Is Murder ever Right?
...about it while he was talking to Lennie. In the Webster’s Dictionary, malice is defined as the “intent to commit an unlawful act or cause harm without legal justification or excuse.” Most people think of “malice aforethought” as planning to kill someone with evil intentions. Though George may have had good intentions, this does not make killing right. He was not killing Lennie in self-defense; therefore, it was against the law. There have been cases in recent years where people were killed out of “mercy”; they were killed because a loved one or friend did not want to see them get hurt anymore. If this type of killing were legal and right, it would be done all the time. Euthanasia would be a common practice, even when a patient had a chance to recover, however slim. Yet, people who commit “mercy killings” are tried and prosecuted the same as murderers who kill for vengeance and with evil intentions. Murder is never right in any circumstance, because it is not man’s right to end a life. If it were, humans would not have been born with this innate sense that killing another human being is wrong. If people were allowed to make their own decisions as to who should live and who should die, there would be millions of fewer people on this Earth. It is because humans are born with naturally evil and sinful natures that there have to be laws to govern society. Otherwise, chaos would reign and this world would not be a great place to live. This argument against George may seem cruel to some people however, because they would argue a different side. George and Lennie were the best of friends. They took care of each other in their own special ways, despite the shortfalls of Lennie’s mind. It was apparent that George did indeed love Lennie. They were pursuing the American dream and they believed in it for each other, despite the fact that it would most likely never come true. George was faced with a difficult decision. He knew what the lynch mob would do to Lennie. He knew Curley, the husband of the woman Lennie killed, was a cruel and unfair boss, and that he was leading this mob. As his best friend, George couldn’t stand to see the innocent gentle giant, Lennie, die in this manner. It would torment him to watch Lennie’s anguish as he suffered for something he wasn’t even aware was wrong. In this day and age, Lennie would have pled guilty in court, with a plea of insanity. He would have been committed to an institution, and probably let live as happy of a life as possible. But this wasn’t a possibility at the time. So George got the idea, that if he was telling Lennie the story of their dream farm, and Lennie’s mind was in a happy place, he could then shoot him in the back of the head, and he’d die instantly. He was going to die anyway, he may as well die blissfully unaware and happy. Any person could see that this would be the merciful decision for George to make. Because he took care of Lennie and watched his back all the time, he couldn’t just let him be lynched when he was able to do something about it. George probably wouldn’t have been able to live with himself had he not killed him. Yet, at the same time, though the story ended with Lennie’s death, George probably wasn’t able to live with his decision anyway. Killing someone has a profound effect on a person, even when it’s an enemy during a war. When the power to take a life forever is used, that memory never goes away. When it’s a best frie...