The thing with relativism is there's an inherent "for X" attached to every statement you make.
"female circumcision is wrong" sounds like an absolutist statement; but can easily be relativist if you assume the "female circumcision is wrong
for X" where X represents those people who agree with that moral philosophy.
What Mrs Diarra does is right
for her, and wrong
for Mrs Robert - it's not 'right and wrong at the same time' so much as right, or wrong, depending on the philosophy involved.
In life we tend to have similar philosophies (eg who agrees with "murder is wrong"?) so we can dispense with the multiple "Murder is wrong for me; murder is wrong for you..." and just call it plain wrong. However, I'd doubt that anyone we call evil really agrees that they are evil - they simply have a different moral code (one which is "wrong for us").
I like your personal response:
Quote:
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What do we call the act of imposing what we believe to be morally right on others? Moral absolutism. By circumcising Mrs. Robert’s daughter, Mrs. Diarra is imposing what she believes to be right onto Mrs. Robert. Here it is absolutism that creates the conflict, not relativism. Had Mrs. Diarra been a sensible moral relativist this conflict would not have taken place.
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As you say, enforcing our morals upon others can be a great source of conflict (and there I end before making inflammatory comments about the world today!
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