The #MeToo movement brought needed light to the darkness of sexual abuse and assault, and underscored a dark principle of human nature: people will often try to get away with whatever they think they can. The public unveiling of sexual selfishness and other evils that typically accompany this brand of egocentrism invites all of us to consider what is good, and why we should do it.
Plato tells a parable of a man who discovers a ring that makes its wearer invisible. With this newfound power, the man kills the king and takes the queen for himself. The ring represents the ability to do whatsoever a person would like to do without accountability (visibility). The point of the parable is that a person will do whatever is in his or her self-interest if there is no accountability. J.R.R. Tolkien later borrowed the ring of invisibility metaphor, offering an alternative interpretation. The power of no accountability (invisibility) was supremely corrupting, but there was a source of goodness that would lead some to destroy the temptation to do wrong when no one was watching, and so [spoiler alert] the one ring to rule them all was destroyed in the fires of Mt. Doom. But what is that source of goodness?
