Edwardian Synthesis Question wyl.p5.t1@gmail.com

Team 1 (HAM)
Charles Salumbides
Fedor Kossakovski
Justin (COOOOOOORN) Cornford
John Farnworth

Edwardian (1901-1939) Synthesis Question

It could be argued that "The Lagoon" and Heart of Darkness (HOD) both deal with violence as amoral rather than immoral. For example, the character of Kurtz in HOD only comes to the realization that his acts and the acts of his "tribal" followers are immoral as he is dying and has to come to terms with the horrors of his environment and his own
inhumanity. In the Greek and Medieval eras, the primitive idea of indiscriminate punishment as a righteous "retribution" was accepted. The philosophies of Homer in The Odyssey, Machiavelli in The Prince, and the philosopher Nietsche would
agree with this. So...when is violence as retribution immoral? Explain whether war makes it amoral? How do we justify violent retribution in our own time? Choose a piece of art (from any art form) that represents how we have justified violence as righteous retribution and explain how this justification is conveyed. (Research Questions 1, 5, 9)

Both The Lagoon" and Heart of Darkness (HOD) are great examples of how using violence as retribution is immoral. The dictionary definition of immoral is the violating of the rules of right conduct or the distinction between right and wrong principles; not conforming to the patterns of conduct usually accepted or established as consistent with principles of personal and social ethics. By this definition violence in any case cannot be moral due to that violence is never justified. Even though it is established through definition of the English language and morals violence is still common in society and is considered at times necessary, such as war. Our society uses war more as a responsibility of the people in society and supports this use of violence. The main concept of war is the fighting and death amongst men due to orders and a cause mostly unknown. These orders and causes for battle encourage war and violence. This encouragement for such violence and death can often lead to amorality. The people involved are subjected to constant violence and stress and in doing so lose their sense of right and wrong. This lose of the soldiers ethics is solely due to the constant bombardment of violence in their lives this makes it possible for the soldiers affected by lose of principles is acting amoral. These soldiers simply accept the violence and live with it. Although they accept it, it doesn’t mean violence is acceptable in general. Except for this select group of men who fight, violence is generally immoral and does not accomplish any good.
As the famous Edwardian artist William Orpen used his famous painting “The Thinker” to depict retribution as society’s justification for violence. The painting specifically shows a lone soldier sitting on a rock. This form of artwork represents the pain of the men to kill their enemies because of their so called “duty” as a citizen. Society believes that retribution as moral, since warfare has been used as a common method to settle conflicts amongst foreign and domestic nations. The soldiers of warfare can become accustom to such violence and destruction, like the one shown through Orpen’s artwork, that he becomes unaffected by violence and acts out of amorality. As a society we see the violence and the basic principles of war as part of life, while it shouldn’t be accepted and contradicts basic principles of humanity. When people begin to accept war and its violence that comes with it, many begin to view it with amorality.