Morality In The Things They Carried By Tim O Brien

War is an event that can have an effect on even the strongest-willed soldier. One of the major themes was morality and the nature of morality. In “The Things They Carried”, there were so many traumatic events that happened throughout the novel. Over time, the soldiers were physically, mentally, and emotionally affected by the events that happened to themselves and each other. Being exposed to these horrific events, one will see how the soldiers’ morality goes back and forth with what’s right and what’s wrong. After reading “The Things They Carried”, you can see how in war, the knowledge of what is right or what is wrong is thrown aside. Obrien wrote this novel to show us how the war literally blinded them from morality. He makes you think that

He is saying that a true and honest war story is hard to tell because all of the unfortunate and painful parts are too upsetting. A relevant story related to morality is the one about Mitchell Sanders and the story he tells in “How To Tell A True War Story”. He talks about six guys that were out one night and were “pretty fried”. Sanders says they started to hear voices and it started sounding like someone was having a cocktail party. In the story, it reads, “"These six guys," he said, "they're pretty fried out by now, and one night they start hearing voices. Like at a cocktail party…Music and chitchat and stuff. It's crazy, I know, but they hear the champagne corks. They hear the actual martini glasses. Real hoity-toity, all very civilized, except this isn't civilization.” (TTTC pg. 46) Sanders continues and talks about how the people started hearing violins and cellos and someone singing.

After hearing all these noises, the guys lose it and begin to destroy the “cocktail party”. In the passage it says, “They get on the radio and report enemy movement—a whole army, they say and they order up the firepower. They get arty and gunships. They call in air strikes” (TTTC