Billy Budd's Dilemma Billy Budd by Herman Mellville is an extremely controversial novel considering the dissent it has generated. The criticism has essentially focused on the topic of acceptance vs. resistance. On the one hand we can read the story as accepting Billy Budd's hanging as a necessary end of justice. We can read Vere's condemnation as a necessary military action, carried out in the name of maintaining order aboard the Indomitable. On the other hand, we can argue that Billy's execution is the greatest example of injustice. It has been asked whether Vere's conduct is right or wrong. In both cases, since Billy Budd is an ethical text, it is very strange that the emotion of guilt is missing. Billy Budd is the story of two murders. Billy kills Claggart and Vere (though indirectly, the decision is ultimately his) kills Budd. None of the killers demonstrate guilt in the form of remorse. For a narrative that seeks to place the reader in a moral and ethical position, it is ironic that the characters themselves do not display what would seem most ethical.... middle of paper...... Must Read The Story of Acceptance or resistance to an ethical dilemma is perhaps questionable. The point of the story may be to assert man's need to punish and retaliate with injuries through means that can be obfuscated. The reader may be shocked by Billy Budd's death not because of the seemingly unjust killing of a sympathetic character, but because of its illustration of a society falling apart; one that doesn't necessarily make sense considering human nature, but which is so closely tied to social systems that it's doubtful it could ever be changed.