Why do we cheer the vigilante? Most people in America have grown up with comic book heroes as their faerie stories, fables, myths. I hope my sons ask me to sew a big red "S" on their blue T-shirts or tie my black bathroom towels around their necks and build a bat-cave in the backyard. It is my belief that children love these heroes because they want to perform the daring deeds; and, let's face it, the feel of the wind tugging the towel behind you is thrilling (this I know from my escapades as Diana Prince (...Wonder Woman, for those of you who had the misfortune to grow up uneducated about the comic book universe...). As adults I think the reason we love these heroes still is because they fight for justice in an unjust world, right the wrongs done by a corrupt and flawed system. Yet, they remain fantastic, outside the realm of plausible possibility.
What do vigilantes look like when they cross into plausible possibility? I began to really ponder this question when, a few months ago at the urging of one whose artistic savvy I greatly admire urged me to watch Boondock Saints. Sinful lifestyle aside, the character I found myself closely identifying was Willem Dafoe's, the federal agent battling between his duty as a civil servant to arrest the men murdering evildoers in the name of God or his desire to see them do more "good" as vigilantes than he could as an agent by allowing them to meet out the proverbial eye for the eye to the truly wicked and debauched.
I began to wonder, if there were a sniper, unsanctioned by any government, who used his training to take out rapists, child molesters, men who traffic in human beings, would I cheer him on or call for his arrest?
Jesus Christ said, "he who is without sin, cast the first stone." Cut and dried, black and white, we as ordinary citizens are not to pass judgement on our fellows. Also in Scripture, the sword is given to government, fallible and corruptible though they may be. But when the government does nothing?
Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a great man of faith, a true disciple of Christ. Many do not know that he set out to assassinate Adolf Hitler. Though I have little love for the characters of Connor and Murphy MacManus (Boondock Saints) I cannot condemn Bonhoeffer for his decision. Some people just need killing.
But where is the line drawn? In my small and uneducated wisdom I would say that when a person is globally recognized as evil any person can stand up and do the world a service, such as in Hitler's case. But in a world where truth does not exist? Where people say that ascribing words such as right and wrong is judgemental? Is it incorrect to say that radical, fundamentalist Islamists who seek to wage jihad on the rest of us until we drown in blood are evil? Pardon me for hurting the poor, murderous terrorists' feelings. Postmodern political correctness will be the death of us all.
Unless we take a stance ...and when words fail take action?
When it is permissible to be the judge, jury and executioner, if ever? If the man I love were wrongfully taken from me, or my sister brutalized, and the government did nothing am I then allowed to dole out justice? Do we wait until the judicial system fails us and then take matters into our own hands? Do we allow the governments of our postmodern world to turn a blind eye to evil while a foreign wolf begins to devour all around it? When the government lays down the sword it has been given by God, are we ever allowed to take it up? For indeed... Some people need killing.
I do not claim wisdom or knowledge. I do not know the answers to these questions. All I do know is that I as a godly woman would be compelled to live by the laws of this beloved land, even if the judicial system failed me. If another like Hitler arose I as a godly woman would pray for his death. Somewhere in the vast gulf that stretches between these degrees of evil I believe a line can be drawn.
But where ... when?
*Disclaimer: It is my belief that radical, fundamental Islam is a threat to freedom, liberty and everything good that America was founded upon. I bear no ill will towards individual Muslims. I do recognize that there are many peace loving, moderate Muslims. This opinion I express with the freedom that comes with the first amendment*
No comments:
Post a Comment