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Originally Posted by mark12_30
I would extend that to a diminishing, absence, or dumbing down of all the virtues; which is an indictment of society as a whole. PJ & co are simply members of virtue-free culture.
That virtue-less culture is not particularly modern. Disinterest in virtue has preceded the downfall of many great cultures.
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Originally Posted by SpM
I do not believe that society is any more or less dumb or any more or less virtuous than it has ever have been. We just have different things to be dumb and/or immoral about.
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I suppose (Shock! Horror!) I side with
Helen here. We may have 'different things to be dumb and/or immoral about' but morality & virtue are (or should be) 'eternal' values. The fact that we are confronted by new things/situations is simply a truism. Human beings have always been exposed to 'new' things & unfamiliar situations & always will be. But, as Aragorn points out to Eomer, 'a man must judge as he always has done'- ie, by 'eternal' standards of 'Right' & 'Wrong'. It does seem to me that the movie makers decided that they had best tone down the 'preachiness' of the book, & substitute 'pragmatism' for virtue in order to make the movies 'acceptable' to a 'modern' audience.