Children of Earth

This was written on breaks from editing.

Last night my husband and I watched the last episode of Torchwood: Children of Earth, a five-night miniseries concluding the latest season of a Doctor Who spinoff.

I couldn't sleep afterwards. TV is too stimulating for me right before bed. But more than that, the moral dilemma of the show haunted me. Is still bothering me.

In summary: An alien comes to Earth in 1965, demands, and is given twelve children. The children are orphans, and the whole thing is kept hushed up until the present, when the alien comes back and demands 10% of all the children on Earth, or the whole planet will die. The military leaders from around the world, gathered at the Prime Minister of England's office, say this is not a battle they can win, so the politicians must decide how to select and deliver the 10%. They settle on the underachievers, those who won't amount to anything, emptying whole schools in poorer neighborhoods onto buses and driving them away.

So, 10% of children die instead of 100% of children and adults. Good deal, right? I sure know I wouldn't want to have been at that meeting! The numbers seem, well, fair... the good/survival of the many over the misfortune/demise of a few... except if your children are the ones that must die.

Meanwhile, Captain Jack Harkness and his Torchwood team struggle to thwart both the government and the alien. Plenty of gadgets and excitement.

At the end Captain Jack must decide between a specific child and the 10%.

...

The looks that the mother of that specific child gave Captain Jack sent my mind chasing to another trade, one life for many, two millennia ago... what did Mary think, standing at the foot of the cross where Jesus was dying? How much did she know, or understand, about his death -- her only son's death -- that day? Was she angry at God? Or did she simply say, "Thy will be done" as she had when the Angel came and told her she was pregnant?

Weighing lives against each other, balancing, trading, the questions that arise brought back memories of college Philosophy credits... and made me really glad I am not God.