I say, "to you" because I believe that while our society likes to paint the picture that we are all on the same page as to what makes someone good or bad, it may actually be entirely subjective. We have our own individual morals and values and those are what we ultimately use to determine a person's goodness/badness on a case by case basis. I believe it to be a grey-area, gradient type scale. So to you, what makes a good person? Is it their words, their actions, or a combination of both? And if it is a combination, does that then mean that someone isn't as good of a person if they do not practice both?
If you say you're a kind person and a very generous being, then you have to prove it through actions.
Empathy, thoughtfulness, and integrity (honesty plus trustworthiness).
Actions are all that matter for any evaluation.
You can be a good person by practicing honesty, being equitable and fair, without talking about it.
You can’t talk a big game without actions to back it up.
The “words and actions” option leaves too much grey area for empty wind address; talk is cheap.
Everyone knows right from wrong. How good or bad a person is is how often they base their decisions on that knowledge. Talk is cheap. Facebook has created an entire alternate reality based on this. Everyone there is a motivational political expert. In real life it's your actions that define you.
But does everyone really know right from wrong? That's part of what I was questioning here. There are guidelines set by our society and yes, a lot of people do agree on some which is why they are the standard in the first place. However, I think things can get muddy quickly depending on how someone was raised and even their mental health. For a common example that our society is split on, some people were raised to see an abortion as murder, and other's don't see it a such and believe the livelihood of the mother comes before the unborn fetus. And taking it outside the window of society, murder: its a fact of life in the animal world and are humans not animals? Our society puts us above all other walks of life based on what we've accomplished and what we think we know about consciousness, but is murder really wrong from a biological standpoint?
Honesty is a very important quality for goodness in my eyes. But it has to be tempered with tact, sensibility and love I suppose. There are some other good qulities of course. Integrity, which is close to honesty. Loyality - which could be in conflict with the other two. Responsibility. Caring. Respect. If I could just use one word? Intgrity. But then people could ask what do you mean by that, just as the question asked what is good?
Demonstration of a conscience followed by deliberate considerate decisions.
From being the Navy I had the pleasure of meeting all kinds of different people. Some of them just happen to be recovering gang members. I have seen the good side of these guys even though they have notoriously, have a deviant side. The ones I have gotten to know in the setting we found our selves in and the honorable thing that I have witnessed them do. All I can say is never judge a book by the cover.
It depends on what the words and actions are. But if you’re the only one to do what you think is right and you don’t share it with anyone or try too encourage others to do the same, there’s little point in doing it.
Now here's one that will really mess with your noggin: are mercy killings moral or immoral?
Depends entirely upon how you define "mercy killings" and "moral".
@NoMagicCookie that was exactly the point of my comment.
A person who does a good dead and then talks badly or complains about it is not a good person.
So by your rubric: If a person jumps onto the recessed train track of on oncoming train to save the life of a person who has fallen onto the tracks and while trying to escape before they are both hit by the train, winds up loosing his shoe and complaining about no longer having a shoe, this person is "not a good person." I disagree.
@NoMagicCookie so if you're going to take it to an excessive extreme just to start a fight let's take it further.
A person jumps into the tracks to save a person. They both live but he lost his show. Now he demands the person whose life was saved pay for shoe, as well as complains the entire time that if he hadn't saved the other, he'd still have a shoe. The shoeless man complains every chance he gets, guiltily the other for years.
Is he really a good person?
@NoMagicCookie because you see, what I was going for was someone who does good actions but verbally abuses or complains constantly about how much they sacrifice to do those good deeds as a way of showing just how grateful someone else should be, is pretty much an asshole.
But you wanted to take what I said and make it out automatically to be a completely different meaning.
Hm wonder what that makes you.
@LadyAlyxandrea In what way does my example not completely fall within the requirements of your assertion? Also, in your rebuttal, you include the person who saved the life of another demanding payment for the shoe. I did not include that because this is not a requirement of your statement. You have just changed shifted the goal post (not a honourable position) as your example does not dictate the person demand reimbursement only "talks bad".
@LadyAlyxandrea I can't envision a scenario where your original statement makes sense. Perhaps you can offer a scenario that justifies your assertion. In my earlier example, if the person who saved another from death complains about having to save the other person (the shoe incident not necessary) by your standard, would be a bad person.
@NoMagicCookie I'm done here.