As I have learned in the nearly 15 years of writing Ethics Alarms, you (that is, I) never know which topics will generate profound commentary. The post about a vegan bakery that sold fake gluten-free doughnuts sparked this terrific and wide-ranging Comment of the Day by Sarah B. Here it is, in response to “Life Imitates ‘Seinfeld’: For Fake Fat-Free Yogurt, Substitute Fake Gluten-Free Doughnuts”:
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I know of one person with celiac disease, and I know personally one person with celiac disease and another two people with a severe gluten intolerance/allergy. These people puke blood when they eat gluten in a reasonable amount. I know of another two people who are allergic to milk. They have significant bone issues as well. I had a best friend in college who was allergic to everything under the sun and had to be very careful to only eat safe foods. She once thought she could actually order some food one night from a grill after watching them closely, but the grill used peanut oil instead of olive oil as she thought, and she had to go to the hospital.
Because I know these people, I feel great compassion for those with real food allergies, gluten and lactose intolerance, and other real dietary concerns. However, there are so many people who pretend to have allergies who do not. The amazing prevalence of fakes makes it hard to remember that people really have true problems.
With fakes, the first casualties are charity and compassion. We see this throughout society. The Wuflu poisoned most of us against masks. Some people really do wear proper N-95 masks properly with latex gloves and immaculate sanitization procedures due to severe medical issues. However, the vast majority of people wear useless cloth or paper masks improperly while spreading germs about willy-nilly. So when I see someone in a mask, I assume that this person is as stupid as the last 457 people I saw.
We see this in the transgender realm as well. We know that there are people out there who truly suffer from a genetic or physical abnormality that makes them unable to truly determine their sex. However, because too many people are out there thinking that just because they don’t like what society says their sex should like, they need to have a false surgery that will never change what they are, and force others to acknowledge a fantasy that reality does not accept, we tend to overreact when something real comes up. The actual struggles of someone with Klinefelter syndrome get buried in reacting to men who claim to be women to harass and abuse women in domestic violence victims’ shelters, prisons, or just schools and pools.
In school environs, we worry about making sure that the minority kids get the help they need. But when every other helicopter mom out there gets her kid an autism or ADHD diagnosis, the money for helping kids with real problems instead of behavior issues from a parent unwilling to discipline soon disappears. The kids who actually need help can’t get it due to unavailability.
We used to, as a society, believe that we should cultivate virtue and deny vice. Now it appears that we embrace vice to pretend virtue. Part of this is that we have forgotten what virtue is. I believe that this is in part because virtue is hard. We should be disposed to give people the benefit of the doubt, which means understanding that they have failed in virtue, and there but by the grace of God go I. This is not a bad philosophy by itself, but when we combine it with our current ideology of separatism, we have many issues. When everyone is supposed to recognize where they stand on the privilege scale, and make sure they are on the right rung of an ever-changing escalator of privileged classes, the idea that one should react with compassion to someone’s lack of virtue in hard situations has deteriorated into demands that one excuse vice in easy ones.
Until society returns to celebrating virtue rather than signaling it, and condemning vice rather than approving it, I don’t see a return to an ethical society. If someone doesn’t do something…well, I’m someone, so I better start by working on my virtues.
Ethics Alarms 
I have a cousin who is gluten-intolerant and a sister with a severe allergy to almonds (including almond extract). It’s tough for those with genuine issues when people jump on the bandwagon and appropriate these conditions falsely.
To your examples, I would also add service animals. There are people who have a genuine need for them, yet so many abuse this by bringing all manner of animals into their lives and inconveniencing others by claiming that they are medically-needed when they aren’t.
This trading of virtue for vice didn’t happen overnight. There used to be a thing called shame that was often used quite effectively through social pressure which served as a deterrent for misbehavior. Over time, as society became more casual in its outer appearance, it became more casual in its outer behavior. Something very valuable was lost It’s no surprise that those wearing their pajamas to the grocery store are bringing the manners of their bedroom into public with them.
Great comment
Question- Does Society have the obligation or the responsibility to accomodate everyone’s anxieties, piccadilloes, neuroses, or even pathologies? I say not. Taking personal responsibility, I beleive, is the base principal.
Sarah, congratulations! This were outstanding thoughts. Social media has created a lot of phonies, and your linkage of that bogus virtue signaling to the actions of The Savory Fig were genius.
Well done!