Otto Priminger’s film, a courtroom drama called An Anatomy of a Murder, was probably pushing boundaries at the time of its release in 1959. Its story revolves around a murder committed by a Lieutenant in the US Military in revenge for the rape of the Lieutenant’s wife. The character of the wife, flirtatious, sensuous and adulterous, was far from the stereotypical model of the 1950s housewife, as was the character of the accused who was an unsympathetic, selfish man, given to fits of jealousy in which he may assault perceived rivals indulged by his wife, or his wife herself. Having these two particular types of people as the victims in this situation, so close as they are to the villains of the film noirs of the 1940s, would not have received the sympathetic identification of the majority of Americans at that time.
The courtroom scene, which lasts for well over an hour in the film, delves probably as far as it could into the details of the rape while still retaining a mass film-going audience of that era’s sensibilities. The outrageous word ‘panties’ is thrown around in the cross-examinations as they become an object of contention; what constitutes rape in law is discussed and a scientific exposition of evidence around male organ functioning is examined alongside the significance of this understanding constituting evidence. Its realism was stark, possibly off-putting for Americans raised on uncomplicated plots and characters, and perhaps this is why the producers cast the highly sympathetic, reassuring incarnation of Mid-West American values, James Stewart, as the small-town defence lawyer who defers personal judgement on his client and his spouse.
The film had a central message, pounded repeatedly like the judge’s hammer in the court scenes: what matters is the truth of the case. It did not matter that the female victim was flirtatious, liked to drink, was adulterous with the lieutenant while still married to her previous husband or that she may or may not have been promiscuous; what mattered was whether she was being honest concerning whether she was raped and beaten or not, and by whom. Nor was it relevant whether the defendant was a nice person, a war hero, a good husband or a control-freak given to jealous outbursts; what mattered was whether he was temporarily moved to insanity by his believing of his wife’s accusations to the extent that he would ‘in a haze’ go to a bar and shoot dead the alleged rapist. By objection and objection interjected by Stewart’s defence lawyer, provoked often by George C. Scott’s more worldly and manipulative prosecutor, this point is driven home in the movie.
James Stewart is the hero, however, it’s not clear by the end of the film that he’s done the right thing, and whether or not it is the case that he, at some point in the judicial process, has not compromised himself. This ambiguity is weaved through the fabric of the story. There is a clash of values and a clash of personalities, externally and internally. As Stewart’s character states at one point, ‘As a lawyer, I’ve had to learn that no human being is any one thing.’ The film represents a change from the clearly defined heroes and villains of previous decades to a less certain grasp of human behaviour and ethics: the assured axioms of previous generations encountering the moral relativism that was beginning to characterise modern life.
However, despite this novel injection of Modernism into the narrative, what the film still manages to communicate most powerfully is the uprightness and decency of the main characters. James Stewart, his legal team – a female middle-aged secretary and a formerly inebriated fellow-counsel – the judge and his ‘folksy’ manner all share a moral universe of good manners, an understanding of appropriate conduct and a coherent understanding of why they are all there in that courtroom. (They want truth and with it Justice.) Although, it’s clear too that this moral universe and its purposes are too threatened with collapse by the ambition of lawyers undermining the spirit of the law, the moral degradation of the regular soldier after becoming involved in foreign wars, in this case Korea, and the permissiveness of the new cultural order emerging.
Nonetheless, to keep the focus on the still pre-eminent reliance on traditional values of that period, it seems impossible that in such a society where issues were taken seriously and reasoned over maturely that the absurdities of Covid and the vaccination programme could ever have gained any form of widespread traction. The emotional maturity of the characters, their attentiveness and their understanding seems too large and their conception of human dignity just a little too sure for the kind of vulgar propaganda that the covid hysteria incubated in. Any claims would be scrutinised and debated and any fallacies brought to light. That’s how it appears.
Obviously, this is wishful thinking. The 1950s was the period of the Red Scare and there was as much or more intimidation to be ‘right thinking’ and pressure to conform to anti-communist principles as there was pressure to fall into line over Covid. The mass vaccination of polio was only a couple of years away when Dr. Alton Ochsner attempted to prove the serum’s safety by injecting his grandchildren with it. One died, the other spent their life in a wheelchair. This was not widely investigated or reported and the roll-out of the vaccine proceeded, despite warnings that an entire population was going to be inoculated with SV 40, the cancer-causing monkey virus. Priminger’s film was either sounding a warning or was already trying to offer a solution to a society that had become dangerously obsessed with satisfying their own appetites, dislocated from a shared Good and further splintered by a hermetically-sealed perspectivism.
Yet despite the failings of that time period, and undoubtedly it told itself a story that was partially untrue, there still existed a set of values and behaviours that were shared and could be conceived as ‘right’, or at least recognised common values that were wished for. The film could not have found traction with an audience otherwise. This constellation of right conduct, suspended in the dark subconscious of competing and chaotic human impulses, was a light to evaluate politicians, others and yourself. It provided a standard.
Currently, it’s quite clear that there is no society-wide subscribed standard, either that or standards have been lowered to the extent that they appear to have vanished. Take the Cass Report for instance. The practices and perceptions of many schools, businesses, clinicians, psychologists, medical workers and health services among many others (artists!) have been shown to lack any sort of credible basis. What has not been proven to be a lie amongst the claims of gender ideologists has been shown to be without any sort of firm grounding in science. In a polis with a shared standard, then journalists would report this fact, politicians would debate it and institutions, corporate or civil, would pause their explicit promotion and support to ensure that they were not guilty of disseminating and seeding harmful ideas among, what turns out to be in the vast majority of cases, vulnerable children. Yet making appeals to values such as truth, rigour, openness seems quaint to a culture that uses ad hominem fallacies as arguments and consistently appeals to emotions as a closing argument with no verdict that contradicts their position being accepted.
It is clear that lockdowns did immeasurable harm. It is now indisputable that the vaccines were unnecessary and dangerous. It is demonstrably the case that children have been exploited, retarded, even mutilated by the prescriptions of an ideology that never saw fit to actually question whether its presumptions had any standing in reality. Nevertheless, there has been a deficit of debate over what is egregiously obvious to any person who will actually spend a few hours exploring these claims. The problem may not be the absence of discussion; the issue might be a dearth of individuals who have the qualities of mind to accept a difference of opinion, to then investigate the question and then to be capable of actually having that discussion.
It may be tiresome to investigate all claims made by all sides in all the debates that rage like wildfire across the internet, however, can there be more important issues than whether your health is under threat or you are sacrificing bodily autonomy or that children are being sexualised or that a political order is being re-shaped in the name of a climatic hoax? It would seem to be the decent thing to do.
Decency is an important feature of democracy and society at large. It implies unavoidable duties for the individual and permits engagement amongst hostile parties on a territory that is mutually agreeable, making human the people on the other side and allowing for common ground and constructive debate that can lead to progress. When Margaret Thatcher was paired with a Labour MP upon first entering the House of Commons, she said that he was ‘one of those cheerful, good humoured socialists that I have always admired’. Decency allows the intangibles of trust, faith and empathy to exist as a basic unifying point of agreement even among those that are avowed enemies in abstract theory and practice. It is a social necessity.
It is stretching the truth to say that most people aren’t decent, because they are. But, in today’s world, are they decent enough? The Empire of Decency is sadly reduced: its depth and extension is less than formerly and its limit is often at political signposts that we have become all too familiar with. When someone says their pronouns, everything else they have to say is dismissed, even if it does have worth; when a person disagrees with mass vaccination or is Covid-sceptical, they too have their perfectly legitimate concerns discredited on all topics, not just the ones out of step with mainstream opinion.
It looks like the public are diverging into two streams of attitude. One being to exit dialogue on anything controversial; the other being to relentless criticise the opposing side on whatever accessible point available. Not one of these bearings is helpful in the long run.
There is no suggestion here of a ‘Kumbaya’ moment and that people give up their passionately held positions to hold hands and sing songs of unity while surrounding a glowing fire of agreed positions. The way covid-sceptics and anti-covid-vaxxers, or indeed anti-vaxxers and ‘conspiracy theorists’ (i.e people who think), have been treated is obscene, however, unless we can establish some sort of foundation for discussion, we will be on the path to a breakaway society. Perhaps that is not a bad thing. The nine million people who never took the Covid vaccination in the UK have probably lost all faith in its institutions are ready to welcome work arounds for education, health care, food, employment and currency. A new social order inculcated with our pro-freedom, pro-human values would be desirable.
But, although society is a multiplicity of plates all siding-up against each other, complementing and disrupting one another, and despite an alternative model being a welcome development, it is near impossible to have a social grouping as large as the disaffected anti-vax, anti-jab, anti-institution polity existing within an order where the majority maintain the opposite view. Something will have to give. There must be devised a modus operandi, accepted by both sides, and established at the grassroots level; otherwise friction between factions will be continually exploited by cynical social leaders to divest people of their legitimate rights and the power to shape their own lives.
Where is a good place to start? Decency is my suggestion. It’s not a nebulous word: basic approaches such as politeness, treating others as you’d like to be treated, a willingness to listen then agree to disagree without the need to try to take the debate into the sewer, a love of truth, fairness, goodwill and a respect for the human being would encompass most of its tenets.
This combined with a slight awareness of rudimentary philosophy when it comes to arguing may assist in establishing a concordat between disparate ideologies. The elementary philosophy in question being an undertaking not to deploy fallacies as a method of argument – always a sign of a scheming sophist who intends to exploit people’s weaknesses rather than connecting with their ‘God-like reason’. That would ensure decency be applied to the law, to journalism, to public communication, to social media, to private communication and to politics.
We must fight our political and social fights with vigour, but let’s keep decency for our general interactions: aside from its own inherent value, it has a persuasive power too. If we can channel a little more Jimmy Stewart, then we make less difficulties for ourselves and reach our goals quicker, more completely and with a clearer conscience than otherwise might have been the case.
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The people who refused the covid injections were mostly not anti-vaccines, anti-jabs or "conspiracy theorists" - whatever that is. I was not opposed to my fellow citizens, I was opposed to my corrupt government who lied and manipulated the people of this country into believing a falsehood. The government wants to have a schism in society and have worked hard to produce it during Covid. They bullied, shamed and marginalised the people who refused the covid vaccine or questioned the covid debacle and tried to incite most of society to follow suit. Our focus should not be on each other but on the perpetrators of this covid scam - government, public health and all the corrupt institutions that helped keep the scam alive. The people of this country deserve to know the truth.
Beautifully written piece. I agree wholeheartedly.