I just found this list of virtues, via Brainpickings, by Alain de Botton: On Being Good: The Secular Virtues.
- Resilience
- Empathy
- Patience
- Sacrifice
- Politeness
- Humour
- Self-Awareness
- Forgiveness
- Hope
- Confidence
I don’t completely agree with his list (which seems to be okay with him; he wants his list to serve as an opportunity to “flex our ethical muscles” and to have meaningful conversations about character and “being good.”). In my quick response, I’d add: curiosity/care + joyfulness + critical resistance/questioning/troublemaking.
I’m fascinated by de Botton’s descriptions of his virtues. They make me curious and inspire me to reflect on many different questions. Take, for example, his description of politeness:
What does he mean by, “given what we’re really like deep down, we should spare others too much exposure to our deeper selves”? What are we really like, deep down? Selfish assholes?
Why did he chose politeness instead of respect for others? Why champion tolerance which often seems to suggest a fundamental disrespect of others’ ideas (you’re wrong, but I’ll tolerate your stupid idea because I have to…)?
What does it mean to be polite and to have “good manners”? How often does this merely reinforce a status quo that encourages us to not question oppressive systems, but to be nice and grin and bear it?
If you can’t tell by my questions, I’m not a big fan of “manners” and “politeness” as a basis for good behavior. I strongly believe that people should care about/for others and respect them. But, “manners,” seem to be too often used to regulate people and reinforce dominant cultural norms that exclude and oppress many. In writing these words, I do recognize the limits of my own critique and that I might be a bit unbalanced in my disdain for manners.
Thinking about manners, reminds me of a problematizer that I created last year:
