Obedience Is Acting Ethically Wrong

What makes ethical behaviors sometimes immoral? Obedience is one of the really good morals that everyone should have, one of the things that people are looking for in people around them and that parents wants their children to have. This valuable moral as much as it is really valued and wanted, sometimes is not the best thing to do; sometimes disobeying or saying “NO” is much better, but this does not mean that it lost its value and become unethical; rather it means that it is like any other thing it has both positive and negative ends to it. The effects of obedience were discussed in many articles and movies, some of these include but are not limited to: A Few Good Men, Opinions and Social Pressure by Solomon E. Ash, Obedience by Ian Parker,
Just Do What the Pilot Tells You by Theodore Dalrymple, Obedience by Stanley Milgram, Review of Stanley Milgram’s Experiments on Obedience by Diana Baumrind, and Disobedience as a Psychological and Moral Problem by Erich Fromm. Many experiments were also made to test and prove how obedience can damage and harm people’s lives easily. Obedience and Disobedience are two things contradicting each other, but both of them are right and wrong; Disobedience is not always the wrong thing as many people think, and Obedience is not always the right thing as the people also think. People believe that because Obedience is a good moral it is always right, but obedience can be as dangerous as much as it was taught that it is respectful when made.
Disobedience is not what the people think it is, it is as good and valuable as obedience and got both ends as any other thing, a proof on that would be the beginning of human’s life. It was revealed in the article Disobedience as a Psychological and Moral Problem, by Erich Fromm as he mentioned, “Human history was ushered in by an act of disobedience according to the Hebrew and Greek myths” (124). Disobedience might have been the first thing introduced to humans, which were Adam and Eve, without disobedience they would have not learned how to rely on themselves. This was also mentioned by Fromm in his article as he said, “Their act of disobedience broke the primary bond with nature and made them individuals…Man had to leave the Garden of Eden in order to lean to rely on his own powers and to become fully human” (124). Of course, everyone wants the people around them to obey and especially parents, but sometimes it is better when they disobey. Fromm supported this idea in his article by saying, “For centuries kings, priests, feudal lords, industrial bosses, and parents have insisted that obedience is a virtue and that disobedience is a vice” (123). Disobedience cannot always be the vice, sometimes children and even adults must disobey things that goes against their ethics and religion. Obedience might seem that it was the wrong thing in this situation, but since it has a negative end it must also have a positive end. Obeying was one of the things that many people grew up learning and knowing that it is the most respectful thing to do.
Even when sometimes it might not be the best route to take, but others taking this route would save you a lot. Sometimes people does not agree with what has been said, told, or ordered, but they do it anyway to avoid getting their parents mad or losing their job for instance. In the article Just Do what the Piolet Tells You, written by Theodore Dalrymple, he was a young doctor like any other. He used to work under a physician, whom he thought was not doing the right thing to the patients, but still followed her orders. Dalrymple mentioned it in his article saying, “I was, of course only obeying orders… I was never sure in any individual case that she, not I, was doing the right thing” (121). He was not as much experienced as her, but he, using his common sense, felt that whatever she was doing was wrong, but he followed her orders anyway to avoid the consequences that might come in return to going against her orders. If he would have gone against her, he might have lost his job. Like people who decide to obey to avoid the consequences, there is other who decide to obey just to avoid being wrong. Solomon E. Asch, had the same concept idea as Dalrymple, that to avoid the consequences people followed the others, even when they were confident that the others were giving wrong answers. It was mentioned in his article, “I am wrong, they are always right” (144).
People could also obey, because they do not think that people punished are worth a value, and thus they do not care about how these people could get harmed, as much as they care about following the orders. It was supported by Baumrind as it was mentioned in her article, “In the former situation the SS man or member of the German Officer Corps, when obeying orders to slaughter, had no reason to think of his superior officer as benignly disposed towards himself or their victims” (93). In addition to the articles, the same idea was supported in the movie, A Few Good Men. In the movie, the soldiers were accused of murder because they obeyed Jessup, their leader, orders’ and gave Santiago a code red. If they have not followed the orders, then they would have dealt with Jessup’s consequences for not following the orders, but would have not been accused of murder. Again, people follow things even when they know that they are wrong, just because they are afraid to go against the others. However, Obedience as much as it is sometimes a route to avoid consequences, other time it is a route that causes a person to deal with a lot of consequences, and facing a lot of problems. Obedience can sometimes cause a lot of problems, rather than help avoid problems. It can even put some people live in danger. In the experiment that was made by Stanley Milgram, where people were told to examine a student and every time they provide a wrong answer that are asked to shock them, was given a great example of how obedience can sometimes be vice. As it was mentioned in Stanley Milgram’s article, The Perils of Obedience, “The instrument panel consists of thirty level switches set in a horizontal line. Each switch is clearly labeled with a voltage designation ranging 15 to 450 volts” (78). Each of the people who did the experiment did not know beforehand that they will be shocking the students, and even when they knew, the did not expect the shocks to be deadly, which made the people feel that they might they are putting this innocent student’s life in danger. It was also mentioned by Ian Parker in his article, Obedience, which is a reflection on Milgram’s experiment that people were so stressed, even after knowing that these shocks were not real. It was even written in the article, “They go home having lost little faith in their friends and their families” (101). Each and every one of the subjects requested once to stop, or at least pause the experiment and check on the student at least once, but they answer that they always got was, “these are the rules, please proceed with the experiment”, which is so stressful for them. The same idea was also supported in Diana Baumrind’s article, Review of Stanley Milgram’s Experiments on Obedience, as it was mentioned, “Subjects were observed to sweat, tremble, stutter, bite their lips, groan, and dig their fingernails into their flesh” (91). People were so stressed, and besides these signs people were showing many more. It was even mentioned about one of the subjects almost having a nervous collapse. It was revealed in the same article being said, “I observed a mature and initially poised businessman enter the laboratory smiling and confident. Within 20 minutes he has reduced to a twitching, stuttering wreck, who was rapidly approaching a nervous collapse” (91). As it is proven by the articles in reflect on many subjects, people were seriously getting affected by obeying the orders given to them. A person with a heart disease or diagnosed with high blood pressure could easily pass out. Even normal healthy people, they can still get harmed emotionally; they would easily start doubting and thinking that anyone can harm them, like it was experienced by one of the subjects. Same idea was proven in the movie, A Few Good Men; Mathew Markinson, the officer who worked in Jessup’s office, said no to the code red but he was told that he should never question the orders. Because he was forced to do the code red, he committed suicide after confessing everything to Daniel Kaffee, the lawyer who was defending Downey and Dawson for the murder. If Jessup did not force him to do the code red, he would have not felt the guilt that lead to the suicide. Neither obedience nor disobedience are always vice nor are they always virtue, it depends on the situations. Sometimes it is better to obey and other times one must say no and disobey to save the people or the situation. Disobeying does not always revel that the person in disrespectful, and the opposite is right too; Obeying does not always revel that the person is respectful, but it depends on how one respond to the situation put in. Everything around is not either good or bad, but everything around is both good and bad.
Saying yes to everything might make one look better, but might cause a lot of problems. For instance, if Dalrymple decided to disobey the physician and said that he would not follow the order she has given to him, he would have easily lost his job, same thing with Adam and Eve; if they would have followed god’s command, they would have never learned to rely on themselves. Obedience as much as it is a good moral, it can put people’s life in a huge danger, as it was revealed in the Milgram’s experiment. Obedience causes more harm and problems than disobedience; most of the harm, damage, and deaths that happened whether in the articles or the books could have not occurred, if they people disobeyed the orders given and did what they believe is the right thing. Yes, obedience is a good moral, and people should keep teaching it to their kids and they themselves should keep doing it, but it should never be overdone. One could save a situation while dealing with a little bit of consequences, rather than obeying and dealing with a huge consequence. Overall, obedience which is what most people think about being a virtue and moral, can be immoral if used to avoid consequences, and only to avoid consequences, while putting a person’s life in danger, and disobedience which people think of as immoral and vise can save a lot of people’s life while dealing with less consequences, since nothing can
happen without consequences. One should never think that if he questioned a situation, that he is wrong, No, everyone should question everything before doing it, because from there they can decide whether to obey or disobey. Also, one should never be afraid to raise against something wrong and disobey; it is better to disobey and save lives and situations, than obeying and looking better. Never go with the flow, one should believe and do what he believes is the right thing, and not what the other people believe is the right thing to do. On the other hand, do not always disobey, one can also harm and ruin the situation for disobeying the right thing. The key idea to choosing between these two things is to think and decide based upon the situation put in, not based on the consequences that might come, what the people might think, or what the people are planning on doing. Disobedience can make one outstand, and be the weird person among others, but can also make one outstand between the other for doing the right thing that a lot of people did not do.