The Lottery by Shirley Jackson: Reader-response Criticism Through The Perspective of Moral Relativism and Teleological Ethics

ANALYTICAL ESSAY

In the story of The Lottery written by Shirley Jackson, I apply reader-response criticism to analyze the story through philosophical perspectives. This is because philosophy can provide an explanation to understand fundamental truths about the nature of human thoughts, the world in which they live, and their relationships with each other. Personally, I also believe that philosophy can be a means to rationalize and provide a logical explanation of every decision made by humans and why every event occurs in the first place. Therefore, there are two philosophical aspects that I have reviewed which are the aspect of moral relativism and the aspect of teleological ethics. 

In the world today, there are ample cultures that possess individualistic and varying moral codes. These two aspects are acceptable within the people in their own culture. In this case, every culture believes that they are all different in many aspects. However, as human beings, do we even have the right to judge these cultures as ethically right or wrong? In moral relativism theory, a person cannot force his or her judgement using the standards of his or her own culture. Instead, one needs to understand the culture on its own terms. From the story, we discover stoning a person to death is a conventional practice of the townspeople. The idea of the ritual that has been performed annually in the story, is not solely because it is the foundation to the town’s existence and stability, but also as the continuation of connections between the citizens and their history to promote the growth of crops, and health for everyone. Like in other cultures, traditions have played an important role as they shape the way cultures exist and evolve within their world. Inarguably, traditions possess such abilities to bring one another together and be carried out because it has been passed from previous generations. The same goes for the ritual in The Lottery. If we see this fertility ritual through a moral relativism lens, we as the reader cannot alter its cultural context based on our beliefs. The townspeople have a great belief in this tradition as it is the backbone of the community, where it maintains the prosperity of people in the society. Like what the Old Man Warner has claimed that it was his seventy-seventh year in the ritual, and even the black box has been used before the old man was born. And this proves that The Lottery is an important tradition to the town's community that brings peace and joy. According to the text, “the boys run around and gather rocks. The girls talked to one another and the woman greeted one another and exchanged bits of gossip as they went to join their husbands”. “...surveying their own children, speaking of planting and rain, tractors and taxes” (Jackson, 1948). From these lines, we know that everyone in the town is very looking forward to this day. Regardless of its initiation, everything that matters is the perspective of the townspeople towards this ritual. The Lottery is merely a standard cultural practice to them, but those from the outside world may not understand or begin to know the importance of this tradition until they become part of the community. That is why it takes a profound understanding of oneself and other cultures to see the importance and conventionalism of specific acts.

Next, credit to the Appreciation of Ethics and Civilisation class, I’m able to exert my prior knowledge to understand this story from a teleological ethics viewpoint. Teleological ethics emphasize moral judgements on the effects of an action or a decision. If the effect of an action is positive, then the action is deemed morally correct. Conversely, if the result is harmful, the action is deemed morally wrong. To further this discussion of The Lottery, there are two distinct scenarios that perfectly depict each of the main branches of teleological ethics—utilitarianism and egoism. Firstly, utilitarianism advocates the action of a person that fosters happiness, or pleasure for the betterment of society as a whole; not for their own self-interest. This theory can be illustrated through the action of a sacrificial offering, where the prior motive of this ritual is to ensure their crops are plentiful and save them from disaster. The Lottery conducts withdrawing the townspeople’s names from the box and anybody who gets a paper with a dark spot on it, he or she will be stoned to death. The chosen one is basically being sacrificed for the good of others and how ironic that can be. Normally, a person who wins a lottery will receive some prize and be celebrated, but in actuality, the winner will be stoned to death by the townspeople as a reward. The villagers strongly believe that the sacrifice must be done for the greater good unless they want the entire society to be tragically ruined. Regardless of outside opinions, following this tradition produces plenty of good for the harvest season and having crops creates a chain reaction of improved wellbeing and provides happiness, and pleasure to the townspeople according to utilitarianism’s principle. 

Another branch that is in the same grouping as utilitarianism is egoism. Egoism is a moral that acts in a person’s self-interest. For example, Tessie Hutchinson who protests and accuses Mr Summers is being unfair to her husband, Bill Hutchinson, for not giving him long enough to choose the paper— “You didn't give him time enough to take any paper he wanted. I saw you. It wasn’t fair!” (Jackson, 1948). Realistically, nobody including Tessie won’t ever speak out against the lottery or argues the legitimacy of the ritual until they themselves or their loved ones are affected. This seems pretty obvious why Tessie would be very upset with the first drawing. As the rules go, only the head of each family comes forward to draw a slip of paper and whoever receives the black spot on it means someone in the family will be sacrificed. Unfortunately, Hutchinson's family is the selected one. That perhaps causes unhappiness to Tessie as she is more concerned about her own safety than her husband and children. Besides, when she knows only she and Bill will be drawn for the second round, she drags her daughter and son-in-law for her own self-interest to decrease the probability to be chosen and sacrificed— “There’s Don and Eva,:” Mrs Hutchinson yelled. “Make them take their chance!” (Jackson, 1948). In this scenario, we clearly can see that she doesn't even have a second thought to put her children’s life on the line or even to take a single consideration of her love for her children. Instead, she would rather save herself than protect her own children. Tessie’s behaviour right after the first round of the lottery is a strong indicator of egoism plays its role on her. 

On the contrary, outside the moral relativism and teleological ethics context, the ritual of stoning people to death is completely outrageous and nearly outdated as the ritual has lost its several aspects over the generations—the black box that is put into use during the ritual is not the real box from before and the lottery papers replaced for the chips of wood. In fact, none of the townspeople has the knowledge of why the lottery exists in the first place. According to the text, “The original paraphernalia for the lottery had been lost long ago...”, “so much of the ritual had been forgotten or discarded”, “at one time, some people remembered, there had been a recital of some sort, performed by the official of the lottery, a perfunctory, tuneless chant that had been rattled off duly each year; some people believed that the official of the lottery used to stand just so when he said or sang it, others believed that he was supposed to walk among the people, but years and years ago this part of the ritual had been allowed to lapse. There had been, also, a ritual salute, which the official of the lottery had had to use in addressing each person who came up to draw from the box, but this also had changed with time” (Jackson, 1948). This grim scenario entirely explains that the purpose behind the ritual might already be far gone and forgotten, and seems to be no end; no saving. Near the ending, Jackson mentions "Although the villagers had forgotten the ritual and lost the original black box, they still remembered to use stones." 

In conclusion, moral relativism and teleological ethics viewpoint indeed assist me to examine this short story. With the aspect of moral relativism as a key to understanding the annual ritual, I ultimately find out the reason it is being conducted. People outside the town’s society may perceive the ritual as morally wrong because it is not part of anyone's culture. The story, I believe, needs to be analyzed through moral relativism as it forbids any judgements that are projected based on standards of one’s culture. This knowledge can help readers to think there is no culture superior to another culture and facilitate them to see the reason why the sacrificial ritual is conventional in their society. Besides, teleological ethics unfold the extrinsic reason of the society and its people for making such decisions. Either it is to benefit everyone as a whole or solely to satisfy one’s self-interest. Therefore, philosophy thus contributes to our understanding of society and helps to see other cultures from different perspectives.