What Does It Take to be Right?

Thomas Paine said, "A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong, gives it a superficial appearance of being right... Time makes more converts than reason."

In simpler words, this means that as long as something is not categorized into being "wrong" then it automatically becomes right as time goes on, even if the moral under question does not make sense. I'm going to use some pretty controversial examples in this article, and I do not mean to start a debate on which side each example is right, I am merely trying to illustrate the truth of Thomas Paine's statement.

Take slavery for example. The southern colonies lived as societies with slaves long before they became slave societies. It's put on the DL, but at one time, slaves could own property, win court disputes, and even buy their own freedom- and not all slaves were black. It wasn't until the American trade society got into the swing of things that colonists started to need more and more slaves from Africa to work, and eventually being black became synonymous with being a slave. Soon after, being a slave meant being stripped of all or most of your rights, and being mistreated. The negative connotation of slavery in the United States was a gradual development.

Two things come to mind in hindsight as obviously being morally wrong: the first, being racist against the African Americans, and second how free people treated the white people. But do you see that there was no big, defining moment where Americans decided "White people are officially free, black people are officially slaves, and the free people are allowed to treat those slaves in whatever manner they desire"? American colonists never really thought about slavery being wrong- everyone else in the world had them- so it seemed to be right. No one challenged the idea of slavery and racism being wrong, and as time went by, the more right this kind of society seemed. Like Thomas Paine said, the people were living in a state without confrontation, and the lack thereof gave the false sense of correctness that settled in as the new lifestyle, even though when one stops to think about it all, it's obviously immoral.

My second example is abortion. In the olden days, I feel like people seemed to be more responsible. If someone got pregnant, they buckled down and accepted the situation for what it was, and made the best of what they had for their baby. Abortion was not a word to be spoken aloud. Nowadays, people seem to only try to either ignore the fact that they're pregnant and go on being irresponsible, or get an abortion. Some of the situations that babies are born into today are downright awful, and the neglect that they are subjected to is sickening. Everyone's heard the rumor about someone leaving their baby in the dumpster to be relieved of the responsibility of raising a child. It's horrible that babies are brought into situations like this. These circumstances almost lead to begging the question whether or not its worse to get an abortion or for the baby to grow up on the streets I'm Pro-Life, but I can understand the point of view of those who are Pro-Abortion.

Obviously, the idea of abortion is finally under questioning today. It seems that sixty years ago people just kept the baby because that's what everyone did. It was habitual to just think that it was the right thing to do, and everyone was "converted" to the idea. So, now that someone has questioned its correctness with the mistreatment of babies born to people unprepared for the responsibility, nobody knows what is right or wrong due to the tradition. Once again, Thomas Paine is right.

On a less serious note, how do you like your toilet paper to hang, over or under? Whatever you prefer, it probably came from how you were raised and what your habit is. You probably never stopped to think "Hanging the toilet paper in the under direction is morally wrong!" but when you go to someone else's house where it, you are astonished at the backwardness of it! Let me tell you, whichever way you leave your toilet paper, it doesn't matter. This is just something that has a right/wrong label even though it's not even close to being important."A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong, gives it a superficial appearance of being right" is true yet again.

So, the next time you are having a disagreement with someone, strengthen your argument by figuring out why what you believe is right or wrong, and make sure that your opinion is not only backed by "I've always thought this way" or "No one ever said it was wrong." Thank you, Thomas Paine, for pointing this truth out to us all.