devilof76
Super Freak
Where in reality do things exist outside of their context?
It doesn't become a bad thing because your bed making has gone to an extreme. The activity has actually been detached from the context in which it has purpose if you do it 15 times a day. It's conceivable that a bed could need to be made that many times (albeit unlikely) and that would still be extreme, but in and of itself, not a problem.
Context is everything, and it's not possible to keep things in context by employing arbitrary parameters of behavior.
Which is not the same as moderation.
It helps to be taught, but it's not like it cannot be learned without guidance.
I would not judge any action according to so specious a standard as usefulness to society. I realize that's not your main point, but it is often the root of the attraction to the moderation approach to morality. People think there needs to be a balance struck between the needs of the one and the needs of the many. Egalitarianism is the end of that train of thought, and that does the individual nor the society a damn bit of good.
It is arbitrary to categorize the problem as an extreme. Would reducing the quantity of rudeness change the nature of the behavior?
I'm challenging his entire approach to morality, yes. And I consider it a rotten approach to discerning right and wrong. Did that come across clearly? Good.
Here's an example. Some people thing totalitarianism is good. Some people think freedom is good. Some people can't make up their minds, and decide that living half controlled and half free is the best, i.e. moderate, approach. Historically, such systems are inherently unstable and the mean gradually moves toward greater and greater controls. Given the latitude to reach its logical conclusion, one ends up with a society that is fully controlled and often justified in the name of some ridiculously warped concept of freedom (freedom from corporations, the rich, global banking conspiracies, etc.).
Had the initial thought process managed to understand that freedom is a survival need of human beings, the notion of compromise with the opposite principle would have never entered the equation. The mere suggestion that 'balancing' freedom with not-freedom would be rejected out of hand as nonsense. Anyone who understood the principle would see that it is one or the other. Morality is binary. Grey areas exist by intellectual default.
So no, it's not a straw man (though it may be condescending---a thousand apologies, I don't know how else to tell someone they're wrong, particularly someone who lives and breathes condescension). Either someone understands, or they don't. If they don't, moderation is a way to give themselves a sense of moral satisfaction while lacking the necessary moral ground they need to stand. It's understandable, I guess. Morality is the heart of human motivation, and it's essentially impossible to live without. That doesn't, however, exempt it from the contempt it deserves. It's a form of fraud and I don't think anyone should have to endure being lectured for the sake of the scold's need to maintain their own internal facades.
I usually follow it up with, "Well honey, if their parents cared about them, they'd teach them that there's always struggles in life and you don't always get what you want and what you do get, you have to work for. Unfortunately, their parents can't be bothered so they'll have very rough adult lives." 
