Essay on Virtue Essay Example for Free

Essay on Virtue Essay For most religious people it is one of the main goals in their life to live after the guidelines of virtue and show behavior with high moral standards. Virtue means goodness, morality, integrity, dignity†¦ Everything that Randle McMurphy is not at the first instance in â€Å"One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest†. His character opposes all classic characteristics of virtue and roughly speaking he fails to survive in the end. Therefore is it important to be virtuous? I believe that although virtue is coming out of fashion in today’s culture, it is a necessary, daily element in our life. For most people virtue isn’t the â€Å"coolest kid in town†. If someone announces that they’re giving up on dating, spending money on nice clothes and to overall work on becoming a more virtuous person, one will be labeled as a â€Å"freak†; someone maybe too religious that has a screw loose somewhere. Being virtuous can be boring because you have to control and put yourself in the background in a time when most teenagers and adults live their life for the public. One will sit in a nice restaurant with a plate more like art than food in front of them, but instead of enjoying their meal and talking with their friends, people will take a picture to display on instagram or facebook showing other people how good their life is. Being wicked and a little bit crazy is a strangely attractive characteristic nowadays. Along the lines of â€Å"good girls go to heaven. Bad girls go everywhere. † In OFOTCN McMurphy is that kind of crazy, wicked person. Although he fails to fit into society, it is hard to argue that he is not polarizing, fun and strangely likeable. When Murphy is asked why people believe he might be mentally ill, he bluntly says, â€Å"Well, as near as I can figure out, its cause I, uh, fight and fuck too much. † A virtuous person would never say that. But coming from Randle, it is oddly witty and authentic. McMurphy is not the perfect example of virtue; he is the exact opposite, the how-not-to-do-it. Yet you feel yourself rooting for him, wishing that he will succeed in his life. Maybe because you see good in him even though you have to dig past a few layers, or maybe you are inspired by his pure love of life and spontaneity. In Addition his relationship with Chief shows true affection and care. For example when Randle is genuinely interested in Chief’s story and even asks him to run away with him. He builds a friendship and basis of trust where the Chief even reveals his ability to communicate. The amazing part is the fact that the Chief never spoke a word with anyone and acted dumb the entire time he was on the ward, fooling everyone. McMurphy brings a lot of joy and freshness into the sanatorium, although they’re primarily enforced with alcohol and women. He is unique and against all norms. If you’ve read The Catcher in The Rye, you know that McMurphy is someone who isn’t â€Å"phony†. But all his likeability aside, McMurphy fails to run away from the psychiatric hospital and even loses his life in the end. Therefore it shows us that it isn’t really possible to live in society without norms. Which brings us to the point that humans need virtue as an element in their life in order to survive. We need and want virtue in our life, so that we can keep things in order and live a happy life. There is an invisible book of rules that almost everybody knows of. Not everyone follows it, but it’s usually known in the name of â€Å"common sense†. For instance people know that it is hurtful to cheat on someone. Loyalty and honesty are elements of virtue and people live by their rule everyday. When you promise someone to do something, you have to do it or will be labeled as irresponsible and untrustworthy. You don’t have to say these things out loud because it’s common sense. Elements of virtue lie so deep in our culture that they’ve become everyday values and traditions that have formed a common code for society. Beside materialistic or selfish values, we need morals and principles that leave us with something more substantial than money or success. Virtue is something that is expected of everyone, yet not usually voiced. Someone who is against all norms usually doesn’t survive in society. The example is Randle McMurphy, who is a healthy and intelligent man. There is nothing stopping him from living a normal life, but his persona is so impulsive and difficult that it is very hard to find virtue in him. Therefore people are quick to judge him and label him as a danger to society. He gets send to the electroshock treatment because he acted impulsively and smashed a window in order to get Martinez’ cigarettes. Bystanders will describe this act as dangerous and violent and conclude that he is a threat. I think that McMurphy didn’t mean any harm, but failed to think twice about what he was doing. A virtuous person would’ve never smashed the window in the first place and therefore never gotten a punishment. We are imprinted with the knowledge that some things are right and others wrong, whereas those judgments are based on the concepts of virtue. But humans aren’t that easy and the way society understand this concept has its flaws. All humans are different in their personas and stories, but no one is better than the other. In OFOTCN everyone in the psychiatric hospital is very different from the other, but they each have their pluses and minuses. The nurses aren’t more virtuous than the patients, which is shown in the irresponsible behavior of Nurse Ratched that ultimately resulted in Bibbet’s death. But for society it might seem that she showed virtuous behavior in forms of honesty. It might seem unfair that those â€Å"Looneys† are locked up either in the prison or sanatorium because they don’t behave in an acceptable manner. â€Å"What do you think you are, for Chrissake, crazy or somethin? Well youre not! Youre not! Youre no crazier than the average asshole out walkin around on the streets and thats it. † McMurphy is the one to voice out that the people in the hospital are no less valuable than the â€Å"normal† people. It is ironic that especially Randle, who seems to be dangerous and aggressive, to say something that true and tolerant. We see that the patients have accepted and believe the opinion of the society. So has the hospital, that just strictly follows the daily routine, shocks patients if they’re not obedient and don’t put visible effort in genuinely helping them. Nurse Ratched says, â€Å"The best thing we can do is go on with our daily routine. † right after Bibbet’s death and McMurphy’s brain surgery. For society it is easy to say that someone is bad according to his or her moral standard and integrity. But not every person is born into a nice environment, a loving family or prosperity. There is much more to a person’s life that forms their character, way of thinking and thus value of virtue. We see that McMurphy is by no means a purely malicious character but a fun-loving guy who loves life. Yet his way of dealing with things put him in trouble and difficulty. It is very important to understand and have virtue in your life, because even though we often neglect open and excessive virtuous behavior, it is an unspoken rule in society to behave to some extent of common virtue. It is somewhat ironically contradicting and there is just simply no scientific answer to being virtuous because there are so many factors that play a role in someone’s behavior. Everyone is good and bad and the lines between villain and hero are sometimes surprisingly blurred. Humans are complex beings that can’t be simply categorized into wrong and right and many situations seem ambiguous depending on the perspective. That is why virtue is a great ideal but by no means a scale to critic.