Richard Whites Friendship and Commitment :: Friends Morals Loyalty Papers

Richard Whites Friendship and shipment In this paper, I will examine the duties of friendship. I will advert at arguments in favor of the view that there ar superfluous clean-living duties involved in friendship, but will ultimately discard this view. I will then explain what role I attend to friendship having in morality even without these duties. In Richard Whites article Friendship and Commitment, White argues that friendship is an inherently moral activity (81). He argues that part of beingness a friend is having accepted obligations, like being helpful or emotionally available. These are obligations that are above and beyond what we owe to a stranger. He also judges that being a friend involves a commitment. He says specifically, when I spend clip with mortal, accept their help, and make myself available to that person, by sharing the more signify aspects of myself, I am also creating an expectation that is equivalent to a commitment, tending(p) the institution of friendship and all that it commonly entails (82). In being psyches friend, aside from the commitments and obligations, he argues, you are also morally endorsing her. That is, you are implicitly saying that there is something semiprecious about them that your friend is someone worth knowing. Let us suppose that all of this is actually the fictional character that friendship really does connote certain commitments, obligations, and endorsements. Do any of these takings morally? Ill address endorsements first, followed by obligations and commitments. When someone is your friend, this seems to imply that you think there is something valuable about that person. But the things I find valuable in her qualification have nothing to do with morality for instance, she ability be intelligent and able to argue effectively. She might make me laugh. She might be fun to be with. None of these are morally relevant, and even a com bination of them would probably be sufficient for me to be friends with someone. As such, it seems that being a friend with someone does not actually imply a moral endorsement of that person.