Reply #37: Playing the devil's advocate...

[varkam]

The inuits, I believe, practice infanticide. Several middle-eastern and muslim traditions practice the removal of the clitoris so that the female does not find sex pleasurable. Some aboriginal tribes believe that homosexual sex between a man and a boy (e.g. 12 years old) is a rite of passage into adulthood, and the depositing of sperm into the boy's body is integral to that process.

Would we be ethnocentric then, in asserting that some or all of these practices are immoral? Or suppose that you and I have been raised on an island lush with fruits and vegetables - we have never known society or language for that matter - but there are enough resources here to sustain the both of us. Suppose one day you take my life because you are worried that the resources will run out - is that immoral?