The Virtues of Bourgeois Rectitude OR Cephalos Redux

A while ago, I confessed that I am "very bourgeois", explaining that "My identity resides in a certain kind of risk-avoiding prudence, in doing things because they are done, an owlish earnestness about culture." Today, I want to dwell briefly on "doing things because they are done," or more accurately, not doing things because they are not done.

As we all know, the first philosophical vignette of that sort of character comes in Book I of the Republic, for there Cephalos attempts to define justice by a code of conduct. Socrates shows why one needs to go deeper, and so gives birth to the philosophical study of normative ethics.

Cephalos came to my mind during yesterday's brouhaha about a distinguished professor posing among scantily clad 18 year olds. My thought was this.

Can you imagine Quine or Strawson doing this sort of thing back in 1960s? Can you imagine them, for instance, posting a pinup on their office wall, or displaying themselves undertaking deep thought among naked nymphs? Not that these philosophical worthies were especially progressive in these or any other matters. It is just that bourgeois rectitude would have stayed them. These were just things that professors at Harvard or Oxford did not do.

The thought came to mind in connection with a comment (#69) on the thread, in which "wonderingmorally" writes:

I mean this as a substantive philosophical question, . . .  I am wondering why one oughtn't view women in a sexual way, such as how they are depicted in the V.H. pictures (or in far less conservative ways). . . It strikes me that of all the philosophical problems still being worked on, sexual ethics is still one on the table.

Well . . . it strikes me that even while you ponder the "sexual ethics" of viewing women in a sexual way—even while you are so engaged—taboos, codes of conduct, and bourgeois inhibitions can keep you from doing wrong. This is their function.

The professor we are talking about—please, let's not mention his name any more—writes:

The intention was that the pictures, as a cover on a forthcoming magazine, might be used to view logic from a somewhat humorous and untraditional perspective appealing to larger audience which the magazine covers.

"Untraditional", exactly. And he might also have thought: "I am a distinguished professor at a famous university teaching impressionable young women and men." Is this behaviour becoming of my position?

You could say that mine is an extremely shallow argument. I would respond that you've got it exactly right. Think about feminism and sexual ethics, by all means. Think about whether there is a philosophically defensible position that clearly shows this kind of behaviour to be wrong (or right). But until you have a worked out reason to oppose social norms, you need a shallow reason to keep you on the straight and narrow.

You could also say that gender discrimination is "traditional" and that my recommendation would permit all kinds of outrages in the name of "what is done". But this misses my point. I take it as philosophically established that gender discrimination is wrong. Back in the 60s, people used to say things like: "Women can't do philosophy, and so-and-so (the famous woman philosopher) just proves my point, since she is so not feminine." Tradition sanctioned these idiotic comments. Fortunately, there is moral progress. We now know that such comments are immoral. Tradition has been decisively refuted.

My maxim is this: When in doubt, behave more or less conventionally.