We spent a large part of our in-class discussion on Lilith’s talking about the morality of the Oankali’s actions toward humanity. They were described as immoral, amoral, devious. What I think Lilith’s Brood shows us is that what we, as humans, think of as absolute morals are actually incredibly slippery and ephemeral things.
The resisters reject living with Oankali because they refuse to mate with the Oankali, regardless of the pleasure it provides, regardless of the fact that doing so is the only way that they can propagate their genes. For them, to create half-breed children is worse than the possibility of never having children at all, to create constructs is unnatural, immoral, and the ultimate betrayal of the species. They refuse to be anything other than human, regardless of what human means. But as the years progress on earth, humanity seems to become something not really worth aspiring to, for no other reason than the fact that their existence is meaningless, and they know it. At one point, Tate admits to Akin “We don’t get old. We don’t have kids, and nothing we do means shit” (402). Eventually, the main characteristic associated with humanity becomes violence. Men rape, pillage, kidnap and kill. Even the more civilized members of Pheonix start using guns and resort to raiding other towns.
The resisters hold so strongly to this moral imperative that they not only kill others, but allow themselves to die. Many resisters with correctable medical conditions refuse Ooloi treatment, one of Akin's captors would "cut his own throat before he let one of those things touch him again," even though they could cure him of the ulcer that kills him (328). Since the Ooloi are so preoccupied with healing, they will, and biologically need to, treat anyone unwell they are presented with, and would therefore do so, even for a resister, yet none seek treatment. They feel they must hold their moral ground, and this makes them suicidal.
At this point, their resistance just isn’t worth it any more. They may be avoiding betraying their species in their minds, but they’re causing much more harm that the Oankali ever did, and for that reason, they’re acting more immorally than Lilith or any of the other humans with Oankali mates. Though clearly our biology tells us that it’s absolutely immoral to allow the extinction of the species, if being human means raping and killing other humans, then trying to propagate the species is itself immoral. Through this, I think Lilith’s Brood shows that there are so such things as absolute morals.