Comparative Analysis

Obedience: How Far is Too Far?
Obedience is when a person yields to explicit instructions or orders from ant authority figure. It is associated with compliance to the majority. Moral values held my an individual are often overlooked when the negative consequences outweigh the positive ones. Outside influences play a large part in swaying a decision to be either obedient or disobedient. In the movie A Few Good Men, two soldiers are given orders to carry out the unethical task of murdering a fellow solider because he was thought to be inferior than the rest. They followed through with this order for many reasons. First, they feel that a superior has more experience and wouldn't steer them wrong. Second, they have a loyalty to the authority and therefore feel forced into not even questioning the orders. Third, the negative consequences they would face if they refused were too great for them to handle. Lastly, its likely that they both felt pressured by the other to say yes, because they did not want to swim against the stream; so instead they merely went along. In terms of society, currently, there are plenty of instances in which people are put in situations each and every day where they are forced to chose whether to obey or not. The moral values held by each individual are often questioned when being obedient threatens to go against what some believe to be right.
In order to become familiar with this problem, history provides an excellent source of examples to learn from. Over time, the human race has experienced many reoccurring events that have led to crucial lessons learned and massive damage to repair and build upon. Erich Fromm, author of "Disobedience as a Psychological and Moral Problem," states, "History began with an act of disobedience, and it is not unlikely that it will be terminated by an act of obedience" (Fromm 124). One event that accurately fits the criteria is Genocide. Crispin Sartwell, author of "The Genocidal Killer in the Mirror,"...