TheRedArchive

~ archived since 2018 ~

0

Disclaimer: As with many psychological principles, these are concepts that apply to populations rather than individuals. The analysis herein does not apply to all women or all men, but rather the majority in any given western population.

In the 1950's, Lawrence Kohlberg began to formulate his now famous and highly regarded stages of moral development, in which he postulated the basis of ethical behaviour had six identifiable developmental stages, which came in one of three pairs; pre-conventional, conventional or post-conventional and how moral development in humans was principally concerned with justice.

The stages are, in order:

  • Stage One: Pre-conventional Obedience and Punishment

This is when consequences determine if something was good or bad. This is the stage occupied by young children. Were you given a time out? Then what you did was bad. Were you rewarded? Then what you did was good. Pretty simplistic.

  • Stage Two: Pre-conventional Self-interest driven

What's in it for me? Does it benefit me, then it's good. Does it not benefit me, then it's not good. Again, mostly occupied by children, usually older children.

  • Stage Three Conventional Social Consensus

Morality is determined by social standards. Individuals are receptive to approval or disapproval from others. As you can imagine, this stage is generally associated with young teenagers. Generalised approval = good, generalised disapproval = bad, because being regarded as good benefits oneself Stage three reasoning may judge the morality of an action by evaluating its consequences in terms of a person's relationships. Remember this one.

  • Stage Four: Conventional Authority and Social Order

This goes beyond approval, and states it is important to obey laws and dictums in addition to social consensus because of their importance in maintaining a functioning society. If one person violates a law, perhaps everyone would—thus there is an obligation and a duty to uphold laws and rules. When someone does violate a law, it is morally wrong; culpability is thus a significant factor in this stage as it separates the bad domains from the good ones.

  • Stage Five Post-Conventional Social Contract

Laws are regarded as social contracts rather than rigid edicts. Those that do not promote the general welfare should be changed when necessary to meet "the greatest good for the greatest number of people". This is achieved through majority decision and inevitable compromise. Everyone has different views, opinions and values. This is the basis of most world Governments.

  • Stage Six Post-conventional Universal Ethics:

This one is a little complicated, but it essentially means building an ethical framework around which one operates consistently in expressing justice. Examples of such frameworks include Kantian ethics, or Utilitarian ethics. The validity of laws is determined by their adherence to a given ethical framework. In this way action is never a means but always an end in itself; the individual acts because it is right, and not because it avoids punishment, is in their best interest, expected, legal, or previously agreed upon.

There are three things we most note before going forward about this theory:

  1. Stage 6 may not exist. The previous 5 stages have all been verified through data analysis but stage 6 remains elusive. Even though Kohlberg insisted Stage 6 did exist, he noted that individuals will rarely act consistently with Stage 6 principles even once they've reached this stage.

  2. Kohlberg's Theory is not a hierarchy. Simply because Stage 6 comes last in the hierarchy, does not mean it is morally superior to Stage 5, 4 or even Stage 1. It is merely the trajectory most people will go through when developing the moral and ethical groundwork by which they act.

  3. Not everyone will make it to stage 6. While the vast majority of people will outgrow Stages 1, 2 and 3; reaching rank 6 is not a guarantee, or even rank 5. People may stop at rank 4, or even earlier. Which brings me to the point of this spiel, now you know the background.

When Kohlberg did this study, he found the vast majority of people studied would reach rank 4, and often the post-conventional stages which were not uncommon. The problem? Kohlberg's study, like almost all psychological studies from this time, were done in men. When studies were replicated on women several decades later, they found that women rarely made it beyond Stage 3, the stage most common in male teenagers that almost all male adults develop "beyond". Stage 3, as you'll recall, is the stage where personal relationships and societal norms around approval or disapproval determining what is ethical and what is just. If your peers don't like it, it's not just, it's not ethical, and perhaps it's worthy of punishment. Allow me to quote directly here on stage 3.

In Stage three (good intentions as determined by social consensus), the self enters society by conforming to social standards. Individuals are receptive to approval or disapproval from others as it reflects society's views. They try to be a "good boy" or "good girl" to live up to these expectations, having learned that being regarded as good benefits the self. Stage three reasoning may judge the morality of an action by evaluating its consequences in terms of a person's relationships, which now begin to include things like respect, gratitude, and the "golden rule". "I want to be liked and thought well of; apparently, not being naughty makes people like me." Conforming to the rules for one's social role is not yet fully understood. The intentions of actors play a more significant role in reasoning at this stage; one may feel more forgiving if one thinks that "they mean well".

Sounds familiar doesn't it? Anyone with extended interaction with women will know this is how they operate, that things that are socially unpalatable are bad by virtue of being socially unpalatable, and indeed many critiques of incel culture come from this mindset. After all, if society doesn't like it, they mustn't like it for a reason, right? This has consequences not only towards the beliefs women have, but how they interact with men, how they interact with society and, perhaps most importantly, in how they vote. While a man might look at someone on welfare and think, "they should work to better their lives and incentivising failure won't help them achieve that", a woman will "feel bad for them".

When this came to light, there were attempts by social psychologists, most notably a woman named Carol Gillian, to reframe the development of morality by giving higher credence to stage 3, or failing that, creating a different moral development tree for women. One that prioritised ethics based around relationships, families, concepts of "caring" and on the individuals involved rather than the principles involved. As has been famously said on various manosphere forums, when a man sees a mountain, he strives for the peak. When a woman sees a mountain, she pretends the mountain doesn't exist and claims the peak is wherever she is standing.

tl;dr the vast majority of women rarely advance beyond stage 3 of Kohlberg's Theory of Moral Development, one that places large focus on social norms and the opinion of one's peers. In men, the vast majority of men will develop beyond this stage as they enter adulthood.


there doesn't seem to be anything here

You can kill a man, but you can't kill an idea.

© TheRedArchive 2024. All rights reserved.
created by /u/dream-hunter