Grandstanding as a Progressor’s Temptation

Is moral grandstanding actually bad? Justin Tosi and Brandon Warmke (2016; 2020) think so. Neil Levy, in “Virtue Signaling is Virtuous,” (2021) counters their view. He argues that grandstanding, or what he’ll call virtue signaling, is not just morally permissible, but necessary. In this paper, I seek a line through their accounts. First, I’ll address two important interpretative differences between them. I’ll consider the fit between ‘virtue signaling’ and ‘grandstanding.’ And I’ll interrogate Levy’s identification of grandstanding as a primarily epistemic issue. Next, I’ll argue that, even if it were a primarily epistemic issue, second-order evidence won’t contribute much. Lastly, squaring these accounts, I’ll claim that grandstanding is both a common social error and moral bad. Grandstanding can be understood as a kind of moral progressor’s temptation. As progressors, we require external checks to measure our moral development. But that same approval distracts us. It introduces a temptation to target gaining praise for our virtues, rather than actually developing them. Inasmuch, grandstanding is a bad that often comes along with becoming a better person. Its dual status reflects a tragic truth about our moral and social lives.