I tried to keep this talk topical and a sort of group Socratic dialogue but that sounds a bit pretentious. It was presented as a serious of questions interspersed with a few quotes which I hoped would be relevant and these were read out by Nica to add a bit of variety and wake people up, gently.

"All the things I really like to do are either illegal, immoral, or fattening."

Alexander Woollcott (1887-1943). In R. E. Drennan Wit's End (1973)

Has anyone here ever broken the law ?

Done something immoral ?

Drunk more than the governments recommended daily limit of alcohol ?

I rather expected that these would be three unanswered questions but not only was there a response but it was characteristically enthusiastic.

Why ? Surely if you know something is wrong then you wouldn't do it ?

Yeah, dream on, I remember the June moot.

Are our pleasures always a bit more exciting if they break the law, are against religious dogma, or against the advice of the health nazis ?

Why ?

The Ashley Madison Affair

A company is set up to make money as an introduction agency for those wishing to have an affair.

Is that a good thing to do ?

It is legal but it may not be moral depending on your viewpoint.

A group of hackers break in and steal the details of those registered.

Is that a good thing to do ?

It would appear to be both illegal and immoral.

There is the suggestion that this was done by a group who believe that infidelity is immoral and against religious law.

Is this a valid reason for breaking the law ?

Is it right that one group should enforce their morals on others ?

It was suggested that the company was short on female members and therefore staff were paid to make up fake female profiles to make up the shortfall. In order to do this they used e-mail addresses which were themselves the result of hacking.

If the company has been using hacked material does this mitigate those who hacked the company ?

The company offered a service to remove the details of any member who wished to be erased. For a fee. Charging for this is illegal.

Does this justify the hack ?

This all sounds a bit petty to us but some of the members live in countries where they may be stoned to death if they were discovered to have committed adultery.

Given that it is illegal in their country, should they have been allowed to sign up ?

What if one of these people was exposed and executed ?

Would that be right ?

What if it turned out that the profile in question was in fact fabricated ?

Are the company guilty of manslaughter ?

Questions like these occur many times every day.

So how do we go about deciding what is right and wrong ?

What is the right thing to do ?

Who decides ?

Why should we do the right thing ?

"All good moral philosophy is but an handmaid to religion."

Francis Bacon (1561-1626). The Advancement of Learning (1605)

This would seem to suggest that at this point in time morals and law were subservient to religion.

Where there is an overlap of law, religion, or health which has priority ?

Does this imply that there will be different morals for each different religion ?

In established religions these questions do not arise since the members of the religion are told how to run their lives based on the teachings of the religion with the concepts of heaven and hell providing incentive and punishment respectively. These are normally codified in a written form and interpreted by the agents of the religion. This constitutes religious law.

At various points and in various countries there is religious law or civil law and, on occasion, both. The problem with having both is the question of which takes precedence and the failures of this juggling act have been demonstrated by history. The Ottoman empire though a roaring success was a constant struggle. Islamic countries seem to be going through this where Christian countries have generally been through it.

How does paganism affect our morality ?

What do we mean by Pagan Philosophy ?

It would be best if philosophy was not subservient to religion.

It could cover any of many different topics.

"Unlike the Goddess and divine immanence, the principle of responsible individual moral autonomy antedates Wicca. It goes back at least to the philosophers of the 18th century Enlightenment, and is a cornerstone of Humanism. But in the 1950s you had to be a Humanist to meet fellow believers in moral autonomy, and that meant being an atheist or at least an agnostic. If you wanted a spiritual life you had to sign up to one of the Christian churches or to the Buddhists, and that meant surrendering your moral autonomy and following the precepts of the great founder, be he Gautama the Buddha, Jesus or Paul.

Gerald Gardner's witches were the first to break out of this artificial dichotomy. We proved that it is possible to have a spiritual life, complete with belief in reincarnation, without believing three impossible things before breakfast and without surrendering any of our individual moral autonomy. And we have been followed in this not only by all other branches of Paganism, but by most of the New Age as well."

Frederick Lamont Fifty Years of Wicca - p.79

Do people agree with the (above) statement by Lamont ?

Has humanism answered the fundamental questions of right and wrong ?

What is individual moral autonomy ?

"...it is the capacity of a rational individual to make an informed, un-coerced decision. In moral and political philosophy, autonomy is often used as the basis for determining moral responsibility and accountability for one's actions."

Wikipedia page - Autonomy

"For Gandhi, the way to achieve such a state of total nonviolence (ahimsa) was changing of the people's minds rather than changing the state which governs people. Self-governance (swaraj) is the principle behind his theory of satyagraha. This swaraj starts from the individual, then moves outward to the village level, and then to the national level; the basic principle is the moral autonomy of the individual is above all other considerations."

Wikipedia page - Anarchism in India

Where does the Wiccan rede fit in ?

"An it harm none, do as though will."

The problem with this simple dictat is in interpretation and implementation.

The individual has to decide for themselves the meaning of "harm" "none" and "will".