Mary Todd's Portrayal in Gore Vidal's "Lincoln"

I may be alone in this, but I actually thought Mary Todd's portrayal in Gore Vidal's "Lincoln" was much more sympathetic than in the last two films. This seems to be the first film to acknowledge that she most likely suffered from a mental illness. The others just portrayed her as having all of these personality flaws without any explanation. Also, there was one bit of dialogue that really stuck out to me. Mary Todd is with the handmiaden who says something to the effect of, "The newspapers don't portray you accurately at all", and Mary responds "Nobody does" (this is all paraphrased). I thought that maybe this was an acknowledgement of how Mary Todd has been seen as unlikeable and mean, and viewed unsympathetically throughout history. Did anybody else think this? In any case, I found that dialogue to be very sad, and I felt sympathetic toward Mary Todd.

Racism

Miller seems overly defensive of Lincoln, especially related to matters of racism. He keeps pointing out that the term "racism" had not yet been coined in Lincoln's time, but does that really matter? Racism did exist, it just didn't have a name. I don't see the harm in pointing out possible racism of Lincoln using our modern language. A lot of people excuse prejudice by saying that the person was "a product of their time". Racism was widespread during Lincoln's life (and still is), but if there were people questioning it then, then why didn't he? I don't think the time period is a very good excuse (I know there have been discussions in class and on the blogs about this topic but I am just forming my opinion now so that's why I haven't responded to anyone in particular).

Is Lincoln a Radical?

To quote Angela Davis, "radical simply means 'grasping things at the root'". If we use this definition of radical, was Lincoln a radical? In a way, he was. Lincoln did abolish slavery-it can be argued that slavery is the root of racial oppression in America. Some would have simply advocated for reforming slavery so that slaves would be treated more ethically and given some rights as slaves, rather than wanting to abolish slavery as an institution. However, in most other ways, Lincoln was not a radical. He didn't seem particularly interested in ending prejudiced thinking against Black people (no, racism was not a term used back then, but it doesn't mean racism didn't exist and couldn't be identified). It makes me wonder why Lincoln was so opposed to slavery, yet he did not view Black people as equal and the Emancipation Proclamation did not grant citizenship to slaves.

Final Thoughts on Utilitarianism

While I can't bring myself to like utilitarianism, i do agree with Mill that intent is not the only thing that matters. Consequences do matter in some sense. You should always be accountable for the consequences of your actions, meaning you see what went wrong and apologize. However, when the consequences of something you did aren't what you intended, it does not reflect on your character or sense of morality.

Reaction to "The Civil War in 'Postracial' America"

When reading "The Civil War in 'Postracial' America" the last passage really stuck out to me. Foner describes a Paris monument dedicated to the victims of slavery. The inscription reads: "By their struggles and their strong desire for dignity and liberty, the slaves of the French colonies contributed to the universality of human rights and to the ideal of liberty, equality, and fraternity that is the foundation of our republic." I love this because it actually keeps the focus on the people forced into slavery and commends their bravery. I think that in America, we tend to focus so much on Lincoln being the savior of slaves that we don't focus enough on the actual victims of slavery. We should focus more on Black abolitionists rather than White ones. This is an example of the "white savior complex" commonly seen in the media (read more about it here: http://spectrummagazine.org/review/2009/12/07/hollywoods-white-savior-complex). Even today, we have to act like White people save Black people from racism instead of viewing Black people as autonomous beings who worked towards their own emancipation.

Utilitarianism and Young Mr. Lincoln

I really enjoyed the film Young Mr. Lincoln, and I think it tied into some of our discussions about morality. In particular, I was interested in the court scene when the mother was on trial. She could have saved one of her sons, but because she couldn't bring herself to turn the guilty son in, she chose to let them both die. Clearly, she was not a utilitarian. I'm sure in another situation, she would prefer to have one son alive then to see both die, but it seemed to be against her moral code to turn her son in. We could guess that she subscribed to more of a Kantian code of morality. She did what she thought was right even though it's consequences caused more harm then the alternative. I suppose that in this situation, a true utilitarian would chose one son to live and one to die, although I can't imagine many people would actually do that in the moment.

Sophrosyne and Lincoln's Pig

Lincoln said that he helped the pig stuck in the mud for his own benefit- not the pig's. But what if Lincoln hadn't done it for his own sake? Imagine if Lincoln saw the pig stuck in the mud and went, "Ugh. I really don't want to go help that pig and ruin my clothes. I don't even care about the pig, but I think it's the right thing to do so I will force myself to help it." This would be an example of the interpretation of sophrosyne that means self-restraint and chastity. Lincoln would be forcing himself to do the right thing, and restraining from the temptation of ignoring the pig. But Lincoln claimed that he did it because he wanted to. So we can assume his thought process went more along the lines of "I should go help that pig because it's the right thing to do and I want to act morally. This is more important than ruining my clothes." This exemplifies the true meaning of sophrosyne. I know that I am taking the story very literally here, and probably more seriously than it was ever intended to be, but I'm just doing that for the sake of understanding Lincoln's behavior in relation to the idea of sophrosyne.