Reaction Paper

"Why the world is the way it is: Cultural Relativism and its Descendents"

We were asked to make a reaction paper on cultural relativism. I got a bit frustrated because I got not a single idea on what cultural relativism is. I tried reading the document presented to us, yet it is filled with deep words with such deep meanings. I couldn't quite figure out what it means. I was about to give up quickly but luckily, I didn't. I read it 4 times, the least.

It is stated that the idea that Relativism contends that all truth is relative except for the claim that "truth is relative". It just means that the truth depends on the people. But the claim that "truth is relative" is not up to the people. We should not impose our values on other societies nor could we contend that one culture is superior to another culture. I think that the most famous intellectual descendents of cultural relativism is racism. Racists are everywhere. A racist is someone who believes that they are superior because of their race and have prejudices against others on belief, they are normally antagonistic towards other as a result of their belief in being superior. This is famous with Americans because they keep on comparing the Whites with the Blacks and that pretty much makes them a racist.

I agree that the truth is different for each individual, social group or historic period. Technically, there is only one truth but it depends on how a certain person or group of people see it. If they see the truth as positive, then the truth will come out as positive and vice versa. But then again, as what David Hume said, no one can know anything for certain. We may think we know but we really don't. He says that a person is unable to pass judgment on alternative moral systems and he claims that neither reason nor the sense can supply reliable knowledge and that, consequently, man is a helpless being in an unintelligible universe. I'm not quite sure if I'm siding with David Hume on his thoughts on truth and relativism but I must say that the guy has a point. We can't really know anything for certain and people think we're experts on causality wherein we just associate our experiences together. I agree with Kant and Hume when they said something regarding the inability to see or prove causality in the objective world. As Kant said, men are cut off from the objective world and can never know the world in itself. For example, when you're born in a rich family and grow up swimming in pols of gold, then you wouldn't really know what the real world is like, you wouldn't really know how difficult life is for most people since you have almost all the pleasure in life.

Multiculturalism in the other hand, stands up for the equality of all creatures be it big or small. Multiculturalism, in my own understanding, is sort of a law or bill because it includes too many anti-individualistic things, things regarding the government, individual rights and other rights, and other law-worthy topics. It also promotes a culture of victims who have perpetual claim on society and the government.

Society sets norms of truth  and falsity and right and wrong. It just means that the truth depends on the people. If majority believes that the truth is positive, then it will be, but if they believe it is negative, then negative its is. If a man sees things differently than the majority, then maybe he doesn't see the truth the way most people do. The truth changes too, that is why evolution is very essential to understanding consciousness, history and mankind.