Superman Ethical Dilemmas

The following essay is about the popular culture icon, Superman, and how a Superhero with immense power can control one’s self. Superman started off with a grim background with the destruction of his home world and the loss of his new father on earth leaving him only with his earth mother. Having not a single person to relate to can leave a person lonely, meaning that superman was alone for a while even though he had a mother to care for him, Superman had no one that could relate to him. What Superman also teaches those who look up to him that people should not give into temptation and should, instead, stick to their moral values because someone cannot be themselves if they do not do what they believe to be right. Nowadays, the people of our
Superman may be faster than a speeding bullet, but he still is not fast enough to save everyone leaving him with the hardest decision of all. Superman in essence plays God with the people of earth since he cannot save everyone who is in danger. This ethical dilemma is the reason why there are some people who despise superheroes due to their role in choosing who lives and who dies. In spite of the fact that Superman makes these decisions, there are still people who understand what he is doing and will still stand on his side because they truly believe in him. Also in the 2013 Film, Man of Steel, Superman battles with the villain General Zod destroying a sizable chunk of Metropolis killing numerous innocent lives in the process. This battle leads to the controversy on whether Superman has a regard at all for human life. According to Heimbach, “There are nonetheless two main schools of thought on what makes an action right or wrong: deontology, which categorizes actions as good or bad in themselves, and consequentialism, which classifies each action based on its results. Essentially, the question for every superhero is whether the ends justify the means”, meaning that even though people were killed in the battle, the entire earth was saved from destruction(Heimbach). When having to make choices like these, it is a wonder that Superman still decides on being a hero. Most
There have been times when Superman had crossed the line and had taken a life. In one comic, one of Batman’s arch nemesis, The Joker, tricks superman into killing the love of his life, Lois Lane, which set the cape crusader on a dark path. As Narcisse states in an article,” The comics indicate that Kal-El's grief leads him to set up some sort of crime-free super-dictatorship so that no crime or unjust death ever happens again”, this shows that sometimes even the best of us can give in to the darkness’s temptation(Narcisse). However, this comic was just one out of the many incarnations of the hero meaning that almost every other incarnation of Superman exhibits him as the boy scout he is, and emphasizes his code of honor of not