|
Post by fjodor on Nov 2, 2010 20:12:47 GMT
Besides serious cases, there are also harmless white lies that protect people's feelings and joking lies and pranks. There's nothing inherently immoral about the act of lying. This is very true! ("Honey, that eggplant casserole smells absolutely lovely but there is something wrong with my stomach and I really need to lie down. Don't save any leftovers for me, I'll grab a sandwich if I feel like it later.") No harm done, feelings escape unscathed, next time make note to ensure no eggplant enters the house to avoid future white lies.
|
|
|
Post by Goatmon on Nov 2, 2010 20:39:50 GMT
She deliberately collaborated with the powers that be which run the court to incarcerate a being who had not, as far as we know, done any harm towards them or expressed ill intent. We don't know that the intention was to incarcerate Renard. They may have wanted to turn him to the Court's side. "He was... deemed a risk. By the court. We wanted to Lure him into the Court, but - we didn't think he would kill someone to do it. " Seems pretty clear to me. Also, the usage of "lure" suggests they were planning to trap him. He was not manipulated by the Court into accepting Coyote's power, as far as we know. All evidence suggests that he obtained them specifically so that he could pursue a romantic relationship with Surma, which suggests that Surma turned him down at some point. Uh, Surma deliberately tricked him into believing that she loved him, with the intention of luring him (In Anja's own words) into the court. That's not true. Reynardine had experimented with his new powers before possessing the young man, and knew that his actions would result in murder. He did it anyways. [/quote] That's actually a pretty good point. You may be right! But we don't know he possessed the animals first. He probably did, though, and decided to do it anyway. Love does make people do crazy things, sometimes. :/ But it's Surma (and the court's) fault that he thought she loved him in the first place. If he didn't believe she wanted him in the first place, I doubt he'd have gone to such lengths. What bothers me especially is that, because Coyote gave his word, they assumed they were safe from him. But instead of attempting to secure a similar promise from Renard, they engineer a trap to put him away. Bad form. >8(
|
|
|
Post by scyllarus on Nov 2, 2010 20:39:50 GMT
Good points. But there must be more to this bridge. I am pretty sure Coyote is powerful enough to make sure the Forest creatures stay away from the Court if he orders it so. And it was Coyote who created the divide (or so he says), but it was the Court who made sure the divide was made permanent. What we have seen sofar is that persons trigger the alarm as soon as they set foot on the grass outside the court, but robot could walk away freely with Shadow2. The way the bridge has been constructed with all those lights, it seems to aim at keeping the shadow people away. It does not seem to stop other creatures (there's no hidden trap that fries you when you step on it). And there seem to be a lot of TicTocs keeping an eye on the bridge as well, while we know that they are not under the control of the Court, or at least not as far as the teachers know. Lastly, it is possible to fly to the Forest, and back. And we just learned that Rey can fly, so the bridge is no requirement for luring him in. so, so far this seems to point to the idea that mechanical beings are capable of freely crossing. perhaps the bridge is limited to only "living" beings? although, coyote only said that the bridge was made on the court's terms, perhaps they did indeed make an agreement with him to allow limited passage over the bridge? although that brings up the question of why coyote would want to cross - after all, he separated the two places to begin with...at any rate, we can definitely agree there's something very important about the bridge. with regards to Coyote saying they all loved Surma: he specifically said "all the people of the forest, and there are many". He could refer to the shadow people or to all creatures, but in my suspicious mind he implies there that non-human creatures did not like Surma. Questions, questions, questions.... mmm, but right before he states "we are all sad." he must refer to himself, at least, in that capacity. he's definitely not a person in terms of being a humanoid and i don't feel that he would refer to the creatures of the forest differently based on body type. i would more readily believe he states that all the many people of the forest were sad as a clarifier - he's not using the royal "we," he's talking about a large number of forest denizens. i think it's only more supported by the idea that surma was probably also very attractive to etheric creatures - we've also yet to see a non-humanoid forest creature other than the three canines.
|
|
|
Post by Goatmon on Nov 2, 2010 20:44:52 GMT
Also, given how successfully she wooed Renard, she was probably very popular with the forest critters in general.
|
|
|
Post by fjodor on Nov 2, 2010 20:44:56 GMT
There's Jeanne's green guy as an example of course, but he's not contemporary. But you are right: we haven't seen too many forest creatures. The ones i can think of from the top of my head are Coyote, Ysengrin, the shadow folk, the fairies, en let's also count Ali and his parents. That's about it I think?
|
|
|
Post by Goatmon on Nov 2, 2010 20:50:28 GMT
Speaking of Ysengrin, I got to wondering why on earth the court would be more concerned with Renard when Ysengrin clearly is far more hostile towards them.
Then I wondered; What if this incident is what makes him so crazy-angry at the court?
|
|
|
Post by scyllarus on Nov 2, 2010 20:53:49 GMT
hey look everyone, a double post!
to those arguing morality:
i'm not arguing whether it was right, wrong, or whose fault it was on anything, but here's something i'm a bit puzzled by:
despite all the theatrics, eg, coyote's "one of my own, tricked!" and "renard was a threat" and etc, no one seems to be acting in a way that seems appropriate for "surma seduced renard and broke his poor little fox heart and the court was the big bad guy because blah blah blah." annie seems less than upset at the idea that her mother was, in short, a manipulative b*tch. mrs. donlan seems mildly uneasy at having to tell annie this, whether it's because there's more to it, or because she's telling surma's DAUGHTER that her mother was a terrible person. and reynardine...if i was him, i'd be nothing but furious with pain if this is the real story. yes, he's probably stuck at the court for killing a young man, but at this point? he's protecting the daughter of the woman who broke his heart. he doesn't even want to return to the forest, he even explicitly tells coyote that he wasn't happy with the kidnapping attempt.
this doesn't seem reasonable behavior for someone who has, because of surma, been imprisoned in the court for years. he's not even angry when he first sees annie and mistakes her for surma - there is only grief that surma is dead.
so while it may be the court's/surma's fault that he accepts coyote's gift and kills multiple peope with it, he does not act like someone who has been tricked. i don't think the court's/surma's intentions were nearly as terrible as many have implied.
edit: or not. jeeze, guys, that was some fast posting.
and see my first post about why ysengrin was a bad candidate.
|
|
|
Post by davidm on Nov 2, 2010 21:04:15 GMT
"This I did not expect." I expected it after reviewing bad relationship with Jones. (Surma is *different* than Jones)
None of this is simple black and white, the court and forest are in a bit of a "cold war" situation, there is a very real risk of lots of death and destruction and total war between both sides.
Look back at how a tree monster could come into court and perhaps slaughter some kids, and the protectors and robots could barely save them.
We who live in a world where billions are spent on nuclear weapons, fighter jets, spy agencies, etc are not in that great a position to judge both sides who see themselves at times fighting for their lives. (Eg forest with mechanical bird monster)
|
|
|
Post by evilanagram on Nov 2, 2010 21:06:38 GMT
We don't know that the intention was to incarcerate Renard. They may have wanted to turn him to the Court's side. "He was... deemed a risk. By the court. We wanted to Lure him into the Court, but - we didn't think he would kill someone to do it. " Seems pretty clear to me. Also, the usage of "lure" suggests they were planning to trap him. Or they wanted to lure him into joining the Court. But that doesn't mean they intended that he gain the power to possess others' bodies and kill someone. That was Renard's doing.
|
|
|
Post by Casey on Nov 2, 2010 21:21:57 GMT
Uh, Surma deliberately tricked him into believing that she loved him Uh, before you continue repeating this, could you please provide even a piece of EVIDENCE to support it?
|
|
|
Post by Elaienar on Nov 2, 2010 21:30:08 GMT
Uh, Surma deliberately tricked him into believing that she loved him Uh, before you continue repeating this, could you please provide even a piece of EVIDENCE to support it? Unless we assume that a) Anja doesn't know what she's talking about b) Anja is lying to Antimony c) Surma lied to Anja then it would seem to be the case that Surma tricked Renard into thinking that she loved him. Just my two cents.
|
|
|
Post by Rex on Nov 2, 2010 21:39:32 GMT
Speaking of Ysengrin, I got to wondering why on earth the court would be more concerned with Renard when Ysengrin clearly is far more hostile towards them. Then I wondered; What if this incident is what makes him so crazy-angry at the court? Why one and not the other? Because Coyote wanted to elevate Renard to godhood, since Renard is Coyote's favorite of the two. When Coyote split the Court and the Wood he promised not to interfere with their side. That's likely the only reason Gunnerkrigg Court is still around. You'd be a fool to allow the creation of a creature that could wipe you out just as easily as Coyote, but without the assurance of non-intervention.
|
|
|
Post by Elaienar on Nov 2, 2010 21:43:28 GMT
Speaking of Ysengrin, I got to wondering why on earth the court would be more concerned with Renard when Ysengrin clearly is far more hostile towards them. Then I wondered; What if this incident is what makes him so crazy-angry at the court? Why one and not the other? Because Coyote wanted to elevate Renard to godhood, since Renard is Coyote's favorite of the two. When Coyote split the Court and the Wood he promised not to interfere with their side. That's likely the only reason Gunnerkrigg Court is still around. You'd be a fool to allow the creation of a creature that could wipe you out just as easily as Coyote, but without the assurance of non-intervention. There's also the fact that we haven't seen pre-capture Renard interacting with anyone from the Court besides Surma. And while Coyote said he "loves humans", he could love humans in general and still hate the institution of the Court. He could even plan on destroying the Court for the good of the humans living there. That said, I don't really think this is the case. But it could be.
|
|
|
Post by fjodor on Nov 2, 2010 21:54:20 GMT
The way I read this page:
Court's point of view 1) if Rey is as powerful as Coyote, there is danger 2) the reason is because Rey never promised to leave people of the court alone 3) if Rey is lured into the court, there is no danger.
Questions 1) what does 'lure into' mean? Make him come to live in the Court of his own free will? Get him to enter the court so they can imprison him? 2) why would they be afraid of a powerful Rey? That he may attack Surma's true love or are there other threats? 3) why did Rey leave the young man's body to take Sivo's body? Why did he not run back into the Forest to reclaim his own body?
Two cents 1) I believe the Court's intention was to make Rey choose their side for good. Evidence: he is still alive (unless they actually attacked him and he made a narrow escape into Sivo's body, but that's wild spec material) 2) Coyote probably cannot break a promise, but he did have a score to settle with the Court, and counted on Rey's Trickster nature to help him with that. So from that perspective the Court was probably right to take action. But following that reasoning, they were probably also right to 'fix' the Annan Waters the way they did.
Thank you for reading my brain fart, off to sleep now.
|
|
|
Post by Rex on Nov 2, 2010 22:23:08 GMT
2) why would they be afraid of a powerful Rey? That he may attack Surma's true love or are there other threats? It'd be like having Coyote doing whatever he felt like to the Court. Renard IS a trickster after all. Good point about the true love stuff, since being madly in love does not make for sound/reasonable decision making (see taking a Court student's body despite knowing it will kill him). Man, you could come up with tons of scenarios to explain that. A simple one would be that he got cornered by Sivo and the Court's protector while escaping, and took the unsuspecting Sivo's body. Hmm, that sounds about right given Coyote's penchant for fun. He's got a whole other area over there ripe for mischief, but he can't do anything because he promised not to. That doesn't mean he can't give his powers to someone to do it for him. Cue endless laughs from Coyote.
|
|
|
Post by todd on Nov 2, 2010 22:30:58 GMT
One more thought. The Court (and maybe many of the readers) was probably looking at Surma's deception of Renard (and Jeanne's murder before it) as the only alternative to being wiped out by the inhabitants of Gillitie Wood. But was it?
I can think of at least two other possible solutions:
1. They could have tried talking to the forest-people and making peace with them, even making amends for the past trouble they'd caused that had angered the forest-folk.
2. They could have left the Court and gone somewhere else. By this time, the emergency that caused them to flee to the Wood is most likely over. (Indeed, I wonder if this is another reason why the forest-folk are unhappy with the Court - the humans in it stayed even after the trouble in the outside world had ended, becoming less like refugees seeking shelter in the forest and more like colonizers.) Of course, that would probably make it harder to continue their research into the etheric, but that might be better than staying near a forest filled with angry neighbors, and being led increasingly down the wrong path in their attempts to defend themselves from those neighbors. (And in light of things like the Power Station incident, the research into the etheric may have its own drawbacks that the Court faculty has blinded itself to.)
|
|
|
Post by Casey on Nov 2, 2010 22:37:10 GMT
Uh, before you continue repeating this, could you please provide even a piece of EVIDENCE to support it? Unless we assume that a) Anja doesn't know what she's talking about b) Anja is lying to Antimony c) Surma lied to Anja then it would seem to be the case that Surma tricked Renard into thinking that she loved him. Just my two cents. By that standard of evidence, Anakin Skywalker and Darth Vader are two different people.
|
|
|
Post by Rex on Nov 2, 2010 23:27:51 GMT
One more thought. The Court (and maybe many of the readers) was probably looking at Surma's deception of Renard (and Jeanne's murder before it) as the only alternative to being wiped out by the inhabitants of Gillitie Wood. But was it? I can think of at least two other possible solutions: Neither of those is reasonable, todd. Coyote has no problem with them being there or he would've never made that promise, and leaving just because the neighbors don't like what you're doing in your house is foolish. Especially after all this time. I think the real problem is that one side is perfectly fine with "it just does" as an explanation for things, while the other wants to know more about the phenomena around them. It's a fundamental disconnect.
|
|
|
Post by hal9000 on Nov 2, 2010 23:54:40 GMT
An angry-looking man knocks onto your door, holding a gun, and demands to know where your best friend is. Your best friend is in the next room. Do you tell the truth? Sure. And then I pick up the shotgun next to the door and put it to the back of Mr. Angry's head when he walks in. Problem solved, no lies needed . (not trying to argue against your point, just sayin) Unless we assume that a) Anja doesn't know what she's talking about b) Anja is lying to Antimony c) Surma lied to Anja then it would seem to be the case that Surma tricked Renard into thinking that she loved him. Just my two cents. By that standard of evidence, Anakin Skywalker and Darth Vader are two different people. Direct testimony is accepted in courts of law to convict people and send them to prison. That is to say, it's sufficiently good evidence to convince most people beyond a reasonable doubt. You have yet to provide a shred of evidence to support your theories to the contrary either, I should point out.
|
|
|
Post by paxjax123 on Nov 3, 2010 0:56:23 GMT
I'd just like to take this moment to point out that Gunnerkrigg Court is a webcomic.
|
|
|
Post by Casey on Nov 3, 2010 1:01:36 GMT
You have yet to provide a shred of evidence to support your theories to the contrary either, I should point out. How do I prove that the comic has never shown Surma professing her love for Reynardine which was a lie? The whole point is that it has never been shown. Hard to prove a negative. So if I have on one hand a page that shows the ACTUAL events, in which Surma NEVER says anything to Renard to lead him on and in fact makes it a point to not say anything at all to his advances (which most guys would take as a hint that the feeling was in fact NOT reciprocated) and I have on the other hand Anja hesitantly and with trepidation answering a question that was phrased in Annie's words, not her own, I'm going to take the historical record over the Ben Kenobi answer any day of the week and twice on Tuesday.
|
|
|
Post by Mezzaphor on Nov 3, 2010 1:06:47 GMT
Unless we assume that a) Anja doesn't know what she's talking about b) Anja is lying to Antimony c) Surma lied to Anja then it would seem to be the case that Surma tricked Renard into thinking that she loved him. Just my two cents. By that standard of evidence, Anakin Skywalker and Darth Vader are two different people. In A New Hope, perhaps. Vader's fatherhood was accepted because further verbal testimony contradicted Kenobi's account, and when questioned about the discrepancy, Kenobi admitted to having lied. For the time being, there is no evidence to suggest that Anja is lying here, so the comparison to Star Wars is meaningless.
|
|
|
Post by mithril on Nov 3, 2010 1:18:39 GMT
Yes, it is laughable. That's why that kind of narrative is in so many of the stories about Coyote: he's a trickster figure, and most of his stories are intended to be humorous. Here's a typical plot: - Coyote gets bored.
- Coyote tries to occupy himself by doing something crazy, dangerous, or magical.
- Coyote bumbles his attempt at whatever it is he's trying, causing chaos for everyone involved.
- Penis joke.
- Coyote runs off laughing.
Coyote is well known for messing up. Trying to give other canine trickster figures some of his powers so that he has equals to do play tricks with, only for those gifts to backfire sounds like the kind of thing Coyote would try. I did not know that, thanks for telling me. I guess you guys might have a point here, if Coyote is actually known for this sort of thing. actually the description is a gross oversimplification of the Coyote mythos. Coyote's motives vary based on the story being told. when coyote is interacting with other deities, the story tend to be; coyote sees someone doing something coyote wants to help/copy it coyote tries to help/copy coyote screws up these are usualy the myths explaining the oddities of the world, like the random placement of stars. in the myths where Coyote interacts with normal people, it's more; Coyote gives a person what they desire gift ends up having bad results for the person person learns a valuable lesson about themselves or the world. coyote has a laugh at people and their absurdities. Coyote might have known that reynard wanted to use his gift to leave the forest for the court, and desired to teach reynard a lesson about remaining himself. only to have both mythic themes result in a very ugly side effect. after all, coyote was trying to copy the actions of other dieties (elevating people to godhood was not unheard of in south western mythology), AND trying to teach a lesson at the same time.. so the gift had a major unwanted result, but also was flawed, like all of coyote's efforts at such plans. oddly, the only story i can remember where coyote doesn't screw up or teach the normal person a lesson was a navajo tale where a man stole coyote's eyes and replaced them with stones, which caused coyote to hide. but in that one, it was more of a vehicle for his Wife "Mole" (who thought coyote was dead) to teach the person a lesson about tricking the gods, by ripping the man apart after changing into the form of a bear.
|
|
|
Post by jayne on Nov 3, 2010 1:46:19 GMT
Uh, before you continue repeating this, could you please provide even a piece of EVIDENCE to support it? Unless we assume that a) Anja doesn't know what she's talking about b) Anja is lying to Antimony c) Surma lied to Anja then it would seem to be the case that Surma tricked Renard into thinking that she loved him. Just my two cents. The way I read it is... Anya explained something that happened. Annie says: "In OTHER words, my mother tricked him..." Anya: "well, yes... you could put it that way" ...as in Anya hadn't stated it so bluntly when she told the story. Rey isn't being tricked into staying anymore. He could just ask Annie to release him if he wanted. He doesn't want to leave. If Surma had cruelly tricked him... he'd be very bitter and resentful... that's just not whats going on.
|
|
|
Post by Casey on Nov 3, 2010 2:11:13 GMT
By that standard of evidence, Anakin Skywalker and Darth Vader are two different people. In A New Hope, perhaps. Vader's fatherhood was accepted because further verbal testimony contradicted Kenobi's account, and when questioned about the discrepancy, Kenobi admitted to having lied. For the time being, there is no evidence to suggest that Anja is lying here, so the comparison to Star Wars is meaningless. It's not a comparison to Star Wars. It's a comparison to someone hesitantly answering a question with an answer that, while accurate "from a certain point of view", does not tell the whole picture. I'm not sure how you can follow the reference and not get the relation. Actually I think Jayne's taking it from an even better angle, which is that Anja told Annie some stuff offscreen, and it was Annie's words, Annie's simplification that we see on-scree, which Anja only hesitantly agrees to. The simple explanation there is that Anja -couldn't- have come right out and said that Surma tricked Renard, because if that's what she had said, then Annie would not need to summarize with the exact same words. It's clear here that Anja does not instantly, emphatically agree with Annie's characterization of Surma's actions, and there must be a reason why. Bottom line is, as I've said, having one page that shows history and having another page where someone paraphrases/interprets history and another someone hesitantly agrees to that interpretation, the former is going to be more accurate than the latter. Therefore there is no evidence that Surma led Renard on, and there exists evidence that she did -not- lead him on in an occasion where she very well could have. Conclusion: We cannot say that Surma led Renard on.
|
|
|
Post by aaroncampbell on Nov 3, 2010 2:13:15 GMT
The way I read it is... Anya explained something that happened. Annie says: "In OTHER words, my mother tricked him..." Anya: "well, yes... you could put it that way" ...as in Anya hadn't stated it so bluntly when she told the story. Rey isn't still being tricked into stay anymore. He could just ask Annie to release him if he wanted. He doesn't want to leave. If Surma had cruelly tricked him... he'd be very bitter and resentful... that's just not whats going on. That's exactly how I read it. Annie is taking the social varnish off of the story, laying out the motives as she perceives them. It is this personality trait of Annie's that some say is cold/calculating/socially inept, while others say is impartial/perceptive/factual. Anja, who has always been sensitive to interpersonal harmony, clearly doesn't care for Annie's frank assessment of Surma, who is after all Annie's own dead mother and Anja's old best friend. Still, she is forced to acknowledge the essential accuracy of Annie's perceptions.
|
|
|
Post by Casey on Nov 3, 2010 2:15:15 GMT
The speech bubble wasn't big enough to write "Well... you could look at it that way, but I don't think that would be an entirely fair assessment of the nuances of the situation".
Ha. Ha ha. Ha.
|
|
|
Post by q3 on Nov 3, 2010 4:43:14 GMT
I'd just like to take this moment to point out that Gunnerkrigg Court is a webcomic. What's your evidence for that outrageous claim?!
|
|
|
Post by Mezzaphor on Nov 3, 2010 5:51:31 GMT
I'm suddenly reminded of that auditorium and shrine to Jeanne that the girls discovered under Anja's old lab. The data that was revealed to Annie, Kat, and Rey regarding Jeanne and Diego was quite inconclusive; the theories that Kat and Reynardine spun from this data revealed more about their personalities than about the actual events.
The data that's been revealed to us in this chapter to date has been similarly inconclusive.
|
|
|
Post by Casey on Nov 3, 2010 5:53:02 GMT
I'm suddenly reminded of that auditorium and shrine to Jeanne that the girls discovered under Anja's old lab. The data that was there regarding Jeanne and Diego was quite inconclusive; the theories that Kat and Reynardine spun from this data revealed more about their personalities than about the actual events. The data that's been revealed in this chapter to date has been similarly inconclusive. You always have a good knack for phrasing things, Mezzaphor.
|
|