- Moral bankruptcy
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Moral bankruptcy is a synonym for immorality that has gained popular usage in the fields of business and politics, in which it specifically implies some instance of political corruption or corporate crime. It is a negatively connoted term referring to the deterioration or devaluation of morality in a person or entity, usually with the implication that the person or entity is aware of and responsible themselves for this deterioration. Moral bankruptcy, therefore, suggests that an individual has a sense of what is both morally good and bad (i.e. right and wrong), but consciously and deliberately chooses to make decisions in accord with the morally bad. Because of its negative connotation, the term tends in particular to mean both a selfish and consistent disregard for morality (where morality means a certain ethical domain, like propriety, justice, duty, the law, etc.). Moral bankruptcy may be distinguished from amorality, which is simply any absence of morality (e.g. some animals as an entire species may be considered amoral simply because they do not belong to cultures with moral codes). One who is exhibiting moral bankruptcy is said to be morally bankrupt.
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