What Superheroes Could Learn from Machiavelli

The Trope

In comic books, TV shows, and movies that feature heroes/superheroes, the trope of the "no kill rule" runs rampant. So ubiquitous as to have its own page on TV Tropes, many fictional heroes refuse to cross the line from beating up the bad guys to ending a human life. In his more recent incarnations, Batman refuses to use a gun. Daredevil wants criminals to be brought to justice using the legal system. Superman took a vow to never kill. Even Jedis try to avoid killing when they can. There are times in all of these books/shows/movies when a judicious use of killing could be used to prevent the loss of many innocent lives. Often times, this is something that the hero is forced to grapple with at some point. As Peter Parker knows, "with great power, comes great responsibility." 

Not So Machiavellian

Machiavelli wrote in The Prince that rulers must act in accordance to a different moral code than a regular person. For an investigation of power, one could argue that Machiavelli would say the same about any person in a position of tremendous power--such as a superhero. While they don't rule countries or kingdoms like a prince, superheroes represent power in our culture today. They have abilities that no human has--extreme strength, the ability to fly, invisibility, endless money with which they can buy cool gadgets--and that is what makes them an embodiment of nearly unlimited power. With such power, Machiavelli would argue that these heroes need to occasionally take a human life in order to prevent that human (generally the villain) from perpetrating more evil. So what does it say about our society that most of the heroes in our books, shows, and movies are reluctant to kill, even if there would be benefits to it at certain times? Does it show that we value human life beyond all else and find it unforgivable for a human to take another human's life? But what if the human that the hero doesn't kill goes on to kill 50 other people? Fifty lives could be saved if the hero would choose to end just one. Even though the math seems simple, this is a hard thing for people to accept. In addition to being representations of power, superheroes are often supposed to be an ideal human of sorts--noble, self-sacrificing, and merciful. Just as we hate to see our superheroes kill, we hate the idea of our government torturing our enemies or killing civilians in times of war. While many people say that they are "Machiavellian" or agree with Machiavelli's principles, it says something about our ideals that our fictional heroes are not so Machiavellian.

What can we do for famine?

Famine in Yemen

From the link, we can receive the information about famine in Yemen. It clearly lists out that 13 million people face food shortage. It is a horrendous number. I believe, most of people will condemn a government if it fails doing anything towards famine, since it is government's obligation to protect people from harm. I am really one of those people before I read Machiavelli. But now I have changed my mind a little bit, regarding a deeper reason.  

For government

Firstly, despite of the reality that government of Yemen is not able to response to this famine by virtue of the war issues and other severe factors, let us suppose that this government actually has the ability to do something. They can increase the production, develop public infrastructure, etc. What about feeding the people? It sounds like the most direct and workable solution. A lot of us will say yes. But what happen next? The government can feed them for a little while, at least as long as it could, keep them alive for a little while longer... till they give more birth to the next generation, more people are born and even much more people die in the future? Or as Machiavelli may propose here if he is ever so spooky to live util nowadays, that the government(leaders) should just be a cruel, ruthless but qualified decision-maker and let people die themselves. Anyhow people will not live a quality life in war condition and there will be more people dying in the future because current aids save lives and raise up the population of next generation. So why don't we just terminate their suffering sooner and quicker?  

For us

This is one hand. On the other hand, as Machiavelli argues that normal person and leaders should be abide by different moral code, does it mean that we can feel at ease and donate food and provide aid since we are promoting the rightness by helping people? They are flesh and blood, how can we just let them fade away? We cannot stop the war in Yemen, we cannot individually go to Yemen and produce more crops, we cannot simply bring people to other country and provide them a job. It seems that only thing we can do is donating food. 

Such a dilemma! What we are doing is increasing the future death by not increasing the current death. Maybe Machiavelli is incisively right. 

Power of Majority

Concern
In Democracy in America, Alexis expresses his concern about possible tyranny in the absence of administrative centralization. Without a sole power controlling, or without a group of experts as Socrates might proffer, decisions made by majority can lead to disaster. Is it the case that the multitude are sometimes so blind and easily misguided by their own desire, that they are driven by emotions and impulse when they are making decision? Will it mean the common will can somehow be a problem? What will happen if someone thinks they can ignore the common will? Will it be the case that, minority will join the majority for multiple reasons even the minority realizes that the majority are wrong? I think I was exposed to a possible answer for all these question though a movie when I was young.
Movie <Malèna>
Malèna
Directed by Giuseppe Tornatore, one of "Home" trilogy 

    Compared to other two movies in this trilogy, "cinema paradiso" and "the legend of 1900", "Malèna" seems less known but appears to be more acute. It deeply touched my heart at my age of 14 and revealed the power of majority in front of my eyes. I was shocked by the scene in the later part of this movie, which depicting a woman, the main role in this movie, besieged, insulted and beaten up by almost all the other women in that small town, when other man just silently stands aside and watches. The others beats her in the name of punishing the slut, when practically the whole town envied her beauty. But no one stops the fanatic multitude! What should we say? What can be said? In the case of the beauty, she is minority. She can not even fight back because she is facing so many people. She wants to justify herself but no one cares.  In the other case of the multitude, they hides their jealousy and selfishness under the mask of righteous judgement, along with the unintentional conspiracy of men, executing the power of majority. 
Get back to topic
    How bad the consequence can a awful decision-making majority result? No worse than an innocent woman beaten up by others. Hence, I personally think suggestions from experts are needed when the situation loses control, or so to speak, needed all to time to prevent that situation from occurring.       

Socialism and Free Will

https://www.quora.com/How-did-Norway-become-so-rich-despite-being-a-socialist-country

Often in class, the ideals of freedom or "free will" of a person have been rooted against "assurances" from the government in contrast. These assurances essentially create a safety net in most cases for the citizens, but the opportunity cost to this usually entails a reduction in freedom. Because of this, it is difficult to strike a perfect balance between the two within the modern society, and socialism in Norway (among others) is in many ways a prime example of a favorable approach to assurances over freedom of the marketplace, etc. While there are still capitalistic components in Norway's system, the higher degree of regulation of the economy and all its working parts utilizes much more restraint than that of many other states.

One of the more important points stated in the article was the belief that there is "a very high level of trust in Norwegian society, which makes a lot of things easy." The apparent demonstration of greater trust and dignity of Norway certainly contrasts with the views on human nature by Dostoevsky and Hobbes, and as a result it could be argued that socialism is possible because of this. However, there is obviously a strong variation among societies around the world in how cohesive they are/can be, which poses issues for a prospective plunge into a more socialist landscape. However, Dostoevsky would most likely agree primarily with the enforcement of socialist policies, as he feels that man would choose assurances of food, money, and material goods over free will. If this were to be true, would socialism be more beneficial when considering foremost the negative views on human nature of Hobbes and Dostoevsky?

Patriotism vs. Freedom?

The Patriot Act vs. the Freedom Act

On October 26th, 2001, President George W. Bush signed the USA PATRIOT Act into law as a direct response to the events of September 11th that same year. USA PATRIOT Act is a backronym (meaning that the name came before the words that the letters stand for) that stands for Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism. The PATRIOT Act allowed for "enhanced surveillance techniques" and increased domestic security measures. In 2013, Edward Snowden revealed the extent of the NSA's collection of phone records; he fled the country immediately thereafter. In the wake of Snowden's revelations, the USA Freedom Act (a backronym for Uniting and Strengthening America by Fulfilling Rights and Ending Eavesdropping, Dragnet-collection, and Online Monitoring) was passed by the U.S. Congress. For differences between the two acts, watch this video at ABC News.

What Would the Philosophers Say?

Hobbes probably wouldn't have many objections to either the Patriot Act or the Freedom Act. Aside from the fact that there could be a question as to whether or not eavesdropping would violate Hobbes belief that a man has the right not to confess, he thinks that a person's liberties are limited to whatever the commonwealth says they are. Rousseau could argue that surveillance benefited the common interest of its citizens. Locke would have more objections to many of the security measures taken by both acts; for example, wiretapping could be seen as a violation of private property. I would also be interested to know what each of these long-dead men would think of the names of these acts--the Patriot Act and the Freedom Act. Both "patriot" and "freedom" are loaded words and have the potential to generate strong feelings. No doubt this is the reason that the words were chosen first and then backronym-ed into long, convoluted names that necessitated the use of the rather colloquial "eavesdropping" over the more technical "wiretapping" or the general "surveillance." The Patriot Act was signed into law in the wake of 9/11, at a time when Americans felt passionately about protecting their country and when nationalism was rampant. Over a decade later, those feelings cooled to a lukewarm pride that primarily emerges on the Fourth of July or at sporting events. Once Snowden revealed the depth and breadth of the NSA's surveillance, many Americans were outraged. (Admittedly, some people did think that Snowden was a traitor whose head needed to be put on a pike, but that is neither here nor there.) When the Patriot Act was revised and made into a new act, it was given a name to invoke that most American of values--freedom! Does this mean that patriotism and freedom are incompatible? One classic American patriot would disagree with this--Patrick Henry, of "Give me liberty, or give me death!" fame.

Property

“The Conflict over Takings and Property Rights in China and Its Parallels with that in the United States”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2014/08/08/the-conflict-over-takings-and-property-rights-in-china/

In this article, the author compares the legal condition of “eminent domain and property rights” in the US and China. Since Kelo v. City of New London, many small business and real estate owners have been advocating against its decision and seeking for reform. Compared to the situation in China, the lower-class peasants and the poor have been suffered from no legal ownership documents and illegal expropriation from their local governments due to “economic development”. Although independent scholars and private owners call for less constraint on property and land seizures, while many Chinese officials favor less constraints since they can improve their performance and gain revenue by selling expropriated land and attracting new investments.

My Personal Reflection:

In China, the concept of “owning a land or property” is largely differently from it in the US. Nobody except the state can truly own a land and the ultimate right of owning any property is reserved by the state. If someone discovers a gold mine in his back yard, it belongs to the state even though the man bought his land and build his house on the land. Local government can reallocate farmer’s lands in a forceful way. In urban area, some people are forced to accept little compensations from the government for taking their property away, even they fight to refuse the offers. What is happening in China is ironic because 70 years ago Mao forced the rich to hand over their lands to the poor while now the poor has to hand over their property to their governments, who have deals with the rich developers.

Bringing Back to the Readings:

To Locke and Rousseau, the concept of property is so important that civil society is impossible without property. In Locke’ writing, he regarded right of owning property is people’s nature rights and the way to enact their freedom of doing more things. In Rousseau’s writing he even states that the “first man” who claimed his property is “the true founder of civil society”. To him, the right to own something make both the rich that want to seek for protection for their property and the poor that want to seek for equality, and thus leads to the agreement of creating government.

However, is the right of owing property not to be violating really critical all the time to us? Some authoritarian societies, such as the Nazi Germany and Japan in WWII, had created the most abundant commonwealths within a short period of time as the government has the power to step in private property and reallocate them. That’s said, individual should sacrifice their rights of owning rights and tolerate what the government do to their property for the sake of the whole society. Therefore the conflict here is, who should has the ultimate right of owning a property, the individual or his/her government? It seems like there is no a satisfying solution even in the most developed country in the world.