Summary Of On Morality By Joan Didion

Moral; of or relating to principles of right and wrong in behavior. Often people attempt to press their morals onto others in the belief that their morals are superior or use their morals to justify their wrongdoing. In Joan Didion's piece On Morality, she claims that there is no such thing as a moral code that everyone should abide by; we each have our own individual set of morals that we believe is right. The problem with this idea that Didion expresses is that the word moral is often used in an abundance and with an incorrect meaning. In Didion’s piece, she suggests that we are using the word morality so frequently we seem to lose the meaning of it. It seems that today that everyone is constantly criticizing everyone's actions based
on what they think is morally correct. Little do people realize that each individual has their own set of morals that they believe is acceptable. Using morality in a negative or positive connotation is the reason it gets overused. There are no set boundaries for us to follow that make us socially acceptable; therefore, we are using the word in the wrong context. On the other hand, we do have laws to abide by which some may consider a moral code, but some people aren’t accepted by society even if they do follow the law. It isn't just everyday people that are using the word morality like this. Didion says “I dwell so upon this because the most disturbing aspect of “morality” seems to be the frequency which the word now appears; in the press, on television, in the most perfunctory kinds of conversations.” Didion is explaining that the biggest problem with morality is not the word itself, it is how often the word is used in the wrong way. Didon defines the idea that each person possesses their own set of morals specific to them. As you grow older your outside surroundings influence what your moral standards become. You don’t just wake up one day with your moral guidelines for yourself, they transform as you grow up and your surroundings change. Yes, other people may have a strong impact on your morals, but you are the only person who creates and modifies your them. Didion highlights how morals are constantly evolving when she says “The Donner-Reed Party, starving in the Sierra snows, all the ephemera of civilization gone save that one vestigial taboo, the provision that no one should eat his own blood kin.” Didion is referring to a group of people who were stranded in the mountains, so they resorted to the last possible option for food, each other. This shows how morals change because these people wouldn’t eat other humans if they had food readily available to them. Morals may change under extreme circumstances but that is a result of you making the decision to change them.
Some people tend to forget that morals are not written rules, they are standards that individuals live by. That is why I am defending Didion’s piece; I believe that there is no social code and we each have our own moral code we create as we grow older. Morals have become an excuse to alienate people from society because we use morals as a social code.