applied colbert

moral relativism: a great evil of our time? or the greatest evil of our time?

on a handful of occasions in recent months i've heard guys on radio or tv—a writer or a questioner in an audience or a caller to a talk show—express one of the above opinions. i heard it once more over the weekend.

damn! that puts folk like me and margaret mead right up there alongside hitler, stalin, slave traders, and ted bundy!

did you ever notice that, in the bible, god is a moral relativist: he commands the children of israel never to kill then orders them to stone somebody to death or even wipe out a whole tribe?

given the plethora of evils in the world today—at least a few of them perpetrated by absolutists—i feel called upon to offer two possible responses to antirelativist assertions like those i led off with:

• well, maybe from your point of view.

• relative to what?