Analysis Of The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas

Using “Utilitarianism” by John Stuart Mill to compare the morality of the people who stay and the people who walk away in “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas,” by Ursula K. LeGuin it can be concluded that the people who stay in Omelas are morally superior to the people who leave. This is because “one person’s happiness, supposed equal in degree is counted for exactly as much as another’s,” meaning that one child’s happiness does not equal the collective happiness of the society. Omelas is a paradise, it is very unlikely that the people who leave will discover a more equal and just place. The world is littered with injustices, some seemingly hidden. The people who stay accept the inequalities of the society. They understand that their happiness is reliant on the suffering of the child. They are “capable of apprehending a community of interest between [themselves] and the human society of which [they] form a part,” proposing that even when they feel
Because they can see the inequality, they leave to a different place. Interestingly enough, they don’t break the law, simply abandon the society. Some people hold the belief “that any law, judged to be bad, may blamelessly be disobeyed,” while others believe “that no law, however bad, ought to be disobeyed by an individual citizen; only [to] be shown in endeavoring to get it altered by competent authority.” Even if one was to argue that the law was unjust, but according to the citizen’s morals they legally cannot break the law; then someone should have tried to alter it. No one ever tries to change the law or break the law it can only be assumed that it is a just law in the eyes of the citizens. The people leave of their own volition at night as to not be seen by the society. Leaving for their own selfish reasons, they wander into the night to avoid the people who now view them as selfish cowards who cannot face