The Human Identity

               The idea of an 'identity' has come up multiple times throughout the semester. We have discussed the differences between our 'irl' identity, in real life, versus our 'internet identity.' We have discussed if a computer program could replace a person. We have discussed the ability to lie to oneself. We have observed a character Waldo that had multiple people behind it at different times still somehow had one one seamless identity. I believe the idea of a personal identity also comes into affect in "White Bear," and in fact we see the same key factor in both-memory. In "Be Right Back" Ash 2 is not the same as Ash 1, because he does not have all of the Ash 1 memories. He does not have any memory of sex, and he does not have any memory that makes him value his own life. In be right back, one of the most disturbing and confusing facts is that they erase her memory every day. Martha has no memory of ever filming that little girls demise, and she has no memory of all of the things that happened to her that led her to being that person who would do such a terrible thing. As she is when she is punished she seems so lost, so confused, and so innocent that it is hard to believe she deserves what is happening to her regardless of what we find out later on. I believe the reason we instinctually feel that her punishment is cruel and unusual and not Justice is because the person who is being punished does not have the same identity as the person who did the crime. In the same way that a robot cannot replace a person, Martha without her memories is not the Martha that deserves punishment.

There is an exercise in psychology and art therapy where you write down the things that you are. 

For example mine would look something like this:

Michelle Elizabeth Pleasant

• Psychology Major
• CBU Student
• Daughter
• Sister
• Friend
• Happy
• Funny

Without those things Michelle Pleasant is not the same. If A=B, i.e. Michelle = those qualities, than not-B cannot = A, i.e. a person without those qualities cannot = Michelle.

Therefore Martha, even though she may be in the body of a person convicted of a crime, cannot be punished for said crime if she has a different identity than the person that committed the crime.  

In addition the argument of Martha being different than the past Martha that committed the crime, there is also the argument against that crime in general. None of us are perfect, and that's part of the reason why our constitution bans cruel and unusual punishment. A punishment can be cruel or unusual, but not both. We fear humanity's capability of evil and thus watching something so frightening and yet so close to what we witness daily on T.V. and in each other we are immediately uncomfortable. 

"White Bear" is scary because it could so easily happen, yet it seems so primal and barbaric.