Utilitarianism, as a Moral System, Is Basically

Utilitarianism, as a moral system, is basically one in which one creates a moral and ethical system based not in each specific action having an essential moral component in and of itself, but in terms of defining the morality of an action by the ends that it is achieved. Moreover, in utilitarianism, morality is linked solely to the satisfaction of desires and thus represents a sort of ethical hedonism:

Utilitarianism is an approach to mortality that treats pleasure or desire-satisfaction as the element in human good and that regards the morality of actions as entirely dependent upon on consequences or results for human (or sentient) well-being.... most subsequent utilitarians discard religious traditions and social conventions in favor of treating human well-being or happiness as the touchstone for all moral evaluation

Honderich 890)

Although this is basically true of all utilitarian systems, it would be both overly simplistic and greatly inaccurate to assume, therefore, that all utilitarianism is the same. Indeed, there are different strains. While classical utilitarianism may hold for the necessity of maintaining and increasing the amount of happiness for the greatest number, other forms of utilitarianism might disagree. The classical utilitarian formation is problematic, because happiness is a vague and ill-defined term, because it can allow for individual barbarisms, and because it can justify systematic exclusion, such as racism. A better formulation of utilitarianism would be to suggest a scale by which one attempts simply to minimize suffering in all individuals. By employing this schema, we can avoid the problems that classical utilitarianism has altogether.

In the classical formulation of Utilitarianism, the idea is to create the greatest amount of happiness for the largest number of people. Indeed, however, thi sconcpetion is desperately flawed from the very start. To begin with, the term happiness is vague and probably misleading. Indeed, a constant state of happines would not even be possible. Freud himself noted that happiness was a periodic phenomenon (as is pleasure), which can only experience in relation to sadness and pain. A continual state of happiness or pleasure is simply not possible. Pain, however, as a criteria make sense, because we all empirical know what pain is and can think of concrete ways to reduce suffering. Furthermore, such a particular scheme of events also enables the legitimizing of the worst kinds of barbarism and terrible acts on the micro level, still. One great example of this idea is in Ursula K. Leguin's story, "The Ones who Walk Away from Omelas." The story details a town which is an almost perfect paradise, except for the fact that the entire town is run on a system that works by torturing continually and terribly, one individual:

the child... sometimes speaks. "I will be good, " it says. "Please let me out. I will be good!" They never answer... It is naked. Its buttocks and thighs are a mass of festered sores, as it sits in its own excrement continually. They all know it is there, all the people of Omelas. Some of them have come to see it, others are content merely to know it is there. They all know that it has to be there. Some of them understand why, and some do not, but they all understand that their happiness, the beauty of their city, the tenderness of their friendships, the health of their children, the wisdom of their scholars, the skill of their makers, even the abundance of their harvest and the kindly weathers of their skies, depend wholly on this child's abominable misery.

Leguin)

Indeed, this idea of utilitarianism allows for this system in which one person is tortured terribly so that others may suffer. Indeed, it is a difficult ethical claim to make that the torture of one pure and innocent child is acceptable so that others may live happily. More to the point, this sort of idea can be expanded to justify things like racism. Indeed, why not subjugate a small percentage of this population to slavery if it would make the rest of the population happy. Wouldn't this be acceptable? If we attempted merely to reduce suffering for all people, however, the terrible societies of Omelas or one based in slavery could never be allowed to exist. Thus, it seems that a society based on a utilitarian ideal that advocated the lessening of overall suffering would be greatly preferable to one which advocated for the promotion of the greatest good for the greatest number.

Someone playing devil's advocate, however, might take exception with such a system and argue that this idea of utilitarianism is ineffective and wouldn't work, that it is a sort of moral communism that reduces people's desire to act and strive for better things. The idea here is that if were only simply trying to avoid pain, rather than seek out pleasure and happiness, then we aren't really living at all. The goal of humanity, according to this line of thinking is to reach for the proverbial stars, to work towards always improving ourselves and our culture. If take the plat form of merely attempting to reduce the amount of pain, however, we are setting our goals very low indeed. We must strive with the realization that some people will be lost injusred along the way. As the old saying goes, to make an omelet to break some eggs. In this more Nietzschean view of the world then, it is our goal as individual to constantly transcend traditional ideas and values and this can only be done if we are strong. Those that are suffering are those that are inherently weak and would not have been helped anyway. How can we bother about those that are too powerless to help themselves when it is our job always to progress towards the new?