From a comment I just made to another diary on the site, here's my idea for the progressive moral code (aka Rules For A Civilized Society). If you have suggestions for additions or improvements, let me know in comments.
Rules for a Civilized Society
- We are all in this together. As Benjamin Franklin said, "Either we all hang together, or most assuredly we shall all hang separately."
- Everyone deserves care and protection from harm, simply by virtue of being human beings and citizens.
- Individualism is a dangerous myth.We are all part of a social network, and nobody got where they are without help from others.
- Following on from that, our whole is greater than the sum of its parts. We can do more as a community than we can ever do individually.
- We are, by our nature as human beings, obligated to help those we can help and entitled to help when we need help. There is no time limitation on this basic right and obligation during our lifetime. It attaches at birth and ends only at death.
- In any society, the government is the best manager and administrator of the social contract because it can do the most consistent (not efficient, but consistent) job, and consistency is more important than efficiency when it comes to providing care and protection from harm, which is everyone's birthright.
- A well-educated and healthy populace being necessary to the running of a free, civilized, and powerful nation, education through graduate school and health care shall be considered public goods and supported as such.
- Basic human rights include food, water, shelter, sanitation, health care, and education.
- Civil rights protecting speech, religious belief or lack of it, the right to trial, the right to privacy, the right to a free press, the right to equal protection under the law regardless of race, color, creed, orientation, origin, gender, gender identity/expression, disability, or age - these rights are inviolate. If one person has them, all people have them. We must support and uphold them, not undermine them.
- Any actions taken to undermine these principles shall be considered an act of violence against one's society.