The Value of Life
“Life has no meaning. Each of us has meaning and we bring it to life. It is a waste to be asking the question when you are the answer.” - Joseph Campbell
I saw the movie "Fury" on Friday afternoon. For those not familiar, it is a harrowing tale of a tank unit during World War II. I have lots of thoughts on the film and on how it changes what we typically see from the genre, which I'll get to in a future post.
What sticks with me most from the screening was how it made me feel. I live in a military town. I am proud to live in a military town and grateful for all the freedoms our fighting men and women afford me. I was happy to see a unit of soldiers attend the screening of "Fury." Then the movie started.
"Fury" is not a subtle movie. The violence is fast, furious, and disturbing. This is a darker take on a war movie. And what made it darker, for me, was the loud applause, cheering, and clapping whenever someone was killed, which was often. Toward the more action-packed portions of the film, it sort of felt like being a Roman in the arena as the gladiators fought to the death. There was something dark and unsettling about the crowd's reaction to death and destruction.
And I don't fault the film -- in fact I think the film was seeking to elicit the opposite reaction. But rather this made me think of how far we've slipped as a culture. We don't seem to place a lot of value on human life, and that's a problem.
People have meaning. As Christians, we know that we're all created in the image of God. When we revel in the brutalization of people -- any people -- I think God is hurt. We should be hurt, too. That's not the plan for the world.
But that seems to be our society. In the wake of a mass shooting at a school, all most people care about is maintaining the right to bare arms and placing blame. We don't mourn for the loss of life as we should. We don't look at ourselves in the mirror as we should.
We go home and play Call of Duty. We mow down people on the screen for a cathartic "release." We pop in a movie and watch our "heroes" lay waste to hoards of people. But it's OK, they're bad or unworthy people. Or they're foot soldiers working for bad or unworthy people. Their lives don't really matter, except for the entertainment their deaths can provide.
Some might think I'm making too much of this -- after all video games, movies, and TV shows aren't real life. Real people aren't dying. And that's true, but it's the principle. We're desensitizing ourselves to death, and we're lessening the value of human life.
Most of our action movies are designed to get us to clap, cheer, and applaud when the bad guys meet their inevitable end. And most of the time it's easy to get sucked into that, even for me. Maybe it was the brutality and realism of World War II depicted in "Fury" that got to me. Or maybe it's just that I finally opened my eyes.
In theaters and living rooms around the country people will watch other people die, often brutally, for entertainment. And doubtless they'll be clapping. But maybe we shouldn't be.
I saw the movie "Fury" on Friday afternoon. For those not familiar, it is a harrowing tale of a tank unit during World War II. I have lots of thoughts on the film and on how it changes what we typically see from the genre, which I'll get to in a future post.
What sticks with me most from the screening was how it made me feel. I live in a military town. I am proud to live in a military town and grateful for all the freedoms our fighting men and women afford me. I was happy to see a unit of soldiers attend the screening of "Fury." Then the movie started.
"Fury" is not a subtle movie. The violence is fast, furious, and disturbing. This is a darker take on a war movie. And what made it darker, for me, was the loud applause, cheering, and clapping whenever someone was killed, which was often. Toward the more action-packed portions of the film, it sort of felt like being a Roman in the arena as the gladiators fought to the death. There was something dark and unsettling about the crowd's reaction to death and destruction.
And I don't fault the film -- in fact I think the film was seeking to elicit the opposite reaction. But rather this made me think of how far we've slipped as a culture. We don't seem to place a lot of value on human life, and that's a problem.
People have meaning. As Christians, we know that we're all created in the image of God. When we revel in the brutalization of people -- any people -- I think God is hurt. We should be hurt, too. That's not the plan for the world.
But that seems to be our society. In the wake of a mass shooting at a school, all most people care about is maintaining the right to bare arms and placing blame. We don't mourn for the loss of life as we should. We don't look at ourselves in the mirror as we should.
We go home and play Call of Duty. We mow down people on the screen for a cathartic "release." We pop in a movie and watch our "heroes" lay waste to hoards of people. But it's OK, they're bad or unworthy people. Or they're foot soldiers working for bad or unworthy people. Their lives don't really matter, except for the entertainment their deaths can provide.
Some might think I'm making too much of this -- after all video games, movies, and TV shows aren't real life. Real people aren't dying. And that's true, but it's the principle. We're desensitizing ourselves to death, and we're lessening the value of human life.
Most of our action movies are designed to get us to clap, cheer, and applaud when the bad guys meet their inevitable end. And most of the time it's easy to get sucked into that, even for me. Maybe it was the brutality and realism of World War II depicted in "Fury" that got to me. Or maybe it's just that I finally opened my eyes.
In theaters and living rooms around the country people will watch other people die, often brutally, for entertainment. And doubtless they'll be clapping. But maybe we shouldn't be.
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