From the WSJ Opinion Archives
DE GUSTIBUS
Jack Bauer's Dilemmas--and Ours
Watching "24" as a primer on moral philosophy.
The current season of Fox's television series "24" began with a dilemma that will be familiar to long-time devotees of the program. A man's wife and child have been taken hostage by a terrorist. If the man does not help him carry out his plans, his family will be killed.
Yes, such a dilemma propels the show's pace and intensifies the dramatic ordeal. But it also points toward difficult ethical puzzles with profound implications for our current real-world moment. You don't need to watch "24" as a kind of primer on moral philosophy, but you probably should.
This season's opening predicament echoes the one into which the show's star, Jack Bauer, was thrust in the series' first season six years ago. Back then, the bad guys tried to compel Bauer, played by Kiefer Sutherland, to assist in the assassination of a presidential candidate. As a result, he was forced both to play along with the terrorists and seek a way to free his family. He succeeded, at least temporarily, in saving both the target of the assassination and his family.
In a variety of forms, the sticky situation with which the series began has formed the heart of the show ever since: Terrorist threats place American civilians and government officials in a position in which they must choose between conflicting loyalties. It is the show's genius, and the key to its enduring appeal, that its writers almost never lapse into thinking that these choices are simple. This is not to say that there are no right and wrong answers. But right and wrong are often only clear--especially to the characters, but even to the viewer--in retrospect.
This season, the kidnapping plot line is reprised, only this time it is the proverbial man on the street who is coerced, and he chooses compliance with the terrorists in the vain hope that if he upholds his end of the bargain, they will too. He does so oblivious to the consequences of abetting a terrorist plot that, as it turns out, results in the detonation of a nuclear bomb in the middle of Los Angeles. Fittingly, the father who made this possible is consumed by the blast. His son, meanwhile, only escapes because the family's mother refuses to rely on the terrorists' goodwill and instead calls in the authorities.
The lesson here is not only that appeasing terrorists is a mug's game. The father's feeling of duty to his family blinds him to the competing claims of his country--and his neighbors. He acts out of simplistic loyalty to family without due consideration of the effects. It is natural to try to save one's family under these circumstances. It would be monstrous
But it is not merely a question of choosing between family and a greater good; or--in other contexts that crop up repeatedly on the show--between civil liberties and national security; or between torture and human rights. It is a failing of our politics that these kinds of questions, in the real world, are presented by both sides as either easy to answer or unnecessary to choose between--or both. It is one achievement of "24" that it treats these tradeoffs as both real and difficult. They are questions that depend on the circumstances in which they are asked.
In another difficult moment from last week, Bauer was forced to choose between saving the life of a known terrorist and murderer and taking the life of a federal agent and friend. If history is any guide, viewers of the show will presumably be given reason to question whether Jack made the correct decision before this season is out. But the contrast between Bauer and the agent he had to kill to save the terrorist lies in the ethical realm: Much as he hates to save the bad guy, he knows that the terrorist may be the only hope of preventing even more murders down the road. The agent he kills, by contrast, is motivated purely by the desire for personal revenge.
All these episodes help the show to maintain a realistic moral tone. An enemy that rejects everything we hold dear about our civil society will inevitably force us to make compromises between competing principles and loyalties. The most interesting complications that ensue as a season of "24" unfolds are the moral ones. And the show's great virtue is that it never pretends that these dilemmas are simple or false.
Mr. Carney is a member of The Wall Street Journal's editorial board.
