Commentators have long debated ‘the moral’ in ideas about moral panic, moral regulation and moral discourse. This byte teases out some of the fundamental moral questions that continue to perplex us, about life and death, good and evil, and sex and the body. With an appraisal of the work of one of the chief architects of moral panic ideas, Jock Young, it asks whether these ideas may help or hinder our understanding of these complex issues.