The appeal to what everyone else is doing has been used to justify behavior in every culture and every era. It is one of the oldest arguments and one of the most consistently wrong ones. Scripture addresses it directly and without sympathy.
The Mistaken Assumption
What is universally practiced is universally acceptable. If every person in a community does something — if it is truly the final argument, with no one left to object — then objection has become meaningless. Social universality settles the moral question.
What Scripture Actually Shows
Genesis 6 is the most extreme case: a world where everyone had departed from God, where the corruption was comprehensive and universal. And the universality did not make it right. God’s assessment did not change with the census. Romans 1:32 describes people who not only do wrong but give approval to others who do the same — the approval is named as an additional problem, not a solution. The validation of a wrong thing by its community of practitioners does not change the nature of the thing. Psalm 14:1-3 — the fool says there is no God — describes a universal condition (all have turned aside) that God does not accept as a standard simply because it is universal.
Why This Feels Hard
When everyone around you has normalized something, the burden of proof shifts onto the objector. The question becomes not whether the thing is right but why you think you are the exception — why your discomfort with what everyone else accepts should count for anything. That pressure is significant and constant.
What Faith Looks Like Here
The final argument — everyone does it — is never a final argument in Scripture. It is the point at which faithfulness becomes most necessary and most costly, because the social cost of holding a different position is at its maximum. The believer who understands Scripture is not surprised by this. They are prepared for it. That preparation is part of what it means to be formed by the Word rather than by the world.