Cultural relativism

In his article “Cultural relativism and cultural values”, Melville Herkovits defines the principle of cultural relativism as “judgements are based on experience, and experience is interpreted by each individual in terms of his own enculturation” (26). This is the basic premise of cultural relativism, that beliefs, values, and morals are all based on one’s culture. Therefore, since morality is based on society and different societies have different views of right and wrong, there can be no moral absolutes. Since there are no absolutes, under this view of cultural relativism all moral views determined by one’s culture are deemed true whether they conflict or not. Upon first glance, relativism seems like a very appropriate concept of morality in the world. It is clear to see that there are differences of what is acceptable and unacceptable in different societies across the world. Growing up in Western culture I have grown a fondness for meat, especially steak. It is a momentou...