There are several characters in All My Sons that base their decisions on personal and family gain rather than for the good of society. Joe Keller is the most obvious example of this act of selfishness. He allows his partner, Herbert Deever, take the blame for selling damaged goods to the army, thus escaping jail himself. Later in the play, he justifies his actions with this argument: “They came with handcuffs into the shop Chris, what could I do? Chris…Chris, I did it for you, it was a chance and I took it for you” (70). He tries to excuse his desperate actions by telling his son, Chris, that if he had taken the blame, the business would have gone up in smoke and there would have been nothing left for Chris. Keller’s son replies with: “For me!-I was dying every day and you were killing my boys and you did it for me? …Is that as far as your mind can see, the business?”(70). These two characters, Chris and his father, Joe, are opposites when it comes to ethics. Joe is fine with committing unlawful or otherwise disreputable acts as long as it benefits his family. Chris, meanwhile, is a regular crusader, striving to tell the truth wherever he goes. The two ends of the spectrum collide in so close a family connection, allowing the reader to see the differences between father and son clearly.
I personally side with Chris on this argument. The damaged airplane parts cost many young fighters their lives, all so that Joe Keller could retain his family business. The price tag on my happiness does not exceed another person’s life, and I could never ship off broken parts to the army if I knew it could put other men and women in danger. In this situation, I believe it was not appropriate to put the needs of my family and self in front of society’s. The cost would be too high for my conscious to bear. If another, less extreme case of similar moral complications arose, I would defend my family rather than society. For example, if my family was starving, and to get them the food they needed I would have to steal money from some rich neighbor, than I would take my family’s needs into account instead of what society thought was right or wrong.
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2 comments:
I don't think you are giving Joe enough credit. I agree that what he did was wrong, but he never dreamed that what he did would result in death. And really, shouldn't the army have caught 100 faulty parts? Ann's father isn't so innocent either. He knew what they were doing was wrong, but did he do anything? No. I think it was a blunder on everyone's part.
The message I get from you is that in order to make an ethical decision, you have to weigh the possible harms against the possible solutions. You agree with Chris because you figure that providing for Chris is less important than preventing deaths and stealing food from someone has less consequence than letting your family go hungry. This all makes sense to me and I agree with you 100%.
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