No subject occupies a neutral position in the social order

Evidence

All social organization consists therefore in neutralizing the disruptive and deregulating impact or moral behaviour. This effect is achieved through a number of complementary arrangements: (1) stretching the distance between action and its consequences beyond the reach of moral impulse; (2) exempting some ‘others’ from the class of potential objects of moral conduct, of potential ‘faces’; (3) dissembling other human objects of action into aggregates of functionally specific traits, held separate so that the occasion for re-assembling the face does not arise, and the task set for each action can be free from moral evaluation. Through these arrangements, organization does not promote immoral behaviour; it does not sponsor evil, as some detractors would hasten to charge, yet it does not promote good either, despite its own self-promotion. It simply renders social action adiaphoric (originally, adiaphoron meant a thing declared indifferent by the Church) – neither good nor evil, measurable against technical (purpose-oriented or procedural) but not moral values. By the same token, it renders moral responsibility for the Other ineffective in its original role of the limit imposed on ‘the effort to exist’. — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 613 (#contradicts, via linked claim)

Life would be completely different if every boundary were definitive, if with advancing life (both in general and in regard to every individual undertaking) the uncertain did not become more certain, the surely believed more problematic. As a result of the inherent flexibility and dislocation of our boundaries, we are able to express our essence with a paradox: we are bounded in every direction, and we are bounded in no direction. — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 786 (#expands, via linked claim)

Herewith is expressed the profound relation between relativity and society, which is the most immediate demonstration of relativity in regard to the material of humanity: society is the supra-singular structure which is nonetheless not abstract. Through this concept historical life is spared the alternatives of having to run either in mere individuals or in abstract generalities. Society is the generality that has, simultaneously, concrete vitality. — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 274 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Society is a concrete generality neither reducible to individuals nor abstract — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 274; Social organization neutralizes morality by making action adiaphoric, neither good nor evil — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 613; Human existence is simultaneously bounded in every direction and in none — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 786 (+4 more)

Related

• Social organization neutralizes morality by making action adiaphoric, neither good nor evil (similarity 0.86)
• Sociology reduces morality to derivative products of non-moral social institutions (similarity 0.80)
• Social organization displaces autonomous moral drive with instrumental and procedural rationality (similarity 0.79)

Broader Connections

• Social organization neutralizes morality by making action adiaphoric, neither good nor evil #contradicts (0.78) — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 613
• Human existence is simultaneously bounded in every direction and in none #expands (0.75) — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 786
• Society is a concrete generality neither reducible to individuals nor abstract #expands (0.72) — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 274
• Morality precedes society and society merely manipulates an already-existing moral structure #contradicts (0.72) — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 514