Evil-Spring 2012

Where is the evil in No Exit ?

If Hell is other people, then Evil derives from the characters themselves. However, none of the three in the room seem evil per se as they describe their actions on earth; they just seem like bad people. However, through their interactions with the "other people" in the room, a form of evil is elicited from each character. By themselves the three are just bad; it is the Hell in their interactions with the others which elicits the hatred, lust, animosity, and evil.

The evil in "No Exit" comes from the relationships between the people. It is generated by their interactions and found in the torture and pain they inflict on one another.

Each perpetrates evil on the others, torturing them with words, making their lives a living hell.

Evil is in the characters' lack of empathy and Inez's sadism.

Evil comes from the deliberate refusal to give others peace, when doing so has little or no negative impact on themselves. In hell, Garcin desires faith to validate his own life, yet Inez, the only other individual capable of providing this faith, deliberately refuses to give it to him ("you're a coward because I wish it" (44)). Estelle desires shallow love, yet Garcin denies her this. Inez desires power, yet Estelle denies her this. In life, Garcin's wife desires mutual love, but Garcin refuses to satisfy this desire. Estelle's lover desires the life of his child, but Estelle refuses to satisfy this desire. Inez's Florence desires a clean conscience, which Inez deliberately denies her.

People are inherently evil so it's the people being evil and creating their own hell.

There is no morality (or at least a different, and as the characters discover, yet undefined version of morality) in No Exit because all the characters have already died and cannot die again. The foundation of human morality is "I won't kill you if you don't kill me," as most actions and reactions that guide human behavior are hinged on, at least on an abstract and subconscious level, the fear of death. The absurdity of their situation is made apparent when Inez tries to stab Estelle but in failing exposes their immortality and thus the false pretenses upon which their morality (which was well-suited for their previous lives) is based.

The evil in "No Exit" is found in the lives that the three characters led on Earth. If Garcin, Estelle, and Inez were not evil then they would not be in Hell. Because these three are in Hell, we know that they committed irremediable sins, and since there is no redemption in Hell, these three characters will remain evil forevermore.

Interestingly, the only evil in the play comes from human souls. It seems that evil originates in each individual, with their manifestation in their interactions with each other.

The evil comes from the people's interactions with each other...I suppose the evil that comes from their interactions with each other goes to show that everyone has evil in them...whether or not they're perceived as evil has to do with whether or not they suppress their evil.

The evil in No Exit stems from the evil thoughts that the three characters possessed during their lifetime. They are in hell because they were evil during their lifetime and their thoughts and consciousness have carried on into their afterlife.

"Other people suck; you suck too"

Agreed; back at you

Other people do suck. They do terrible things both on purpose and by accident because that is just human nature. Most people are aware that other people suck because of things that happen to them. Other people can disappoint you or hurt you so it easy to see that they suck. What is harder to recognize is that you are even worse. Other people may inflict pain on you but you are the one who allows it to bother you. You are the one who dwells on the flaws other people point out until you drive yourself crazy. People suck in their interactions with other people but more than that we are terrible to ourselves.

Each person's suckiness is amplified by others's suckiness. T.T

People seem to be predisposed to consider their own well-being over that of others, even if advancing their petty interests is of great harm to others. Inez, Garcin, and Estelle had the power to give each other peace with little or no effect to themselves, but they all refused in order to validate their self worth as they perceived it.

Yeah, everything sucks. Especially when you're in hell. Every person is obviously making this experience worse for the others, but they are also doing it to themselves. By acting as they are, they provoke each other making everything worse for everyone. Each one is being cruel and in turn making everyone miserable including themselves.

I guess they do suck, but they are also responsible for alot of good. For example, people suck in No Exit because each individual holds different conceptions of what the other desires and is either unwilling or unable to satisfy that desire. It is no coincidence that this combination was placed together, however--if another combination of people were placed in hell they could we willing and able to satisfy the other's desire and provide them with peace, representing a "good."

Other people won't naturally want to help you if that's what it means to suck in your view.

Since other people can cause you pain, and we’re all human, it’s pretty certain that you are also capable of causing others pain. Even if you try to mitigate the pain you cause others, it’s inevitable that you will accidentally hurt someone, thus adding one more to the category of “sucking.”

Yes but the amount of "suckiness" you allow them is dependent on you yourself. As in, they're only as "sucky" as you make them out to be. Perhaps the "suckier" someone appears to be, the "suckier" you are yourself.

Absolutely everyone has the potential to suck. In the context of this post, "to suck" is to be viewed negatively, with varying degrees of annoyance, anger or resentment, by another person. There is so much subjectivity and relativity in the way people are perceived by others, so absolutely anything anyone were to do could be perceived negatively by another person. And everyone is bound to annoy or anger another person, as it is very unlikely for any one person to be universally loved, so everybody does suck.

In the context of the play, it is true that everyone sucks, both in truth and in each others eyes. However, a contradiction arises because even though the people suck they need each other. Inez needs Garcin to sap away at her autonomy so she can fight back; Garcin needs Inez to view him as brave and not a coward; Estelle needs Garcin to lust after her so she can feel like a woman. All three hate each other, yet all three need each other. Thus derives the basic conflict of the play, and thus derives the evil in each other.

We suck because we sin. We sin because we suck.

"A triangle never works"

Thats a little unfair. It may not work perfectly, there may be some tension, but it can still work, some people do play well with others. Just because these three choose to make this room the hell they expect, this doesn't mean that no three people can get along, some people are kind to others.

I agree a group of four is much better than a group of 3 because people will generally pair off instead of having a dynamic of two against one. In a group setting, rarely do people want to stand alone--for example, in a group of three, the dynamic will generally not be one vs. one vs. one, but rather, two vs. one. The idea that "a triangle never works" is true if trying to create a setting in which there will be a cohesive dynamic. It is not as true in No Exit, where the dynamic trying to be created is one of torture--when Estelle and Garcin pair up against Inez, they are able to torture her more effectively. They are also tortured by their pairing because Estelle relies on Garcin for a release from her torture and vice versa, so if one fails the other, torture ensues.

Whoa, “never” is a little strong, especially since it’s going to have to work in the case of the play where they can never leave. With an infinite amount of time, they are going to eventually work everything out between them.

The problem with a triangle, or a relationship between three people is that there are two relationships involving some combination of overlapping people. Relationships are already problematic. Your relationship with yourself constantly changes and affects you because it is complex. Then throw in another person and you have a conventional relationship. It is very difficult for most people to maintain even a two person relationship. Now add one more person and you have a triangle. Not only are there the normal complexities of trying to relate to other people in a way that is constructive and conducive to enjoying life, there are multiple relationships competing for attention within the same system of relationships. No matter how well three people seem to get along there will always be tension and conflict generated by attempting to balance the multiple relationships. Inevitably the relationships between the three will be different and incomparable and yet all the members of the triangle will constantly be attempting to compare them. We are inherently envious creatures and ultimately the triangle would destroy itself and disband. Unless of course you are in hell and the bell doesn't work.

People do stuff for their own good. It just happens to be that each person's own good conflicts with the other two's in this story. But a triangle can work.

People in a relationship will inevitably come into conflict. A triangle allows for two people to team up on the other and escalate the tension. Triangles work sometimes, granted, but not always.

In the context of No Exit, this is true if you consider working to be equal to peaceful or beneficial coexistence. Sartre implies through his relationships constructed between the three that a triangle can never work because people ,at least those such as Garicn, Inez, and Estelle, can never coexist peacefully. In fact, one could argue that two people can never exist peacefully. Although a triangle might work, the relationships between the three and the types of people they are doom them from the start.

A triangle can work. If each is able to provide the others with peace (i.e) satisfy one's desires without impinging on the other's peace. This becomes difficult as the individuals become more closely associated with one another, and as the web of their interactions becomes more difficult (they desire more from one another and it becomes more difficult to satisfy the desires of one without impinging on the desires of another).

Evil and Altruism

Bowers, Bailey, Beavers, Cowan
If There is no Altruism, is There Evil?

In Anthony Burgess’ A Clockwork Orange, Alex finds himself used as a human guinea pig. In Sophocles’ Ajax, Ajax, Odysseus, and the Gods feud over choices. In Machiavelli’s The Prince, a young ruler gets advice on how to expand his kingdom and rule with stability. All of the people previously described have something in common: every action they commit is for the direct benefit of one person -- themselves. If every action committed is inherently selfish, evil cannot exist, even when (and especially because) society defines what evil is.
Unselfish acts for the sake of helping others do not exist and cannot exist. Everything is done for the benefit of the person doing it. When someone does something society sees as altruistic, the person in question does not actually do it completely unselfishly. They get something out of it: chemicals released into their body that makes them feel good. Even though someone on the outside cannot know what motivates someone to do something, we can understand that something positive for the person must come out of a human action. So, even though we don’t know exactly what the motive is, we know there is one and it has to be good for the person. If every effect has a cause, then every conscious action has a motive. Yes, but the motive we think we have isn’t necessarily the only one. Basically, if someone takes time out of his or her day to help an elderly grandmother cross the street, it isn’t because it is the nice thing to do or because it helps her. Those are indirect results of the action. It is because by helping that person across the street the helper gets a good feeling. Without that good feeling to accompany the action, the helper would never help the elderly grandmother across the street. Yes, but only in a fairly restricted sense is that “the motive”—to keep from falling into tautology, you should distinguish between proximal and distal motives… Society’s depiction of the result is the same with or without the motive (the good feeling), but the charitable action would only occur with the “rewarding” feeling to accompany it.

In A Clockwork Orange many actions that would be seen by society as unselfish in nature and designed to benefit society as a whole these two are not equivalent… are actually based on selfish motives. One of the more obvious examples is Brodsky, the Minister, and their ideas on treatment. The job of Brodsky and the Minister with respect to the penal system is to protect society. If they do their job well, they are seen as good men by the society they protect. The end result of their actions toward a more perfect prison system seems to be a more agreeable society. as well as their continuing in power On the outside, the purpose of their job is to help people and they don’t seem to be advancing themselves. If this were true and selflessness existed, then Brodsky wouldn’t exhibit a changed Alex with such pride, since pride is derived from personal achievement (139). While he does rave about how much the treatment will help society, this is only because he did the job himself. Support? The reward for him isn’t actually a better society; it’s the advancement of his career. You portray those two rewards as mutually exclusive, yet presumably they are not.

Also, in A Clockwork Orange, through pursuing what society would consider altruistic, people actually commit what could be seen as evil acts. How is protecting society from violence altruistic? If I live in society, don’t I benefit from being less likely to be attacked as well? The Ludovico technique’s usefulness to society as a whole is undisputed doesn’t it seem to be disputed by the society that takes up Alex as its poster boy? What aspect of its usefulness is undisputed? , but the method by which it was achieved and the consequences of the procedure to the person can be constituted as evil in society. Why? Aren’t they morally evil to Alex rather than “evil in society”? Can you explain how they are the latter? The videos shown to Alex are malicious, disgusting, and hate-filled and they break him as a person (117). Not in and of themselves, no. His personal rights and freedoms are completely thrown out of the window and he is effectively tricked into signing the paper with an offer that really is too good to be true. Actually, the offer is completely true…. Brodsky and the Minister pursue this technique so vigorously because it makes them look like unselfish public servants support? which they know is a boon to their career. The boon to their careers is the service to the public, isn’t it, rather than the “unselfishness” you claim? It also seems altruistic because everyone but the person the technique is used on is benefitted, directly at least, by the procedure. Nope, and besides the altruism of the action is irrelevant, isn’t it? They who is “they”? are safer from harm. But Alex loses all moral choice and he is effectively a robot, unable to control his actions other than the ones programmed into him. Too strong: what specific things does the programming affect? Taking away what makes someone human, their ability to have free will and make conscious decisions (or at least the illusion of it) can never be constituted as a completely good act. Does the government look on the programming as a moral issue (and hence one concerned with “good”)? It is basically murder, killing a person and their personality and replacing them with a program. Overstatement for rhetorical purposes here? Or do you think that making someone physically sick at the thought of doing violence to another is the same as killing him?

On the other hand, in The Prince, Machiavelli overtly accepts that humans are inherently selfish. Cunning tactics are devised for princes to retain their power over a population of people without regard for the people the prince might have power over. Doesn’t Machiavelli at several places say overtly that certain acts of violence actually make the society safer and happier as a whole? How does that fit in to your assertion? The objective of the book is to cater to the selfish demands of a prince. Since you can’t really know the “objective of the book,” I’d suggest you leave this statement out… In The Prince there is no idealism, only what actually happens and how to respond to it. Machiavelli takes the stance that people are inherently self-serving, and because of this believes that it is better to be feared than to be loved. As he says, “Men worry less about doing an injury to one who makes himself loved than to one who makes himself feared” (Chapter 17). The worry the men feel comes straight from their own emotions so by trying to avoid the consequences of injury to someone who is feared they are selfishly protecting themselves. He knows there is no such thing as altruism and that love is fickle at best and fear is unwavering, so fear curbs a self serving populace better. The statements in the previous sentence are overstrong or unsupported or both, so I’d reword it. Unlike Burgess, who simply through depicting regular human behavior shows true selfishness, Machiavelli uses it as the basis of his work, stating it explicitly.

Even in Ajax there is a lack of unselfishness for unselfishness’ sake. Odysseus listens to Athena not because of his unwavering love and support for her, but out of a certain fear like the one Machiavelli describes. He knows her and the gods’ power. He sees Ajax’s destruction at the hands of his disobedience. Odysseus and Ajax aren’t too different: they are both in pursuit of glory and power for themselves. Odysseus uses Athena as a tool to get his glory Support? while Ajax deems Gods unnecessary in his conquest. While it seems the more virtuous one comes out on top (Ajax is corrupted by Athena after disobeying her, How is he corrupted? later commits suicide), they both had selfish motives like anyone else. Odysseus just isn’t as outwardly involved in his self-interest.

Since true altruism is not a real life occurrence, there can be no such thing as evil. How does that follow? Selfishness may lead to evil sometimes, but very few people would say they are synonymous… In terms of how society defines what is evil and what is good, there is a spectrum with the properties of a continuum. On one extreme we have evil, the other extreme we have good, and somewhere in between we have bad. In this spectrum good is effectively the opposite of evil, and through the lens of society, bad is just a watered-down version of evil. What is good, evil, and bad is controlled by the morals of the society. Every action that would be defined by society as “good” has an element of sacrifice and unselfishness to it. Any action that is inherently self-serving can never be good. This statement is not true by most people’s definition of “good.” It is certainly not true if “good” is defined socially as opposed to theologically. If true sacrifice and unselfishness do not exist, as is implied by the idea that altruism cannot exist, then there can never actually be good as defined by society. This conclusion could only be true if you define “good” as an absolute and assert that anything that is not “100% good” is by definition bad. Since societies today care about the intention as well as the result (this can be seen in justice system the world over which implement different penalties based on the intention of the crime) of an action, an action that has selfish motives is inherently contradictory and can never be “good.” You contradict your own point in the same sentence: if your conclusion is to be valid, your beginning must state that societies care about intention instead of results, not as well as ….. Without good there can be no relative evil, and bad just fades away because it is a societal shade of evil. In the end it comes down to people acting in their own self interest but the degrees of these actions are tempered by self-preservation and interest. It’s reasonable to assert that, at some level, people act according to what they perceive as their own self-interest, but the only way I see to get to your conclusions about good-evil is to assert that intentions are all that matters. While there are some theological creeds that would agree with such a statement, they’re not very mainstream these days. And certainly no social (as opposed to theological) system can subscribe to such an absolutist point of view. Why not?

Another way to look at how a lack of unselfishness removes a social idea of evil is through moral systems. A moral system implies two things. This first is free will. Morality is based on the premise that someone in their own power can make the decisions that will be judged on a moral scale. The second is what is morally favorable, a relative way of deciding what is favorable or not. For each moral choice in society, the biggest decider of the morality of an action is the inherent selfishness of that action. Support? This implies that there is always a choice between the bad, selfishness, and the good, unselfishness (in general terms). Are you aware that you just moved in the previous sentence from “the biggest decider,” which implies there’s more than one such, to an absolute equation of bad=selfish and good=unselfish in this sentence? When every action is deemed selfish, this idea of morality falls apart because there is no way to classify unselfish acts because they do not exist.Nope. If you hit me and steal my money, that’s selfish. If you get a job to earn money, that’s also selfish. But the two equally “selfish” acts are not equally desirable either socially or by most people’s definition of morality…</font?>The spectrum collapses and morality has no more social definition.

All of this falls under the assumption that there is no deity putting forth moral objectivity and creating a strict set of rules and procedures for deciding if something is evil or not. For the aforementioned argument to be pertinent, the moral code and evil-good spectrum must be decided by society and not an outside observer or force. Your perspective shifts significantly in the course of the essay. It starts by suggesting there is no such thing as altruism and ends up with the assertion that as a result, there’s no such thing as morality. The first is pretty much a matter of definition: if “altruism” requires “pure unselfishness”, I’d probably agree with you. But there are other, less absolutist, ways to define the idea of “doing good for others as well as for oneself” rather than “instead of for oneself” that one could use. It’s also not true that selfish=bad and unselfish=good except in very restricted contexts or points of view. It’s also not true for most of us that we (or even our individual actions) are “purely bad” or “purely good.” If the point of the paper is that no one is absolutely unselfish, most everyone would agree with you but scarcely find the point arguable. Given that, what is the point of the paper supposed to be?

If it were easy...

Bernazzani, Heinle, Hogan, Lichtarge
Mai, Mauel, Stadnyk, Wareing

Why is it so Hard to do What’s Right?

Anyone who has ever seen a nature clip of cheetah taking down a gazelle on the steppes of Africa can clearly tell that the cheetah is not concerned about whether it is doing the right thing. That is because justice does not occur in the natural world. Even in the human world, is it unjust to kill to preserve our own lives? the problem with this paper is that it doesn't address from where justice comes. The point that "justice does not occur in the natural world" is a difficult point to make without defining what justice is or from where it comes and it also sets humans apart from the natural world. As starving cavemen, we were not concerned about the moral ramifications of killing a mammoth. So, cavemen lived in a natural world, but we don’t? These first sentences set up non-obvious, tangential, argumentative, and unsubstantiated implications that distract from the point you're trying to make. That is because evolution and survival does not rely on justice. That is why it is so hard for human beings to grasp the concept of justice. In Anthony Burgess’s novel A Clockwork Orange and Sophocles’ play Ajax, characters do unjust things because it does not occur to them that they should not be doing these things. The reason why there are so many criminals is that the idea of justice does not come naturally to us. That the idea of justice does not come naturally to us means nothing. Perhaps thinking critically about our actions does not come naturally to us but we are born into a society that instills our ideas of justice in us. Perhaps extend your thesis...if you want to say the idea of justice is unnatural, you might talk about the abstractness of justice and how, as an abstract concept, it holds less sway over the actions of people than more concrete things like fear of punishment, etc.

In A Clockwork Orange, Alex and his gang brutally beat up an old man because doing so makes them happy and they don’t believe that they should not be doing it. When they see the old man carrying his books, they decide to beat him up purely for their entertainment. Dim dances around the old man and laughs while they are tearing his books and beating him up (Burgess 9). Quotes/citations should support analysis, not plot points. They show no remorse for their act. It never occurs to them that they are doing something that is wrong. They are not bothered by their act at all. They see no reason why they should not do something that they enjoy. There is nothing stopping them from doing the same sort of thing again. They do not concern themselves about the well being of the old man because, as far as they are concerned, they have no reason to. It’s when you attribute motivation/provide explanation for what happens that you need to provide support from the text that indicates your interpretation is correct (or at least plausible). You can't argue that they don't know that this is wrong. In fact, there is evidence in the novel that supports the idea that they DO know that it's wrong. At one point, Alex even says he "knows he does wrong."

In Ajax, Ajax defies a goddess because he is more concerned with doing what he wants to do than what a goddess tells him that he should do. When Athena tells Ajax to stop torturing Odysseus, Ajax replies “Athena, in all else will I do thy will” (Sophocles). Ajax wants to do what he feels is right, what will make him happy. “what he feels is right” and “what will make him happy” are not inherently equivalent though your use of parallelism here implies they are. He does not care if it is an unjust thing to do. How do you know this? If he “feels it is right” how could he consider it “unjust”? It does not bother him that he is doing something a goddess told him not to do. There is nothing holding Ajax back from doing what he wants to do. It might bother him yet not hold him back….He knows that he can do whatever he wants to do, so as far as he is concerned, why shouldn’t he? You should be extremely careful of using rhetorical questions in writing because they are in fact very ambiguous even when not meant to be… He does not think of changing his course of action simply because he has been told that he should. If I tell you to shoot the kid who annoys you, will you think seriously of doing so simply because you were “told that [you] should”? It's not as simple as merely someone telling you not to do something--it's someone with a ton of authority (a god) telling you not to do something. Even if he doesn't care about respecting the authority of a god, he should still respect the power because the power can, and does, end his life. Ajax has not been led to worry about the feelings of others. He is not disturbed by the consequences of his actions because they do not affect him, and thus are not a reason for him to worry. But the consequences do affect him; they lead to his ostracism and death. Saying that consequences don't affect him is perhaps not so accurate because, as Dr. Raulston says, they do lead to his ostracism and death, which is pretty significant.

The jails are full of robbers, rapists, murders and all sorts of other vicious criminals. For many of these people, the concept that their actions were wrong was not enough to prevent them from carrying out their acts. That’s not the point you just made with Ajax, though. What’s the distinction between the two points? You're merely scratching the surface of the problem. You might further explore the social contract of justice...in more depth. They did not think of the justice (or lack thereof) of their acts while they were doing them. How do you know what they were thinking? Rightness did not occur on, or was not at the forefront of their mind. In order to prevent more people from doing the same thing, the government enacts laws with harsh penalties for breaking them. They must do this to keep order because simply people’s just and moral compasses are not enough to stop them from committing heinous crimes. To what extent is your universally stated assumption true? The concept of pain and punishment is natural and works to prevent many crimes, but the concept of justice and morality is not natural and thus will not often work to prevent crimes. What support do you have for equating “natural” with “successful”? We think instead of natural, you might mean inherent. We think you're trying to say that people are self-interested and want to reap the benefits of the social contract of justice without having to face the consequences of doing things that they're not allowed/not supposed to do.

The only way to have the notion of justice conveyed to Alex is through hardcore and graphic therapy that brainwashes him. Alex literally has to have it hardwired into him that violence is a bad thing before he stops committing these evil acts. Go re-read the appropriate section of the novel. He does not in fact learn that violence is “bad.” What does he learn? The law (and having to follow their laws) is being hardwired into him, not the evil of violence. He has his eyes forced open as he is shown extremely graphic videos in an effort to show him that violence is wrong and has bad effects on the victims (Burgess 115). That is not in fact the reason for showing him the films. What is? They show him the videos to associate disgust with his opinions...they're essentially conditioning him like Pavlov's dogs, not changing his opinion that violence is wrong. This notion of doing the right thing must be pushed so hard upon him before he can assimilate them. It takes this much effort to bring him to recognize this unnatural act. It is not easy to instill a foreign idea in a person, to convince them of an idea that has not been inculcated in them by thousands of years of evolution. Quite possibly true, but what does this last, reasonably objective, statement have to do with the concept of “the right thing” to which you refer just previously? This is why the doctors have to resort to such drastic measures when dealing with Alex and their efforts to get him to stop doing violent deeds.

Alex finally does do the right thing technically, he simply avoids doing certain wrong things; what is the distinction?, but only when his personality and thought process have been forcefully transformed. After the treatment, Dr. Brodsky showcases Alex’s transformation. He brings in a man to insult and put down Alex, but Alex does not react violently to this man (Burgess 138-139). When Alex does not follow his instincts and lash out at someone because they insulted him it is because he has been conditioned to believe that violence is bad. Nope. What has he in fact been conditioned to believe? His human nature was overridden. His thoughts and reactions are not normal; they are unusual. “unusual” and “not normal” are not inherently antonyms; what opposition of ideas do you really want here? This is why all of the audience members are so amazed at what Alex is doing. He is doing the right thing because he has been made to believe that is what he should be doing. Nope. He has been programmed to change his logical thought process. What is the “logical thought process” before and after the conditioning? Only with the forcible override of his human nature, this wording implies that his nature is pretty much general to all of us; why do the rest of us not require such conditioning? does Alex begin to consciously to good and kind things. Give examples of such things.

Alex and his gang and Ajax do not see a problem with committing bad and unjust acts. Do they, particularly Ajax, see them as “bad and unjust”? They just do what they want to do and what makes them happy. The idea of justice and morality do not occur to them because that is not part of their mindset. How does “justice” play into Ajax’s sense of his actions? It is not programmed into them that they should do the right thing. There is simply no reason for them to act justly to others when the can get away with not doing so. Do they feel their actions are unjust? If not, why should they act differently? Without this reason to do kind things to others they have no reason not to act purely in their self interests. Does this conclusion generalize to others? The only true way to keep peace and order in a society is to use fear and pain, both natural feelings that can convince people not to do unjust things. The power of nature and instinct is strong and not easily overcome, and that is why crime is so rampant. If the sense you describe is indeed universal, where does the idea of “justice” even come from? Why would anyone try to do differently? Perhaps someday the idea of doing what is just will occur to all people, but that will take lots of effort and hundreds, if not thousands or millions, of years of conditioning. Why, then, does anyone ever try to act “justly”?

In your thesis paragraph, you say justice does not come naturally to us; your paper argues that only fear of pain causes people to act justly. Where, then, does a sense of justice come from? What does the concept even mean? You should also look up “conditioning” and go reread the section on Alex’s conditioning. He is not conditioned to determine what is right and then to do it. What is he conditioned to do?

Your essay could be a pro-behavioralist interpretation of human social systems, but to be more persuasive, it would have to get the details and implications of Alex’s and Ajax’s views and actions correct.

If it were easy...

Bernazzani, Heinle, Hogan, Lichtarge
Mai, Mauel, Stadnyk, Wareing

Why is it so Hard to do What’s Right?

If it were easy... Bernazzani, Heinle, Hogan, Lichtarge Mai, Mauel, Stadnyk, Wareing Why is it so Hard to do What’s Right?

Anyone who has ever seen a nature clip of a cheetah taking down a gazelle on the steppes of Africa can clearly tell that the cheetah is not concerned about whether it is doing the right thing. That is because justice does not occur in the natural world. Even in the human world, is it unjust to kill to preserve our own lives? As starving cavemen, we were not concerned about the moral ramifications of killing a mammoth. So, cavemen lived in a natural world, but we don’t? That is because evolution and survival does not rely on justice. That is why it is so hard for human beings to grasp the concept of justice.It’s not necessarily difficult for people to grasp a concept of justice, it’s hard for people to agree on THE concept of justice, if that even exists. In Anthony Burgess’s novel A Clockwork Orange and Sophocles’ play Ajax, characters do unjust things because it does not occur to them that they should not be doing these things. Is that why they do them, or why they don’t feel bad? Alex does not hurt people because he does not think it is bad, he hurts them because he feels like it. The reason why there are so many criminals is that the idea of justice does not come naturally to us. Just because something is not inherent or instinctual does not mean it cannot be learned. Language does not occur “naturally” and yet people adopt it as a basic element of living with other people.

Could you define justice for us? It would help clear things up. In A Clockwork Orange, Alex and his gang brutally beat up an old man because doing so makes them happy and they don’t believe that they should not be doing it. When they see the old man carrying his books, they decide to beat him up purely for their entertainment. Dim dances around the old man and laughs while they are tearing his books and beating him up (Burgess 9). Quotes/citations should support analysis, not plot points. They show no remorse for their act support this point . In fact, they enjoy violence 18 “So we…singing”. It never occurs to them that they are doing something that is wrong. They are not bothered by their act at all. They see no reason why they should not do something that they enjoy. There is nothing stopping them from doing the same sort of thing again. They do not concern themselves about (with) the well being of the old man because, as far as they are concerned, they have no reason to. Do they have a reason to? It’s when you attribute motivation/provide explanation for what happens that you need to provide support from the text that indicates your interpretation is correct (or at least plausible).

In Ajax, Ajax defies a goddess because he is more concerned with doing what he wants to do than what a goddess tells him that he should do. When Athena tells Ajax to stop torturing Odysseus, Ajax replies “Athena, in all else will I do thy will” (Sophocles). Ajax wants to do what he feels is right, what will make him happy. “what he feels is right” and “what will make him happy” are not inherently equivalent though your use of parallelism here implies they are. He does not care if it is an unjust thing to do. How do you know this? If he “feels it is right” how could he consider it “unjust”? It does not bother him that he is doing something a goddess told him not to do. There is nothing holding Ajax back from doing what he wants to do. It might bother him yet not hold him back….He knows that he can do whatever he wants to do, so as far as he is concerned, why shouldn’t he? Because the Gods have the power to ruin his life and Ajax knows that so I think they better question is what made him think he could defy the gods and not be met with negative consequences? You should be extremely careful of using rhetorical questions in writing because they are in fact very ambiguous even when not meant to be… He does not think of changing his course of action simply because he has been told that he should. If I tell you to shoot the kid who annoys you, will you think seriously of doing so simply because you were “told that [you] should”? Ajax has not been led to worry about the feelings of others. He is not disturbed by the consequences of his actions because they do not affect him, and thus are not a reason for him to worry. But the consequences do affect him; they lead to his ostracism and death.

Who’s to say that the goddess represents justice? She exhibits very human and very flawed behavior. The action is just from his perspective. How does justice not come naturally if he is able to deduce his own? The jails are full of robbers, rapists, murders and all sorts of other vicious criminals. For many of these people, the concept that their actions were wrong was not enough to prevent them from carrying out their acts. Some criminals do not see their actions as wrong. That’s not the point you just made with Ajax, though. What’s the distinction between the two points? They did not think of the justice (or lack thereof) of their acts while they were doing them. How do you know what they were thinking? Rightness did not occur on, or was not at the forefront of their mind. In order to prevent more people from doing the same thing, the government enacts laws with harsh penalties for breaking them. They must do this to keep order because simply people’s just and moral compasses are not enough to stop them from committing heinous crimes. To what extent is your universally stated assumption true? The concept of pain and punishment is natural and works to prevent many crimes, but the concept of justice and morality is not natural and thus will not often work to prevent crimes. What support do you have for equating “natural” with “successful”? If you are going to make this argument I would introduce the point earlier in the paper

This support is not consistent with your thesis. The only way to have the notion of justice conveyed to Alex is through hardcore and graphic therapy that brainwashes him. Alex literally has to have it hardwired into him that violence is a bad thing before he stops committing these evil acts. Go re-read the appropriate section of the novel. He does not in fact learn that violence is “bad.” What does he learn? He does not learn that violence, he learns that violence generates and uncomfortable physical reaction in him. He has his eyes forced open as he is shown extremely graphic videos in an effort to show him that violence is wrong and has bad effects on the victims (Burgess 115). That is not in fact the reason for showing him the films. What is? This notion of doing the right thing must be pushed so hard upon him before he can assimilate them. The indoctrination process seems very distant from learning wrong and right. It takes this much effort to bring him to recognize this unnatural act. It is not easy to instill a foreign idea in a person, to convince them of an idea that has not been inculcated in them by thousands of years of evolution. Quite possibly true, but what does this last, reasonably objective, statement have to do with the concept of “the right thing” to which you refer just previously? This is why the doctors have to resort to such drastic measures when dealing with Alex and their efforts to get him to stop doing violent deeds. Interpret this to work with the new thesis. The treatment gives him physical discomfort when confronted with violence, making it in his best interest to avoid it: best interest dictates our actions. Alex finally does do the right thing technically, he simply avoids doing certain wrong things; what is the distinction?, but only when his personality and thought process have been forcefully transformed. After the treatment, Dr. Brodsky showcases Alex’s transformation. He brings in a man to insult and put down Alex, but Alex does not react violently to this man (Burgess 138-139). When Alex does not follow his instincts and lash out at someone because they insulted him it is because he has been conditioned to believe that violence is bad. Nope. What has he in fact been conditioned to believe? Wrong, all he knows is that he will feel pain. His human nature was overridden. His thoughts and reactions are not normal; they are unusual. “unusual” and “not normal” are not inherently antonyms; what opposition of ideas do you really want here? This is why all of the audience members are so amazed at what Alex is doing. He is doing the right thing because he has been made to believe that is what he should be doing. Who is to say that is the right thing? Nope. He has been programmed to change his logical thought process. What is the “logical thought process” before and after the conditioning? You made the argument earlier that Alex and his friends did not really think about their actions so what “logical though process” are you referring to? Only with the forcible override of his human nature, this wording implies that his nature is pretty much general to all of us; why do the rest of us not require such conditioning? does Alex begin to consciously to good and kind things. Give examples of such things. He is not actually doing good things, he is just avoiding pain. The thesis is inconsistent with the support. Maybe you should try a new thesis: individuals often ignore justice because they believe that their self interest is better served by their doing so. In this case, I’d suggest a different support for Clockwork, specifically the decision to rob the old lady’s house (60-61). Toss the conclusion. Or go with something general: best interest overrides our sense of justice. In the case of Ajax, you could make a case that it is considered “just” by greek society to obey the gods and that he disobeys this “justice” in order to further his interests. In the case of Alex, you could make the case that (i) pre-ludiviko the allure of pleasure makes his committing injustice serve his best interest and (i) post-ludiviko the pain of violence makes his avoiding injustice serve his best interest. ` Outline:

Intro: natural indifference (good is not rewarded by nature/ bad is not punished) - random nature of natural distasters - Theis: Best interest demonstrably overrides our sense of justice

I. Decision to rob ladies house driven by self interest over injustice

II. States treatement of alex—self interest overrides “higher ethics”

III. Prince—self interest makes justice irrelevant (utilitarian)

IV. I would avoid real world situations, seeing as you do not have access to omniscient knowledge, like in a novel.

V. Only after his best interest is no longer served by violcence, he stops doing it.

Mingled Worlds

Kemfack, Jones, Lapin, Long, Wong

The Mingled World of Good and Evil and the Muddled World of Justice and Injustice

Good should not be forced upon man nor should a man be compelled to be just. All men must have the free will to choose the ways in which he acts, whether that is evil and unjust or good and just. When any man is deprived of his free will, the outcome is, more often than not, unpleasant and chaos most likely ensues. As Buddha asserted, “there has to be evil so that good can prove its purity above it.” If we are robbed of our free will and evil no longer exists, but instead we are all entirely good, then the importance of choosing the path of justice and the quality of goodness would completely vanish and we would cease to be human.

The world is not a place painted with only two colors, black and white; there are also shades of gray. Just as the world is not solely black and white, neither are the world and its people absolutely good or entirely evil. As Anthony Burgess stated astutely in his introduction to A Clockwork Orange, “It is inhuman to be totally good as it is to be totally evil.” There are shades of gray. That is why no one man is absolutely evil. Thus, although in A Clockwork Orange, Alex may seem to be the epitome of evil, there are sides to him that are still good. Alex’s goodness is verified after the Ludovico’s Technique ordeal because, although he had committed gruesome and heinous acts, Alex does change. Do we really see this change, though, or does he just talk about it? We for sure see a way Alex's thoughts change in the 21st chapter (and indeed in how he acts, ie he refuses to go out with his new droogs). This would indicate a change in character and actions. He proves that humans are not unregenerable; they can become, what society would consider, decent human beings. Oh? I don’t find Alex to be a “decent human being” when he casually accepts that his son will be just like him and shrugs that off as part of “growing up”… True, he doesn't become a decent human being, but he does change, which I think is Burgess' point (although not the author's of this essay). In other words, Alex has the capacity to change inside him, and although he doesn't become a "decent human being" he has become a "better human being" when compared to his old self. On the other hand, the opposite case could be true and a human could instead become more wicked. In either case, no human is entirely evil nor is he or she completely good.

Because the world is shaded with variations of gray is also why, although clearly defining evil or injustice may be effortless to some, the application of choosing when to enact justice or deciding whether an act is purely evil is much more complicated. I think you’ve inverted cause and effect: isn't it the fact that the choosing is so difficult that leads us to believe that the world is “shaded”? There are always special circumstances to every situation. Perhaps a boy was physically abused at home as a child or a girl was emotionally abused at school when she was younger and that is why they inflict pain upon others and refuse to obey the rules. Many would consider this boy and this girl to both be merely a product of their past sufferings and thus would judge their actions less harshly.If you include the word “merely” you’re effectively precluding free will…. However there are exceptions. In Sophocles’ Ajax, Ajax openly defies the Greek goddess Athena’s wishes, leading to her powerful wrath and eventually to his suicide. However, could not Ajax’s disobedience be seen as merely his inability to observe the situation clearly? It appears fit to say that anger was clouding Ajax’s judgment while he conversed with Athena outside his tent. Ajax had been denied what he strongly believed to be rightfully his. He had been proclaimed as the second best warrior, behind Achilles, and thus, when Achilles died, to Ajax it seemed only natural that he would receive the fallen warrior’s armor. Hence, when the gods chose to bestow the armor, and thus the honor, instead upon Odysseus, it is rational that Ajax would become angry and respond to Athena when she ordered obedience, “in all else will I do thy will” (Sophocles). Where Ajax failed is when he initially became concerned with Achilles’ armor because as Machiavelli wisely said, “the armour of others is too wide, or too strait for us; it falls off us, or it weighs us down” wonderfully apposite quote! and in the end, Achilles’ armor only led to misfortune for Ajax (Machiavelli 36).

What distinguishes God from the Greek gods is that God does not mercilessly punish man. He does not play a role in man’s death. God only judges man and his actions once he has passed from this life on Earth. The Greek gods, on the other hand, are petty and cruel, essentially humans with god-like powers. Athena plays a large role in Ajax’s death, by driving the warrior into madness. But is her “madness” what causes his decision to murder, or merely what redirects the object of his wrath? Her action was not one of justice because unlike God, she punished Ajax for her own benefit and not for the benefit of man. If he was going to kill the Atreidae any way, then she does indeed benefit Ajax’s society (pragmatically, if not morally)….

A distinction that must be made is that an act of justice is very different from a justified act. An act of justice would be an action that is performed within the realm of righteousness. Justice is the quality of being just, impartial, or fair and conformity to truth, fact, or reason. On the other hand, a justified act would be an action that is usually performed within the confines of self-justification or vindication. To justify is to prove or show to be just, right, or reasonable or to demonstrate a sufficient lawful reason for an act done. Thus, it is not surprising that in Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary the only synonym for “justify” is “excuse.” Many times the confusion over justice versus injustice is due to the misunderstanding of an act of justice and a justified act.Now, that’s a very thought-provoking distinction… For example, in A Clockwork Orange, it is understandable that when the old man whom Alex palpitated two years before saw Alex in the library, that he would inflict the same pain upon the hoodlum. This is not an act of justice because it would not be impartial to beat up this man. However, this beating is a justified act because Alex unnecessarily harmed this starry vesche and thus, this old miser is justified in his desire to injure Alex.

Martin Luther King, Jr. truthfully wrote in his 1963 “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” that an “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” However, it must also be noted that a just act can serve injustice just as well as an unjust act can serve justice. This is when the line between justice and injustice becomes blurred. In A Clockwork Orange, an extreme example of an unjust act performed with justice in mind is when the Government performs the Ludovico’s Technique upon Alex. It is true that Alex deserved punishment, perhaps even for most, if not all of his life, depending on your sense of justice, in the form of incarceration. Some may even believe that Alex earned the death sentence. Yes, Alex had “sinned […] but [his] punishment ha[d] been out of all proportion. [The Government had] turned [him] into something other than a human being. [He had] no power of choice any longer. [He had] committed to socially acceptable acts, a little machine capable only of good […] Music and the sexual act, literature and art, all […] a source now not of pleasure but of pain” (Burgess 174). The Government had deprived Alex of the most essential God given gift. And thus the line between good and evil also became blurred because the Government endeavored to possess the same power as God. Excellent point. The Government attempted to change God’s creation—man’s free will, and thus, the Government’s “’essential intention is [considered by many as] the real sin. [Because a] man who cannot choose ceases to be a man,’” (Burgess 175). On the other hand, to some, most likely to the old man that Alex beat up, to F. Alexander whose wife Alex and his droogs raped, and to the cat lady if she were still living, the Government’s action was justified. Alex had been cruel and merciless and thus deserved to be tortured. You put the points very well.

I believe that it is accurate to state that, in the end, all three victims would not be concerned with Alex’s robbed free will unless, of course, their free will was in jeopardy as well,Excellent insight because they would be too caught up in their desire for vengeance. True, F. Alexander is outraged about the Government’s actions initially, however, when he discovers that Alex is the man who assaulted his wife, the Government’s actions no longer seem as unjust. F. Alexander even attempts to enact his on justice upon Alex by playing classical music, a sound that Alexander knows to bring physical pain to Alex. Although the Government’s acted to serve justice by implementing injustice, in this case the unjust act did not beget justice. Perhaps because the govt was concerned with social order, not justice?

What the distinction between good and evil and justice and injustice comes down to is the struggle for power. Humans desire the power to control the definition of what constitutes evil or justice. Because whomever controls how the world views evil or how the world views justice, controls all humans. And thus everybody vies for power. As Alex reflected in A Clockwork Orange, “Power, power, everybody like wants power” (Burgess 205). The entire premise of Niccolò Machiavelli’s The Prince is to guide man on how to gain power over a people. That is why Machiavelli stated that it was better to be feared than loved as a leader because “men are less careful how they offend him who makes himself loved than him who makes himself feared. For love is held by the tie of obligation, which, because men are a sorry breed, is broken on every whisper of private interest; but fear is bound by the apprehension of punishment which never relaxes its grasp” (Machiavelli 44). Thus, as Aristotle said because “the generality of men are naturally apt to be swayed by fear rather than reverence, and to refrain from evil rather because of the punishment that it brings than because of its own foulness,” a leader who is feared will not only hold the power to define justice and injustice but also hold an empire that is not inclined to partake in evil acts.

Good will always strive for justice and evil will always strive for injustice. By this definition, very few of us are good. However, it is significant that man be given the free will to decide whether he partakes in evil acts or commits a just act because if he is not given that choice then he ceases to be a man and becomes but a thing, simply an object. As Anthony Burgess wrote, “…by definition, a human being is endowed with free will. He can use this to choose between good and evil. If he can only perform good or only perform evil, then he is a clockwork orange—meaning that he has the appearance of an organism lovely with colour and juice but is in fact only a clockwork toy to be wound up by God or the Devil or (since this is increasingly replacing both) the Almighty State. It is inhuman to be totally good as it is to be totally evil. The important thing is moral choice. Evil has to exist along with good, in order that moral choice may operate. Life is sustained by the grinding opposition of moral entities” (Burgess xiii). The world we live in has a fundamental opposition of forces—the duality of good versus evil. Thus, I think that when regarding good versus evil or even justice versus injustice, it is important to note what William Dewitt Hyde wrote in The Art of Optimism, “The world we live in is a world of mingled good and evil. Whether it is chiefly good or chiefly bad depends on how we take it. To look at the world in such a way as to emphasize the evil is the art of pessimism. To look at it in such a way as to bring out the good, and throw the evil into the background, is the art of optimism. The facts are the same in either case. It is simply a question of perspective and emphasis.” Justice versus injustice and good versus evil will always be subject to bias.

So, what’s your conclusion? The paragraph starts by stating that good always strives for justice and ends only one step short of saying that there is no such thing as either one except as one’s perspective makes it so…

This essay is the best synthesis of different sources in a during-the-semester paper I’ve seen in years. It’s an essay in Montaigne’s sense, however, rather than an argument, because at the end, I’m still not sure which of several different possible perspectives you’re arguing is best.