Many people attack moral relativism on the grounds that accepting moral relativism implies that there is no more reason to ever consider anybody's behavior to be wrong, and that it therefore becomes impossible to punish wrongdoers (because there won't be any). For example, moral relativism would imply that we can't intervene in an abusive household or protect battered women whose religious believes would have them submit to their husbands or male relatives. Why is tolerance and abstention assumed to be a fundamental quality of moral relativism? After all, if moral relativism implies it isn't wrong for my neighbour to beat his wife because he believes God allows it, then moral relativism also implies it isn't wrong for me to call the police on him, or for the police to lock him behind bars, or even for me to go over and protect his wife myself, physically if necessary. So why is moral relativism assumed to go hand-in-hand with being passive and (essentially) impotent? Is there really some link that I'm missing?