I like movies for all sorts of reasons. One of the primary reasons is their ability to let me sink into an idea with a gentle but definite period of reflection. Having just rewatched Robert Redford’s 2007 film Lions for Lambs I’m in that reflective zone.
The backdrop for the movie is the Afghanistan war in the years after 9/11 but the focus is on what our responsibility is in relation to high level choices made in our name.
3 stories unravel as we watch the movie.
1. A senator tries to solicit a member of the press to help advocate a new military strategy
2. Two students who have enlisted to fight
3. A university Professor and a student discuss the student’s changed behaviour
These stories explore the tension between what choices are made in a non-combat civilian setting and their impact in an actual combat theatre.
The Professor/Student scenes explore the disillusionment with politics; about its self-serving nature, associated corruption and uselessness in solving its often self-made problems and what happens if we as citizens begin to avoid participating in it.
For many of us, responsibility for global affairs and regional conflict are the concern of politicians, generals, business leaders and associated journalists. We often see ourselves as readers and watchers of stories appearing in the media, but essentially we are outwith the choice and consequence matrix. But just because we are not actively involved at that immediate level, this does not mean we are not involved in the process as a whole. If we are lucky enough to vote, choose not too vote, or just collapse into cynicism, we are participating involuntarily. So it is wise to be discerning.
In discernment we can accept that political systems do incorporate corruption and self-centred grandstanding but at the same time, we can accept their importance in our individual lives. The puzzle today, is how to deal with the negativity without simply washing our hands of a system we can’t actually wash off.
We are blasted with information today which is often deliberately intended to provoke outrage, muddy comprehension and push us into fixed positions. Some is even designed to collapse trust in any information. Undiscerning conspiracy investigators would have us belief the information itself is always conspiratorial. In such a landscape, escape from any responsibility is seductive.
I won’t advocate Lions for Lambs being balanced, nuanced argument presentation but it does ask the audience to consider its own engagement with politics, journalism, war, and most importantly, personal responsibility for discernment amid engineered and non-engineered mis-information and perception.
Lions for Lambs is a phrase alluding to soldiers being sacrificed by their commanders for objectives dubious in their morality at times, but also ordinary civilians being sacrificed by those who we would want to tell us truth.
The movie is really asking its audience a simple question:
Are we willing to stay engaged amid complication, frustration and disappointment?
If not, there are still consequences to be faced. Disengagement is a political choice after all. And engagement does not guarantee better consequences. But, citizenship requires attention, and I’d argue discerning attention.
If Lions for Lambs leaves a message in its wake, it is that we can choose to be discerning lambs among less discerning lions. But we have to want to.
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