The Limits of Applying Ethical Theories to Literary Analysis
While philosophy and literary studies are two entirely different academic disciplines under the humanities, ethical theories can be extremely useful in justifying the stance we take in moral issues brought up in literary texts. Ethics mainly works towards evaluating the moral permissibility of actions in nonfictional scenarios; however, the treatment of the fictitious characters and plot in literary texts as having verifiable existence allows us to use the ideas of philosophers in interpreting complex issues presented in novels. For example, applying ethical theories to Toni Morrison’s Beloved enables us to use a methodological approach in thinking about the moral permissibility of Sethe’s attempted murder. For this paper I have chosen the two theories of Kantianism and Utilitarianism, due to their contrasting deontological and consequentialist viewpoints that enable us to see two vastly different ethical approaches to this issue. I argue that while the Utilitarian and Kantian approaches to determining the moral permissibility of Sethe’s actions initially appear to lead to contrasting conclusions, both theories condemn her action. The novel, however, presents a much more ambivalent picture of this issue, and the limits of the ethical approach to fully capture this ambiguity is due to its unjustified deeming of historical context and the identities it forms as irrelevant. First, I will give a basic summary of the two theories and use passages from Beloved to apply their logic onto this situation. By addressing possible objections to each application, I will illustrate how the contrasting ethical theories both lead to the same conclusion. Finally, by looking at the novel’s own approach to this moral issue through its treatment of the murder scene, I will explain the limitations of employing this ethical approach.
Kantianism is a form of deontological ethical theory, which judges a given action not by its consequences, but rather by its adherence to given rules. Its central philosophical concept is the categorical imperative, which states that one should only “act according to the maxim whereby you can, at the same time, will that it should become universal law” (Kant 30). The second part of the categorical imperative states that human beings must not be used as a means to an end, but rather as ends in themselves, meaning that they must never sacrifice themselves or sacrifice others for themselves. We have a duty as rational human beings to understand our maxim, or the motivation behind the action, and to ask ourselves whether we would truly want it to become universalized. Because we must act out of duty, the categorical imperative remains in force over subjective considerations and specific circumstances. Utilitarianism, unlike Kantianism, is a consequentialist moral theory, meaning that actions are evaluated solely on its consequences. John Stuart Mill and Jeremy Bentham are the greatest contributors to the development of utilitarianism. The doctrine’s Greatest Happiness Principle states that “actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness” (Mill 21). Mill argues that when calculating measurement of utility, and performing what he calls hedonic calculus, both the quality and quantity of the pleasure or pain that the action causes should be put into consideration. In short, all actions should be directed towards achieving the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest amount of people.
A Kantian would argue that Sethe’s attempt at murdering her children was not morally permissible. While he does not directly address the killing of one’s own children in his text, we can apply his statements regarding suicide into this situation. He applies the categorical imperative and identifies the maxim behind suicide as wanting to end one’s life out of self-love when the predicted future threatens more evil than it promises satisfaction (30). He argues that this is not permissible because it violates the second part of the categorical imperative; by taking your own life, you are using yourself as a mere means to achieve your end of reducing suffering. We can apply this to Beloved’s murder because Kantian theory, as it is a form of deontology, evaluates an action based on the motives behind it. Sethe’s maxim behind attempting to kill her children is the same maxim that would prompt suicide. For example, when explaining in detail what happened on the day Schoolteacher came to take his slaves back, she explains that her “plan was to take [the whole family] to the other side where [her] own ma’am is” (Morrison 240). She is referring to where souls go in the afterlife, as her mother has long been dead. Like Kant’s example of someone considering suicide, her maxim behind her action is wanting to end her children’s’ lives due to her belief that staying alive promises much more suffering than it does any happiness. Because the moral permissibility according to Kantian theory is based on the motivations behind the action, we can apply Kant’s explanation for how suicide goes against the categorical imperative to this scenario. Sethe’s action is wrong because it uses not only herself, but also her own children as mere means to achieve the end of escaping slavery.
One possible objection to the above argument could be that her action is a considered form of paternalism. Kant argues that one “cannot do good to anyone according to [one’s] definition of happiness (except to the young children and insane)” (453). Sethe truly believes that happiness is impossible to achieve in an enslaved state. When Beloved tries to make her mother pay for the handsaw, Sethe tries to explain by describing the almost inexplicable horror that is slavery: “That anybody white could take your whole self for anything that came to mind. Not just work, kill, or maim you, but dirty you. Dirty you so bad you couldn’t like yourself anymore. Dirty you so bad you forgot who you were and couldn’t think it up. And though she and others lived through it and got over it, she could never let it happen to her own.” (Morrison 295)
Because she truly believes that slavery is the worst possible state to be in, she acts according to her own definition of happiness in killing her children. The objection could be that since Beloved’s young age qualifies her as an exception to Kant’s statement and therefore enables Sethe to morally apply her definition of happiness onto her daughter. However, this objection does not work according to Kant’s definition of paternalism. Paternalism consists of two elements: interfering with one’s autonomy and doing it to benefit the patient. (Kant 76). While Sethe does impose her definition of happiness on her children, her actions cannot completely qualify as paternalistic because murder would not benefit Beloved, as it is failing to respect her as a person. This objection fails because we see by Kantian logic that her action is morally impermissible due to its inability to treat her children as ends in themselves, which again violates the second part of the categorical imperative.
In order to approach this moral issue from the ethical standpoint of Utilitarianism, we must shift our attention from the maxims behind her action to the consequences brought on by Sethe’s action. During her stream of consciousness after realizing that Beloved is the reincarnation of her dead baby, Sethe explains to the Beloved why she had to kill her. She explains that if “she hadn’t killed [Beloved] she would have died and that is something [Sethe] could not bear happen to her” (Morrison 236). Whether Beloved’s anticipated death is literal or a way to describe the horrors of slavery is not explicit; however, Sethe still believes that the experiences that her daughter would have had to endure were more painful and that ending her life was a way to spare her that pain. By evaluating her decision through a utilitarian perspective, her action seems to be justified because she acted according to what she believed would reduce the overall quantity of pain by sparing her children of the incomparable agony brought on by slavery.
This can be complicated, however, with the failure of Sethe’s foreseen consequences to match up with the actual consequences. Not only did Beloved fail to get to a happier place, but Sethe’s action may have arguably caused more misery for a larger number of people. Paul D certainly believes this to be the case, as he claims during a debate with Sethe. As he argues, he tries to get her to understand the immorality of her actions by reminding her that her “boys gone…one girl dead, the other won’t leave the yard” (194). While her children have not had to endure slavery, her attempt at murder has brought pain to the community and affected a larger amount of people by invoking a sense of fear both in her children and community. This brings up a problematic aspect of classic utilitarianism, which is the issue of how much consideration should be given to foreseen and actual consequences. Bentham clarifies this issue by explaining that “it is not to be expected that this process [his hedonic calculus] should be strictly pursued previously to every moral judgment” (Bentham 128). The principle of utility is not to be used as a procedure or decision-making guide that can be consciously applied to help make choices, but rather as a criterion for determining the moral permissibility of an action. That is not to say that the Greatest Happiness Principle should not be considered in the process of decision-making, but rather that the actual results following an action are what must be considered during its evaluation. Therefore, this objection is successful in showing that utilitarian principles would actually consider Sethe’s murder of Beloved wrong because of the criteria’s consideration of actual consequences.
While the application of these two ethical theories indicates that Sethe’s action was very clearly unjustified, the novel takes a much more ambivalent stance. This inconclusiveness is presented when Beloved’s murder scene is being described. While there are many parts throughout the text where the reader is enlightened as to what Sethe’s crime was, it is not described in detail until later. When the schoolteacher and his entourage arrived at 124, they see Sethe in the shed where is in the process of killing all of her children. She was the most valuable slave but was no longer worth taking back since “she’d gone wild, due to the mishandling of the nephew who’d overbeat her and made her cut and run” (Morrison 176). Through attributing her clearly deranged actions to her past, the novel portrays Sethe as a victim of the trauma that left her feeling like there was no other choice. Kantianism and Utilitarianism consider this history of slavery extraneous, as the entire branch tends to disregard historical context and investigate situations as individual scenarios. The novel, however, considers her victimization as extremely relevant. The novel is not, however, in anyway justifying her action and claiming it is morally permissible, but rather portraying it as a complicated ethical issue. What is right and what is wrong is not the main question; this distinction is both senseless and meaningless in this context. Unlike our previous application of Kantianism and Utilitarianism, there is much more ambiguity regarding the situation.
Sethe’s logic behind her decision to murder her children can be represented as the use of the Greatest Happiness Principle because she believed that she was reducing the overall quantity of pain her children would have had to endure had they been brought back to Sweet Home. Despite the fact that her reasoning is utilitarian, Utilitarianism would still condemn her action as wrong because of its consideration of not the foreseen consequences, but rather the actual effects. Kantian ethics provides another way of determining the justifiability of her actions. While the employment of Kantian logic nonetheless leads to the same position on this debate, it does so by showing how Sethe’s actions violate of the second part of the categorical imperative that prohibits the use of anyone as a mere means. Both deontological and consequentialist ethics, despite the fact that they are very contrasting in the criterion they use to evaluate the moral permissibility of an action, lead to the same conclusion. The novel, however, takes a much more complicated stance, where right and wrong have very little perceived meaning. This difference is due to the fact that the historical context of slavery and Sethe’s identity as a victim that is a result from her enslavement are considered extraneous according to the ethical theories. Because context is important from the perspective of literary studies, the deeming of historical context and identity as irrelevant is problematic. This reveals a severe limitation of using an ethical approach to this issue, as it fails to capture to true complexity and ambiguity of moral justifications through its approach to ethical issues as individual scenarios.
Works Cited:
Bentham, Jeremy. An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1907. Print.
Kant, Immanuel. Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Co., 1993. Print.
Mill, John Stuart (1906). Utilitarianism. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Print.
Morrison, Toni. Beloved. New York: Vintage Books, 1987. Print.