When Society Redefines Good and Evil, Who Decides What Is Right?

HARTWELL, Ga. — Every generation faces disagreements over values, but America now appears to be debating something more fundamental: Who gets to decide what is good, what is evil and what is acceptable?

For generations, many Americans found their moral foundation in faith, family, community and the belief that certain truths did not change simply because society did. Right and wrong were not always easy to apply, but they were understood to exist.

Today, morality is increasingly treated as something personal, political and subject to revision. Conduct once condemned may be celebrated. Beliefs once considered ordinary may be labeled dangerous. People are often judged not only by their actions, but also by their political affiliation, religious convictions or refusal to embrace the latest cultural demand.

That shift affects every group differently.

Religious Americans may feel pressured to remain silent about their beliefs. Parents may discover that institutions are teaching values that conflict with those taught at home. Young people are surrounded by social media platforms that reward outrage, humiliation and instant judgment while offering little room for grace, forgiveness or honest disagreement.

Political identity has also become a substitute for character. Too many people excuse dishonesty, cruelty or corruption when it comes from someone on their own side. The same behavior is condemned as evil when committed by an opponent.

That is not morality. It is tribalism.

History offers repeated warnings about what happens when governments, political movements or cultural elites are given the power to redefine good and evil according to their immediate interests. Injustice is often introduced under compassionate language. Censorship is called protection. Discrimination is renamed fairness. Control is presented as public safety.

None of this means society should refuse to learn or correct genuine injustice. America has changed for the better in many ways because courageous people confronted slavery, segregation, discrimination and unequal treatment. Those reforms succeeded because Americans appealed to enduring principles: human dignity, equal justice and rights granted by God rather than government.

There is a difference between correcting society when it violates its principles and abandoning principles because they have become inconvenient.

A healthy society must be capable of moral reflection without surrendering objective truth. It must recognize that people can disagree without becoming enemies and that compassion does not require celebrating every decision. It must also remember that freedom cannot survive if truth changes according to whoever holds the most power.

Good and evil are not determined by political parties, popular hashtags or temporary majorities. Popular opinion may change, but consequences remain. A lie does not become truth because millions repeat it. Cruelty does not become kindness because it is committed in the name of a favored cause.

The question before America is not simply whether our values are changing. Values have always evolved as people gain knowledge and confront past failures.

The more important question is whether we are becoming wiser—or merely more willing to call darkness light when doing so benefits our side.

A nation capable of answering that question honestly still has hope. A nation afraid to ask it may eventually discover that once every moral boundary becomes negotiable, no one’s rights are truly secure.

HARTWELL, Ga. — Every generation faces disagreements over values, but America now appears to be debating something more fundamental: Who gets to decide what is good, what is evil and what is acceptable?

For generations, many Americans found their moral foundation in faith, family, community and the belief that certain truths did not change simply because society did. Right and wrong were not always easy to apply, but they were understood to exist.

Today, morality is increasingly treated as something personal, political and subject to revision. Conduct once condemned may be celebrated. Beliefs once considered ordinary may be labeled dangerous. People are often judged not only by their actions, but also by their political affiliation, religious convictions or refusal to embrace the latest cultural demand.

That shift affects every group differently.

Religious Americans may feel pressured to remain silent about their beliefs. Parents may discover that institutions are teaching values that conflict with those taught at home. Young people are surrounded by social media platforms that reward outrage, humiliation and instant judgment while offering little room for grace, forgiveness or honest disagreement.

Political identity has also become a substitute for character. Too many people excuse dishonesty, cruelty or corruption when it comes from someone on their own side. The same behavior is condemned as evil when committed by an opponent.

That is not morality. It is tribalism.

History offers repeated warnings about what happens when governments, political movements or cultural elites are given the power to redefine good and evil according to their immediate interests. Injustice is often introduced under compassionate language. Censorship is called protection. Discrimination is renamed fairness. Control is presented as public safety.

None of this means society should refuse to learn or correct genuine injustice. America has changed for the better in many ways because courageous people confronted slavery, segregation, discrimination and unequal treatment. Those reforms succeeded because Americans appealed to enduring principles: human dignity, equal justice and rights granted by God rather than government.

There is a difference between correcting society when it violates its principles and abandoning principles because they have become inconvenient.

A healthy society must be capable of moral reflection without surrendering objective truth. It must recognize that people can disagree without becoming enemies and that compassion does not require celebrating every decision. It must also remember that freedom cannot survive if truth changes according to whoever holds the most power.

Good and evil are not determined by political parties, popular hashtags or temporary majorities. Popular opinion may change, but consequences remain. A lie does not become truth because millions repeat it. Cruelty does not become kindness because it is committed in the name of a favored cause.

The question before America is not simply whether our values are changing. Values have always evolved as people gain knowledge and confront past failures.

The more important question is whether we are becoming wiser—or merely more willing to call darkness light when doing so benefits our side.

A nation capable of answering that question honestly still has hope. A nation afraid to ask it may eventually discover that once every moral boundary becomes negotiable, no one’s rights are truly secure.