Are right and wrong convertible terms dependant on popular opinion?

Dicey question. Right or wrong can sometimes be a huge gray area. Or a matter of personal opinion. Let’s take the abortion issue as an example. I support women’s rights, and their right to determine what happens with their own body. That said, I also understand that many people are opposed to abortion, on what they consider personal moral grounds. Or maybe strongly and sincerely held religious belief. So I won’t say that they are “wrong” in their belief / opinion. I feel they are wrong however, when they piss and moan about “my body my choice” in relation to vaccinations yet are willing to deny that same choice to a woman needing an abortion. Does that make sense?

Social norms develop through a variety of mechanisms. Sometimes it seems to have an organic growth, other times there is purposeful persuasion by governments or other entities trying to shape societal behavior.

Here is a link about social norms. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_norm

Deviant behavior is behavior outside of the acceptable norms.

Popular or accepted behavior by the majority does set norms and can make something that might previously be seen as wrong now right or vice versa.

Because of the deliberate efforts of politicians (and the media and church figures who are involved in that politics), and the tribal arguments it creates.

In order to justify the continued power, authority, and excessive wealth of those who have it, they generate a series of arguments (even, conflicting arguments) to get people thinking they have a political argument with other “wrong” people that keeps them from noticing that the people telling them that are their rich powerful and/or “holy” “leaders”, who actually are only pretending they care about those same arguments so they can get everyone else’s attention off how there’s a class of corrupt super-wealthy assholes hogging all the wealth and power and telling them their problems are all about people in another tribe.

Particularly in modern US culture, you have many overwhelmed people who have little capacity for more information, and who would really like to trust one source of information, the simpler the better. Or even better, they’d like not to have to think about politics. So they’re eager to believe their choice of newscaster, preacher, politician or person they know.

Many US politicians and new media, conservatives and centrists have seemed to me to be engaged in social experiments to try to see how much BS and apathy they can get away with. Can we put an idiot in as POTUS? How about an actor? A reality TV star and con-man? Hey, look, we can! Can we have a lying right-wing news company or two broadcasting at a 4th grade level and lying left and right, and not get completely laughed at and called out? Hey, yes we can! Can we slash taxes for the rich and not the poor! Yep – they still just think it’s “tax cuts”! Can we get rid of social programs, environmental protections, government oversight of business? Yep! Can we just go along with the crazy ex-POTUS lying that the election was rigged against him? Looks like! Can we incite them to storm the Capitol! Yep! If we tell them it was “Anti-fa”, will some of them believe it? Yup. Hey, let’s see if we can have maniac Q-Anon believers in Congress! No problem. Gaetz was running a pedophile racket – let’s see how long it takes him to get ejected from Congress… well, not yet! Hey, look, all this noise it great at getting people not to notice what’s really going on… yup, how many billions have you got now? Oh, lots…

I suppose they are.
Right and wrong are social constructs.

For me, right and wrong are not swayed by politics, society or vigorous debate in most cases.
It’s easier to rationalize your way into a grey area for various reasons-popularity, etc.., and more difficult to maintain moral integrity and stand your ground.

All that being said, though I value life, is all pedo’s disappeared, I’d be thrilled.

I think right is right and wrong is wrong because they are often based on what is actual fact. Opinions though do not have to be based on fact because it’s based on personal belief. For instance, I agree with @Nomore_lockout, but its a fact that when you murder someone you erase someone from existence and you hurt those who loved them. That would be a fact that would prove to be wrong. Beating someone is painful to the victim and can cause all kinds of harm, both physical and mental. Again wrong. No opinion really changes whether these things are right or wrong. But sometimes things that are wrong can be used for the greater good. Someone is about to kill you and you shoot that person in self-defense. It’s still the murder of someone who may be loved by others, but you have a right to defend yourself and it could’ve been avoided if only the other person never attempted to kill you.

So the wrong falls on the attempted murderer. The point is there are different scales for murder. Murder itself is wrong but not all murders are equal. This is where opinions vary, but murder still feels wrong.
Same for helping the helpless. Fact, it is a good thing. But it too has variation. Too much help can make someone believed they are owed all the help they want and become indulgent. Too little help can make a person feel wronged or worthless. But the right amount can help people get back on their feet and feel worthy of living. Finding that right amount is awesome and Good. The other two, are not good. So fact. It is Good to help. In fact, it is hard to find that perfect solution for everyone because we are all individuals.

I mean you can say the nature of what is good or bad is based on opinion, but if you look at it scientifically, and you see what are the repercussions of a murder, or beating or rape or of helping, or being kind, or volunteering, then you go beyond opinion.

Yes normally this happens when emotions overrule logic. If you can paint someone as evil, then then actions that would normally be unacceptable are justified. When riots erupted across the country, many justified those actions as the only course of action for a battered demographic Burning, looting, armed insurrection all became righteous in the light of George Floyd. Jailing rioters became became oppression. Alinsky said “One acts decisively only in the conviction that all the angels are on one side and all the devils on the other”. Make the issue or person “Good vs Evil”, that will justify any action, good or bad, acceptable.

Popular opinion sways people because that is the very definition of right and wrong. There is nothing obvious about it. The best example is killing people is wrong unless you are a soldier in war, then it’s OK, under certain circumstances, or when the law allows execution of criminals and when people kill in “self defense”.
Another example that is changeable is who you are allowed to marry. That has been in Flux for many societies.

What is right and what is wrong mostly boils down to this. “do not do unto others what you would not have them do to you”. For example if you wouldn’t like to be a slave then you shouldn’t support slavery. If you were making a lot of money from slavery you might think otherwise but you would be wrong.

@flutherother , The Golden Rule is a good standard, but it does not cover everything. How, for example, would you apply it to the abortion issue?

@LostInParadise I would look at it from the pregnant woman’s point of view. What she wants would be paramount and I think it would be wrong to insist she give birth to a baby she doesn’t want.

Well, that’s one of the classic moral conundrums. Take slavery for example. For most of human history, people simply accepted slavery as a normal part of life. They recognized that enslavement was an undesirable state, but there was no sense that it was morally wrong to enslave people until relatively recently. So does that mean that slavery was always wrong according to some universal metaphysical standard that transcends culture and history and we (well, most of us at least) just took until the past couple centuries to realize it or did it become wrong over time because opinions shifted?

What? The golden rule easily makes slavery not ok. If you don’t want to be a slave don’t enslave others. I guess people convinced themselves other people weren’t human, but then I’m back to the golden rule, do you want to be treated as subhuman? If not, don’t treat others as subhuman. Don’t inflict pain, it’s really quite simple.

If you don’t want to have to donate blood and give up part of your liver and some vitamins to support another and be forced to gain 40 pounds and high chance of incontinence at least temporarily and possibly diabetes and high blood pressure to support another life, don’t force women to give their body to support another life. It’s not just about not wanting a child, it’s about physically supporting and birthing the baby also.

@JLeslie Sure, but my point wasn’t that the Golden Rule can’t apply to slavery, it’s that humanity was essentially on the same page for a long time and then recently did a complete 180. So what does that say about universal moral standards and where morality comes from?

And the Golden Rule can’t explain all moral principles in either case. Like the prohibition against incest. It seems to be viewed as morally wrong because we are biologically wired against it. But that doesn’t really fit in with the “do unto others” framework.

^^Why doesn’t it fit? I haven’t met one child who is happy an adult forced them to perform sexual acts. Actually, not only would those same adults not have wanted to be forced as children, they don’t want to be forced as adults. The rapists don’t want to be raped.

@JLeslie But are all examples of incest an adult forcing a child? What about two adult siblings? It’s true that incest often involves abuse, but if we find an example where it doesn’t, it’s hard to characterize its wrongness in terms of the Golden Rule. In this case we’re saying it’s wrong because it’s abusive and abuse is wrong. I’m talking about establishing incest as wrong without reference to abuse.

^^I agree with that.

Morality is slightly different than cultural norms.

Take being gay. Some people consider it immoral. Others believe two consenting adults should be able to do as they wish. Separate from this are cultural norms. 40 years ago homosexuality was considered a psychological disorder. The psych establishment wasn’t making a moral judgment as much as they were making a judgment about mental health. Eventually, the psych community came around to accepting same sex attraction and relationships as within the norm.

Yeah, that’s another perfect example. When I ask people who think homosexuality is immoral to explain why (apart from referencing a divine moral edict), they will say things like “it goes against nature” because there’s no “harm principle” argument they can make.