An accusation of evil

This news story from September 7 features quotes from former Alaska Governor and Vice Presidential Republican nominee Sarah Palin complaining of something she considers evil.
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2009/09/07/palin-calls-news-org-heartless-and-selfish/

Despite her claim that the image should be "sacred," we shouldn't lose sight of the fact that death is a part of life. In his article "Ideals of Human Excellence and Preserving the Natural Environment," Thomas E. Hill, Jr. argued that refusing to accept aspects of ourselves, including similarities to animals, can lead to troublesome and troubled attitudes, originating from their lack of humility and honesty.

Palin, as many politicians do of other acts, condemned the act as selfish. The "problem" with using selfishness as a measure of good and evil is that almost everyone acts selfishly. To condemn some for a common fault is hypocritical and leads to self-righteousness rather than self-improvement.

In explaining the action of the Associated Press in a way that declared she knew what its motivation was (a very morally dangerous thing to do as, obviously, no one can exactly know motivation aside from the actor, and external acts can have varying explanations and motivations), "exploit[ing] the tragic death of a true American hero," her emotional description tries to set the act as simple, wrong and thus deserving of condemnation.

Relying on emotion is a poor moral measurement as just about anything can be described in a way that makes it emotionally appealing (or at least necessary) or repulsive. Emotions also depend very much on what another person brings with him or her and so are not likely to convince those that feel previously feel differently. Convincing the previously-ignorant, especially with emotional terms, is neither difficult nor admirable, and the persuasion is (as the person could subsequently read an equally-bad or better argument from the other point of view) likely to be short-lived compared to a less-emotional or partisan argument. Trying to reinforce the already-convinced through simplistic methods doesn't deepen understanding but causes debaters to be more firmly placed in their weak positions.

The news media should inform, and inform as accurately, in a manner intended to make audiences understand, as possible. Showing that conflict areas involve deaths, and allowing viewers to see death, a part of military conflict, fits with this mandate. The idea that news products should never be disquieting or disturbing (and they too-often do self-censor) contributes to false understanding of reality, hampering citizen's ability, right and duty to make informed decisions in their self-governance.

Dying in service to your country and the people who placed you in that situation is hardly a private act. While the wishes of grieving family members deserve some consideration, it should hardly be the only consideration because in the real world important considerations frequently come into conflict.

Palin also declares that the fallen soldier was a hero, yet heroism involves both actions and motivations. We don't know Joshua Bernard's motivation nor all of his actions. I believe that in something as morally complex as military service, intention has to matter as do external conditions. There exists the possibility that a nation is in the wrong. While someone who has examined matters and come to the conclusion that the nation is in the right deserves to be respected (again, posting of truth is not disrespect) even if people disagree, there's no obligation to call the person a hero if you feel the actions were, regardless of intention, resulted in bad ends.

Of course, the idea that a soldier is always morally commendable simply because he fights for your nation is one of the worst types of bias and that mindset perpetuates warfare.

Given that an alternative interpretation of the AP's action was to inform readers, that death is part of life and the news and doesn't have to be seen as dehumanizing, to calling it evil goes dangerously close to the traditional definition of evil as being something that one doesn't like, from which point there can be no objectivity. The act doesn't fit my definition of evil as the photographer and decision-makers would likely consent to the idea of having their deaths reported on, especially (with a picture) if the death was of an unusual sort and especially if the citizens of a nation, through their actions, bore responsibility for it. Unless they wouldn't consent to it being done to them, they are not hypocritical and given that it's known that soldiers and wars will receive press coverage, hence soldiers aren't in a position of total privacy, let alone in the battlefield, the treatment was not dehumanizing. Rather, accuracy to the truth can, and in my view should, be viewed as a great form of respect paid to people's decisions.