| There are different ways of putting things together at the margins, emphasizing friendliness or organizational efficiency, for example. Additionally, there are often factual questions that may or may not be true in a given situation. For example, whether one holds bikinis to be immoral depends a lot on the factual question of whether they are likely to arouse much more than ordinary bathing suits, in a manner that increases the likelihood of sexual aggression. Absent definitive studies, it is somewhat speculative. Finally, there is the realignment of practices which come with major shifts in the perception of what personhood and the good society are. For example, when we understand women to be full fledged persons, rather than needing perpetual guardianship; needing reasonable liberty of action, in order to develop as persons; and capable of making profound contributions to society if we will not waste their talent, then what I call the "duenna society", where unmarried woman are not allowed out in public without a chaperone, becomes intolerable. We make a decision as a society that allowing them liberty of action is more important than the possibility that there will be an increase in sexual experimentation, and therefore concede that chastity is not as high as value as it had been.......... |
