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Monday, November 19, 2007
The Morality of "Saving Private Ryan": Did he "earn this"?
A week late for Veterans' Day, when I probably should have written this. But let me raise a moral/ethical issue that has stuck with me from the movie Saving Private Ryan. Initial disclosure: I think the first 30 minutes of the movie should be required viewing in any civics or modern American history class, for the way that the film recreates in vivid detail what happened during the Normandy Invasion. Until I saw it, I do not think I fully understood what that battle (or any battle, obviously) really was like. The rest of the movie is good-but-fairly-typical war-movie fair.
The heart of the movie is the question of the morality or ethics of the mission reflected in the title--sending a squad of eight men into harm's way (two of whom die in the search, four more of whom die in the final battle) to rescue one man and pull him out of harm's way. At one point, the main character, Captain Miller, played by Tom Hanks, tells his sergeant that Ryan had better do something great, such as finding a cure for cancer, to justify the loss of the men in Miller's squad. Miller dies in the final battle and his last words to Private Ryan (played by Matt Damon) are "earn this." At the end of the movie, we see Ryan visiting Miller's grave at Omaha Beach 50 years later--Ryan is married, has several children and grandchildren, and his wife confirms that he has been a "good man" in his life. Of course, we do not know what it means to be a good man. The inference I drew was that Ryan lead the sort of "ordinary" good life of many WW II veterans in the mid- and late-20th century--he probably went to college on the GI Bill, had a successful (if not apparently famous or world-altering) career in some undisclosed profession, raised a family, and enjoyed a life of middle- or upper-middle class comfort.
So, did Ryan "earn this"? On one hand, he never could earn it, simply because the sacrifice (exposing eight men to danger and losing six men to save one) is too unequal, especially when all are soldiers who have taken on the task of fighting and facing death. On the other hand, suppose Ryan could earn it by leading a virtuous and successful life. Did he? Could he earn it only if he developed a cure for cancer or became President of the United States or CEO of GM, or otherwise did something that history defines as "great"? Or did he earn it by being a husband, father, and grandfather who, say, taught high school or worked as a banker? In other words, did he earn it by doing precisely what we fought the war for?
This point is not revolutionary. But I have thought about it since I first saw the movie nine years ago and I have not read anything discussing it. Thoughts?
Posted by Howard Wasserman on November 19, 2007 at 10:36 AM | Permalink
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David Schmidtz has a great article on desert that discusses the "Earn it!" scene of Saving Private Ryan. The article is "How to Deserve," in Political Theory, vol. 30, pp. 774-799 (Dec 2002) -- see page 785 for the discussion of the film.
Posted by: Alice Ristroph | Nov 19, 2007 11:29:35 AM
I think his MOM earned it by losing her other sons in the war effort.
That is the only reason Private Ryan was saved.
So her sacrifice as an American parent is what "earned" Private Ryan's safe passage away from the front.
Of course, other mothers lost children in the squad. But Ryan did not asked to be saved.
Posted by: Val | Nov 19, 2007 1:12:40 PM
Even though the film is over 9 years old, some people have not yet seen it (although we might yet rent the dvd). Consequently, I would have appreciated a "spoiler alert" at the beginning of your post.
Posted by: steve lubet | Nov 19, 2007 1:36:32 PM
Once a movie is 9 years old, no one has any duty, moral or otherwise, to honor the wishes of those who want to remain ignorant of the ending because they "might yet rent the DVD." Sure, you might.
Posted by: oh, please | Nov 19, 2007 2:57:38 PM
I have always thought that Miller's injunction ("Earn this") and Ryan's introspective questions ("Have I deserved this? Am I a good man?") were misdirected. They should have been directed not at Ryan and his generation who fought the war, but the next generation and their descendants (Ryan's children and grandchildren who hover in the background of the opening and closing scenes at the cemetery like a mute Greek chorus). What have we done with the peace that they fought and died for? What have we done with the peace for which they sacrificed their lives? Are we, in how we now live today, deserving of this great gift? Do we honor those who died by how we live?
Posted by: John M. Breen | Nov 19, 2007 4:01:27 PM
John: Interesting point. But then what is our obligation to really and meaningfully educate the future generations? If we are going to chastise Ryan's children and grandchildren for hovering in the background, what should we make of the fact that they clearly knew nothing of Capt. Miller or of the sacrifices made for their father/grandfather (and thus for them)? Of course, neither did Ryan's wife. Is it incumbent on Ryan and those like him to share their experiences and make children and grandchildren understand?
Posted by: Howard Wasserman | Nov 19, 2007 4:19:38 PM
I had some idea what to expect from the first 30 minutes of SPR, having read a number of books in high school on the invasion for some sort of report. It largely corresponded with what I read, albeit in a compressed sort of way.
I don't remember which book -- it was probably either John Keegan, Six Armies Over Normandy, or maybe Max Hastings, Overlord: D-Day and the Battle for Normandy -- but one of those has a good account of how individual actions all along the beachhead made the difference between being trapped on the beach and getting off. One story that still sticks in my head 20+ years later is the engineers at one location who were responsible for placing a "Bangalore torpedo" -- featured in the movie I think -- a long tube used to blow a path through barbed wire. One engineer ran forward to try to put it in position, exposing himself to fire, but he was gunned down before he could. Then a second ran forward, moved it a little further, but was also killed. The third or fourth engineer finally succeeded. I've always wondered, what would it take to be that third engineer?
Posted by: Bruce Boyden | Nov 19, 2007 6:40:46 PM
Howard:
It is incumbent on us -- on we the living -- to learn what the actual veterans of D-Day, and all the horrible battles that followed in that great conflict, did for us. We must recall their sacrifice, and keep the memory of what they did alive, and not out of mere sentiment. It is the debt we owe to them.
I remember the first time I saw the film. Seeing the slaughter on the beach so vividly captured on the screen I asked myself "What did those men die for?" Surely, one answer must be that they died for one another. They died to save one another, as brothers do. But I also thought that they died for the freedoms we purport to cherish and yet take so much for granted.
That is what struck me about the family members lurking in the background at the cemetery. They are the beneficiaries of so much sacrifice, so much blood spilled. Yet for them, for Ryan's children the cemetery is merely a pretty scene in which to take photographs, and for his grandchildren it is a distraction, the backdrop for some idle talk about the latest fashion, or Britney Spears love life, or some other damn thing. Is that what Miller and the other men died for? The freedom to indulge in such appetites? The freedom to build a culture of abasement? Is that what the flag flying over the cemetery at the beginning and end of the film means? I would be loathe to think so.
Posted by: John M. Breen | Nov 20, 2007 1:39:45 AM
I agree with John that it is all of our obligations to "earn" the sacrifices of those who came before. Then the question becomes how we, or Ryan, earns it -- by what standard do we measure Ryan or any of us? Also, does Ryan have more of an obligation to earn Captain Miller's, and the other five soldiers', sacrifices than, say, my obligation to earn their sacrifies? Ryan personally feels the burden of the six soldiers deaths more than the rest of us can, but should we say that he has a greater moral burden to earn their sacrifices than all of us who are the beneficiaries of the "greatest generation"?
Howard, based on your "initial disclosure," I would highly recommend reading E.B. Sledge's graphic account of the brutality and atrocities of the pacific theatre in his memoir, "With the Old Breed." I know your post was about Normandy, but it should be required for anyone to more fully understand the second world war.
Posted by: Eli Mark | Nov 20, 2007 4:04:03 AM
My take on that movie and the first scene in particular was that it was perhaps as powerful an antiwar statement as can be created. Surely those books that Bruce mentions detail and communicate the atrocities that are war, however, for most people I doubt they would convey the visceral enmity we all feel when watching those thirty minutes.
I believe the way we "earn this" is by never fighting wars again. For those who think that is an idealistic impossibility I would say we simply will not have earned it until we achieve permanent peace. I personally believe that, as has been said before, no war is inevitable until it has already started.
Posted by: Jim Green | Nov 20, 2007 8:22:12 AM
I can't disagree more with Mr. Green's antiwar sentiment. The backdrop of the Normandy invasion was the evil enveloping Europe, which we fought to overcome. Most viewers assumed that background.
But suppose the movie began with 30 minutes of footage from the Holocaust, followed by 30 minutes of the SPR Normandy footage. And then flash as an alternative to those who walk away and say "not our problem," before resuming the story of those who fought. Are the "pacifists" then the heroes of the film? I think not.
Posted by: War Defender | Nov 20, 2007 5:51:45 PM
I would suggest that they died to enable the continuation of a free, open, and prosperous society, but I would not attempt to give content to that. "Is that what Miller and the other men died for?" could be asked about *any* exercise of freedom and choice in that open society. It could be asked about the frivolous interests of Ryan's grandchildren that John discusses. But it also could be (and probably was) asked when Ryan's children were burning draft cards and bras and flags and protesting Viet Nam and getting arrested during sit-ins as 20-year-old undergrads in 1970. That question could be directed at any exercise of freedom with which the questioner disagrees. Fighting to preserve a free and open society means fighting to allow people to do things and care about things that those who fought and/or died probably did not agree with or would not think are worthwhile.
Posted by: Howard Wasserman | Nov 20, 2007 6:48:43 PM
I didn't intend my comment to disparage what the brave men and women did during WWII in general or on D-Day in particular. Nor did I intend to mitigate the horror that was the holocaust.
But I would suggest that those who only practice pacifism after bullets start to fly are ineffective pacifists. In fact I would go so far as to define war to include the holocaust itself. Once we let the world devolve into a circumstance that created enough tension for the holocaust to occur and where such behavior is tolerated at all we were already on an inevitable path to war. To be effective pacifists requires more than just a post hoc reaction to intolerable acts.
So if War Defender renamed him/herself Defender of the Allied Powers in WWII, I would join him/her in that defense.
Posted by: Jim Green | Nov 21, 2007 11:20:14 AM
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