Moral taint and Donald Trump’s reverse Midas touch | Opinion
Some people have a perverse talent for turning gold into dung. These bad apples taint everyone they touch. The solution is avoidance: It is best to stay away from people with the reverse Midas touch.
Moral taint occurs because morality is learned behavior. It is easier to be good when surrounded by good people. Good friends and colleagues support you in virtue and warn you away from vice. But when malice and mendacity are common, it is no longer easy to live well.
If your friends are thieves, stealing becomes normal. If you grow up among gangsters, your moral compass will be broken. And if you live in a nation of scoundrels, it is easy to become one yourself.
The Epstein files provide an example of contagious corruption. Jeffrey Epstein’s touch spread corruption to the halls of power in many countries. Some of the men in Epstein’s orbit may have been evil to begin with — perverts and criminals often seek each other out. But their association with Epstein was also about wealth, power and to gain access. In choosing to be around him, those people opened themselves to moral infection.
Now consider the case of the U.S. men’s hockey team: The gold-medal team should be honored, but when Federal Bureau of Investigation Director Kash Patel and President Donald Trump inserted themselves into their Olympic celebrations, things got weird.
The controversy occurred when the Trump squad introduced scandal, sexism and anti-Canadian animosity into the victory.
It does seem that Trump has a kind of reverse Midas touch like his former friend, Epstein. (Among many examples, we could note how Elon Musk’s reputation suffered from his association with Trump.) But, of course, Trump sees things differently: At a campaign rally in 2024, Trump said, “Everything Joe Biden touches turns to shit, everything. I tried finding a different word, but there are some words that cannot be duplicated.”
Perhaps Biden was also a reverse Midas: He certainly cast a shadow over former Vice President Kamala Harris’ 2024 presidential campaign. But Trump’s argument against Biden seems a bit like a skunk complaining about garlic: They both stink.
The general problem is that evil is contagious, as is stupidity. We ought to avoid those who make us worse, while seeking out good and wise companions. In the ancient world, it was common to speak of people as being “cursed.” A family or a nation could be damned, and the unhappiness of a cursed people could somehow be inherited. Mere membership was enough to contaminate.
In the story of Oedipus, the king of Thebes, Oedipus’ father, Laius, was cursed by the gods for raping a boy. Oedipus inherited his father’s curse, and so he was fated to kill Laius and marry his own mother on the way to becoming king. As a result, the entire city of Thebes was cursed. The family’s evil and corruption tainted the entire city.
Adam and Eve in the Bible were cursed for disobeying God, and the notion of “original sin” holds that all humankind inherits the curse of Adam, which is only abolished through belief in Jesus Christ as savior. The Christian story infers that moral taint can only be washed away by the grace of God.
Thus, the idea of moral taint points toward deep philosophical questions, but modern thinkers no longer believe in fate and curses. Guilt by association is unfair, as is guilt by inheritance. These ideas devalue individual responsibility and free will. That means it’s all up to us to avoid complicity and contamination.
Large institutions can be corrupted by bad leaders and pernicious ideologies. When things stink for long enough, we can lose track of what is pure, noble and good. When moral taint flows from the top of an organization, it can be difficult to avoid the avalanche of dung.
This reminds us of the fundamental need to seek wisdom and virtue. Goodness is contagious. Virtuous leaders inspire us to be better. And a moral wind can blow away the stench of corruption.
Andrew Fiala is a professor of philosophy and director of The Ethics Center at Fresno State.