The biggest ethical dilemma in out country today is the lack of moral absolutes. It surpasses every other ethical problem because of the fact that it encompasses all of them. Today's culture accepts a tolerant view to relativism. They cry out Voltaire's words "I may not agree with what you say, but I'll defend your right to say it" with such ease that the oxymoronic statement of "nothing is absolute" has become their slogan.
What separates man from its nearest relatives, the primates, is 1% of DNA. Not only does this DNA affect out physical differences, but it seems that it also codes for a higher level of morality. To my belief this morality is like a pen sitting on a table. It simply exists. Then why all the relative outlooks on life? From the moment of birth on we are constantly influenced by outside forces. What Del Raztsch calls "shaping principles." They vary from our outlook on life so that we cannot clearly see that the pen on the table is just that: a pen on a table. No one can escape these shaping principles. In a room full of people we have people who look at the pen and say "I wonder who lost that pen" or "what a lovely pen" or "I would like to shove that pen up Junior's ass" and there are those who simply ignore the pen all together. The fact remains that there is still a pen on the table. This 1% DNA, and this pen, are what C.S. Lewis calls 'the Natural Law.' It's natural to all of us, yet all of us break it because our shaping principles have altered our views of how it should be.
As stated previously, the biggest moral problem is the group of people (exponentially growing) who choose to completely ignore the moral law, or the pen, and hope that by doing so they have somehow released themselves of their own conscious. As if this were not bad enough, post-modernists like Derrida and Foucault advocate the fact that they everyone can see it in a different way, to embrace their differences.
As a result the black and white status of the natural law has been reduced to a color-wheel of embraced relativism. The great proponents of subjectivity beg for everyone to be open-minded to everyone else's view. Tolerance has become almost taboo and replaced with acceptance. Not only should you embrace the other person, but embrace their views as well.
This slide into a never ending pallet of colors affects every issue. The black and white of abortion is wrong and life is right has been replaced with the blue shade of "on certain circumstances," the red of "of course abortion is okay," and the yellow of "not for me, but you can do it." Overwhelmingly we see the same trend through every issue: lying, euthanasia, war, violence, adultery, fornication and in many cases even murder.
While the crayon box is wide open there is still a chance of regaining out belief in the natural law. Because it is out shaping principles that brought us to the quandary in the first place, I believe it is shaping principles that can get us out. By influencing children at a young age as to what is right or wrong we begin to mold them into the search for the simple "pen on a table." I'm sure people will revolt though, for absolutes means hurting someone's feelings, denying someone's needs or calling someone on their error. Even more, so it means that acceptance isn't allowed, and neither is embracing someone else's wrong, only toleration for their personhood. But fear of stepping on someone else's toes is nothing but a fair shade of green.