LaFollette Roadmap

'PERSONAL RELATIONSHIPS' LAFOLLETTE

i) MORALITY AND PERSONAL RELATIONSHIPS: DO THEY CONFLICT?

INTRODUCTION: morality, as typically conceived, requires that we treat all humans alike, unless there is some general and relevant reason not to. On the other hand, personal relationships are partial to the core; We give preferential treatment, and we expect it in return.

The principle of equal consideration of interests: a formal principle which requires that we treat people the same unless there is some general and relevant reason which justifies our treating them differently. (It does not specify what counts as general or relevant reason is, and thus does not explain how people should be treated.

one general and relevant reason why intimates should be treated differently, is simply because they are intimates. This moral rule which justifies partiality, is itself impartial- everybody should treat their intimates better than they treat strangers.

Intimacy promotes honesty, caring, loyalty, self-knowledge, patience, empathy etc, values are promoted by intimate relationships. 

Lafollette: there is some force to this, although there are still problems. It is legitimate to treat intimates better than we treat strangers, implying that we should treat all intimates the same unless there is some general relevant reason that justifies a difference in treatment. However, we assume it is legitimate to treat different friends differently, it is not clear that we can provide a general and relevant reason which would justify our treating different intimates differently.

Instead, perhaps we should conclude that relationships should be partial only in limited ways. RACHELS: 'universal love is a higher ideal that family loyalty'. This allows for people to still have duties to one another, but they are more limited. Role-specific duties are stronger than general impersonal obligations. Eg, Doctors should look after their patients health in ways that they do not look after strangers' health. A doctors duty to their own patients will take precedence over the medical needs of strangers, in hope that the stranger's doctors will act partially to the stranger.Similarly, parents have special responsibilities to their children; their assigned role legitimate limited preferential treatment. (but not so preferential that it would ignore the needs of less well-off children- RACHELS). The only legitimate personal relationships are derived from impartial duties. (The demands of morality are always superior).

This view strikes most as wrong and undesirable,  however it has significant insights which should not be ignored. Impartiality is vital to our understanding of morality, it explains why egoism, racism and sexism are 'morally odious'. RACHELS.

Moreover, it may be appealing to lavish attention to our intimates, but this attention is 'cosmically unfair given that other people, through no fault of their own, are so poorly off'. Lafollette claims that 'luck plays an inordinately large role in determining a person's lot in life, morality should attempt to diminish, if not eradicate, the undesirable effects of luck.

There are so undesirable consequences if we accept Rachels' point of view: it completely undermines the possibility of personal relationships; parents would care for their children because the impartial rules of morality would require them to do so, not because they love their children. Benefits of personal relationships are that it heightens our sense of self-worth, people like us because of who we are, thus it makes you feel better about yourself when someone likes you. If people only liked you because of the impartial rule, it defeats the benefits of intimate relationships- parents would care for their children as prescribed by general moral rules.

Personal relationships and morality inevitably conflict: WILLIAMS, WOLF, NAGEL. WILLIAMS: suppose two people are drowning (one is the rescuers wife) and the rescuer can only save one of them, Williams claims that the rescuer should straighforwardly save his wife. He doesn't need to justify this position, an attempt to justify it would be 'completely inappropriate'. Save your life, not because in al situations you should save your wife, but because she is your wife- just save her. When personal relationships are at steak, it is inappropriate to assume all of our actions must be guided by impartial moral standards. Williams: 'there will not be enough conviction in a man's life to compel allegiance to life itself'... without personal relationships our lives are meaningless.

ii) THE INTERPLAY OF MORALITY AND PERSONAL RELATIONSHIPS

Problems arise when we assume that morality and personal relationships unavoidably conflict; perhaps the focus should be on how they are mutually supportive: 1. personal relationships empower us to develop an impersonal morality.2. intimacy flourishes in an environment which recognises the impersonal demands of all. 'close personal relationships are the grist for the moral mill', different theories agree that morality requires we consider the interests of others. We cannot know how to develop moral knowledge to be impartial without having intimate relationships. We cannot promote interests that we cannot identify; they way we learn to identify the interests of others is through interaction with others. We come to recognise our parents pain and happiness through many times in which they comforted us when we were hurt, or happy.

Without these times, we would not have the moral knowlege sufficient to promote the interests of others, and we wouldn't have the inclination to do so either. Lafollette; we may have some biologically inherited sympathetic tendencies, but they will not be developed unless others have cared for us and we have cared for them.

If we develop empathy towards our friends, we will be inclined to generalise it to others. We become so aware of our intimate's needs that we are willing to help them even when it is difficult to do so.

a person must have exposure to personal relationships to be motivated to be moral or to know how to be moral. 'PEOPLE CANNOT BE JUST OR MORAL IN A VACUUM', 

Relationships between non-moral people are at risk; intimates must be honest with one another 'any dishonesty will chip away at the foundations of the relationship', people cannot be as honest as they need to be if they are within a culture built of dishonesty and deceit. Personal relationships are possible if the people trust each other; 'mistrust squelches honesty' for you would not be honest with someone if you did not trust them. The possibility of a genuine relationship is limited in an immoral environment; people will enter relationships for their own personal gain, thus the relationships will not be persona; since they are not inclined to see the legitimate needs of others. 

CONCLUSIONMorality and personal relationships are not at odds, they are mutually supportive. Involvement in a PR will enhance one's interest in the well-being of others. LaFollette seeks a hybrid view to resolve the conflict between morality and personal relationships. If an impartial morality requires that we treat everyone impartially all of the time, we could not develop the knowledge or motivation needed to act morally, so impartiality cannot require that. It must allow at least some personal relationships, 'otherwise it is self-defeating'.LaFollette is unsure of how much partiality should be allowed; enough to permit people to having genuinely intimate relationships, does not justify unlimited partiality, the type of partiality that disregards stranger in order to help the trivial needs of intimates. Conflicts will of course arise, but the same way they would for any moral theory. Duties between friends, and duties between two strangers, these conflicts show morality is difficult to achieve, not that it is impossible.

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