Morality and ethics vs legality

Morals and ethics are like 5 & 6 because they work together in every aspect of any society, but then there are some times we need to separate them simply because we can’t just overlook some things all in the name of morality, and we can’t hold everything as an offense because of ethics as well, and that is why we need to be careful when dealing with these two things.

I am from Africa, Nigeria to be precise, and here in Nigeria we have zero tolerance for disrespectful behavior, especially when it has to do with kids and elders.

For instance, a child calling his parents by their first name or not bowing down properly to greet them, or a junior sister or brother calling his or her elder brother or sister by their names without adding respect—then such a child would receive a massive punishment from the parents or even an outsider who feels it is not appropriate for a child to be disrespectful.

But then in another country, a child could call their parents by their names, greet them casually, and of course call their elder brothers and sisters without any form of respect, and no one would punish them for it.

The thing is that we all have different cultures, laws, and peoples as well, so we can’t just consider morals and ethics alone when making laws in a country because in a country there would be different people from different countries, and that might affect some people because they might find the law too difficult to abide by since they don’t see anything wrong with the law where they are coming from.

My mom would say, “Bi a se n se nile wa, ewo ibomini,” which in English is “Everyone has their own way of handling or dealing with things.”

If some things should be overlooked just because they are not crimes, some things are worse than committing a crime, which most people don’t pay attention to, but they just know that it is not good anyway.

Moreover, it is not every bad thing that happens that is actually bad; some happen accidentally, which law can never overlook. Morality and ethics can be very difficult and complex to deal with when making laws. For instance, I saw a video of a woman who is an artist in Nigeria.

This woman and her husband have been separated for the past year, but they both keep it underground so that people wouldn’t question them, and that was because of their child, but I don’t know what happened and how the secret got out.

So people started throwing shade at the woman for leaving her matrimonial home, and that hurt the woman because she had taken more than enough from the man before deciding to leave for the sake of her sanity.

There is a freedom of speech, they say, but there are things people shouldn’t really say to another person because it might hurt them deeply. The lady couldn’t arrest anyone for talking or throwing shade at her because no crime was committed, but people really said so many hurtful words to her.

When you talk about morals, this should be a thing of mind, home training, and, of course, personal stuff as well. When you have good morals, you wouldn’t want to say things that would hurt someone else, which has nothing to do with law. More so, morality is the only thing that keeps people informed and in check so that they will not commit crimes.