YesBut can schools help establish a moral code?

YesBut are schools capable of engendering in their pupils the qualities necessary to establish a community having a moral code?

Two-thirds of inmates of British prisons have innumeracy and literacy levels below 7 year old children! How on release from jail can these 50,000 prisoners hope to get good jobs and become worthwhile members of society? When New Labour came into power in 1997 they announced from the rooftops their priority would be education, education and education! Why ten years later are schools failing to provide even minimum standards of education to so many children?

The answer is very simple. Schools objectives are no longer the education of children, but to meet targets set by Government. Children are coached to pass tests so the school satisfies targets. Sports grounds have been sold off, so children cannot participate in sports and team games.

Schools should have only one objective, to prepare children for life. This includes not only teaching children to read, write and do arithmetic but also how to function in society.

A school has a problem child. What happens? They are excluded from the school. Throwing children out of school isn’t the answer. All that achieves is for the excluded kids to form gangs and get into trouble. Why should they obey the laws of a society, which has rejected them? They drift from just “mucking about” to “trouble making” to petty crime and on to drug dependency and gun crime, finishing up as one of the illiterate inmates in Her Royal Majesty’s Jails.

Schools will not have a new ethos until Government itself alters its concept of educational objectives.

YesBut how can an individual’s loyalty to community be established?

In the previous blog I made the case that a moral code cannot function where people have no feeling of community. In the 1980s Margaret Thatcher guided Britain through the process of dismantling a belief in the existence of community. And now we are suffering the consequences, with the absence of a moral code of behaviour.

How can a sense of community be established? One way would be by starting in the home and re-establishing families as community units. There existed years ago extended families that supported one another. Aunts’ uncles, elder cousins took an interest and were involved in the upbringing of younger family members. In those days, who were or not blood relatives wasn’t always clear; neighbours were referred to as Aunty Elizabeth, and Uncle George, etc. There were eyes everywhere, protective eyes to ensure no harm came to you. Those eyes were just as affective in monitoring behaviour - step off the straight and narrow and you were bound to be caught!

Unfortunately due to economic pressures, to obtain employment, people have had to move from their home towns and family. They live in their little boxes surrounded by strangers. Strangely this isolation hasn’t strengthened the nuclear facility unit

Children have to be provided for; they “need” the latest brand named cloths, trainers, MP3 player and computer. Mothers have to work. Children have to become more self-sufficient. They stay in their bedrooms communicating with their cyberspace friends in chat rooms. Families rarely sit around a table to eat - convenience foods are eaten on trays in front of the TV set. For a family to function there must be communication. Parents and children need to set aside time to talk, exchange views, laugh, explain and plan. With family life functioning, links can be made between neighbours. People can again start caring for society and the environment around them.

Regrettably in the United Kingdom the highest crime rates occur in sink estates in large urban conurbations. The rundown, badly maintained estates provide “homes” for families suffering economic and social deprivation. One parent families living just above the poverty line survive in a concrete jungle, surrounded by crime, their children poorly educated. Any aspirations for achieving improvements are slowly squeezed out of them by the daily struggle for survival. With no hope, dysfunctional families produce dysfunctional children. Yet paradoxically a sense of being social and economic outcasts produces communities. When the world is against you, tribal loyalty comes into play. Individuals look for allies. Unfortunately the result is gang culture.

Gangs survive, because they have strong membership loyalty whose behaviour is controlled by strict rules. Members have their code of honour - “moral” codes. This can, in extreme circumstances result in murders being committed, to prove gang loyalty. Unfortunately instead of tackling the problem politicians aren’t addressing the problem they merely use it for political manipulation and self advantage.

In the era of spin, the exploitation of public fear has become a feature of British politics‘- whether it is street-crime or terrorism. In doing so large sections of society are being ostracised and demonised. Black youths and Muslims are being caricaturised, respectively, as being synonymous with street-crime and terrorism. This results in excluding them from society. So instead of building communities politicians are tearing them apart.

If an individual’s loyalty to community is to be established, it must be done in the home and in schools.

YesBut are schools capable of engendering in their pupils a recognition of the need to establish a community having a moral code?

YesBut what is conscience?

It’s not against the law to tell untruths - except when said under oath in a court of law. Yet people are reluctant to lie. What controlling factor influences a person to take or not take an action? One of the reasons is fear. Fear of being caught and punished - either by the law or as an act of retribution by a deity.But why do atheists consider acts which are not against the law unacceptable? Why is some behaviour considered acceptable, while others are taboo? Is it due to the functioning of conscience?

The performance of conscience requires a judgement between right and wrong, acceptable and unacceptable. To do this there must be a predefined standard of behaviour - a moral code.

Perhaps one moral precept which is universally accepted is don’t take another human’s life- the sixth of the Ten Commandments. Yet both Blair and Bush who profess to be Christians had no hesitation in ordering the invasion of Iraq. Resulting in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of civilians.

The Ninth Commandment accepted by both: Jews, Catholics and Protestants is “Thou shall not bear false witness”. How can you tell when a politician is lying? There lips are moving.

Is conscience an inherent sense or the product of social indoctrination and pressure?

It must have a social component - morality isn’t universal. For example homosexuality is not against the law and becoming more socially acceptable in Europe, yet is considered both repulsive and taboo in Africa. So moral standards vary from country to country and are continuously evolving.

Conscience is the indoctrinated reaction to a set of rules formulated to attain social cohesion.

In recent years there has been a parallel decline in both a sense of community and social conscience. I am jarred most on witnessing apparently trivial wrongdoings:

• spitting - something that is on the increase,
• young people not giving up their seat on public transport to an old person or pregnant woman,
  
• behaviour with no consideration for others - barging in front of people, talking loudly on mobile phones, playing MP3 players on public transport - the constant muffled sh sh sh sh sh.

In a “I centred World” there is no requirement for conscience and as a consequence morality.

No amount of preaching by politicians or religious leaders will re-establish a moral code - they are no longer respected or trusted. In reality even if they were, morality cannot be introduced into the collective consciousness - it would be equivalent to sowing seed in a parched desert. The pre-eminent prerequisite is the establishment of a sense of community.

In an earlier blog (“YesBut can society thrive without a moral code?”, dated 29th April 2007) I discussed the dismantling of community in the 1980s under the guidance of the then British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.

How can individual loyalty to community be established?