Introduction
As Aristotle indicates that a slave can't be just if the war is unjust, slaves seem strictly binded to war as an object with no soul but only body. If in a unjust war the slave inwardly refuse to fight,will it make him more just? In class of political philosophy, a classmate asked a interesting question"If the slaves make mistake, whose fault it is?" Should we lay all the obligation upon the masters whereas slaves are the ones actually execute all the instruction, or should we think this way, that salves are nothing but certain tools manipulated by master, therefore master ought to bear all the consequences?
German movie"Die Welle" (The Wave)
Page for "Die Welle" from IMDb
Movie "Die Welle" was released in 2008. In a week of freely selection of course by students, A high school teacher is reluctantly pushed to teach autocracy when firstly his aptness is anarchy. At the beginning of first class, he makes a decision that he will rejuvenate the class, through reframing rules and disciplines, to rebuild an anarchy. The enormous sense of group honor, uniforms, “Die Welle" as group name, unanimous greeting gesture, the class seems to be more self-disciplined and in order. Everyone shows substantial belongingness and attachment. However, as time pass by, things are becoming uncontrollable, one students got shot by a fanatic boy when teacher announce that "Die Welle" is over, the fanatic boy commits suicide after.
The movie is adapted from a novel which based on a real event in US in 1967.
Let us think
The movie is similar to all other movies about fascism. By detachment of "anarchy and autocracy", it seems to me just coincide with slaves system, teacher gives orders as a master and students follow as "slave" to preserve this group as a prize. This group "Die Welle" somehow indeed nourish students in a sense of group honor and reciprocal support. The twisted and complicated relation among teacher, students and group"Die Welle" is what make this movie so mesmerizing and fascinating. At the end of movie, a boy kills himself. Who should take responsibility? Teacher? Who, to some extent, start everything.The group"Die Welle"? Which the carrier of teacher's ambition and students' desire for community. Student? Who himself pull the trigger. It is really hard to say. That's what makes that question from classmate so profound. Who to blame? Maybe everyone can not avoid the consequence resulted from their actions insomuch responsibility fairly cast upon.
I would say that it was unjust of the teacher to inflict his own beliefs on his students in such a way. Of course he could not have expected such an extreme result, and the bulk of the responsibility lays with the boy who pulled the trigger, in my opinion.
ReplyDeleteBut what if at the first place he didn't really realize that the thing would come to this? Tracking back his origin of thoughts, he just wanted to make the class more interesting to students.
DeleteFor the most part, I'm thinking along the same lines as Rachel regarding where the responsibility should be attributed to. However, I would not go so far as to say that it was unfair for the teacher's part to alter the course of the class in favor of what he felt to be better for the students.
ReplyDeleteI additionally find fault with the premise of thought in Aristotle's particular views stated in the introduction, but this may simply be a result of my biased perspective on slavery today.
I agree that teacher should not alter the course of the class in favor of what he felt to be better. The movie is managed to show how easy those students can be manipulated and how innocent they are, though. However, I think the teacher should be as careful as he can, as a guidance to those students.
DeleteCould you state your opinion that mentioned in the second paragraph more clearly?
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ReplyDeleteI believe that it is the teacher's fault for the boy's decision to commit a suicide. I also agree with Nathan regarding the fact that the teacher shouldn't have changed the class by forcing his opinion and beliefs on the students.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I feel like the case which you are discussing is a little bit different from Aristotle's case with the slavery. Because in this movie the students are not slaves. They are just doing what is necessary to do so that they don't get punished for disobedience. But at the same time they have some rights right? I haven't seen the movie but from what I read, this is the way I understood it. Whereas, in Aristotle's case, the slaves were forced to do their masters' wishes and didn't have any rights at all.
I would say it is the teacher's responsibility to everyone's craziness and the death of his student. If he does not perform exercises on the young high school student who lack of critical thinking of things, the students would not turn into such a extreme social group. As a teacher, he should know the result before he does it because his purpose is to educate student.
ReplyDeleteI think what you want to express here, is that instead of turning their bodies into slaves, the teacher enslave the students' minds. The input is what the teacher tell them to do, and the output is they will be willing to do what their teacher says. It is kind of like using a mysterious religion to make them do certain things. But in Plato's time, the official law gave the masters to force their belonging-the slaves, to do something that the slaves may not want to do. However, religionizing people is not the same as enslaving people.