In Black Mirror's White Bear, we ask ourselves is someone the same person if they do not remember what they did and if they should still be punished. We follow a woman named Victoria as she wakes up in confusion. She sees people videoing her as she questions them. She is then chased with a masked man with a gun. She runs and more videoing people show up as she screams for help. Eventually, this is all a show and she is chained to a chair to watch a news report about her and her fiancé killing a little girl. She has no recollection of this and feels shame. She screams for them to kill her. They erase her memory every night and let her relive horror and trauma everyday. Turns out, this is a "justice" park dedicated to torturing her. People come to the park as enjoyment just to video her suffering.
I think this is very wrong and horrifying. Yes, she did do all those horrible things to a little girl, but they should just take her to prison. She will have to live with knowing that she did a horrible thing and if she killed herself, then that’s her choice. Her fiancé must have felt some remorse to kill himself. I think we should have a choice even if we had made a bad choice in the first place. This perpetual cycle of torture is wrong even if she doesn't remember it. Also, if her memory was wiped and she has no memory of what she had done, then she shouldn't be punished for it. She is not the same person as she was before.
The question is if she had her memory wiped, would she do what she did again? Probably not, I think the fiancé was a big influence on her doing what she did to the child. Certain circumstances and certain people can be a big influence on what you do. I honestly think if you wiped her memory, her brain chemistry was probably altered. She could be a totally different person and live the rest of her life as a good citizen. It’s all in the circumstances and the people who influence you.
We do not just have memory wipers laying around, so is murderer who says they have changed really changed? I think so, your brain chemistry is going to be the same and if they really worked on whatever problems they had, they could possibly have changed. I am not saying that these people should not be in prison for what they did or cut their sentence shorter because they still did what they did; but I think if they are aware of what they did was wrong and want to change because of it, I think they can. They can live with just knowing that they have changed and I think that is important.
4 comments:
Living with the memory certainly is a punishment. However, as Javier pointed out, she did not help the guy who was fighting the man with the shotgun. She let him die. I think she should not be punished for something she doesn't remember doing, but I think she would be capable of doing the same thing again even though her memory was wiped.
I agree that certain crimes are circumstantial. No, that does not negate that a crime was committed, nor does it absolve the guilty of responsibility, but people definitely do react differently when different factors come into play. Watching this episode made me wonder if she was being abused by her fiance, or if he threatened her life as well. I thought this because in the snippets of her memory Victoria seemed to be a sort of comfort to the little girl, offering her reassuring smiles, and empathizing with her. The little girl even smiled back, but then again, she was with her future murders for months, so it's possible that she developed Stockholm Syndrome for Victoria, which is why she smiled back at her. I don't know, I just find it hard to believe that someone could do something so abhorrent after having comforted their victim without some other factors coming into play. Her fiance looked evil to me anyway and anyone capable of kidnapping, torturing and setting a child on fire would have had no qualms threatening to eliminate anyone who stood in their way. Assuming that this is true, with her own life, safety, and well-being threatened, it would not surprise me that Victoria filmed this crime to appease her fiance and ultimately save her own life. She could've been like that ex-Nazi who claimed to have just been following orders.
For the most part I agree that Victoria should have to remember what she did rather than have her memory erased. However I feel that her going through what the victim did would make a difference and allow to understand what she did and empathise with the victim which she clearly didn't do as she filmed the murder. I think this could potentially be the start of rehabilitation for Victoria if this was a one time only thing.
I agree with what you're saying. How can she possibly move forward and work on changing if she can't remember what she did in the first place? In the end memory is a very important part in realizing your wrongs.
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