English translation: internalisation of shared social perceptions of right and wrong
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GLOSSARY ENTRY (DERIVED FROM QUESTION BELOW)
English term or phrase:
moral awareness
English translation:
internalisation of shared social perceptions of right and wrong
English to English translations [PRO] Social Sciences - Law (general) / incapacitation
English term or phrase:moral awareness
Hello everyone,
But the process of coming to terms with what crime has meant for the individual prisoner, close relatives and victims is painful. Especially where serious crime has been committed strong guilt feelings can be expected to arise. Moreover, since such feelings emerge in the course of a long prison sentence, the opportunities for reparation are almost certainly limited or non-existent.
Unless these feelings are recognised and the prisoner is helped to deal with them, the gains in ***moral awareness*** risk being lost in damaging depression. It is, therefore, imperative that the existence of guilt feelings be recognised, that opportunities are provided for their sensitive exploration and, where possible, for some form of reparative action
Does "moral awareness" imply the realization by the prisoner of the bad/harmful effects of his/her crime, the realization that what he/she did was wrong, etc.?
Explanation: What is specific about morality is that it is about internalising ideas about right and wrong behaviour that are not just about whether something is legal or not. Of course somebody could have an internalised moral code that was completely their own creation and shared by nobody else, but that is not what is meant here. Generally though, moral codes are shared within a social group, religious or secular.
There are some problems with the use by State authorities of the idea of a moral awareness, e.g. they want us to think that killing is wrong, but not if it is carried out by their armed forces. They may concede that killing by their armed forces is only morally right if it is against combatants and for military objectives in wartime. However, when e.g. Wikileaks shows soldiers killing innocent civilians, they find that the only thing wrong was the revelation. Right and wrong are clearly flexible concepts deeply affected by power considerations.
Explanation: I believe the author is not merely speaking about the prisoner's recognition of wrong doing in the particular act that sent him or her to prison, but a more general awareness of right and wrong.
The following, from a religiously oriented website, is appropriate to your secular context:
"Conscience is a judgment of reason whereby the human person recognizes the moral quality of a concrete act that he is going to perform, is in the process of performing, or has already completed...
Moral conscience, present at the heart of the person, enjoins him at the appropriate moment to do good and to avoid evil..."
I think the author of your text is suggesting that something be done both to help the prisoner understand his feelings of guilt that will most probably occur and use that to help nurture that moral awareness/more conscience that has caused those guilt feelings into something positive that was missing in the prisoner's mind/conscience.
Stephanie Ezrol United States Local time: 21:16 Native speaker of: English PRO pts in category: 20
internalisation of shared social perceptions of right and wrong
Explanation: What is specific about morality is that it is about internalising ideas about right and wrong behaviour that are not just about whether something is legal or not. Of course somebody could have an internalised moral code that was completely their own creation and shared by nobody else, but that is not what is meant here. Generally though, moral codes are shared within a social group, religious or secular.
There are some problems with the use by State authorities of the idea of a moral awareness, e.g. they want us to think that killing is wrong, but not if it is carried out by their armed forces. They may concede that killing by their armed forces is only morally right if it is against combatants and for military objectives in wartime. However, when e.g. Wikileaks shows soldiers killing innocent civilians, they find that the only thing wrong was the revelation. Right and wrong are clearly flexible concepts deeply affected by power considerations.
B D Finch France Local time: 03:16 Works in field Native speaker of: English PRO pts in category: 36
Grading comment
Many thanks to everyone.
Thank you, B D Finch
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peer agreement (net): +3
