# How would you describe something that isn’t immoral but is still harmful to people and society? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [October 8, 2021, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-describe-something-that-isn-t-immoral-but-is-still-harmful-to-people-and-society/952163 "2021-10-08T18:55:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2021, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-describe-something-that-isn-t-immoral-but-is-still-harmful-to-people-and-society/952163/21 "2021-10-09T15:44:34Z")
> [@Boycott](#): > > Not all immoral acts are harmful to other people and society. Why are they immoral, then? (Though I agree with @MrDibble, and would include non-human living beings, natural features, archaeological sites; when the damage is done carelessly or for the sake of the damage.) ---
**Author:** ![Boycott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boycott/32/6741_2.png) [@Boycott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boycott)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2021, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-describe-something-that-isn-t-immoral-but-is-still-harmful-to-people-and-society/952163/22 "2021-10-09T15:53:29Z")
That’s when we start going down religious lines of what constitutes immorality. Lust for example is considered an act of immorality in religion but if there is no physical movement on the desire of a man having lust for a woman is that harmful? ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2021, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-describe-something-that-isn-t-immoral-but-is-still-harmful-to-people-and-society/952163/23 "2021-10-09T16:17:12Z")
> [@Boycott](#): > > Lust for example is considered an act of immorality in religion Some religions. > [@Boycott](#): > > if there is no physical movement on the desire of a man having lust for a woman is that harmful? Presuming that you mean that the person only thinks about it inside their own head, without obviously leering, gossiping to others about an identifiable person, etc.: I would say not only is it not harmful, some of the time it’s unavoidable. Ditto if it’s a woman having lust for a man; or any of the other permutations. ---
**Author:** ![Sitnam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Sitnam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sitnam)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2021, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-describe-something-that-isn-t-immoral-but-is-still-harmful-to-people-and-society/952163/24 "2021-10-10T14:03:37Z")
Predatory loans, if explained in full, don’t seem immoral to me. And yet they certainly are a stain on society and target the most desperate. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2021, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-describe-something-that-isn-t-immoral-but-is-still-harmful-to-people-and-society/952163/25 "2021-10-10T17:14:51Z")
> [@JohnT](#): > > ‘Negative externality’ Was what I first thought of, from the title – except that many negative externalities _can_ and/or _do_ harm other people or social structures, if not necessarily directly. But the OP text’s elaboration creates confusion, though, by referring to: > [@Cmyers1980](#): > > traits, behaviors and trends that don’t hurt other people (so they’re not immoral) but are nevertheless wrong, harmful and reprehensible for the individual and/or society Part of it comes that at the start it seems to differentiate “hurt” and “harm”, and define immorality strictly as that which “hurts” others, and asks about what if which something _doesn’t_ “hurt” **others** , but _is “harmful”_ **to the individual or society** … But then that gets muddled by going on to use “harm” interchageably in the sense of direct hurting, as in: > [@Cmyers1980](#): > > It’s easy to imagine a completely peaceful society where people didn’t harm each other but was nonetheless a rotten and sad place to live in. As an example materialism, consumerism and hedonism aren’t immoral because no one is directly harmed like theft or assault but I wouldn’t want to be an excessively hedonistic and materialistic person and I wouldn’t want to live in a society like Huxley’s Brave New World As best as I can understand it is being asked about then is something that does not directly, or as a first or second remove necessary consequence, _make your individual and collective condition materially worse_ than it was, but _prevents it from or does not contribute to it being as good and fulfilling as it could be?_ Others have mentioned it and I must agree, part of this makes me think of my old religious education classes and the definitions of sin, where part of the issue is that you can have acts/thoughts that affect nobody else but you, and do not cause you or others any objectively quantifiable damage, but that corrupt _your own_ spiritual growth and separate you from godliness. Moving that into secular terms, you could then say for example from the OP list, unrestrained consumerism _ **can** _ in fact be seen as _immoral_, because it makes the mass consumption process central to the person or society’s way of life, leading them to dismiss the value of sustainable use of material and human resources, and thus turning them into quiet enablers of the harm to workers and the environment. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2021, 1:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-describe-something-that-isn-t-immoral-but-is-still-harmful-to-people-and-society/952163/26 "2021-10-12T01:54:06Z")
> [@PhillyGuy](#): > > Another example is taking a second vaccine dose before hundreds of millions of people who want a first dose have had the opportunity to get one. It’s perhaps not extremely immoral. And there’s an argument that favoring your own country’s safety is moral. Still, I find it morally troubling. And I say that as an immunocompromised person who has, under medical advice, had the jab three times. The problem there is that it’s not like anyone around here (i.e. the US) not getting vaccinated is somehow going to mean that someone somewhere else can get vaccinated. It’s not that sort of choice where you doing something means someone else can’t. It’s very much one of those if you don’t do it, it’s more likely it’ll be thrown away having expired. Which to me, seems less ethically justifiable than anything else. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2022, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-describe-something-that-isn-t-immoral-but-is-still-harmful-to-people-and-society/952163/27 "2022-01-06T21:47:55Z")
> [@Cmyers1980](#): > > I wouldn’t want to live in a society like Huxley’s Brave New World where the population was made up almost entirely of shallow, ignorant people who only care for sex, drugs, mindless entertainment, gossip and other trivialities. I feel like you are ascribing your own definition of morality to determine what you think is “harmful” to society. People and society aren’t necessarily “better” just because the adopt a Protestant work ethic, build furniture with their hands, or learn to grow their own vegetables just for its own sake. There are practical reasons why hard work and knowing how to be handy are valuable skills. But one can also imagine a sufficiently advanced society where such skills are not really necessary as anything more than a side hobby for most people. How many Americans know how to ride a horse or till a field or make a barrel by hand compared to 200 years ago? Is modern society worse for that? The reason most of the things you described might be “harmful” in excess is because there are typically other things that require people’s time and efforts. But one could imagine in a suitable wealthy and automated society, there might not really be a lot of meaningful work to do. So why not just fuck around, do drugs and watch dumb TV shows all day? Other than a lot of people might find that really boring after awhile. I suppose the term you may be looking for is **unintended consequences**. Negative or harmful results that weren’t planned as a result of well-intentioned purposeful action. Similar terms might also include **perverse incentives** or **moral hazards**. All these terms share a similar theme of bad things happening due to well intentioned or at worse morally neutral actions. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2022, 4:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-describe-something-that-isn-t-immoral-but-is-still-harmful-to-people-and-society/952163/28 "2022-01-07T04:34:40Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > So why not just fuck around, do drugs and watch dumb TV shows all day? Have you seen the election results lately? Or the contents of social media? That’s what you get when you empower people whose main life pursuit is finding new sources of mindless amusement. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2022, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-describe-something-that-isn-t-immoral-but-is-still-harmful-to-people-and-society/952163/29 "2022-01-07T13:51:36Z")
The caveat was that there isn’t something more important that those people were required to do. Imagine what all those idiots might do if they weren’t being distracted all day! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-describe-something-that-isn-t-immoral-but-is-still-harmful-to-people-and-society/952163.md?page=1)