Would you walk away from Omelas?

[emzie]

I'd gather my party and set out for new lands. After all, there may be more suffering and death outside, but is sacrificing a child's happiness for the good of society worth the dishonor?

Would it be dishonourable if the adults all accepted it?

 

[zxcvbnm]

Original text: The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas, a short story by Ursula K. LeGuin.

Summary for everyone thinking TL;DR:
Omelas is a utopian city. The inhabitants are happy, yet "not less complex
than us" for that reason. Perhaps they have trains and temples if those make people happy, likely they do not have secret police or slavery. The joy of Omelas is maintained by a sacrifice of sorts, a scapegoat, a child kept in misery and darkness. "It is so thin there are no calves to its legs; its belly protrudes; it lives on
a half-bowl of corn meal and grease a day. It is naked. Its buttocks and thighs are a mass of festered sores, as it sits in its own excrement continually."
And "the beauty of their city, the tenderness of their friendships, the health of
their children, the wisdom of their scholars, the skill of their makers, even the abundance of their harvest and the kindly weathers of their skies, depend wholly on this child's abominable misery." Children growing up in Omelas learn about this child as soon as they are old enough to understand it, usually between the ages of eight and twelve.
Sometimes people look at the singular unhappy child and leave Omelas. They never come back. "But they seem to know where they are going, the ones who walk away from Omelas."

---

So. Utilitarianism would no doubt list Omelas as a better society than ours. A lot of other ethical theories would disagree. The poll asks what you would do if you lived in Omelas and thought of the child. This thread asks for a wider discussion of what yardstick we should measure a society by (total happiness?) and how much scapegoating, if any, is acceptable.

Such behaviour is usually called immoral by christians, yet they have their own scapegoat: Jesus Christ. The whole point of christianity is that Jesus suffered and died so that nobody who believes in him will go to hell.

Id est: They need not face their own wrongdoings in the hard way.

They can be happy, free of guilt, free of the burden of all the crimes they have committed, because, they have a scapegoat who suffered for them.

The Roman way of crucifying was an extremely painful one, the crushed nerves in the wrist caused pain few of us can even imagine. The whole point of christianity is that that cleansed them. Those who believe in Jesus believe that he suffered and died for their sins.

Yet they think that is immoral, when done in another world?


I couldn't be happy if someone had to suffer so that I could be happy. That is why I'm neither a christian nor happy.

 

[~Corsair#01~]

To "stay in Omelas" would be to admit that we cannot create a perfect world, that suffering is inevitable and that our aim can only be it's minimalisation. As a result, it would mean the end of all that humanity strives for, and would render life pointless.

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

Well, the difference between Omelas and Christianity has a lot to do with the consent of the one suffering for all.

(That, plus it isn't really correct to say that believers can ignore all consequences or don't have to pay in some way.)

 

[zxcvbnm]

I'm not saying that they can ignore the consequences, but they feel forgiven and such, which means that they are at least partially freed of them.

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

But this only comes through a conscious act on their part, unlike in Omelas where they don't even have to think about it. And, more importantly, it was Jesus' decision.

 

[zxcvbnm]

It was the decision of everyone involved. Any step in the chain could have stopped it.

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

It was the decision of everyone involved. Any step in the chain could have stopped it.

In Chrisitanity or Omelas? Because according to my view of Christianity, the only person who had real control over the situation was Jesus - who, having agreed from the beginning that he would atone for the sins of humanity, and having already begun the process when he was arrested, was not going to let some Roman governor mess it up.

 

[zxcvbnm]

Pontius Pilatus could have stopped it by risking riots

The jews could have stopped it

etc.

Anyway, I'm not letting anyone suffer because of me!

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

Again, no, he couldn't have really. Another way would have been found.

And if you are not willing to let someone - who volunteered for it - suffer for you, then you can't complain if you end up suffering more than they did.

(The real issue is not that you are unwilling to let Jesus take your sins, of course, but that you don't believe he can. I would assume. So why say that you are unwilling?)

 

[zxcvbnm]

I consider all options. If there is a heaven I'm not going there on someone else's shoulders. I have my principles, and using (even voluntary) scapegoats isn't one of those.

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

What if someone else's help is the only way to get in? What refusing additional aid means you can't get into Heaven, not because God is petty but because that is the only way? I suppose He will not deny damnation to anyone who really wants it, but they will have none to blame but themselves.

 

[zxcvbnm]

Then I'm out. But I consider it pretty petty if someone, with no more proof than others, demands belief.

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

I am not demanding belief, and God is not demanding belief with no more proof than what others say - nor is belief, as such, the determining factor. "Belief" as the term is generally used is not the same thing as "accepting the sacrifice of Christ".

 

[zxcvbnm]

Well whatever it is, there simply isn't enough proof for one religion to be more true than others.

And how about those who haven't heard, or have heard but not accepted? And accepting depends on a lot of outside things. Two people, one with the spirituality gene, one without, one brought up in a religious family, one in an atheistic family, one having found happiness from religion, the other seen only persecuting churches, those two don't have at all a similar stance towards religion or faith or spirituality or what it is exactly called.

And one can't really call Jesus voluntary, he merely accepted that he was going to die, if the Bible is considered as giving a truthful image of it.

 

[philippe]

I would try to ease it suffering if it's possible, like what those South-American tribes did who sacrificied children in desperate times in the Andes, those kids were special treated and had high fame and regard of all the others. I would not try to freed it though, that is too much of an box of Pandora.

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

Well whatever it is, there simply isn't enough proof for one religion to be more true than others.

I disagree, but proof of any one religion is actually irrelevant to my point.

And one can't really call Jesus voluntary, he merely accepted that he was going to die, if the Bible is considered as giving a truthful image of it.

According to how you interpret the Bible, maybe. According to how (I think) most Christians see it, and how I see it, not so much.

 

[sourboy]

Is the child Jesus or another potential religious cultist?

 

[zxcvbnm]

I disagree, but proof of any one religion is actually irrelevant to my point.



According to how you interpret the Bible, maybe. According to how (I think) most Christians see it, and how I see it, not so much.

"If that is your will I accept it" on that hill

"My Lord, why did you leave me?" hanging on the cross

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

"If that is your will I accept it" on that hill

In other words, he agreed to accept the will of his Father.

"My Lord, why did you leave me?" hanging on the cross

Although "being forsaken" is generally understood (by Christians) to mean something separate from the sacrifice itself.