Must “American Sniper” Chris Kyle be seen as immoral?

Last updated on: January 26, 2015 at 10:57 am by Guest Contributor

Must “American Sniper” Chris Kyle be seen as immoral? 2015-01-26T10:57:52-06:00 Guest Contributor

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This is in response to so much that we’re now seeing on the Internet–and maybe especially amongst progressive Christian bloggers (such as Ben Corey)—about how “American Sniper” Chris Kyle must, by virtue of having done his job, be immoral.

It would have been wrong for Chris Kyle to have ON HIS OWN killed people. That would be murder. He, and his fellow soldiers, whether they were snipers or truck drivers, put the needs of others ahead of their own lives, and that is the very essence of both love and heroism. And we rightly honor heroes.

That of course is not the same thing as saying that all wars are just. Leaders make mistakes, and citizens have the responsibility to question the morality or need for any war. One could argue that the United States made either a moral or practical mistake by entering any number of wars. But the heroism of the individual soldiers who served in those wars remains exactly the same.

Non-violent means of political change is great, and should always be pursued. But non-violence is not a moral absolute. Gandhi is a hero, for standing up to British imperialism non-violently. But non-violence did nothing but encourage Hitler.

Without war, without the sacrifice of many, many, heroic soldiers, slavery would be legal in the Confederate States of America, and Auschwitz would still be in operation. To refuse to fight those wars would have been immoral.

Finally, out of necessity, soldiers don’t have the luxury of sensitivity. It interferes with their ability to do their job. In the same way, ambulance drivers don’t cry and fall to pieces at accident scenes, and surgeons don’t freak out when they cut a person open. Criticizing a soldier for seeming emotionally detached from his work from the vantage point of the typical safe American life isn’t fair. It is particularly not fair when that safe American life has been bought at the expense of many heroes’ lives.

Submitted by Unfundamentalist Christian Beth Williams.

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