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Date Posted: 07:46:17 10/28/05 Fri
Author: manwitch
Subject: Should potential failure be a consideration in one's moral stance?
In reply to: Celebaelin 's message, "Re: The Spidey Responsibilities" on 07:11:39 10/28/05 Fri

"The liklihood that we might fail ought not deter us from defending a cause we believe to be just."

--Abraham Lincoln

You have given a great reason why in film or TV the superhero will be played by Jennifer Garner or Julia Roberts or some other hot bod. You have not given any argument for why the moral or ethical imperitave applies more in principle to the hot, fine or studdly more than to the weak, ugly and frail.

Abraham Lincoln, a real historical figure, has offered an argument that it applies to all the same, and that failure is irrelevant to these responsibilities. Spidey has no responsibility to be successful. Nor does Buffy. They have a responsibility to choose rightly whether they will fail or not. Buffy is wrong to refuse to fight the Master even though she might die. Her responsibility is to fight the master in spite of the fact that she will die doing it. I would argue that even though her presence fighting him is what allows him to escape, and even if Buffy had not been resurrected, in terms of the Spidey Imperative, she had no other legitimate choice.

I believe that the show, and probly even Spidey, is suggesting we all should feel that way. One can argue of course that the world is a void, a wasteland, and that we have no responsibilities of any kind other than what we take on ourselves. Fine. I still don't see why it applies in principle more to the strong than to the weak. That it does is an Ortega y Gasset noblesse oblige type argument that I have always rejected.

Anyways, I still maintain that the only thing that has changed for off screen potentials is the variety of ways that they might manifest their choice to either accept or reject the spidey imperative. The choice confronted them before regardless.

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