's argument on nuclear weapons for a post-2022 era. I argue with regret that in light of the contemporary security environment it would be a sign of irresponsible statecraft to abandon the nuclear deterrent unilaterally. At the same time, I hold that a renewed and genuine effort needs to be made not just to avoid nuclear war but to create a culture that one day will lead to complete nuclear disarmament. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Misunderstanding other people can be interpreted as the result of an insufficient performance of people's skills to understand other persons and their experiences. But what does understand mean in these contexts? And what are the relevant skills that need to be engaged to successfully understand other people? I argue that understanding other people is a form of recognition of the epistemic validity of another person's perspective. I claim that minimal understanding does not require an endorsement of another person's perspective. This makes the avoidance of lack of understanding a feasible achievement in almost all cases, though it often requires effort in the interactive process of understanding. I specifically analyse the epistemic and normative roles of empathy in this process. In pursuing this aim, I also defend empathy against recent philosophical arguments that point at moral dangers of empathic processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: What do people see as distinguishing the morally exceptional from others? To handle the problem that people may disagree about who qualifies as morally exceptional, we asked subjects to select and rate their own examples of morally exceptional, morally average, and immoral people. Method: Subjects rated each selected exemplar on several enablers of moral action and several directions of moral action. By applying the logic underlying stimulus sampling in experimental design, we evaluated perceivers' level of agreement about the characteristics of the morally exceptional, even though perceivers rated different targets. Results: Across three studies, there was strong subjective consensus on who is morally exceptional: those who are empathetic and prone to guilt, those who reflect on moral issues and identify with morality, those who have self‐control and actually enact moral behaviors, and those who care about harm, compassion, fairness, and honesty. Deep controversies also existed about the moral directions pursued by those seen as morally exceptional: People evaluated those who pursued similar values and made similar decisions more favorably. Conclusion: Strong consensus suggests characteristics that may push a person to go beyond normal expectations, that the study of moral exceptionality is not overly hindered by disagreement over who is morally exceptional, and that there is some common ground between disagreeing camps. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sterilizations sponsored and coerced by the state occurred at the Laconia State School in New Hampshire for decades as part of the American eugenics movement in the early twentieth century. The context of that movement is summarized, the case of the Laconia State School is presented, and arguments are offered to explain the immorality of the affair. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper pays homage to the late Professor, Brij Lal, for the critical role he played in debunking colonial and patriarchal myths about Fiji's Indian indentured (girmitiya) women. From as early as 1985, Lal critiqued the way the British administrators wielded power over displaced female labourers by misrepresenting them in internal and external exchanges. My specific focus here is on the way he deconstructed colonial and patriarchal tropes associated with indentured women such as their alleged immorality and promiscuousness, 'sexual jealousy', 'maternal negligence' and madness, by situating these constructs within a specific historical context. With these interventions as the foundation for this paper, I will illustrate how my own interdisciplinary investigations in the interconnecting fields of gender, indenture, subaltern studies and minor history have attempted to address Lal's concern that girmitiya women's perspectives were absent in the historical records. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The word "innocence" is ubiquitous in James scholarship, especially in studies of his late novels. But the word operates in two semantic realms: an epistemological one (where its counterpart is knowledge) and a moral one (where its counterpart is guilt). Even as critics recognize the importance of "innocence" to James, however, the tension between these two meanings of the word has not been seriously explored. I argue that James increasingly exploits the polysemy of "innocence," drawing the two meanings together as characters like Lambert Strether and Fanny Assingham try to prevent immorality by keeping themselves ignorant of it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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This paper investigates whether an ethical flaw in an artwork can be an aesthetic merit. I explore two versions of immoralism from Eaton and Kieran. I will defend the immoralist claim that artworks containing rough heroes are ethically flawed. I will then argue that an indirect connection between an ethical flaw and aesthetic merit is sufficient for immoralism, so long as it is a necessary connection. On this understanding of immoralism, I will argue that Eaton and Kieran are both successful in showing that an ethical flaw in an artwork can make it aesthetically better. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Vladimir Nabokov and Philip Roth had much in common, from an intense commitment to their art to an appreciation of so-called May-December relationships. Roth's personal library includes twenty-four Nabokov titles with six copies of Lolita (1955). His underlinings and marginal notes in two editions confirm his study of the book, which he also taught, and underscore his belief that "sex is but the ancilla of art," as Humbert Humbert states. But the influence of Nabokov goes beyond the single text. Elements of Nabokov exist in various Roth works. Lolita may have also provided license for Roth's uncensored sex in Portnoy's Complaint (1969), although Roth began to question whether art alone could vindicate immoral actions. Could art actually shelter the artist? Both authors attempted to distance themselves from their characters, but the public would not allow such separation. Nevertheless, the aesthetic of accumulation, sense of satire, and use of a self-conscious first-person narrator, added to the theme of sexual desire, cement the Nabokov-Roth nexus rooted in the numerous Nabokov titles found in the Philip Roth Personal Library. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: This study tests if the public overestimates the immoral behavior of formerly incarcerated people. Methods: In a benchmark study with people on parole and people without a criminal record, participants played a game that allowed them to deceive their counterparts in order to make more money. A subsequent prediction study asked an online US-nationally representative sample to estimate how both groups played the game. By comparing the estimated likelihoods to the observed likelihoods of deception we examine if people correctly assess the deception rates of both groups. Results: Both groups showed an equal propensity to deceive. In contrast, respondents from the online sample believed that people on parole would be much more likely to deceive than their counterparts. Conclusions: The results suggest that the public holds stigmatizing attitudes towards formerly incarcerated people, which can be a detriment to successful reentry into their communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

I argue that monarchies, in any possible form (absolute or constitutional), should be abolished once and for all. This is because of the deeply immoral presuppositions such a system of government upholds (implicitly or explicitly). Call this 'the moral argument against monarchy'. I identify three basic moral principles that monarchy by definition breaches: 'the basic moral equality principle', 'the basic dignity principle' and 'the basic moral desert principle'. Finally, I examine and reply to three objections, including the common objection that constitutional monarchy should not be abolished because it is pragmatically useful. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines Ian Softley's 1997 adaptation of Henry James's 1902 novel The Wings of the Dove as a study in the representation of liminal sociocultural moments, specifically through its infusive representation of the character of Aunt Maud, played in the film by Charlotte Rampling. James's Maud is the financial centre of the narrative, a complex and contradictory weaponization of philistine convention and vulgar immorality, a collage of surfaces repeatedly described as gloss on a double-sided coin. James felt that the diffusiveness of Maud's power was the novel's structural problem, because it inhabited a liminal space where the desires of the individual coextend with the desires of the market, and thereby dislocated the centre of critique and control in the text, moving the reader further and further away from the commercial trappings of their cultural moment. The filmmakers claimed that eliminating Maud allowed them to update the novel's language, costumes, etiquette, and environment for a younger audience, but the film was dismissed as a pandering cash grab, an attempt to make Henry James a brand. In this way, the film diminishes Maud's presence but empowers her narrative agency; resituating James's brand of displacement, alienation, and loss into a liminal environment makes Maud's commercial influence so inescapable and self-reflexive that it makes the film look like one of her many enterprises. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author of Hebrews accuses Esau of sexual immorality in Heb 12:16. This essay argues Esau's sexual immorality is his marriage to foreign women, which sowed seeds of discord in the family and led ultimately to his unredeemable exclusion from the community. Esau's exogamous marriage, as such, is not the concern in Hebrews, but rather how his mixed marriage introduced bitterness into the family and led ultimately to him abandoning the group. Like the wilderness generation in Num 13–14, Esau lost his inheritance by failing to persevere with the community. Tested against recent studies of conversion and deconversion, we see how Esau becomes a paradigmatic community-abandoning apostate and a warning against similar abandonment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Upon the modernization of the Republic of Türkiye, the Swiss Civil Code and the Swiss Code of Obligations were adopted in 1926. The Turkish provision that regulates liability arising from immorality (Turkish Code of Obligations Art 49/2) requires the tortfeasor to act intentionally. However, it is controversial in Swiss doctrine whether the Swiss Code of Obligations Art 41/2 – the source law of Turkish provision – requires Absicht (malice/pure intent to cause harm) as a different degree of intent. Even though the Turkish Code of Obligations Art 49/2 uses the Turkish term kasıt -intent- (Vorsatz), the debate in the Swiss doctrine spread to Turkish doctrine, and there is a disagreement regarding the degree of intent required in the provision. While some authors state that, in accordance with Swiss law, Absicht (malice) should be required for the application of such a provision with a restrictive nature, other authors find indirect intent (dolus eventualis) sufficient to invoke said provision. In brief, in this paper, the degree of intent required for the liability arising from immorality under Turkish tort law shall be evaluated in comparison with German and Swiss laws. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Al-Amereyah State was established in Andalusia by the hand of Al-Mansour Mohammad BinAbi Amer in the reign of the Ommayad Caliph Al-Hakam Al-Mustanser (302-366H/ 915-978 A.D.). The Ninth among Bani Omayah Emir in Andalusia, who entrusted all his affairs to Al-Mansour, who afterwards was nicknamed "The Triumphant Chamberlain", his son Abdel Malek shared him in building the state till he was died in the year (399H./ 1008 A.D.). And followed him in concealment of the Caliph Hisham, the supported his brother Abdel Rahman, Nicknamed (Shanjoul). He was with a changeable personality and "Filled so much of the cup of pleasures until the heeltap". He was repudiated shameless. And inspite of his shamelessness, he thought to become the Caliph after the Ommayad Caliph Hisham the supported by the Al-Mighty God. He enchanted on that and informed the caliph with that, insisted and threatened the caliph with killing. Then he prepared his famous decree to take over caliphate, collected all people to be witnesses and called upon the caliph to be present with the public, and read the wording of the decree that he had prepared earlier, and asked the caliph to sign it; wording him to be heir to the throne after the caliph. The caliph optionally signed that at the presence of the public and the distinguished figures, celebrations were performed by his companions and servants from the Barbarians. The Ommayads were angry and rebelled against him. At that time he was preparing for a new invasion against the Christians, he was Al-Amereyah State was established in Andalusia by the hand of Al-Mansour Mohammad BinAbi Amer in the reign of the Ommayad Caliph Al-Hakam Al-Mustanser (302-366H/ 915-978 A.D.). The Ninth among Bani Omayah Emir in Andalusia, who entrusted all his affairs to Al-Mansour, who afterwards was nicknamed "The Triumphant Chamberlain", his son Abdel Malek shared him in building the state till he was died in the year (399H./ 1008 A.D.). And followed him in concealment of the Caliph Hisham, the supported his brother Abdel Rahman, Nicknamed (Shanjoul). He was with a changeable personality and "Filled so much of the cup of pleasures until the heeltap". He was repudiated shameless. And inspite of his shamelessness, he thought to become the Caliph after the Ommayad Caliph Hisham the supported by the Al-Mighty God. He enchanted on that and informed the caliph with that, insisted and threatened the caliph with killing. Then he prepared his famous decree to take over caliphate, collected all people to be witnesses and called upon the caliph to be present with the public, and read the wording of the decree that he had prepared earlier, and asked the caliph to sign it; wording him to be heir to the throne after the caliph. The caliph optionally signed that at the presence of the public and the distinguished figures, celebrations were performed by his companions and servants from the Barbarians. The Ommayads were angry and rebelled against him. At that time he was preparing for a new invasion against the Christians, he was [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Personal similarities to a transgressor makes one view the transgression as less immoral. We investigated whether personal relevance might also affect the perceived immorality of politically-charged threats. We hypothesized that increasing the personal relevance of a threat would lead participants to report the threat as more immoral, even for threats the participant might otherwise view indifferently. U.S. participants recruited online (N = 488) were randomly assigned to write about the personal relevance of either a liberal threat (pollution), conservative threat (disrespecting an elder), neutral threat (romantic infidelity), or given a control filler task. Participants then rated how immoral and personally relevant each political threat was, as well as reported their political ideology. Partial support for our hypothesis emerged: when primed with conservative writing prompts, liberal-leaning participants rated the conservative threat as more immoral, compared with the same threat after a liberal writing prompt. We did not find these results for conservative-leaning participants, perhaps because all participants cared relatively equally about the liberal threat. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Commenting on Michael Walzer's essay, the author adopts a perspective that traces back to Machiavelli. In this view, 'dirty hands' is a true problem faced by politicians, not a philosophical fiction or a moral quandary resulting from wrong reasoning. 'Dirty hands' results from the collision of two spheres of human action -morality and politics- which entail different duties; it concerns actions which have extremely serious public consequences and therefore applies eminently to politicians and the public sphere. The author examines different scenarios to elicit a clear view of the specificity of this problem, which is not analogous to the conventional issue of immorality in politics. 'Dirty hands' is a problem that cannot be avoided by politicians, because they have responsibility over the ultimate decisions; it follows that people who wish not to dirty their hands should thus refrain from entering the political realm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article provides a response to commentators' views on the morality of intellectual property. The author engages with various arguments and criticisms, including the propagation argument, which suggests using intellectual property to limit undesirable works. They discuss concerns about rewarding harmful behavior and the potential use of intellectual property as a regulatory tool. The author also addresses the application of Locke's theory to their arguments, disagreeing with the interpretation that intellectual property rights should only reward good behavior. They agree with the consideration of moral values in regulating intellectual property and support denying protection for immoral inventions and certain modes of expression in trademarks. However, they disagree with denying copyright protection for fake news, as it may have a negative impact on legitimate news. The author also argues for denying copyright protection for pornography due to its harmful effects on society and lack of intellectual value. They suggest applying the equitable doctrine of unclean hands to deny copyright protection for illegally created graffiti. The author acknowledges practical concerns but believes judges can consider the public interest and provide well-reasoned opinions. [Extracted from the article]

In the article "Comments on the Ability of the Court to Assess the Social Effects of Intellectual Works: A review of Intellectual Property and Immorality: Against Protecting Harmful Creations of the Mind by Ned Snow," Professor Ned Snow argues against granting patent and copyright protection for inventions and creations that are harmful to individuals and society. He explores the moral limitations imposed by different intellectual property theories and discusses arguments against denying protection on moral grounds. Snow also examines the court's ability to assess the social effects of intellectual works and deny intellectual property protection based on moral judgments. He suggests that judges may deny protection to works involving unlawful activity and works that fail to promote progress as defined in the Constitution. Congress also has the authority to deny intellectual property protection based on moral values. Snow concludes by addressing the potential conflict between denying protection on moral grounds and the doctrines of free speech. [Extracted from the article]

This article explores the moral implications of intellectual property law, particularly in relation to harmful creations such as nicotine technology. It discusses three moral theories for regulating intellectual property and argues that intellectual property is not an effective tool for reducing harm. Instead, the article suggests that public health bodies should hold patents on harmful products to promote public health. The text also examines the moral foundations of intellectual property rights and discusses the concerns of developing countries regarding biopiracy. It concludes by emphasizing the need to revisit and test arguments for the current approach to copyright law. [Extracted from the article]

Morality has been an integral part of social cognition and our daily life, and different languages may exert distinct impacts on human moral judgment. However, it remains unclear how moral concept is encoded in the bilingual brain. This study, therefore, aimed to explore the emotional and cognitive involvement of bilingual morality judgement by using combined event-related potential (ERP) and psychophysiological (including skin, heart, and pulse) measures. In the experiment, thirty-one Chinese–English bilingual participants were asked to make moral judgments in Chinese and English, respectively. Our results revealed increased early frontal N400 and decreased LPC in L1 moral concept encoding as compared to L2, suggesting that L1 was more reliant on automatic processes and emotions yet less on elaboration. In contrast, L2 moral and immoral concepts elicited enhanced LPC, decreased N400, and greater automatic psychophysiological electrocardiograph responses, which might reflect more elaborate processing despite blunted emotional responses and increased anxiety. Additionally, both behavioral and P200 data revealed a reliable immorality bias across languages. Our results were discussed in light of the dual-process framework of moral judgments and the (dis)embodiment of bilingual processing, which may advance our understanding of the interplay between language and morality as well as between emotion and cognition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Eunuchism was conceptualized as a sacred political duty in Gandhian liberal nationalism. From 1906 to 1948, Gandhi embraced the identity of a 'pure' and 'asexual' eunuch through his brahmacharya experiments to locate the nation on an alternative plane and sought to educate Indians to practice an asexual life for larger cultural liberation based on moral supremacy. This article explores how Gandhi creatively utilized his practice of brahmacharya – often defined as the search for God entailing celibacy – to reinvent the persona of the eunuch. It discusses how he decriminalized and demarginalized eunuchs by collaborating with them conceptually to salvage the colonized (male) self. The article also shows the paradox of Gandhian eunuchism: the exclusion of real eunuchs who were evaluated according to colonial ideas of deviance and immorality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Metal music is here to stay, by all outward appearances, mainly, as I shall argue, by virtue of its expressive properties. Old calumnies excoriating metal for promoting immorality and the dark arts have collapsed under their own weight. Yet this article makes the harder case for representation as a value added to metal aesthetics. Metal goes so far as to assess ancient and modern foreign policy and to represent classical art forms. Philosophical aesthetics offers new insights into metal music, as shown via the article's discussion of debates involving Roger Scruton, Stephen Davies, and Peter Kivy, among others. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper deconstructs the ways the image of Fāṭima Zarrīn-Tāj Baraghānī, known as Tahirih Qurrat al-ʿAyn (d. 1852), has been distorted in academic works and in anti-Bahā'ī polemics. The misrepresentations of Tahirih in these works range from disconnecting her from the source of her inspiration, to accusations of immorality, to denying her knowledge, to denying her poetry, to depicting her as a militant figure. It is suggested that misogyny, religious prejudice, selective as well as uncritical use of primary sources, and agenda driven scholarship explain the misrepresentations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Why do people think that someone living a morally bad life is less happy than someone living a good life? One possibility is that judging whether someone is happy involves not only attributing positive psychological states (i.e., lots of pleasant emotions, few unpleasant emotions, and satisfaction with life) but also forming an evaluative judgment. Another possibility is that moral considerations affect happiness attributions because they tacitly influence attributions of positive psychological states. In two studies, we found strong support for the second hypothesis. Moral considerations only appear to affect happiness attributions when they also affect attributions of positive psychological states. Additionally, both studies supported a hypothesis about why moral judgments have these effects. Specifically, we found that when people judge that someone is living a bad life, they infer that the person is not at peace with themselves. However, when this inference is blocked, moral considerations do not affect attributions of happiness or positive psychological states. In sum, although "happiness" appears to be a purely psychological concept, happiness judgments are sensitive to moral considerations because people often assume that immorality disrupts intrapersonal harmony. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article seeks to explore the mechanisms of holding others accountable for a perceived deviation from moral order through public complaints on Chinese social media as well as the influences of emotional stance and social positioning when people perceive a breach of the moral order and try to restore it. Our data consists of a transcribed complaint narrative (CN) widely deemed morally transgressive, and a corpus of web-based news comments (WNC), displaying public counter-offensive actions to the CN. A contextualized discourse analysis reveals that abundant context-spanning impoliteness formulae in WNC are strategies for constructing collective identities and magnifying the condemnation of immorality. In the process of moral order appeal, using various emotive impoliteness formulae appear to be a situated norm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues that Kant and Fichte develop a conception of "obscuring reason." This conception allows us to explain our reasons for immoral actions although we are not able to cognize the original ground of evil. The paper analyzes Kant's conception of rationalizing (Vernünfteln) as obscuring reason. By rationalizing, we imputably misuse our faculty of reason in order to construct a viewpoint from which we are no longer bound to the absolute demand of the moral law. Fichte draws on Kant and distinguishes three kinds of operations to obscure the moral law, namely (i) abstraction, (ii) delaying, and (iii) downgrading. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The central claim of this essay is that in interpreting the U.S. Constitution, it is immoral to choose original intent over social welfare, broadly conceived. Once this argument is laid out and defended on its own terms, I support the central claim with a variety of arguments, including the defective process pursuant to which the Constitution was enacted, the deeply flawed substantive content of the Constitution, the incongruity of fidelity to the views of a generation of revolutionaries, the current virtual imperviousness of the Constitution to amendment, the failure of the Constitution to resolve fundamental questions concerning the allocation of power within the government, which leads to dependence on the un-democratic Supreme Court to resolve important and controversial social issues and finally originalism's tendency to force otherwise honorable people to lie or obfuscate about the reasons for their official decisions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper examined yesu'ah (Yeshua) in the Old Testament and the notion of a break to the curse of pandemic in Nigeria. The Hebrew word yesu'ah means; victory, relief, solution, salvation or freedom from physical challenges such as drought, famine, sickness, bondage, illness, epidemics or pandemics etc. The concept of the latest pandemic (Covid-19) has created timidity in the minds of people in Nigeria since December 2019 up to date. The major problem is that no one has ever known the actual cause and the actual medicine required to curb the spread of the deadly virus which plagues society. However, just like how the Israelites overcame their challenges, this paper which adopted a critique method reveals that Nigerian tribal societies (Yoruba, Igbo and Hausa) possess their traditional method of obtaining suitable solutions to their challenges which are very much synonymous with those of the Hebrews in the Old Testament period. But in an attempt to secure relief for their physical challenges, the people jettisoned and supplemented their traditional ways of solving problems for scientific 'proof'. It is noteworthy that the influence of civilization has become significant on the Yoruba culture. In the light of the above, the paper concludes that to obtain proper relief from the syndrome of pandemics, there must be proper discipline and morality, transparency, diligence, honesty and a total positive revolution in the way that people live. Besides this aspect, the paper elucidates that the people should re-examine their traditional methods of seeking God's face for deliverance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Stories about moral exemplars can provide crucial information about the moral heterogeneity of social groups involved in the conflict. This article addresses the role of moral exemplars narratives in changing perceptions of violent historic intergroup conflicts. We propose that two central outcomes of such interventions make them potentially an effective approach for improving intergroup relations in situations of violent intergroup conflict: (1) facilitation of intergroup contact and (2) increasing reconciliatory attitudes. Although most of the existing research on moral exemplars is focused on their positive outcomes, we suggest that moral exemplars might also have destructive consequences: they could be misused to gain an advantage in an intergroup conflict and might stress the immorality of the non‐helping majority. By integrating these two possibilities, we propose a curvilinear model of the effects of moral exemplars narratives in post‐conflict reconciliation and resolution of violent conflicts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Strong comic immoralism maintains that every time a humorous demonstration (for example, a joke) involves a moral defect, it is enhanced aesthetically in virtue of having this moral defect. I want to show that strong comic immoralism is a coherent position, that it is possible to defend, and that there is, in fact, some reason to defend it. By doing this, my hope is that, moving forward, those who are interested in questions about the relationship between immorality and the aesthetic value of jokes will take more seriously the objections that may be presented against their views by the strong comic immoralist, rather than claiming that "no one on this side of Satan" would be one. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A dealbreaker, in the sense developed in this essay, is a relationship between a person's psychology and an aspect of an artwork to which they are exposed. When a person has a dealbreaking aversion to an aspect of a work, they are blocked from embracing the work's aesthetically positive features. I characterize dealbreakers, distinguish this response from other negative responses to an artwork, and argue that the presence or absence of a dealbreaker is in some cases an appropriate target of moral evaluation. I then use the concept of dealbreakers to develop a new approach to the question of our moral obligations with respect to the work of immoral artists, arguing that there is no general obligation binding us to cultivate or eliminate a dealbreaking aversion to their work. I conclude by suggesting several other philosophical debates that could benefit from a focus on dealbreakers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background. The ideology embodied in the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation is a manifestation of diverse Western European liberal philosophies, teachings and concepts. In them, freedom was understood and is now understood as freedom of reason (subordination of the will to reason – formal logic). Subordination of the will to reason is the cornerstone of the liberal (rationalistic) paradigm of freedom in Russian cri-minal proceedings. Unlike the latter, Russian (Orthodox freedom), first of all, is the freedom of will (aspiration of the soul) of officials conducting criminal proceedings as mature individuals. It is also the centrifugal force of their aspirations and desires. In essence, the freedom of will of officials conducting criminal proceedings is the embodiment of the spir-itual and moral principles of the life of the Russian people in criminal procedural activities. It is not difficult to see: liberal freedom, with its potential, not only subordinates to formal logic the freedom of will of officials conducting criminal proceedings, but also purposefully to devastate the spiritual and moral principles of domestic criminal proceedings. However, domestic criminal proceedings are not conceivable without its inherent spiritual and moral principles. Thus, the study of the dialectic of Russian (Orthodox) freedom and the liberal ideology of criminal justice is relevant and timely. The purpose of the work is to substantiate the need for the formation of spiritual and moral consciousness among persons and bodies conducting criminal proceedings on the basis of the disclosure of spiritual potential embodied in Russian (Orthodox) freedom. The study also substantiated the scientific hypothesis according to which the liberal Freedom of the mind is a spiritual slavery aimed at killing all freedom as such. Materials and methods. This research is based on published spiritual and scientific knowledge (materials) available to the general scientific community about the ideological (essential) basis of Russian (Orthodox) freedom and the liberal ideology of Russian criminal justice. Russian Russian spiritual tradition (the spiritual pillars of Russian Orthodoxy), cultural and historical heritage and the system of traditional spiritual and moral values of our Fatherland have been used to realize the research tasks based on the use of the potential of the spiritual method of thinking and ideological and methodolog-ical tools, originating in their origins from the Russian (Russian) spiritual tradition (spiritu-al pillars of Russian Orthodoxy), cultural and historical heritage and the system of traditional spiritual and moral values of our Fatherland. The methodological potential of the research includes a system-activity approach and a cultural-historical method in solving the problem of dialectics of Russian (Orthodox) freedom and the liberal ideology of Russian criminal justice. Results. Taking into account the life of previous generations, the idea of the need to form the spiritual and moral principles of domestic criminal proceedings by revealing the spiritual potential of Russian (Orthodox) freedom is established and substantiated. Conclusions. The research carried out allowed us to substantiate the idea that the lack of understanding by the domestic science of criminal justice of the origins of Russian (Orthodox) freedom led (unfortunately, and still leads) to the fact that in the criminal pro-cedural sphere freedom is usually understood based on the postulates (ideologems) hostile, aggressive, spiritless, senseless and immoral liberal ideology (philosophy). Such a vector orientation of liberal ideology in understanding freedom contradicts the spiritual foundations (laws) of the life of our Russian (Orthodox) people. Russian criminal process is being destroyed by the liberal ideology with its hostile, aggressive, spiritless, senseless and im-moral potential. Their destruction inevitably entails the loss by domestic criminal proceedings of their inherent meaning and goals, as well as the depersonalization of officials conducting criminal proceedings.

Anthropomorphism is a widely used communication strategy—especially popular to promote food products. The current research examines the novel idea that food anthropomorphism negatively affects consumption—reducing consumption amount and deteriorating consumption experience. I argue and show that this negative effect occurs because anthropomorphizing grants the food product the perceived capacity to feel pain, which negatively affects consumption because it increases perceived immorality of consumption. In support of this process, I demonstrate that this negative effect manifests only among warm‐hearted (vs. cold‐hearted) consumers and in consumption (vs. purchase) decisions. Doing so not only extends anthropomorphism theory by providing a more nuanced understanding of how consumers respond to food anthropomorphism, but also allows to formulate managerial guidelines for the implementation of this strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent work by Matthew Bedke and Max Hayward develops a new attack on metaethical non-naturalists: that they are committed to an immoral state of mind, because they must be willing to change their mind about the moral importance of certain actions given possible evidence about the layout of the non-natural realm. For example, they must be willing to decrease their credence that torturing babies is bad, if they ever get evidence that torturing babies is not in the extension of a non-natural property. The present paper aims to both develop the strongest version of this argument and propose a response to it. The first section argues that the strongest version of this attack does not depend on whether accepting non-naturalism commits one to believing a certain kind of conditional proposition. Rather, it depends on whether accepting non-naturalism commits one to having a certain kind of conditional credences. Moreover, the moral criticism at hand does not hinge on the causal inertness of non-natural properties. And in so far as the argument does not depend on causal inertness, the people threatened by immorality are not just non-naturalists, but metaethicists in general (Sect. 2). This is because the worry hinges instead on particular relationships of epistemic dependence between our metaethical and some of our ethical views. But it is not clear that those relationships obtain; we could adopt metaethical methodologies that preclude morally problematic dependence of relevant first order views on evidence about our metaethical theories (Sect. 3). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The contemporary world faces a moral crisis affecting various spheres of life, such as the community, the family and the school. In light of this view, it is noted that the secondary school learners in Lesotho are not immune from the escalating immorality. The study, therefore, sought to explore the indigenous strategies that could reinforce moral education among the learners. The study departed from an African indigenous perspective and solicited teachers' views regarding the indigenous strategies that may reinforce moral education among secondary school learners. The Botho/Ubuntu philosophy was thus applied as the over-arching theoretical framework. A qualitative research method was adopted, and data were gathered through an open-ended questionnaire and semistructured interviews. Twenty-eight purposively selected Lesotho secondary school teachers took part in the study. The findings suggested that community-based, schoolbased, lifestyle-changing strategies such as abstinence from immoral urges, e.g. sexual intercourse can reinforce moral education among Lesotho secondary school learners. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay gives a brief account of an artist who embodies several aspects of Transitus, or 'moving across'. First of all, his work has been embraced not only by curators of national galleries but eager collectors of Art Brut, and marks a transept where Outsider and High Art intersect. Second, his outpourings transmit uncomfortable reminders of fascism and wider immorality crossed with references from culture's broader canon. These images are generally based on photographs, which his drawings transliterate and transmogrify by turn. These processes produce works fusing extraordinary pictorial grace with vivacity, so much so that they often transcend their sources' negative, sociopolitical drag. Finally, in life he attempted to transpose his drawings' transgressive imaginings into reality; a transference that resulted in tragedy, the ending of a life all to transient. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tragically for Romanians, there are many, many untruths uttered by Titu Maiorescu and his minions. The present study brings to the attention of the public decades of lies that have been given to us in various ways. The conclusion of this inherently limited article cannot be other than the following: death does not rank the file of any existence and the mere passing of time, even with meritorious personal efforts, is not likely to erase the consequences of a profoundly immoral conduct that has destroyed consciences and destinies in a climate of insecurity and terror as in the case of the assassination of Mihai Eminescu or the foreign occupation of the country during the First World War. And here we have in mind two fundamental features of man that have never come under the jurisdiction of laws -- common sense and honor. The honor of keeping your word, the honor of what you have done, the honor of taking responsibility for your deeds and words. The free man is a man of honor, who obeys only his conscience, while the servant man obeys what his master commands, because he has sold his conscience to the master, so the mentality of pleasing those who have power dishonors him . This human construction that was Titu Maiorescu perfectly meets the above criteria. If we add the fact that our "hero" has not completed any higher education system, we have the complete picture of the greed of the liar, traitor and murderer. I have used a mild phrase, but I state at the outset that I cannot now speak of all that I know, think, or feel on this matter. It is neither the moment nor the historical time has yet come. I haven't had any criticism from anyone except an unfortunate suggestion "to be careful we have children". Instead, almost from the beginning of my studies I was bombarded with many studies and materials about Eminescu. I assumed that only my membership, military-juridical, was the big problem, that, probably, I was a stain on the splendid yellow painting of the words about the real Titu Maiorescu. I still do not completely understand today what led the "protector" to put pressure on Eminescu, at a newspaper where he had a lot of work anyway. In addition, I don't even think about why I would have had a part from the "sources" if I had written more about Maiorescu's membership in Freemasonry and their role in Eminescu's assassination. Finally, I have other interpretations for this situation, but it is not yet time to tell them. I think that the geopolitical situation that Romania is going through in the last year requires a different approach for projects regarding national security and defense. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Some have put forward a normative principle that it is immoral and highly disrespectful to create free, rational creatures (like human beings) without their prior consent. (See, for instance, Monaghan in Int J Philos Relig 88(2):181–195, 2020) If true, this principle constitutes a new argument against the existence of God since it is logically impossible to acquire the consent of someone before they are created. Thus, God's existence is taken to be incompatible with creating any persons. I shall examine this normative claim and show that it is not plausible. In the first place, it fails to meet three criteria that are commonplace to the "logical problem of evil." In the second place, the principle has clear counterexamples that show many plausible exceptions that could justify God in creating persons. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: We examine whether affective, verbal, and restitutive displays of remorse are associated with perceived offender immorality, as well as whether displays of remorse exert indirect effects on preferences for criminal sentencing via perceived offender immorality. Method: Data are from an online survey, which included a sentencing vignette with experimental manipulations for offender remorse and items measuring sentencing preferences, perceived offender and offense immorality, and controls (N = 352). OLS regression and bias-corrected bootstrap confidence intervals were used to estimate direct and indirect effects. Replication analyses were conducted with two student samples (N = 103 and N = 131). Results: Displays of remorse were associated with perceived offender immorality. Displays of remorse also exerted indirect effects on preferences for sentencing severity and support for particular sentencing goals (including incapacitation, rehabilitation, and restoration). Conclusions: Affective, verbal, and restitutive displays of remorse may be associated with sentencing preferences via perceived offender immorality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Negatively valenced news dominates the press, with stories of death and destruction gaining significant traction while also negatively impacting people's mental health and perceptions of humanity. Given that horrific acts happen and need to be reported, we examined if news stories featuring others' kindness could undo the aversive effects of news stories featuring others' immorality. In Studies 1a-d we tested whether media exposure to the acts of kindness that occurred in response to a terrorist attack could alleviate the aversive effects of media exposure to the terrorist attack. In Study 2, we examined whether, more generally, the aversive effects of news stories featuring immorality (e.g., homicide, paedophilia, bullying) could be alleviated through news stories featuring acts of kindness (e.g., volunteering, philanthropy, caring for the homeless). In Studies 1 and 2, we found that participants exposed to others' immorality and then others' kindness suffered from less aversive changes to their mood, experienced greater levels of elevation and were more inclined to believe in the goodness of others, than participants exposed only to others' immorality. Given this, we suggest there is merit in journalists shining a light on others' kindness if people's affective well-being and belief in the goodness of humanity is to remain intact. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]