Fleeting moral integrity

Integrity is the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles. It means doing the right thing even when no one is watching.

Basically it means acting according to your values, even under pressure, taking responsibility for your actions and keeping the trust of others by staying true to your word.

This quality is expected in society by default, we all expect it from others even when we don’t share the same values, some value honesty while others value results even when it goes against honesty but the fact of the matter is that we expect everyone to maintain their integrity and stay true to whatever they believe.

The issue arises when people flip-flop on their values, today they stand for one thing and the very next day they stand for something totally different, this leads to something we call hypocrisy. The reason why hypocrisy is so disliked is because no one likes inconsistency, our brains can only function with consistent data, when you have no clue about the position a person will take, it becomes very difficult to even make sense of their actions, today they want this, tomorrow they want that, it all becomes a shit show at the end. Everyone appreciates consistency, knowing whether a person stands for the same values or not and will stick to those.

How fleeting is your morality

I am not here to talk about hypocrisy but rather how fleeting our morality can be some times. One thing you have to understand about people is that, all what we do is first for survival then secondly for our self interest, so we only remain moral or we only keep our integrity as long as those two elements are not in danger. You can certainly imagine lying if your life was in danger, or you’ll be more inclined to be corrupted if all your wealth was at risk. Of course not everyone is like this, there is a minority who would hold on to their integrity no matter what but that’s not really the average person.

Its difficult to see this happen when everything is going on well in your life or in the lives of others, but when your back is against the wall, the options of things you are willing to do widens and morality or integrity become suggestions. How many people revert to crime when their survival or self interest are at risk? you might be thinking you are too strong to do that but don’t be so sure of yourself, you never know.

The worse among us

For some it doesn’t even take for their survival or self interests to be threatened for them to lose their morality, they just play politics on everyone. When they are in front of people they’ll claim the highest moral standards and how they abide by them but in the shadows they are ready to do anything to advance their self interest. If the lives of everyone were to be exposed, we would all see just how morally corrupt we all are and how hypocritical we can be. The worse among us destroy the lives of others just to make a couple of coins, they live among the very same people they hurt while claiming to be upright, meanwhile in the shadows they contribute to their demise with a narcissistic smirk.

Conclusion

Morality and integrity is very much needed in society, but unfortunately it becomes fleeting when our survival or self interests are threatened and for some its just a tool they use to hide their evil intentions.

Thanks for reading ☺️