A class-to-remain-nameless was given a lecture today on the precautionary principle, which I in my limited understanding believe is the general idea of erring way on the side of caution when deciding policy for things scientifically unknown. In an attempt to accentuate the difference between "known" and "unknown," the professor capped the class with the following quiz:
"Jill is married and lives south of a large lake. Every day when her husband leaves for work, she takes a ferry across the lake to her secret lover's house. The ferry man is peculiar in that he has a no exceptions policy of only accepting exact change for the ferry ride; as a result, Jill has to bring exact change both for the ride to and the ride from her lover's house. Incidentally, her lover's house is a cabin in the woods, and in those same woods, there is a man named Butch who is known to murder people he finds int he woods after dark. One day, Jill is leaving her lover's cabin and realizes she doesn't have exact change. She asks the lover for exact change, but he doesn't have it. Jill can't stay at his cabin overnight as both she and the lover are worried the husband will notice her missing. So Jill walks to the ferry, but because she does not have exact change, the ferryman (knowing full well about Butch) denies her the ride. The sun sets, Jill attempts to walk back to the cabin but runs into Butch, who kills her in stereotypical fashion with an axe.
So, given that everyone knew about Butch (except for, perhaps, the husband), who is responsible for Jill's death and why?"
A. The Husband
B. Jill
C. The Ferry Man
D. The Lover
E. Butch
F. "Other"
So, put on your culpability hats and decide this one. Wait just a second and we'll reveal that...
In a class of 200 people...
All high school educated...
Perhaps registered to vote...
And therefore eligible for jury duty...
151 people said....
JILL.
That's 75.5%!!!!!!!! Over three fourths blamed a corpse for her own death!
18 said Butch.
11 said the Lover.
7 said the Ferry Man.
5 said the Husband.
8 said "Other," whatever the hell that means.
So (and admittedly, I'm apparently holding a severe minority opinion here) I'm gonna go ahead and throw out that the standard JudeoChristian ethicolegal system answer to the question "who is responsible for the death of the murdered woman?" is THE GUY WHO MURDERED THE WOMAN. Butch, in this case, just to make that clear. Sheesh.
And the justifications for blaming Jill for her own death were equally outstanding. They ranged from the standard rape "she had it coming" defense to the quasi-Victorian "an affair? She deserved to die!" logic. And in between were some attempts at incorporating the concept of precaution, that since she "knew" about Butch she is ultimately responsible for the outcome. Exciting. The two best responses, though, were the one that blamed the husband (He should have done a better job satisfying his wife; he started the whole chain of events) and one that tried to split the blame: "Both Jill and Butch are equally responsible, though only Butch is punishable." Yes, I suppose incarcerating the corpse would seem a little gratuitous.
I would like to think that at least part of this was a weird sort of gamesmanship, that the lecture had so put these students in the "look for unobvious answers" mindset that they were a bit duped into forgetting that the actor is generally most responsible for the act. But still, wowsers - this puts it over the top, very uncomfortably, for me. People apparently think this way, or are at least willing to submit quizzes that indicate as much.
(And if I'm just really off on this and not seeing why Jill is truly responsible for her fate, please, let me know. I think the most you can say about Jill is that she behaved recklessly, but when another agent is involved, you can't pin responsibility on her reckless behavior. Maybe that's just me).
No comments:
Post a Comment