When you are surrounded by rape, murder, mutilation, and genocide how can you figure out morality? The conditions in the Congo that resulted from the total war taking place create a state of general moral ambiguity. Just as it is impossible to call one side good and the other bad during a war, it is often difficult to figure out what decisions are morally correct and what are abhorrent when war is taking place around you. This ambiguity is a central focus of “Ruined”. Mama, Mr. Harari, Fortune, and a number of other characters are all forced to make decisions in cases in which right and wrong are unclear.
Mama runs a brothel. With just this information, it would be easy for me to call her a bad woman. As far as I am concerned, prostitution is wrong and therefore anyone who causes or allows it is wrong. However, there is much more to the situation. Mama runs a brothel in a worn torn country where there is little opportunity for women. Prostitution is one of the best ways to make money. If she didn’t have such a business, Mama would have no business at all and likely be living on the streets. There is no safety or comfort on the streets of a war torn nation. She would be used, abused, and killed if she did not have a shelter and provide a service.
In light of this information, Mama seems less bad, but it would be hard to call her good. She sounds selfish and greedy. However, her brothel also provides food, shelter, and money to young women of the Congo. The young women she houses would be even more likely to be abused on the streets than she, and in all probability be forced to be sex slaves. They would be doing similar work in a worse situation. At least with Mama, these young women are properly fed and housed, and can have simple enjoyments such as their romance novels.
The specific instance when Mama forces Sophie to perform sex acts on Osembenga is filled with moral ambiguity. It seems harsh and wrong for Mama to command her so. Sophie clearly detests Osembenga. His side of the army did terrible things to her and her people. However, it seems likely that Osembenga would have raped and killed Sophie, and possibly the other women, otherwise. Does this make Mama’s choice good? I don’t know, it is unclear, and that is really the point.
Mr. Harari is faced with a difficult decision near the end of the play. He has the opportunity to leave, but only without Sophie. It seems cold of him to leave her in the Congo when she could be given the chance of a better life. However the aid worker says “I have to leave now.” Though Harari may be looked at as selfish, a less selfish act may not have been possible or practical. Had the aid worker left without him he could not have gotten Sophie to a safe place. Would anyone’s situation be better if Harari had stayed? I don’t see how. Perhaps he could have made a better effort to convince the aid worker to stay, or the get Sophie’s attention, but that may have just resulted in his being stranded in the Congo. Again, the most moral decision is unclear.
Fortune’s case is the most difficult to see the ambiguity. Beating and rejecting his wife after she has been raped seems clearly wrong. The rape was not her fault, and after it she needed comfort, not punishment. To us, Fortune was cold and cruel, a bad husband and a bad man. However, this may be the result of ethnocentrism. Fortune had the proper response according to the norms of his culture. This idea is extremely foreign to us, but we were not born and raised in the war torn Congo. We cannot really see things from his perspective, and must take that into consideration in making our judgments.
I think what it comes down to is that there is not good in war and that without experiencing it in the way these Congolese people do, we cannot understand it. Barring a small amount of horrific incidences, American soil has been safe from enemies. The threat of violence and abuse is not imminent. Therefore, morality needs to be looked at differently in the United States and the Congo.
