A comment on love and The Reader

[Brother Ramon]

To me, the murder of one innocent person is a horror beyond belief.
The mass murder of hundreds, thousands, or even millions is completely
incomprehensible. And I believe that those who can turn a blind eye to
it, have somehow hardened their hearts, to the point that they have
destroyed their humanity.

I watched "The Reader" (2008) recently, which is a portrayal of a
female Nazi mass murderer who confesses to writing a document that
puts hundreds of people to death, rather than reveal she cannot read
or write. She is not ashamed of her participation in mass murder, but
she is ashamed of being unable to read or write!

When a young boy first meets her, he falls in love with her, not
knowing her wicked past. The most incomprehensible thing in the movie
is that he retains his affection for her even after he knows what she
did! The writer of the story was completely unrealistic in this
respect!

To me, the only possible explanation for such a situation is that he
has fallen in love, not with her, but with the girl he thinks she is.
He has turned a blind eye to the fact that she is an inhumane mass
murderer who cannot love and who is completely unworthy of his love.
Or anyone's love!

So often that is the way of love. We fall in love with the person we
think they are, then comes years of heartbreak as we try to hang on to
the dream, and finally comes the divorce.

One must be very careful in one's choice of a partner, making sure
that one's choice is not influenced by wishful thinking, or a hope
that the partner will "change". Only in this way can we exercise our
inherent right to pursue happiness.

Brother Ramon