Black Dog Day

A friend of mine says that there is a difference between integrity and morality. Well of course there is; the English dictionary gives them different meanings for a start. So, for example, it’s a lack of integrity that causes someone to arrange to meet a friend and then to forget to arrive; but it’s a lack of morality however that tempts someone to embark on a sexual liaison with, say, their best friend’s wife.

I suppose we’d all like to think that we contain both qualities; that we have both morality and integrity. But I think a person can contain conflicting qualities at the same time. There are people, I’m sure, who would think nothing of stealing a book or a bar of chocolate from a shop but who would never dream of stabbing a good friend in the back. Others might pride themselves on their honesty as an upstanding citizen, yet at the drop of a proverbial (and paid for) hat will spread poison and gossip about someone they claim to be close to.

Which is it better to be? I suppose you’re going to say that neither trait is defensible, but I wonder whether having either integrity or morality (or both, or neither) is a matter of personal choice. I would like to investigate whether the lack of either attribute in someone is actually the result of some subversive conditioning and whether the perpetrator of any vice is in fact the real victim. If a person has the integrity to run after a woman in the street to advise her that she has inadvertently tucked her skirt into her knickers, yet lacks the morality not to sleep with the partner of a good friend, are they really in control of their own actions?

Hmm. A difficult conundrum indeed. I might conduct a survey.