Individual Morality and Ethical Principles in Stories of Holtman and Wallace
Morality is our individual way of distinguishing between right and wrong. “Calvin and Hobbes', a comic written by Bill Watterson, showed a young kid questioning whether to cheat on his test or stick to his beliefs.as well as Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird presents many characters with each their own individual set of morals. Moral principles define a person’s character and help them when making hard decisions. A person should always stop and think and let their morals usher them in all situations. Principals are made to be your guide down the right path in life.
Deciding to cheat on a test depends on your moral principles. In a short comic written by Bill Watterson, the boy Calvin is explaining to his friend how he was questioning to cheat on his test. Calvin starts to explain how “Of course most everybody cheats some time or other, people always bend the rules”. In other words, Calvin is trying to rationalize, make something bad seem good, cheating. Calvin himself is going against his own beliefs. He feels cheating is wrong and does not satisfy himself.
Many times in To Kill a Mockingbird when Scout, Jem, and Dill are all playing outside they would try to make Boo Radley come out. They know what they were doing was wrong but they’d always tried to justify their actions by saying “nobody could see them at night, because Atticus would be so deep into his book he wouldn’t hear Kingdom coming,”. To put it simply, Jem, Scout, and Dill knew no one would see them because it was night and that Atticus was too deep into reading for any noise to disturb him. In Both situations, one starts to question their respective principles. They know what they are doing is bad but whether they continue or not is up to them.
Calvin chose not to cheat because his morals were too strongly against it. On the contrary, Jem, Scout, and Dill always chose to torment Boo. In these situations you should listen to your morals instead of overlooking them. Morals help you make decisions. Don't try to rationalize bad choices.
In conclusion, when faced with any situation easy or difficult you should always try to use your morals to lead you down the right path. Holtman and Wallace forgot about the competition for a moment and helped a hurt stranger. If you live a life with no morals there are no limits on your actions. With no limits you may be hurting yourself and others on a journey to get to what you want. Fulton J Sheen once said, “Moral principles do not depend on a majority vote. Wrong is wrong, even if everybody is wrong. Right is right, even if nobody is right”.
