The difficult choice

There is a Czech movie, Most (eng The Bridge), that tells us a story of a father. He has to make a different choice. He has to choose between his son's life and hundreds of strangers' lives.
The movie is quite enlightnening, as much as it is heart-wreaking.

There is a short version of the movie, that centers on that fact,


And here is a complete movie, that goes deeper into it and the consequences.



I suppose we all know what the right choice is. And still, shall we serve the family or the humanity then?

MTFBWY-All, and may you never have to face such a choice...

Thank you for posting this. It reminds me a little of Sophie's Choice, where a woman is forced to choose which of her children is killed. I watched the clip yesterday and have spent most of the last 24 hours considering it.

My answer was no problem for me, but giving an adequate justification for it has been challenging. I'm not sure I can manage it because it implies the grossed moral relativism imaginable.

I would, unquestionably, let the train crash. First I attempted to justify this to myself by simply saying "my duty as a father outweighs any other", but that doesn't really say enough. Then I decided that my son means more to me than all humanity combined, and I would happily sacrifice the lot if it meant he could live. But then I considered why "life" was such an essential quality. If every other human died and my son lived, would that be a good outcome? And extending this back in the other direction, would my son be happy (and be happy with me) to know his actions indirectly caused the death of hundreds of people? Would he be able to forgive me for making that choice?

I turned down the path of avoiding blame; perhaps the driver should have stopped at the red light, so perhaps the deaths of the hundreds of people would be on his conscience, rather than mine. Why should my son pay for the mistakes of the driver? Besides, all those people got on the train knowing trains sometimes crash. But as I say, regardless of finding some momentary justification of the action I think I'd choose, those deaths would remain on my conscience (and the conscience of my son) forever. So... I'd save my son, but I honestly can't give you a decent argument why. I love my son enough to kill 100 innocent people so he could live.

I guess this is one reason I'm not a bridge operator :lol:

And as you say, may none of us ever have to face such a choice. Thankfully such decisions are rare in the real world!

I'm kinda like you tzb.

Unquestionably, I would save my son also and then deal with the ramifications later. I have several reasons why but I hate typing too long on this phone.

I look at it this way: if the Force meant for those people to be saved then it wouldn't have put me in the position to decide its fate over my son's because I'll choose my family every time.

I suppose we all know what the right choice is.

I don't think it's a choice of right or wrong. It's just...a choice. There are consequences either way.

The much more morbid choice for me (as a parent) would be having to choose which child to save of the three of mine if I could only save one.

shudders that would be awful.

^ I mentioned Sophie's Choice above, I rewatched that scene while thinking about this and it still just chills me to the bone.

I read something a few years back about a "real life Sophie's Choice", during the war a Jewish mother was in the house with one of her daughters while her other kids were out playing. She saw the gestapo come up to the door and knock, so sent her daughter to answer. While she did, the mother ran out the back of the house, gathered up the other kids and fled for the border.

The daughter survived the camps, happily. But what a thing to have to live with - for both of them.

What a tragedy that would be. Made more difficult because he was at work, he had the duty to lower the bridge, and his kid should not have been playing there - it's his fault the kid was there to begin with!!! Though given the location of the kid, trying to save him might have ended up in both of them getting killed in the resultant crash anyway so..... in that regard he killed his kid as soon as he let him play on the bridge either way.

almost everybody is ready to kill completely innocent strangers for somebody they love. We wouldn't want them thinking we didn't love them....

now that would be cruel.

Willfully killing innocent strangers is not the same thing as not saving them from their doom that the Force led them to.

At least I don't think it is.

lol the force didn't lead them to die. "it lead" you to make a choice. You made it but don't act like it's not there.

It's not an inevitable death for them. Just an inevitable death at play. Which really sucks.

Also that wasn't the point. It was to evaluate your decision, lol.

How about this. Imagine the guy chose the strangers instead of his son. Looked on him one last time in the eyes and let him die. I wonder if he really and truly loved his kid for doing that.