Think for Yourself

By my lights, there are two versions of the Golden Rule.

Most people have concluded, have been taught that they are contradictory. I submit that they are perfectly congruent, even redundant if read properly.

» Both establish love of one’s self as the highest moral standard for the treatment of one’s fellow man.

» Both affirm the self-evident axiom that a person’s understanding of his rational self interest is the benchmark of all social interaction.

» Both reject the injustice of any man’s life being subordinated to another’s.

» Both rebuke treating Peter’s life merely as the means to Paul’s ends, absent mutual, volitional agreement.

That one has been misconstrued as a moral obligation to pursue self-immolating altruism and the other wrongly decried as the mantra of soulless, greedy egomaniacs is the victory of tyrants, a.k.a. preachers and politicians. The fact that statists have made both objects of derision ought to be a warning.