This is maybe setting up a bit of an unrealistic expectation, but pasted below is an essay that I wrote a while back for a class. It's safe to say that most of the things I'll be posting on here won't be as long or as involved as this one is, but I kind of wanted to start this blog off with a bang.
Enjoy.
Hell Is Other Toys: An Existential Look At Toy Story
In the film’s opening, we see a young boy named Andy playing with his toys, and in his playacting, we are introduced to his favorite toy, Woody—a cowboy sheriff made of plastic, cloth, and cotton—and all the rest of his gang of inanimate playthings. But as soon as Andy steps out of the room, his toys spring to life—and not just life as some kind of vague, hypothetical byproduct of Andy’s pondering imagination, but lives in a very real, literal sense; vibrant lives, overflowing with authentic personalities unique to each individual. They walk and talk and even hold regular “staff meetings,” led by Woody, to discuss important issues that will affect their lives and their roles within their society—their society. So while these toys might not be human, they are by no means inanimate.
Woody’s life, however, get knocked on its side when Andy gets a new toy for his birthday: a state-of-the-art spaceman named Buzz Lightyear. With his copper-wire sound system, an LED “laser” that shoots from his wrist, and his push-button jetpack wing expansion, Buzz is superior to Woody in all of the ways that once made him a “cool” toy. Piece by piece, with decorations, posters, and eventually, even the bedding, Andy turns his room into a virtual shrine to Buzz Lightyear. And it’s not just Andy who’s treating Woody differently; all of the other toys who used to revere Woody, now look up to Buzz and treat Woody merely as they would any other toy. To add insult to Woody’s injury, this new toy is a complete basket case who deludes himself with the belief that he actually is the fictitious character he was based on. One night, Buzz accidentally gets knocked out of Andy’s second story window and it becomes Woody’s job to go out and bring him back safely.
However, after Woody leaves the room and tracks down Buzz, they find themselves suffering setback after setback, leaving them far from home. Eventually, they find themselves stranded with Andy’s next-door neighbor, Sid—a brutal and sadistic twelve-year-old who passes the time by tormenting his little sister, destroying toys, and whenever possible, merging the two. It is while trapped at Sid’s house that Buzz finally realizes, and is forced to confront his true identity head-on: he is a toy. It is then up to Woody to somehow yank Buzz out of his existential despondency, save him from complete, physical annihilation at the hands of Sid, and return the two of them back to their proper place in Andy’s room.
If we are to examine Toy Story and its relevance to existentialism, the first things we need to understand are how the toys’ issues relate to our own and what exactly we mean by saying that they ‘come to life.’ From there, we can examine some specific instances of existentialism at play throughout the film, specifically in regards to issues of personal responsibility. Lastly, we will take a look back through the film and ask ourselves why we should even care about what happens to a roomful of toys.
We, the Toy-People…
Let’s begin this section with a thought experiment in the form of a question. What would you call something that is rational and self-aware with the capacity for language, morality, and emotion? You might respond by either saying “a person” or “a human,” and while both of these answers would technically be correct, one is more open, while the other, more confining. In his essay, “Personal Identity and Life After Death,” author and philosopher, Jeffry Olen, illustrates the distinction between the two.
“Although we often use the terms ‘person’ and ‘human’ interchangeably, they do not mean the same thing. If we do use them interchangeably, it is only because all the persons we know of are human beings, and because, as far as we know, whenever we are confronted with the same human being we are confronted with the same person.”
He goes on to describe human beings as biological organisms categorized as Homo Sapiens. He argues, however, that, “The notion of a person […] is not a biological one.” So what Olen is saying here is that something other than a human could still possibly be considered a person.
He elaborates his point by defining a criteria by which he believes to be a reasonable standard for establishing personhood, saying that a person needs to be a being which is capable of rationality and self-consciousness, and not only has beliefs and desires, but beliefs about its beliefs. A person, by Olen’s standard, should also be capable of having moral responsibilities and the ability to treat others as members of the same moral community, as well as possessing the capacity for an open-form language system, and not just a closed-form, animalistic type of functional communication.
While so far, all of these points seem fair and reasonable in creating an uncontroversial common ground for what we may call personhood, one point that Olen brings up seems to have a serious fundamental flaw. This particular criterion states that “a person is a creature that we treat in certain ways. To treat something as a person is to treat it as a member of our own moral community.” The problem with this particular point should be quite apparent if we think back throughout some of the bleaker patches in human history, times when human beings—who would otherwise fit perfectly well within Olen’s person criteria—were not treated with the same level of dignity or the same rights given to other humans within that same community, and were therefore, treated as something less than a person. This is a serious issue, of course, but it’s one we will come back to later on. For now, we will take a closer look at the toys and see how well they fit within the established qualities that make up a person.
Let us begin with the rational/self-conscious criterion by addressing the film’s most pressing question: aren’t toys inanimate objects? Typically, of course, the answer would be yes, but the convention of the film proposes a philosophical burden of proof thought experiment—similar, in a way, to that of Russell’s Teapot or the Flying Spaghetti Monster—where, if all toys are actually conscious, self-aware beings who know that they are toys and also know that the purpose of a toy is to be an inanimate plaything, couldn’t they design their own active lives around this rule and only play inanimate when people are watching? The film insists a resounding, yes! (Even drawing on the fallibility of human memory as their defense, with the old, ‘I swear, it was just here a moment ago,’ gag.) While all of the toys have their own unique lives and concerns (Andy’s Mr. Potato Head doll vocalizes his frustrations with how rough Andy’s younger sister plays with him, and Rex, the plastic tyrannosaurus, shares his nagging fears and insecurities about being replaced with anyone who will listen), they are all crystal clear in their understanding that their primary responsibility—which they follow with strict, religious observance—is to be one of Andy’s toys. So while we could say that all toys are built with a particular essence in mind, the fact that the film portrays them as having unique personal identities unto themselves, means we are to believe not only that they are fully conscious and self-aware beings, but also that they fit within Sartre’s notion of existence before essence.
Let us next examine how well they fulfill the language criterion. While most of the toys—such as Woody, Buzz, Hamm, and Potato Head—all have the capacity and the ability to communicate through their use of open-form, spoken language, some of the other toys—such as Etch (Andy’s Etch-A-Sketch), and Sid’s ‘mutant’ toys—do not. Does this mean that since only some of the toys seem capable of speech, that only some of them can be said to fulfill the language criterion? Only if we would say that a mute person or someone who has taken a vow of silence lacks the capacity for language. With the example of Etch, while he does not speak because he physically lacks a mouth, he still communicates constantly with those around him by using his screen to write messages and draw pictographs. With the case of Sid’s toys, while their vocal silence goes unexplained throughout the story, they all seem to perfectly grasp the complexities of Woody’s uprising plan without any confusion or hesitation—and the Erector-Spider-Baby, in particular, shows Woody that he is fluent in Morse Code. So we can safely say that while not all of the toys in the film are active speakers, the lines of communication between all of them are open and free in ways that are not simply limited to accomplishing strictly functional goals, as say, the ‘dances’ of honey bees, or the sonic screechings of bats.
So they fit the language criterion, but what about their moral responsibilities? For the toys to be considered moral beings, they have to show that they are capable of more than simply not committing immoral acts—after all, humans can be said to be moral beings even though we often do things that are immoral. To prove that they have the capacity for moral responsibility, they would need to be able to show that they are “responsible for their actions in a way that other things are not,” and would be “subject to moral blame and moral praise.”
To illustrate the issue of moral accountability amongst the toys, we can look at the example of Woody in terms of his escalating rivalry with Buzz. After suffering the major blow to his ego that was the arrival of Buzz Lightyear, Woody’s determination to reclaim his former status as Andy’s favorite toy (as well as the clout and respect that came with the position,) leads him to hatch a plan to knock Buzz back behind the dresser with the hopes of keeping him out of the picture for the evening. His plan, however, gets out of hand when he accidentally knocks Buzz out the window instead, endangering him to the elements and leaving him unequipped to return to the room on his own. When news of Woody’s treachery gets around to the other toys, they form a lynch mob, declaring that this type of reckless, self-centered sabotage is unacceptable within their society. At this, Woody realizes that the only way he can be allowed to remain as a citizen of Andy’s room, is if he manages to go out and bring Buzz back safely.
We can see from this example that it was Woody’s pride and ego that led him to make his immoral decision. This, of course, would fit the model for moral blame. Next we see the outrage of his fellow toys who denounce Woody’s actions and pronounce his actions immoral. They are Woody’s moral community, and when their moral norms are violated by Woody’s actions, they demand that he somehow make it up to the community or face banishment, confinement, or worse.
So by all of Olen’s criteria, we can determine that, for all intents and purposes, and regardless of their factory-built origins, the toys depicted in Toy Story are indeed people. A brief analysis of their behavior shows that they exhibit a sense of rationality, self-consciousness, and self-awareness, as well as reciprocity and moral responsibility. They also have a clear grasp on language and its ability to help them express what they are internalizing. While their lives, as perceived by the humans of their world, might resemble the nature of the proverbial tree falling in the woods, their actions throughout the film, nevertheless, make them recognizable as people.
To Personal Responsibility… And Beyond!
Going way back to our opening discussion of Sartre, now that we know we can define these toys as ‘people’ and that their existence, as with humans, precedes their essence, we can now see how these toy-people measure up to Sartre’s ideas on personal responsibility. In the same lecture by Sartre that was brought up in the opening, he brings up some the various refutations that have been made against Existentialism—that it is a pessimistic idea that gives rise to inaction and immorality—and claims that these refutations run completely contrary to the core ideals of Existentialism.
Sartre cites the first effect of Existentialism as, “it puts every man in possession of himself as he is, and places the entire responsibility for his existence squarely upon his own shoulders,” meaning that people are solely responsible for all aspects of their lives. In one of his more recognizable quotes, Sartre goes on to state that since we first exist before we can know of a predefined purpose or nature, and that there is no pre-established, universal morality, that mankind is ultimately “condemned to be free,” and elaborates, “condemned, because he did not create himself, yet is nevertheless, at liberty[.]” This freedom he suggests is so categorical and so imposing, that acknowledgement of it can leave a person overwhelmed with feelings of, what Sartre refers to as, anguish, abandonment, and despair. Regardless of these feelings, however, he believes it is still the obligation of the individual to observe the responsibilities of their existence. Sartre also held that the most condemnably immoral acts are those of self-deception and of rejecting one’s personal responsibilities while blaming others or their circumstances for their misfortunes. On this topic, he said, “Those who hide from this total freedom, in a guise of solemnity or with deterministic excuses, I shall call cowards. Others, who try to show that their existence is necessary, when it is merely an accident of the appearance of the human race on earth—I shall call scum.”
Since we now have some insight into Sartre’s model for personal responsibility, we can try to cross-reference it against Buzz Lightyear’s own existential transformation throughout the film and trace his progress from a self-deluded spaceman to an honest, responsible, self-actualizing action figure.
As mentioned earlier, when Buzz first crashes down on Andy’s bed in his cardboard spaceship, he comes into consciousness completely deluded as to the actual nature of his being and identity. He imagines himself to be some kind of astronaut crime fighter—or “space ranger”—with the fate of the entire galaxy hinging on the success of his undefined, top-secret solo mission. He also believes himself to have the actual physical abilities that his superficially interactive features are based on—including, but not limited to, the ability to fly. If Sartre were to see Buzz at this stage, he would probably assume that Buzz was simply deranged or mentally incapable of coming to grips with his existence, and therefore, not relevant to the issue of personal responsibility—much the same way as a newborn infant.
However, in his time spent at Sid’s house, Buzz is forced to confront his existence head-on—for better or for worse. While sneaking through Sid’s house, he sees a commercial for Buzz Lightyear action figures on television. As the commercial describes each one of the toy’s features, Buzz silently responds by activating the same features on himself, stunned by the many indisputable similarities between himself and them. When he lifts up the flap on his stick-on wrist communicator and sees MADE IN TAIWAN embossed on the underside, it might as well read: YOU ARE CONDEMNED TO BE FREE. At last, the commercial brings the hammer down on his delusion by stating that he is categorically, Not a flying toy! This news comes to Buzz as an existential waking nightmare, stripping all the layers of meaning from the way he perceives his life and leaving him with what Sartre would most definitely refer to as his feelings of abandonment. Making one final, misguided attempt at preserving his delusion (or perhaps even as a testament of his undying devotion to his delusion), he expands his plastic wings and leaps from a high platform, sending himself crashing to the ground, where he just lies despondent and broken (literally, since his arm pops off upon landing.) Woody eventually finds Buzz in Sid’s younger sister’s room, dressed in a frilly pink smock and a lady’s sun hat, babbling the seemingly nonsensical gibberish, “Gone. It’s all gone. All of it’s gone. Bye-bye. Whoo-whoo. See ya.” Woody tries to snap him out of it, but it’s no use. Buzz’s sudden, profound realization of the full-scope of his responsibilities has left him with a soul-crushing burden. Racked with existential anguish, he resorts to self-mutilation, peeling the sticker off of his wrist communicator as a kind of personal rejection of his newfound freedom, expressing a sentiment along the lines of, If I cannot be what I wish to be, then I will simply choose to be nothing and no one. While awaiting his execution-by-rocket-explosion at the hands of Sid, Buzz vocalizes his despair—not at his impending doom, but at his lack of purpose, since he has already accepted (we could even say, chosen) annihilation as his personal end. “Andy’s house, Sid’s house—what’s the difference? […] I’m just a toy, a stupid, little, insignificant toy.” Woody responds by giving Buzz a heartfelt little pep talk—one very reminiscent, in fact, of the advice Sartre gave to his pupil when he said, “You are free, therefore choose, that is to say, invent. No rule of general morality can show you what you ought to do; no signs are vouchsafed in this world.”
At Woody’s Sartre-like nudging, Buzz decides not only to acknowledge his existence, but to embrace it. He overcomes his feelings of abandonment, anguish, and despair, and replaces them with a determined zest and optimism for his new freedom. Through their willpower and actions alone, he and Woody are ultimately able to escape from Sid’s house—a task which earlier seemed to the both of them like a circumstance far beyond the reach of their control. From then on, Buzz becomes so in-touch with the truer nature of his reality, that even as he is gliding Woody down to safety from the hundred-or-so foot drop near the rocket’s peak, he is able to acknowledge what looks, only superficially, like flying, and disregard it, correcting Woody, “This isn’t flying, it’s falling---with style.”
The Hazards of Not ‘Playing Nice’
While the toys in Toy Story can certainly be said to have a grasp on the concepts of their own personal responsibilities as well as their responsibilities to one another as members of their moral community, what reason do they give humans to treat them as members of their own moral community? In other words, what responsibilities do humans have over them if the toys never make their sentience apparent?
Way back, when we were discussing Jeffry Olen’s ideas on personhood, we looked briefly at one final criterion of his which seemed largely debatable in regard to the legitimacy of its inclusion with the rest of his points. It was his criterion which stated, “a person is a creature that we treat in certain ways. To treat something as a person is to treat it as a member of our own moral community.” Since, as we established earlier, there have been repeated cases of human beings throughout history being treated as less than persons by members of their own moral community, we can not accept this as a viable defining characteristic in determining personhood. It does, however, raise an interesting question, and it is this question that this segment will attempt to answer: what is the harm in treating people as though they are less than people, if we don’t recognize them as people in the first place?
To help us answer this question, we will turn to philosopher and theologian, Herbert McCabe, who, in his essay, “God, Evil, and Divine Responsibility,” broke down all of the possible varieties of human suffering, and separated them into two categories: natural evil (or, evil suffered) and moral evil (or, evil done). Natural evils are the kinds of suffering that arise simply from being creatures who are capable of suffering and who live in a material universe, and can occur completely independent of any external moral agency. Examples of natural evil could be someone stubbing their toe, getting struck by lightning, or getting eaten by a bear. With the example of the bear, McCabe would still categorize it as a case of natural evil because the bear is not eating the person out of any kind of bad intention, but rather to help promote itself by keeping itself fed, and thus, preserving its place in the natural order. Moral evil, on the other hand, can be seen in the conscious decision made by a person to treat another person, or other people, in a way that defies the expectations of their moral community—which is to say, an act that runs contrary to the perceived notion that people should, by nature and by virtue, be good. Clarifying the distinct difference between these two, McCabe argues, “There could not be a material world, developing according to its own laws, without evil suffered but there could most certainly be a material human world without evil done.”
So let us examine how these different kinds of “evils” affect the lives of the toys. To keep the comparison simple, we will use the examples of Andy’s baby sister, Molly, and Sid to illustrate these two forces at work. In the corner of natural evil, we have Molly, an infant who has yet to acquire the capacity for speech. In the film’s opening we see her standing, propped up against the railing of her crib holding Mr. Potato Head, then Andy walks by, tipping his hat to her and sending her into a fit of excitement, and she slams Potato Head repeatedly into the railing, sending his facial feature flying out across the bedroom. In this case, when Molly causes Potato Head to suffer, it is because her brain is still largely unformed and she doesn’t have any understanding of personal property or the fragility of toys; he could just as easily be a rattle, a sippy-cup, or even say, a pair of her mom’s glasses (which even if it was and she broke them—forcing her mom to have to go out and buy a new pair—it would still be a case of natural evil because the intention to cause her mother’s suffering simply wasn’t there). So Molly is innocent because she does not consciously process her actions with malicious intent.
Sid, on the other hand, who smashes, melts, dismembers, and blows up his toys, is fully conscious of his actions. He even makes stark jokes that show his acknowledgement of the similarities between what he does to his toys and torture—and torture is certainly what it seems like to the toys he “plays” with. Unlike the example of the bear that I mentioned, where the bear was able to benefit from eating the person, Sid’s acts of brutality towards the toys benefit neither the toys nor himself. McCabe makes this point, stating, “Whereas in evil suffered there are two beings to be considered, the one inflicting the harm and the one suffering it (for one what is done is good; while for the other, it is evil); in evil done the harm is done to the agent which causes it.”
So while Sid probably believes that his psychopathic treatment of the toys is just a harmless way of acting out his latent cruelty, according to McCabe, he is mistaken because he had not considered the harm he is doing to himself. McCabe elaborates on the nature of this self-inflicted harm, stating, “I do not mean by this that acting unjustly has a bad effect on me […] I mean that acting unjustly is a bad effect on me, it is a diminishment of me, just as not being able to rinse the clothes is a diminishment of the washing machine.” Thus when Sid’s wicked nature extends from what he believes to be inanimate toys to the way he treats his little sister, it is just a further progression of his own diminishing humanity.
So while we can safely say that it is neither wrong, nor evil, to treat inanimate objects as though they do not have the same rights as living creatures or persons, it is, however, wrong for an individual to project the qualities of a person onto that object and act out maliciously towards it. The reason for this is not strictly because it is bad for the object itself, but because it reinforces those harmful attitudes and behaviors in the individual who performs the acts, while detracting from the individual’s achievement of human virtue. In the end, the best bet is to treat everything—person, animal, or otherwise—with no less than a basic level of respect.
“See? They’re Right Where You Left Them.”
Although some of the issues brought up—such as the issues of personhood and the genres of evil—relied more heavily on interpretation, Buzz’s drastic transformation throughout the film bordered on an almost literal connection to Existentialism, even down to some of his lines (“Andy’s house, Sid’s house—what’s the difference?”). While it seems doubtful that the minds at Pixar Animation Studios would have created this movie with philosophers like Olen, Sartre, and McCabe in mind, the unusual nature of the world these toys live in, along with the deep and conflicted characters presented throughout the film, open up the story to many different philosophical concepts worthy of contemplation. With just the few areas we slid under the microscope, the film yielded enough information to, not only to support the questions raised by these philosophers, but also to provide them with some sufficient answers and insights. A further, more in-depth analysis of the film could likely produce an endless exploration of different philosophical themes, questions, and interpretations, from here to infinity… And beyond.
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