Should People Be Held Accountable For Their Actions Essay Example

Should people be held accountable for their actions in life-or-death situations? People in life-or-death situations should be held accountable for their actions because they have control over putting themselves in these types of situations. Even if someone does something wrong out of fear, it is still wrong. This makes people believe that others should be held accountable for their actions in life or death situations.

The first reason why people should be held accountable for their actions in life-or-death situations is that some people make poor decisions, then continue to make them again. For example, the story “The Moral Logic of Survivor Guilt” by Nancy Sherman, talks about how soldiers experience survivor guilt, which is when they feel guilty about the people that didn’t make it or were injured. Sherman states, “But it is a comedy of errors. Any one of a dozen decisions made over a course of a two-month period and none of them really occurs to you at the same time. Any one of those made differently may have saved his life” (p 156). This person could have made any change in his poor decisions and he would have had to deal with the consequences. Another example is from “The Voyage of the James Caird” by Caroline Alexander. This story is about a person's first day on a voyage but he wanted to blend in, so he acted like he had done something like that before. Alexander wrote, “Even on this first, relatively easy day, the Caird shipped water, soaked by spray and soused by breaking waves” (p 180). This person should have been extra careful on his first day. This is because he hadn’t been fully trained yet but decided to do risky things that put him in a bad situation. This is why people should be held accountable for their actions in life-or-death situations.

Others may say that people shouldn’t be held accountable for their actions in life-or-death situations. They may think this because people don’t understand what they are doing in some situations. However, “The Moral Logic of Survivor Guilt” by Nancy Sherman shares that people that survive through these situations feel guilty for others. Sherman states that “High on that list of emotions is guilt. Soldiers often carry this burden home—survivor guilt being perhaps the kind most familiar to us”(p 2). She is using soldiers in this example, but it applies to all people. When they survive, they feel guilty and know that whatever they did was incredibly wrong. This is why people should be held accountable for their actions in life-or-death situations.

Another reason why people should be held accountable for their actions in life-or-death situations is that some people understand the possibilities of events that could happen. So, they should take the proper precautions to prevent events from happening. For example, in the article “Titanic vs. Lusitania: How People Behave in a Disaster” Jeffrey Kluger talks about how the captains on the Lusitania knew what had happened but took the risk either way. Kluger states, “Finally, there was the simple fact that everyone aboard the Lusitania was aware of what had happened to the Titanic just three years earlier and thus disabused of the idea that there was any such thing as a ship that was too grand to sink—their own included” (p 11). This shows that the captains and people on the ship knew what had already happened but they still took the risk. Another example is “The Seventh Man''. It is about a typhoon hitting a town. The boy asks to go outside and his friend gets swept into the water. The author states, “We’re in the eye of the storm,” my father told me. “It’ll stay quiet like this for a while, maybe fifteen, twenty minutes, kind of like an intermission. Then the wind [will] come back the way it was before.” I asked him if I could go outside. He said I could walk around a little if I didn’t go far. “But I want you to come right back here at the first sign of wind”(Murakami p 15). People should be held accountable for their actions in life-or-death situations because people don’t take the proper precautions to prevent these events.

Who pays the money for the equipment, and the workers? And how do the workers get treated? Well, the simple answer is everyone else that pays taxes. All of the people either don’t do risky things or do but take the proper precautions. The article “The Cost of Survival” shows the actual cost of the average rescues. The author states, “Someone has to pay for those rescues. The rescue of the family stranded at sea cost $663,000. That figure does not include pay for the rescue workers. Getting the caver safely to the surface involved 728 people”(Cost p 127). This shows that it is expensive to rescue people not even including paying for the rescue workers. Another story that shows this is “The Value of a Sherpa Life” by Grayson Schaffer is about rescue workers in the mountains and how valued their life is. Schaffer states, “[Do you] Want to know what a Sherpa life is worth?: You only need to review the numbers that I reported last year: lower pay, lower standards for rescue insurance, lower payouts on accidental - death coverage in general” (Schaffer p 218). This shows that the workers don’t get paid enough or are treated fairly considering their job is to save people's lives. So I ask again; who pays the money for the equipment and the workers? And how do the workers get treated?

Others may say that people shouldn't be held accountable for their actions because saving people is their job; they should expect things to happen. While yes, it is their job they should not have to worry about careless people. People should be held accountable for their actions in life-or-death situations because their poor decision-making puts rescue workers in dangerous and life-threatening situations.  The argument “The Value of a Sherpa Life'' by Grayson Schaffer shares an inside on the life of Sherpas and how they are treated. Schaffer states that “The answer isn’t decreasing, or ending, the climbing business on Everest; the solution is increasing the value of a Sherpa life. Because right now—despite what anybody may feel in their heart—the industry clearly values life on a two-tiered basis: Westerners at the top, Sherpas at the bottom”(p 5). This shows that almost the whole world puts Sherpa’s life at the bottom of the list. This is why people should be held accountable for their actions in life-or-death situations.

Should people be held accountable for their actions in life-or-death situations? People in life-or-death situations should be held accountable for their actions because they have control over putting themselves in these types of situations. Even if someone does something wrong out of fear it is still wrong. This makes people believe that others should be held accountable for their actions in life or death situations.