Why Is Atonement Is Wrong

Atonement is to compensate, amend or satisfy a wrong. Briony is the one responsible for the wrong act that needs atoning. A lot was running through this thirteen year old mind before setting out with this act. Firstly, she witnessed what seemed to her as sexual apprehension between her sister, Cecilia, and Robbie at a water fountain outside her window. After seeing her sister stripped down to her underwear, she misunderstood this as aggression on Robbie's part. As a natural human being, one feels somewhat duty-bound to try and look out and protect for her family, especially sisters. After this had her thinking about what was happening and how to reason it. The letter that she read from Robbie using a sex-crazed, demeaning language for her sister
The punishment of raping a girl is jail, and, she did not see for sure that it was him doing this immoral act. She did think of the consequence of her act because she wanted him away from herself and her family. Another consequence was giving Robbie a life in jail and no association with the outside world; by doing this he would not be able to fulfill his goal of becoming a doctor. The main consequence of her act thought is the guilt associated with the accusation being false. Briony did not take into consideration anything of that sort while performing the accusation. She had not witnessed with her eyes seeing Robbie raping Lola but was determined to send him to jail from her past ‘misjudgments'. Briony being able to make such a decision to affect someone else's life so drastically upon a notion and no concrete evidence is morally wrong. He was apprehended because the police took into consideration the thirteen year-old verdict without a doubt; she was apparently old enough to be able to make such an accusation. Clearly she was not mature enough to send him to jail because she was asked if she saw his face, and Briony lied. She wanted herself to be self satisfied and tried to get him into a place far away from her and her family, that being jail. The act was clearly immoral because it was motivated upon false judgments and the consequences were not thought about
Analyzing the consequences single-handedly of this situation, whatever everyone except Cecilia and Robbie wanted, who was the minority, was sacrificed for everyone else's happiness. Thus, the moral worth under utilitarianism is determined by its overall utility, making it morally right since the overall happiness of the majority outweighed the minority. The outcome was Robbie being in prison which meant that most will be happy with this situation; it makes everyone except Cecilia feel happy and at ease. Utilitarianism is therefore another theory of ethics that permits lying which is an immoral act. This is a very exclusionary and discriminatory approach to this situation that promotes no moral consequences of this