Gray Places In The Kite Runner

The world is a colorful place, to paint everything in just two shades is ludicrous. Baba often sees the world in black and white, he does not believe a gray area exists. He tells Amir, “there is only one sin, only one. And that is theft. Every other sin is a variation of theft.” (Hosseini, 17) This ideal leaves no room for the gray area, it oversimplifies every situation. I believe that most people live in the gray area, or at least I certainly do. Rarely do I deal with problems that are as clear cut as right or wrong. My personal belief is that every decision has its benefits and drawbacks. A good example of this is at school, whenever there is a fight I pretend not to notice and avoid it completely. I do not want to watch people fight, it is not appealing to me. A part of me would like to try and stop it, but there are too many factors and issues that prevent me from choosing to do so.
It seems to me that Baba views all sins equally. I cannot think of lying and murder as being on equal footing. Baba’s explanation of how the two are theft makes sense, but I think that one is significantly worse than the other. He oversimplifies how terrible one sin is to another, it does not make any sense to me. This quote is great if you have a clear situation where the right and the wrong are crystal clear, but if the situation falls into the gray area it fails to provide a suitable answer. I think the best example of this is Baba omitting the truth about Hassan being his son. Even with his idea about theft, he still went and sinned. Apparently the situation was dire enough that he ignored his ideals. His relationship with Hassan was in the gray area, there benefits and drawbacks to any decision he could have made. According to his belief he is as sinful as a person who has committed a heinous crime like rape or