Sorry for the self-reply, but to expand on my point about the difficulty Westerners have talking about certain dimensions of morality, I want to present an illustrative example from a different perspective.

Let's say we're in an alternate world with strong, codified rules about social status and authority, but weak, vague, unspoken norms against harm that nevertheless keep harm at a low level.

Then let's say you present the people of this world with this "dilemma" to make Greene's point:

Say your country is at war with another country that is particularly aggressive and willing to totally demolish your social order and enslave your countrymen. In planning how to best fight off this threat, your President is under a lot of stress. To help him relieve his stress, he orders a citizen, Bob, to be brought before him and tortured and murdered, while the President laughs his head off at the violence.

He feels much more relieved and so is able to craft and motivate a war plan that leads to the unconditional surrender of the enemy. The President promises that this was just a one-time thing he had to do to handle the tremendous pressure he was under to win the war and protect his people. Bob's family, in turn, says that they are honored by the sacrifice Bob has made for his country. Everyone agrees that the President is the legitimate ruler of the country and the Constitution and tradition give him authority to do what he did to Bob.

Was it okay for the President to torture and kill Bob for his personal enjoyment?

Then, because of the deficiency in the vocabulary of "harms", you would get responses like:

"Look, I can't explain why, but obviously, it's wrong to torture and kill someone for enjoyment. No disrespect to the President, of course."

"What? I don't get it. Why would the President order a citizen killed? There would be outrage. He'd feel so much guilt that it wouldn't even relieve the stress you claim it does."

"Yeah, I agree the President has authority to do that, but God, it just burns me up to think about someone getting tortured like that for someone else's enjoyment, even if it is our great President."

Would you draw the same conclusion Greene does about these responses?