@Transparentist  
Masochism and Sadism are an exception, and in that case “hurting” is a bit more complicated.
 
I think the main issue here, though, is we mean different things when we say “morality”. What are you even calling “morality”, then? What makes you feel good/bad to do? What each particular person calls “good” or “evil”?
 
In that case, you’ve defined morality to be relative to “what makes you feel good/bad” and “what each particular person calls ‘good’ or ‘evil’”. So of course it’s relative, you’ve defined it that way.
 

 
But I call morals, basically what I would call the difference in-between good or evil and what I think others ought to, as well. There’s a different sort of implication and feel to calling something “unethical” as opposed to “immoral”. Ethics are more of a careful study - it’s unethical to, say, spend your vacation time working, since it would make coworkers begin to have to sacrifice their vacation time if they want to stay competitive with you, so it’s unethical. But it’s not what I would call “evil”.
 
I would say evil is when you intentionally violate ethics, without concern for others’ well-being, and good is intentionally following ethics. After all, it’s somewhat incongruent with the idea of evil for someone to be “accidentally evil”. But someone can most definitely be accidentally unethical - like, for example, if they work over their vacation oblivious to the unethical situation they’re creating.
 

 
I mean, see - morals are a rich thing to explore, and saying they’re whatever completely cheats out basically the entire conscience in its fascinating depth.
 

How so? What does validity even mean if it has nothing to do with any kind of value judgement? Moral compasses that point to “murder is good” are bad. But then you’re using morality in that judgement because you’re saying “is bad”. Either that, or you’re saying their compass is broken because the only thing a “bad compass” can really mean is it’s broken and/or morally inferior to another.
 
In which case you’re either  
A) saying that their moral compass is broken, which implies there’s a “fixed” compass to compare it to, or  
B) you’re using your own morality to make a judgement about their morality by saying “it’s bad”, which is a different statement than “it’s not a taste I agree with”, it’s actually saying it’s bad, which means there’s some morality it can be compared to in a valid way. If you really believe all morals and moral compasses are on equal footing and none is really better than any other, then you can’t say anything is bad or good, because it’s all just relative. That’s real, physical relativism - you can’t say anyone is moving, only moving relative to each other.
 
But you still believe in your own moral views, so you believe things are good or bad, which means you believe in a “preferred frame” so to speak. Moral relativism makes no sense if you hold any moral views at all, and that’s why it has such a negative reaction - because you’re effectively saying that a hypothetical R-rated Storm King torturing Twilight and killing ponies for kicks and giggles isn’t actually “bad”, just “bad” to some people’s morals, and saying he’s “bad” is no more valid than him saying he’s “good”.
 
And that’s why it’s repulsive. We find it repulsive when people are unwilling to call heinous acts evil, and if it’s all relative, then he’s not “evil”, he just has a different compass. Same could be said of Mao, Stalin, Pol Pot, or any genocidal manaic. You’re refusing to say they’re actually evil, and asserting that it’s just as valid to call them good as it is to call them evil - that’s relativism.
 
But - with some assumptions, such as they knew what they were doing and somehow weren’t doing some sincere greater good - they’re evil. And in order to say they’re actually evil, you have to say your system of morality is a “preferred frame”, which means it’s not relative.
 
And that’s basically why people will get upset at you for saying morals are relative. Because you really do have to believe in some level of moral objectivism if you think it’s more valid to call a serial killer evil than to call him a saint. By definition, if some morals are more valid than others, then they are not relative. I refuse to believe that there’s any valid system of morals where causing horrendous suffering for your own selfish enjoyment is good, therefore, I do not believe in moral relativism and find it a disturbing position, as it makes disturbing implications about what someone who truly believes in it would do if they thought they could get away with it.
 

 
Again and again, if Storm King tortures Twilight because he enjoys watching her suffer, I will never accept that any morality that calls him “good” is valid. Therefore, not truly relative, since some moralities are more valid than others.
 
On some finer details, it can be difficult, but a lack of people agreeing does not mean there is no true answer.

@Cirrus Light  
“I can merely hope that others would agree with me when I say that hurting others for self-benefit or direct pleasure is bad.”  
Masochism and Sadism disagrees ;P
 
“it’s an argument about semantics about what should be called “morality””  
No you are just conflating personal morals and ethics  
For example someone who just took over could see killing the old ruler as immoral, but it IS the ethical thing to do for “the greater good” because otherwise you are pretty much setting yourself up for a high chance of terrorism and possibly an attempt by the guy to take you down. Which could endanger many more lives.
 
“since you believe your frame of morality is more valid or preferred – or somehow otherwise different or better.”  
I can make a rational argument for why “Murder is bad” is a good morality to have without saying that that any other moral compass is invalid.  
Because morals arent some tool we designed for a purpose, the purposes it is useful for if the person happens have to have a certain set of morals is a dice throw.  
The problem is you look at the effect of having X morals and assume that is what morality is designed to do.  
Saying X morals are beneficial for Y is simply seeing which block fits into which hole, different sets of morality have a different value AS TOOLS objectively but morals themselves are not objectively set (Objective morals would mean we have 1 set of morals and those who dont believe in them would simply be denying them, a similiar thing is “everyone believes in god those who say they dont just hate him”)
 
“what do we call that set of values we want to encourage people to hold to make the world better?”  
Ethics.

@Transparentist  
We’re defining morals differently then, and it’s really an argument of semantics.
 

But you kinda do. If I’m judging his acts as morally good or morally bad, then I’m calling him either good or evil, and I’m saying it’s good to call evil acts evil and good acts good.
 
Relativism means that every viewpoint is just as valid. Relativity of frames means that every frame is just as valid.
 
But Storm King’s screwed up morality is not valid. That’s a value judgement we make, and I can’t prove that any more than just saying that things that cause pain are bad (except in some context where it might cause greater future happiness, or some other caveats like a willing sacrifice that causes others happiness), I can merely hope that others would agree with me when I say that hurting others for self-benefit or direct pleasure is bad.
 
I don’t think we really disagree, so much as it’s an argument about semantics about what should be called “morality”, and what should be called “things we discourage or encourage from members of a society / how things ought to be”.
 
Pulling “things we discourage or encourage from members of a society / how things ought to be” off of “morality” seems to make morality a pretty hollow and useless concept.
 
At the end of the day, if you think anything is evil or anything is good, and that your view is more valid than any other, then you don’t really believe in moral relativism, since you believe your frame of morality is more valid or preferred - or somehow otherwise different or better.
 
If there’s a preferred, more valid, better or whatever frame, then it’s not really relative, is it? And if morals aren’t things we should encourage in society, then what do we call that set of values we want to encourage people to hold to make the world better?

@Cirrus Light  
TL:DR: Morals are about what people think is right or wrong not beneficial to society or not and i never claimed you cant punish a murderer just because the murderer thinks murder is a ok. We dont use other peoples moralities to decide if something is illegal or not
 
So because you can’t accept that good and evil is entirely based upon whoever looks at something it has to be objective.  
Non.
 
The fact that others can disagree with you on what is right or wrong is evidence for there not being an objective right or wrong. Does that stop you from you saying anything is right or wrong? No, as stated before it simply means you are judging whoever by your morality.  
I never said you should judge everyone by their own morality. I dont care wether you thought theft is bad or not, if you steal you’ll be punished by the law.
 
Murder isn’t wrong, in their eyes so to them its not immoral. and wether its beneficial to your society to have murderers or not does not affect whether you think its moral to murder, stop acting like just because doing certain things is beneficial that it means those are some objectively morally good thing. Morals arent about whether your society benefits of your actions or not Morals are just about your personal feelings about things.
 
Moral objectivism is a stupid philosophy based on the misunderstanding what morals even are.  
Like seriously, you go “Like motion, relativity does not imply non-existence” yeah i never said MORALS dont exist, i said Objective morality doesnt exist.  
Which is a simple fact by people having different set of morals.  
If objective morality would exist we would all think the same things are good and evil, but yeah do go on to basically act like anyone whose morals differ from yours is just broken. You do realize there’s less impactful things than murder that are strongly varied on how people think about them such as piracy.
 
“If you can accept a goal or definition of morality – such as a set of ideal behaviors that create a mutual feeling of trust, compassion, happiness, and a functional society and individuals, then there is a definite morality, as whatever set of behaviors achieve this.”  
But thats not the definition of morality.  
Morality is simply whether someone considers something right or wrong, there is no attachment to it that says “but only if it benefits society”  
That’s like me going:  
If you can accept a goal or definition of Art – such as a product of human creativity but only if its audio based.
 
You know or how about, dont use someone elses morality to judge them?  
You dont need to say something is morally bad to not encourage it, i mean literally we have laws against murder.  
Morality being subjective doesnt stop us from stopping those who try to harm others.  
It simply means that in their mind they are still “good guys”
 
It’s actually hillarious how you keep acting like just because the villain doesnt see himself as Evil that somehow is supposed to mean that you cant judge them, you can, but you dont need morality to be objective for that.  
Because literally my last post ended with me pointing out exactly that, you and the storm king merely have two different moral compasses. And that if you call someone evil you are just talking about whatever you consider evil.  
And what do you do? talk about how actions can be beneficial or deterimental, yeah, because we were talking about whether there is things that objectively improve or are deterimental to a society.

@Transparentist  
Yes and no. Like motion, relativity does not imply non-existence. But unlike relativity, there is a preferred frame of a system of morality that makes the most functional and happy society and individuals.
 
Just because others disagree with what I call right and wrong doesn’t mean I can’t say anything is right or wrong.
 
Murdering people is wrong. Sometimes a situation like war necessitates it to prevent greater wrongs, but it is still wrong.
 
Just because someone has a screwed up moral compass does not mean their actions are okay or not wrong.
 
I mean, you’re literally saying a serial killer who just loves the thrill of murder isn’t really doing wrong if he doesn’t think he is.
 
Heck no. Moral relativism is a stupid philosophy based on a stupid misunderstanding of the Theory of Relativity, which is better termed Invariance Theory, as the primary principle of the theory was not the relative effects, but the central feature from which you can derive the entire Special theory and all those effects is the constancy of the speed of light in every frame of reference, and the central defining feature of the General theory can well be said to be the invariant line element. Reality is not relative - that something seems relative merely means you’re not looking at the right feature. Space intervals and time intervals are relative, but the key to unlocking the “metric” - literally the measure of spacetime - is realizing that spacetime intervals are constant in all frames.
 
Similarly, you’re getting so caught up on people’s broken moral compasses that you’re saying there’s no morals. That’s horribly wrong.
 
Just because a lot of people have broken compasses doesn’t mean there’s no North. If you can accept a goal or definition of morality - such as a set of ideal behaviors that create a mutual feeling of trust, compassion, happiness, and a functional society and individuals, then there is a definite morality, as whatever set of behaviors achieve this.
 
And that’s way more useful and realistic than saying a psychopathic serial killer is just as good as Buddah, Ghandi or Jesus. Maybe we can’t agree on what shades of grey are black and white, but there is a definite black and white at the ends, and just because people who are completely blind exist doesn’t mean black and white don’t.
 
It’s pretty freaking simple. Hurting others for your gain is bad. Helping others is good. The details and mixes can get complicated, but in principle, it’s ridiculous and repulsive to say that just because a horrible murderer doesn’t see himself as bad, he isn’t. No, he pretty freaking well is evil. Evil doesn’t mean “what any one person thinks is evil”. It means evil. And it greatly worries me and makes me wonder what kinds of things people get up to if they think being a villain that hurts a lot of people for fun and thrill is okay. That’s sick. It’s not okay so we call it evil. Pretty simple.

@Transparentist  
I like you

@Ihhh  
Morality is not an objective Standard, it is a subjective thing.
 
To the stormking any resistance movement would be evil and anything that benefits him would be good, that is his morality.
 
Just because you disagree with the storm king about whether what he did was ok or not doesnt mean that his actions were evil, they were deterimental for the ponies and beneficial to him, when you start talking about good and evil you really just start talking about your own morality.

@Transparentist  
There are no good and evil people, but there are good and evil actions. Tempest’s actions were evil any way you slice them. How can you justify turning the princesses to stone, putting innocent ponies into cages, and stealing their magic? And while Tempest may have had the excuse of being misguided, the Storm King was merely selfish and power hungry. He did not care about the morality of his actions, and only did what he did because he could.

@Ihhh  
Twilight was “good” because we are viewing this from the perspective of the ponies not from the perspective of pre faceturn Tempest nor the Storm king, she was a threat and as such deseved to be caged.
 
There is no real Good and Evil. it depends on through whos eyes you view it.

@Transparentist  
Because Twilight is good and Tempest was evil. Why do you even need to ask?

@Cirrus Light  
How did twilight not deserve to b caged by someone shes at war with?

@RainbowDash69  
While that’s technically right, it bothers me a little since that sounds like something a self-righteous police officer might say about arresting someone, and clearly Twilight didn’t deserve it :q

@Cirrus Light  
they did fantastic work, I love these scenes. Too bad Twilight had to rage or else she probably wouldn’t have been caged!

@Cirrus Light  
Eeyup.

These prisoner scenes were friggin’ heartbreaking.
 
_{The despair felt too much like my life}
 
@Mega PoNEO  
Is that what he calls apples/fruit? That’s awesome! lol.

Stephanie, Twilight needs some Sports Candy.