How Virtue Signaling Has Replaced Virtue

O what marvellous skill! You know how to measure the circle; you find the square of any shape which is set before you; you compute the distances between the stars; there is nothing which does not come within the scope of your calculations. But if you are a real master of your profession, measure me the mind of man! Tell me how great it is, or how puny! You know what a straight line is; but how does it benefit you if you do not know what is straight in this life of ours?

- Seneca, “On Liberal and Vocational Studies”

Virtue signaling deserves scorn because it is a way of making oneself look better than others merely by saying the right words or partaking in the correct rituals—think slogans like “trans women are women” and political pageantry like land acknowledgments. But these feeble attempts at signaling that you are a “good” and “progressive” person deserve more than scorn. We should be concerned that the mere appearance of virtue has replaced the desire for virtue itself in our society.

I'm not one who looks at the past and thinks that those who came before us were always wiser and more virtuous than we are today. In fact, I think by and large they were not. People have always been people, complete with both the good and bad. Virtue signaling is certainly not new either—there have always been those who care more about looking good than doing good. And as someone who leads a very—shall we say—unique life, I am grateful to live in the place in the time that I do. I obviously think it has its positives.

But something concerning has indeed happened in modern times. Where most people used to at least agree that virtue was good and should be pursued, today it has become passé and almost taboo to talk about. To speak about virtue at all, especially in progressive circles, seems judgmental. You might get accused of shaming those who don't have the traits that you consider virtuous; for example, bravery, patience, and humility.

Expecting people to act like good people can get you mired in a conversation about privilege and oppression: “Of course you can’t expect [X] group to show courage in the face of difficulty, they carry so much trauma from being oppressed!” “Demanding patience in the face of the oppressive system is white supremacy!” “Trans women shouldn’t have to be humble! We earned our womanhood, unlike the cis women who were born into it.”

At the same time, virtue signaling causes people to proclaim their support and allyship for “oppressed” groups. They repeat the slogans and the mantras, and they take part in the pronoun rituals to showcase what good people they are. They rarely actually do anything to show support for their stated beliefs (when is the last time someone who said a land acknowledgment gave any land back?), but their willingness to nod along and parrot the words demanded of them perpetuates the world where virtue signaling thrives.

The question of how this worldview came about is obviously incredibly complex and can’t be boiled down to just one single cause. We can blame everything from industrialization to social media. However, I believe one important place to look is in education.

Classical education emphasized the cultivation of virtue. It aimed to shape the intellect of students, yes, but also their moral character. The goal was not just to increase one’s knowledge but to discern what knowledge was conducive to living life well. As Seneca said, “You know what a straight line is; but how does it benefit you if you do not know what is straight in this life of ours?”

Modern academia, on the other hand, is corroded by postmodernism. Some of the key features of postmodernism are moral relativism, subjectivism, and linguistic deconstruction, and these tools are turned time and again toward a critique of virtue. “How can we know what is good when the good has a different meaning for everyone?” a postmodernist might say. “It’s all relative.” And so, with its focus on language and subjectivity, postmodernism replaces actual virtue with the mere declaration and appearance of virtue.

This inverted philosophy (since it doesn’t represent a love of wisdom at all) may have been born in the academy, but it has seeped out into the world at large, masquerading as intellect and insight. And the worst part is that many people have indeed accepted it in place of actual morality. To bring this piece back around to my usual topic: this is how you get people wholeheartedly defending such obvious and objective cruelty as allowing men to compete in women's sports or placing male sex offenders in women's prisons.

Postmodernism doesn't allow for The Obvious or The Objective. This kind of thinking is pedestrian. Notions of right and wrong must be problematized—this is the mark of a true thinker and intellectual! And it doesn't end until you problematize and no longer allow The Good.

But we should aim to actually be good rather than to parrot what trendy opinion says is acceptable. It is important to reaffirm that cultivating virtues is a desirable goal for education and for all of society itself. Is there going to be an element of subjectivity in regard to what is virtuous? Of course. But don't let the postmodern mindset convince you that the attempt to pursue it at all therefore is pointless. The development of real moral character is more important than jumping on the cause du jour.