by Jan G.

Created on: June 22, 2009   Last Updated: June 23, 2009

What has come to mind with this subject was the saying "two wrongs don't make a right." I'll use these old words of wisdom to explain why doing wrong for the right reasons is still wrong. What it means here is that one person's wrong doing, cannot be more or less wrong than it is, even if a earlier wrong was committed, that could have made this second wrong feel acceptable or no greater wrong. The key word here is feel, as there is no universal chalkboard of life to record our daily actions as right or wrong, because right and wrong, good and evil; they are judged and subjective; subjected to social norms and moral judgment.

Hence, it is also impossible to quantify and rate a list of right or wrong; is holding the door for someone more right than making a donation, and if so, how much more is the difference in 'intensity' of this right done? I am tempted to use the word 'intensity' to rate the endless list of life's right and wrong, but even if we were able to rate right and wrong actions based on its intensity, it does not mean that one right could add on another right and increase the intensity of it being right, nor one right cancel a wrong or lessen its intensity of being wrong. And, in the case of two wrong don't make a right; each wrong is considered independently; there is no reason to consider any wrong as a lesser wrong in comparison.

Holding onto this line of argument, I would agree that doing wrong for the right reason is still wrong as proposed; right and wrong do not enhance or cancel each other. A better way of putting this subject I feel is, doing wrong for a right is still wrong, by the way the subject is being phrased. I might understand it another way and argue that there is never a right reason to doing wrong, and that will touch on whether the end is more important than the means of getting to the end.

Doing 'wrong' is as argued, to be judged independently and being innately wrong shall be condemned; whereas the right reason that is to be the outcome is right in itself and shall be praised. Each judged separately, and the confusion lessens when we realize that there is no absoluteness in right and wrong. Right for me to give a child low marks for a test to be fair to the rest who studied harder; whilst the same action is wrong to the child who loses interest in a subject. The end is also of no greater importance or value than the wrong means to the end, my means to a right end are commas of a sentence, which could also be a ending points to those along the way whom wrong is being done to.

Doing wrong is wrong even for right reasons; right reasons are right even with wrong actions. It's not philosophical, it's life.

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