Ethics Newsline®

Sissela Bok is Distinguished Fellow at the Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies, where she frequently comments on ethical issues in government, media, and public life. Her books include Lying: Moral Choice in Public and Private Life; Secrets: On the Ethics of Concealment and Revelation, and Mayhem: Violence as Public Entertainment. A member of the advisory council of the Institute for Global Ethics, she was interviewed by Rushworth Kidder by telephone on October 1 from her home in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Kidder: As a result of these attacks, what do you hope will change for the better in our country and the world over the next decade?

Bok: I’ve been very impressed to see the outpouring of generosity, and the huge effort people have made in New York, and in Washington, and elsewhere. The press, I think, has been very good in conveying the significance of this effort.

Stepping back a little, it would be very good if people began to think more carefully about what moral values are the basic ones, the ones we share. In our communities, certain basic values such as constraint on violence, on lying, and on breaking promises — and positive values such as sharing, and caring for the sick and the young and old — are recognized the world over. But they’re often practiced mostly toward one’s own group. What we need to do is to help people recognize that other human beings beyond one’s group matter as much, and that it cannot be right, ever, to kill innocent human beings.

When people say, “Well, my God tells me that I have to do this. I don’t necessarily mean to kill innocents, but my religion drives me to do this,” I always think of Immanuel Kant’s dry enlightenment comment: “Even though something is represented as commanded by God, through a direct manifestation of Him, yet, if it flatly contradicts morality, it cannot, despite all appearances, be of God.”

People need to join together — especially within their own religion — when their fellow co-religionists are carrying out atrocities, to say, “Not in the name of our religion! Not in the name of our God!” It’s always easier to say, “Our religion has been so misunderstood; there really are some good things in it.” That is not a strong enough message at this point. We also have to say, “Our co-religionists are doing things that do not correspond to our religion.” This is already happening in this country and abroad.

Another good thing that could happen — and I see some signs of it — is that in America, people could take the anomaly of entertainment violence more seriously. Children are exposed to so many messages — so many programs and so many songs that glorify violence. I think many parents were shocked when their children saw the September 11 terrorist attacks on television and said, “Ah! A movie! Cool!” We’ve seen so many people say, “This seemed like a movie at first.” Parents had to say, “Wait a minute — this is not like other explosions you’ve seen. This is not like all the war games you’ve taken part in. This is real.” We need to explain that violence is not thrilling when it happens — it is not entertaining, and should not be. If that shift is taking place, that’s important.

This film that was about to come out — the Arnold Schwarzenegger film, which was about blowing up the Twin Towers and was going to be called “Collateral Damage” — I’m glad he withdrew the movie. The phrase “collateral damage” is part of the problem. A number of countries, including our own, use “collateral damage” as a euphemism. For instance, if there is an attack on Afghanistan, and a lot of innocent human beings are killed, or wounded, or injured, the expression “collateral damage” is going to be one way of avoiding responsibility.

Kidder: What do you suppose causes individuals to overcome one of the deepest human drives — the drive to stay alive? What is it that caused the terrorists involved in these attacks to plan their own suicides this deliberately and chillingly?

Bok: I think there must have been indoctrination, perhaps starting early in childhood. In some communities now, the word “martyr” is used, and suicide is glorified. But that only seems to work if there is also a notion of the afterlife — of God willing this activity and providing benefit for you. It seems to me that that form of indoctrination is easier to carry out in societies where there is no free press.

In my book Secrets, I had a chapter on secret societies, such as the twelfth-century Assassins, who terrorized the Near East. I talked about bringing people into the group, and making them able to carry out atrocities that they would never have been able to carry out before. That often happens by asking them first to do some one act — of killing, for instance. Once that’s done, they’re in the group, and it’s very hard for them to get out.. But coming back to the question, I think this is what so many in this country are asking: How could people use themselves as weapons, and go against what many Muslims are saying is the view of the Koran, which is that suicide is always wrong?

Kidder: What do you fear might change for the worse in our country and the world over the next decade? What’s the downside?

Bok: The downside could be a polarization. Americans might get the feeling that there is so much hatred out there that they don’t understand, while others on the outside may find their hatred reinforced by forces whipping up antagonism. Some people are prepared to say that anything goes in war and in love. And, of course, neither in war nor in love can that possibly be true, if we just stop to think about it.

I do think that it’s a good sign that there’s so much more collaboration the world over, by so many organizations and governments. We have much more police effort in many societies, governments collaborating on information being passed back and forth, banks sharing information in new ways. That’s a very important and good thing. But the fear would be a growing polarization in the world, and violence that could spring from it, and other hostilities that could be exacerbated — as, for instance, between India and Pakistan, both of whom have nuclear weapons. So there is a real fear that this could lead to much larger conflicts. This is somewhat similar, perhaps, to the way some people say it was before the First World War, when tensions began to rise and yet nobody could have expected that a world war would break out.

I think Americans can be very good at resisting that polarization. There are many good forces here, in the press, in various religious organizations, in communities, warning of the dangers of polarization, and that is a hopeful sign. But if there is another attack, the terror could lead to emotional reactions that would be very damaging to the country. And of course, that’s what terrorism is all about — it’s about bringing about terror and making people self-destruct morally as a society.

Kidder: In the last three weeks there seems to have been an unprecedented introspection, a willingness to discuss deeper metaphysical and moral questions. Do you think that’s a blip that will disappear, or do you think something has changed here?

Bok: I think something has changed, at least for quite a while, because everybody could identify with the victims, and then ask, “What did I do with my life before this happened? Am I really prepared for this kind of eventuality? Is the family prepared? What can we do more?” We see many more families pulling together, asking what matters in their lives, what kind of life they want to be leading, what kind of person one might want to be, and what kind of community they want to live in.

I think that is a very important change. It’s not at all clear that it will last forever. But for instance, the general attitude of “looking out for Number One” has been shaken. A lot of young people, who may have thought that that was what life was all about, no longer take that for granted at all. The role of the press, the role of intellectuals, the role of communities is all-important in stressing what we human beings have in common.