A Dangerous Poll: Save your spouse or your child?

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masterjedi747

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This question came up last night, and inspired a surprising amount of debate and discussion, so I figured I’d throw it out here and see what people think. 🙂

Here’s the situation:

**You find both your wife/husband and your child dangling from the edge of a cliff. There is no time to speak with anyone, and you only have the option to save one of them. You know that the one you don’t save will fall to his/her death.

Which one would you save, and why?
Is there an obligation to save one over the other?

**In addition to posting your explanations, please also place a vote on the poll above.
 
…got a few interesting poll results, but no one wants to talk about it? :hmmm:
Of course it is an absurd situation… but surely someone feels more strongly one way?

I’ll go ahead and present some of the main arguments that were given on both sides… feel free to add on, counter, or respond to any of these arguments:

You should save your wife because:
You are joined in the sacrament of marriage.
Your duty as a husband is more to your wife than your children.
You would be able to have more children later.
Click to expand...
You should save your child because:
They would be able to live a longer life.
Marriage is ordered to creating children.
Your duty as a father is more to your children than your wife.
Losing a spouse is not as bad as losing a child.
You may be able to marry another woman later.
Click to expand...
 
I have two points:
  1. Who comes up with these crazy scenarios?
  2. Nobody here has done any serious mountaineering.
The general rule is, you save the person you can save. You base your decision on things like the weight of the person to be rescued and your ability to haul that person up (those who haven’t tried it can’t imagine how difficult it is), the distance you have to haul them and so on.

In other words, you have to play the odds.
 
What kind of poll is this??? People are giving reasons why one life is more important than another?? This is absurd. I love my wife for the role that my children cannot fulfill and I love my children for the roles that my wife cannot fulfill. I love them all 100%. I do not divide my love between family members.

For those who would save one over the other: You have to ask yourself what it is that is missing whereby you lack the 100% love for the individual that you would consider secondary.

When I married my wife I gave her 100% of myself and that did not lessen with the birth of my children. AND the gift of my children (which we are given stewardship over by God) allows me to give 100% of my love to each child.

This is not a dangerous poll, it is a senseless poll…Sorry but polls are opinions and I gave you mine…teachccd 🤷
 
masterjedi747 said:
You should save your wife because:
Click to expand...
You are joined in the sacrament of marriage.
Your duty as a husband is more to your wife than your children.
You would be able to have more children later.
Click to expand...
You should save your child because:
They would be able to live a longer life.
Marriage is ordered to creating children.
Your duty as a father is more to your children than your wife.
Losing a spouse is not as bad as losing a child.
You may be able to marry another woman later.
Click to expand...
WHAT??? I have less duty to my children than I do to my wife. WHO SAID THAT??? I can have more children later???ARE YOU KIDDING??? Ask anyone who lost a child if their next child “replaced” their loss.:confused: :eek: :mad:

My mother lost my dad and none of us kids can replace what was held in that relationship.

I just realized that I’m all worked up about a ridiculous situation that is resulting in ridiculous responses…
 
teachccd said:
I just realized that I’m all worked up about a ridiculous situation that is resulting in ridiculous responses…
Click to expand...
At least someone’s awake.😃

No one who has done any serious mountaineering would consider this situation anything other than comedy. Real life ain’t like that.
 
I can appreciate thought provoking threads/polls. But I can’t really answer this because there really isn’t a right or wrong answer. Would really come down to the situation and so on.

Reminds me of scenarios we used to get in Catholic High back in the late 70’s in Theology class. If you were in a life boat out in the middle of the ocean with a priest, doctor, prostitute, ect…and one of you had to vote one person out, who would it be and why? So, that’s where I am coming from…
 
vern_humphrey said:
  1. Who comes up with these crazy scenarios?
Click to expand...
…beats me. :whacky: But it started some interesting discussions on campus last night (and it was interesting to notice that the women almost overwhelmingly thought you should save the child), so I figured it might be worth throwing out here.
vern_humphrey said:
The general rule is, you save the person you can save.
Click to expand...
I think the situation is supposed to allow that you can save either one… but only one.

I guess you’re just supposed to tell us what your gut reaction is to making that split second decision. Some people can immediately give their answer and defend it; others are incredibly unsure, and would rather simply not give an answer.
teachccd said:
What kind of poll is this???
This is absurd.

This is not a dangerous poll, it is a senseless poll…
Click to expand...
It’s a serious question attached to an absurd scenario. And believe me, I truly considered not putting it in the “Moral Theology” forum… but it really didn’t seem to fit well anywhere else.

I called it a “dangerous” poll because, at least in my experience, the question tends to get some people feeling very, well… strongly about one or the other position. :rolleyes:
looks down at the next response 🙂
teachccd said:
WHAT??? I have less duty to my children than I do to my wife. WHO SAID THAT???
Click to expand...
Well, someone brought it up last night… I told you, it was a crazy discussion. :o

The claim was you have a duty to your wife as husband and a duty to your child as father… maybe one duty is greater than the other, maybe one isn’t. But if you had to chose, in an incredibly absurd scenario, what’s would your gut reaction be?
Simon_X said:
…I can’t really answer this because there really isn’t a right or wrong answer. Would really come down to the situation and so on.
Click to expand...
I mostly agree. But I guess the argument that got me leaning much more in favor towards the “you should save your child” reaction was this:

What do you really think your wife would want you to do? If it were you in her position, would you want her to save you instead of your son? Most people seemed to agree that both parents would tend to favor protecting the child rather than themselves. shrug :twocents:
 
masterjedi747 said:
…beats me. :whacky: But it started some interesting discussions on campus last night (and it was interesting to notice that the women almost overwhelmingly thought you should save the child), so I figured it might be worth throwing out here.

:twocents:
Click to expand...
Well, you seem to be having fun with this so enjoy. We all need a little diversion in our lives to the grim reality of things like child abuse, war, murder and the like. Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to “play” into your “reality” game…😃 teachccd
 
People who are calling it absurd and stuff, lol, yes it is, but at the same time, it’s a conditional proposition essentially, ‘if’. So regardless of whether it’s happened, happening or going to happen, it’s a valid question.

Of course we all know you love your wife and kids bla bla bla, but still, really tests people and doesn’t give them a comfort zone.
I answered Male - Child, it would be difficult, but I essentially think when I do get married, my wife would still want me to save the child and that marriage was essentially created for children, even though there are other things to it.
 
I wouldn’t want to be the wife of anyone who would hesitate to die for his child.
 
I would save our child. That is what my husband would want me to do.
 
A parent would willingly give life to the child. People who ask these questions are not parents.
 
Clearly, my child. My husband would demand it of me – indeed, I know he would be screaming at me to save my son as I approached them. As I would do were the situation reversed. A no-brainer. And as my husband and I are joined as one, I know this and would do as he wished.

I would not have known this before I became a parent myself.

Its how God made parents.

sojo
 
sojo said:
Clearly, my child. My husband would demand it of me – indeed, I know he would be screaming at me to save my son as I approached them. As I would do were the situation reversed. A no-brainer. And as my husband and I are joined as one, I know this and would do as he wished.

I would not have known this before I became a parent myself.

Its how God made parents.

sojo
Click to expand...
Try this – tie a rope to your husband, then take the other end of that rope up on the roof of your house and try to pull your husband up.

You’ll have your answer right there.😉
 
Which one is in a state of grace (to the best of your knowledge)? You then let that one go. If both are in a state of grace (to the best of your knowledge) then it does not matter which one goes.

The one who dies (given they are in a state of grace) goes to heaven. We have a moral obligation, especially as spouses, to get our other half to heaven. The loss would of course be devastating in this world, but knowing he was in heaven would be a comfort to me.

I am not able to have children, so I can only speak hypothetically about them. But the same assumption applies - if the child is in a state of grace, and my husband is not, I save my husband. And vice versa.

~Liza
 
lizaanne said:
Which one is in a state of grace (to the best of your knowledge)? You then let that one go. If both are in a state of grace (to the best of your knowledge) then it does not matter which one goes.

The one who dies (given they are in a state of grace) goes to heaven. We have a moral obligation, especially as spouses, to get our other half to heaven. The loss would of course be devastating in this world, but knowing he was in heaven would be a comfort to me.

I am not able to have children, so I can only speak hypothetically about them. But the same assumption applies - if the child is in a state of grace, and my husband is not, I save my husband. And vice versa.

~Liza
Click to expand...
Now there’s someone who is really thinking:) Why didn’t the rest of us think of this?
 
vern_humphrey said:
  1. Nobody here has done any serious mountaineering.
No one who has done any serious climbing would accept that. That’s not how it happens in the real world.

Try this – tie a rope to your husband, then take the other end of that rope up on the roof of your house and try to pull your husband up.
Click to expand...
Aside from the fact that it’s an absurd scenario – which I willingly admitted – when did mountaineering, climbing, or the roof of anybody’s house ever come into all of this? :confused:
 
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