Dr. Stephen L. Anderson, a professor in Ontario, Canada, had what he called a moment of "startling clarity" while teaching a section on ethics in his senior philosophy class. He needed an "attention-getter"—something to shock his students and force them to take an ethical stand. He hoped that this would form a "baseline" from which they could evaluate other ethical decisions. Here's how he explained what happened next:

I decided to open by simply displaying, without comment, the photo of Bibi Aisha. Aisha was the Afghani teenager who was forced into an abusive marriage with a Taliban fighter, who abused her and kept her with his animals. When she attempted to flee, her family caught her, hacked off her nose and ears, and left her for dead in the mountains … She was saved by a nearby American hospital. I felt quite sure that my students, seeing the suffering of this poor girl of their own age, would have a clear ethical reaction ….

The picture is horrific. Aisha's beautiful eyes stare hauntingly back at you above the mangled hole that was once her nose. Some of my students could not even raise their eyes to look at it. I could see that they were experiencing deep emotions.

But I was not prepared for their reaction. I had expected strong aversion; but that's not what I got. Instead, they became confused. They seemed not to know what to think. They spoke timorously, afraid to make any moral judgment at all. They were unwilling to criticize any situation originating in a different culture. They said, "Well, we might not like it, but maybe over there it's okay." Another said, "It's just wrong to judge other cultures."

I wondered, "How can kids who have been so thoroughly basted in the language of minority rights be so numb to a clear moral offense?" …. No matter how I prodded they did not leave their nonjudgmental position. I left that class shaking my head. It seemed clear to me that for some students—clearly not all—the lesson of character education initiatives is acceptance of all things at all costs. While we may hope some are capable of bridging the gap between principled morality and this ethically vacuous relativism, it is evident that a good many are not. For them, the overriding message is "never judge, never criticize, never take a position."