We should take the Moral Highground

[mediamogul]

I'm not being sarcastic or anything, but how is it possible to claim the 'high moral ground' while asserting that morality is just a set of arbitrary conventions for behavior?

Valid question.

I, for one, believe in a moral theory more based upon rights and freedom as opposed to "moral principles". There are some nearly universal precepts that inform human conduct but have individual cultural manifestations as they are put into practice. The foremost of which is that "people should be treated as ends in themselves", as in, a person should never be used to achieve another persons end. Actions are generally acceptable if they do not harm others and are the freely chosen actions of those capable of making such decisions. Homosexuality for instance if it is a consensual action between adults performed in the privacy of their own home harms no one and therefore people have a right to do. Humans, and animals in my case (that is perhaps an argument for another time), have certain rights applicable to them on the basis of them having sentience, that is a nervous system capable of supporting consciousness and the ability to suffer in some meaningful way. Suffering is self-evidently bad and therefore each human, by the requirements above, has the right not to have suffering inflicted upon them. Conversely a person has the right to pursue their own happiness provided it does not cause another person to suffer, provided that person has not violated the rights of another person. The last category relates to those things that promote the overall functioning of society by increasing happiness and reducing suffering on a societal and cultural level. That is my view in a nutshell for the rational basis of ethics.

Once again, this system requires one to care more about humans themselves than adhering to principles from a book on threat of heaven and promis of hell.