Abstract

Students often suffer from what might be called “ethics anxiety,” a kind of alienation from moral discourse due to a fear that another’s values will be imposed upon them. A consequence of this anxiety is that students detach themselves from participating in moral deliberation. This paper proposes a way of thinking about moral judgments aimed at assuaging the fears of students who are skeptical about any moral claim that is not wholly personal or cultural. Rather than viewing moral judgments as imperatives that aim to impose one’s values on another, moral judgments ought to be understood as truth claims that are practical or action-guiding.