A Common Humanity

Author: Raimond GaitaPublisher: Roli BooksYear: 2000Language: EnglishPages: 293ISBN/UPC (if available): 0415241138 DescriptionA beautifully written and profound book about how the humanity of our fellow human beings is sometimes not fully visible to us.Drawing on the examples of the Holocaust, the David Irving Affair, the case of Mary Bell and the taking of children of mixed blood from Aboriginal parents in Australia, Raimond Gaita examines the reasons for this. Amongst them, he argues, are a moralistic conception of morality that runs deep in our culture and an impoverished conception of reason and understanding. Both encourage a false opposition between moral judgment and compassion and between head and heart.Turning on its head the way we are inclined to think about evil, Gaita argues for an understanding of it that is inseparable from a sense of the preciousness of each human being. Only this conception of evil can safeguard us against the temptation to treat some evil-doers as no