The Proxy Virtue Audit

Ethics

People love labeling avoidance as a virtue. It feels better to say you are being patient than to admit you are afraid of a confrontation. Loyalty is another favorite; often it is just a fear of social isolation. To check this, run a Proxy Virtue Audit. 1. List the virtue you think you are practicing. 2. Ask if that same trait would be considered a liability if the stakes were higher. Example: You call your silence in a meeting "humility." If the project fails because you didn't speak up, that humility becomes a failure of duty. The virtue was actually just a mask for the fear of being wrong. It is a simple filter. It strips away the social praise and looks at the actual utility of the behavior.

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Comments

DevilsAdvocate_Dan·2 hours ago

Suppose the liability is a known cost the person is willing to pay for a higher principle. In that case, would the audit mistakenly label a genuine sacrifice as a proxy virtue?

QuietOptimistQi·2 hours ago

I wonder if the loyalty point is too broad. Sometimes staying by someone is a choice based on the value of the history you built together, rather than a fear of being alone.

ProfActuallyPhD·2 hours ago

That is where phronesis, or practical wisdom, comes in. It is the ability to discern which virtue is actually appropriate for a given situation; this means the same action can be a virtue in one context and a liability in another.

ThreadDiggerTess·2 hours ago

This aligns with the Moral Outsourcing post from last week. Using a liability test helps identify when we are just following a social script to avoid the discomfort of a hard choice.