The walking dead and western morality

I find The Walking Dead to be a rather interesting show to contemplate. After this past week's episode I was a bit surprised at the reaction that people had to Shane and the episodes ending.

[Note: I'll do my best to keep this spoiler free but something might slip out, so read at your own discretion.]



I like Shane. I root for Shane. I agree with what one of the shows developers said:

"Shane was right in most of the decisions he made... and I think that Rick's humanity is always his flaw. But I think that he understands now that Shane was right."

My wife constantly asks me why I watch the show (she doesn't like the violence) but I find it to be something of an interesting intellectual exercise. One that we might see played out in future seasons in the character of Carl. Given the events of the past two episodes, the question that comes to the fore for me is:

What is their basis for morality?

Carl has already begun to question the ideals of his elders. Being disconnected from humanities past due to his youth he is a much more open slate, morally speaking.

I think that, in the context of the show, Shane's character demonstrates the moral arc of Western society. He broke free of humanities historic moral underpinnings in such a way as to achieve what many would consider a very lofty goal; survival for himself and those he loves. In fact he goes beyond even that, working for the protection and survival of those he openly opposes (Dale).

The world has changed and he adapted to meet the realities and challenges of what was staring him in the face. Others were unable, unwilling or simply just a bit slower at making that transition and as such Shane, was condemned and more because of it.

People seen the future in Shane and recoiled at what they say, at what he represented. It caused people to question their foundations, to rethink their morality to greater or lesser degrees.

Is Shane what they will need to become in order to survive into the future?

Is what Shane became something to be fought against at all cost because the cost of such a transition is what, for the individual, is the sense of their humanity? In that sense, is Dale the canary in the mine shaft?

I look at these things and think of society and how we are driving forward on a wave of progress. Shedding our historical and cultural moral underpinnings in religion, we are striking forward into uncharted territory. Some look to the future and see glory on the horizon. Others look to the future and lament the loss of what they seen as what made man human.

Dale argues that there is an essence to humanity, a spark within it, that is not only worth saving but that must be saved at all cost, for if it were lost or extinguished humanity would lose its meaning. It would become nothing better than the monsters that hunt them. He looks to the future that Shane represents and laments, what he see's as humanity's fall.

Shane argues that to survive is the essence of humanity. That, while hard choices will have to be made, what they are is pretty clear. He's taken the path of utilitarianism, the most good for the most people. If that means that one boy has to die so be it, if it keeps his group alive; if it keeps them safe. Survival is what is paramount and anything that gets in the way of that needs to go, even if its what Dale would argue is the spark of what makes us human and worthy of survival.

We can see (to the extent that the producers will show us) this moral tug of war occurring in the characters as they try to come to terms with a world that forces them to question their previous moral assumptions. We see it in Rick wrestling to make a decision concerning Russell or when trying prepare his son for and shield his son from the realities of the world.

Carl however has none of his elders moral anchor points. He is free from society's past by virtue of not having been shaped by it. He is the scion of a brave new world whose "humanity" will be shaped by a world vastly different than that of his parents. There are some residual connections to the moral world of his parents as can be seen in his relationship with Shane and his father Rick at the end of the last episode but will that be enough to swing him towards Dale or was that the actions of a Shane in the making?

This I think we can relate to our present society fairly well. The young of western society are Carl. Dale is the world of their grandparents, while Shane and Rick represent the varying degrees in which their parents broke from that world view and have begun to shape their world free of society's historical religious moral foundations.

Its in thinking through such things that I see Dale as a tragic hero of a bygone age that, like Achilles, had to die in order for a new age of man to begin and like Dale I look forward in lamentation.