A Movie to Chew On...in Moral and Ethical Questions

This past week-end, while in D.C., my husband and I went to a movie. There are many choices available in the D.C. area that are not available in certain regions of our country. And some of these movies never make it outside the larger cities of D.C. or New York. We enjoyed having the opportunity last year of taking advantage of this situation while in D.C. for the year.

This movie was about an illiterate German woman during WWII and her response to shame. Although the movie was a pretty common story of a relationship, estrangement, reconcilliation, and human tragedy, it's story line ran through many complex moral and ethical questions. The more my husband and I talked about it, the more ways we "saw" the diverse views of understanding the 'issues"....

This woman was "convicted" of war crimes, partly, because she was ashamed of revealing her illiteracy. While she was being tried before a jury, she struggled as she was asked about her passivity to the cries of prisoners being burned alive. Her response was one of "keeping moral order" ("There would have been chaos, if I had freed them."). The moral detachment from the reality of human suffering is one that most of us in one form or time have experienced. Even though others were just as cupable, her sentence was for life, while the others were sentenced to 4 years...

What was the moral obligation of the "friend" who knew facts that would have given her leniancy? How was his shame connected to his reticence to come forth with the information? What did he do as a result of his guilt? In the end, was the life of the woman (and "friend") "saved" from the tragedy of what "shame, humiliation, and condemnation" of thier "societial obligations" (the "moral authorities") demanded?

I find it fascinating that most often those who resist the moral authorities are at a higher level of moral development than those who allow the domination of a system. I do not support revolution for revolution's sake, but it seems that humans are "comfortable" in the "morally mundane"...