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Post by flowsthead on Jun 4, 2022 3:06:25 GMT
I feel like we're talking about two different things. The misguided versus evil feels like a question of morals/ethics. I'm not exactly sure how you're using it, but having a justification is beside the point. Every evil act can be justified by those doing it. That doesn't mean evil doesn't exist. The fact that they had a justification doesn't mean it lessens the evil. And if you're suggesting that its efficacy is what it makes it misguided then while that might be true I don't think it's relevant to the point I was making. I'm not suggesting it lessens the evil and I agree: any act of evil can be and typically is justified to the person doing it. That isn't what makes the Court misguided. If anything I think it's the usage of misguided we aren't on the same page about, I see it as a common symptom of a certain type of evil, such as what happened with the Court. They are misguided because they think the ends justify the means, leading them to a very evil action. They didn't do it to be evil, or because they hated anyone(aside from Diego of course) or for greed or love(again, exculding Diego). They did it because they had the misguided view that protecting the Court from Coyete was worth human sacrifice, which I don't agree with. I don't live next door to a God and don't know the society and circumstances that existed then, but we've seen Coyete and his power, so they weren't wrong about him being a threat. If they weren't misguided, what would you say the reasoning they had was? Good points. I don't know is the answer. I tend to think of the word misguided as being applicable to children. They can't accurately step away from themselves to look at the consequences of their actions, so misguided would be something I would apply to say Annie picking up Kat's bird boyfriend way early in the series. But that's a me thing. For something like this, something they knew full well was horrendous, as evidenced by the fact that they took measures to keep everything they did from being recorded, misguided doesn't seem to cover it. I can understand that they thought they were doing a necessary evil, but even then, they allowed Diego to push for choosing Jeanne because of his emotions. It would be different if one of them willingly sacrificed themselves, but they chose an unwilling participant, well two I guess. I don't know that misguided can sum that up. It's just so much more calculated in its evil. But like you said, it might just be a difference in how we define the word. |
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Post by Isildur on Jun 4, 2022 5:08:47 GMT
Moreover, Annie, I think what he's trying to say is "walk the Earth" (not "walk to Earth").
I wonder if it will be corrected. (It's odd enough phrasing that it seems almost certain to be a typo.)
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Post by todd on Jun 4, 2022 12:45:04 GMT
There's nothing misguided about Jeanne's story. That was just evil. True. But the Court's overall goals suggest the "misguided" approach. Despite its faults, I certainly do not think it intends to use its scientific discoveries to take over the world and enslave mankind, or anything like that. If it poses a threat to the world, it's more being so blinded by its pursuit of its goals that it doesn't realize the side effects of those goals (just as Kat never thought out the possible consequences of incorporating Diego's arrow in the "switch-Reynardine's-custody-back-to-Annie" process). The Court's most corrupt moments (like Jeanne) stem from its fear of the Forest and seeking safeguards against it. (Since the trouble with the Forest stems from its pursuit of those goals, which endangers the Forest, however, those clearly are the consequences of that pursuit.) |
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Post by todd on Jun 4, 2022 13:02:11 GMT
Good points. I don't know is the answer. I tend to think of the word misguided as being applicable to children. They can't accurately step away from themselves to look at the consequences of their actions, so misguided would be something I would apply to say Annie picking up Kat's bird boyfriend way early in the series. But that's a me thing. For something like this, something they knew full well was horrendous, as evidenced by the fact that they took measures to keep everything they did from being recorded, misguided doesn't seem to cover it. I can understand that they thought they were doing a necessary evil, but even then, they allowed Diego to push for choosing Jeanne because of his emotions. It would be different if one of them willingly sacrificed themselves, but they chose an unwilling participant, well two I guess. I don't know that misguided can sum that up. It's just so much more calculated in its evil. But like you said, it might just be a difference in how we define the word. Very good points. Of course, from the Court's point of view, Jeanne was the only one for whom the plan would work, since a vital part of the plan was the anger and grief over the murder of her lover. I doubt that any of the Court's Founders had similar loves who could be sacrificed alongside them. But - yes, they knew deep down that it was wrong (recognized it enough to pretend that Jeanne never existed as part of the cover-up - thus adding falsehood to murder) and only one was brave enough to walk out of the meeting. To me, however, for the Court to be described as out-and-out evil would require their overall goals being to use their scientific discoveries for purposes just as corrupt as what they did to Jeanne and her lover (say, taking over the world and making themselves the despotic rulers of the human race); the evidence is that their scientific investigations are the ends rather than the means. |
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Post by flowsthead on Jun 4, 2022 14:10:38 GMT
Good points. I don't know is the answer. I tend to think of the word misguided as being applicable to children. They can't accurately step away from themselves to look at the consequences of their actions, so misguided would be something I would apply to say Annie picking up Kat's bird boyfriend way early in the series. But that's a me thing. For something like this, something they knew full well was horrendous, as evidenced by the fact that they took measures to keep everything they did from being recorded, misguided doesn't seem to cover it. I can understand that they thought they were doing a necessary evil, but even then, they allowed Diego to push for choosing Jeanne because of his emotions. It would be different if one of them willingly sacrificed themselves, but they chose an unwilling participant, well two I guess. I don't know that misguided can sum that up. It's just so much more calculated in its evil. But like you said, it might just be a difference in how we define the word. Very good points. Of course, from the Court's point of view, Jeanne was the only one for whom the plan would work, since a vital part of the plan was the anger and grief over the murder of her lover. I doubt that any of the Court's Founders had similar loves who could be sacrificed alongside them. But - yes, they knew deep down that it was wrong (recognized it enough to pretend that Jeanne never existed as part of the cover-up - thus adding falsehood to murder) and only one was brave enough to walk out of the meeting. To me, however, for the Court to be described as out-and-out evil would require their overall goals being to use their scientific discoveries for purposes just as corrupt as what they did to Jeanne and her lover (say, taking over the world and making themselves the despotic rulers of the human race); the evidence is that their scientific investigations are the ends rather than the means. I can appreciate the argument that some of you are making, but I don't think their overall goals need to be evil for the word to be applicable to the way they conduct themselves. For one, the Court is still made up of humans and they don't all need to have nefarious goals for a few to twist and corrupt and ruin it all. For another, it's not hard to think of real world examples that fly in the face of the idea of "science" being used for a noble goal with the way it is being conducted being unethical to the point of evil. I'm basically arguing that I have no problem imagining the Court taking part in the Tuskegee Study, nor do I think they wouldn't do something like that again. |
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Post by warrl on Jun 4, 2022 19:46:51 GMT
I think human sacrifice can sometimes be justified - but one of the conditions for that is that the humans being sacrificed volunteer for the role. Knowingly.
Neither Jeanne nor her boyfriend volunteered to have their souls trapped at the bottom of the Gap for a few centuries.
Another of the conditions is that the sacrifice be necessary. Diego's motive was plainly to punish Jeanne for not loving him. The other members of the Court might have trusted him, but I have no doubt they had reason to be suspicious of his motives. There is no reason to believe the sacrifice was necessary. In fact, at most it gave the Court greater assurance that an apparently-stable, safe situation would remain stable and safe. That is not something sane people sacrifice competent soldiers for.
There's a lot to be said for honesty, too, and several members of the Court lied to Jeanne about what was going on. Even more knew of the lies and had opportunity to correct them, but chose not to.
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Post by maxptc on Jun 4, 2022 21:07:52 GMT
There is no reason to believe the sacrifice was necessary. In fact, at most it gave the Court greater assurance that an apparently-stable, safe situation would remain stable and safe. That is not something sane people sacrifice competent soldiers for. I dunno, Coyete had just made his move and split away from the Court. I don't think the Courts action was justified at all, and while I can confidently say from the eyes of a reader the situation had stablized and was safe, I doubt I would feel that way if I was living in the Court at the time. They did have a reason to be uneasy. |
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Post by todd on Jun 5, 2022 0:23:49 GMT
I think human sacrifice can sometimes be justified - but one of the conditions for that is that the humans being sacrificed volunteer for the role. Knowingly. Neither Jeanne nor her boyfriend volunteered to have their souls trapped at the bottom of the Gap for a few centuries. Another of the conditions is that the sacrifice be necessary. Diego's motive was plainly to punish Jeanne for not loving him. The other members of the Court might have trusted him, but I have no doubt they had reason to be suspicious of his motives. There is no reason to believe the sacrifice was necessary. In fact, at most it gave the Court greater assurance that an apparently-stable, safe situation would remain stable and safe. That is not something sane people sacrifice competent soldiers for. There's a lot to be said for honesty, too, and several members of the Court lied to Jeanne about what was going on. Even more knew of the lies and had opportunity to correct them, but chose not to. I've wondered whether Diego kept his pursuit of Jeanne, and her rejection of him, a secret from his colleagues (partly to ensure that they wouldn't suspect that he had ulterior motives, partly to spare himself public humiliation). One other thought I've had about the Court's scheme; it was hypocritical, embodying many of the elements they condemned about the Forest. Savage violence, for a start. And it also involved the ether, coming extremely close to black magic - meaning that the Court, for all its rejection and disdain of the ether, was using it as a safeguard. (Is it possible that that's another reason why they covered it up?) And apparently, despite that continuing disapproval of the ether, the Court is trying to make use of it in that big ether-collecting enterprise. It's almost like a witch-hunter denouncing witchcraft while using it to wipe out witches. |
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Post by davidm on Jun 5, 2022 20:38:34 GMT
That's a crucial point to me. The Court's done a lot of bad things, but in a way that suggests misguided people rather than thoroughly bad ones. (Most of their bad deeds, in fact, have stemmed more from their - understandable - fear of the Forest, coming up with the wrong decisions on how to handle it.) The impression I have is that that harm they've done with their experiments is a larger-scale version of Kat's - getting so excited about making new discoveries that they don't spend enough time considering the possible side effects (Kat incorporating Diego's arrow into switching Reynardine's custody back) or how this discovery could be misused by others (Kat in "The Torn Sea"). There's nothing misguided about Jeanne's story. That was just evil. 2 dead/suffering people traded for potentially vastly more people in safety. (not killed by overpowered/magic forest creatures who had a thing for invading court) That sort of thing happens on very regular basis in our modern real life world. Allies in world war 2 did a whole lot of bombing of germany including civilians. Dresden Feb 1945 saw 1 day of extreme fire bombings that left oil tanks and army bunkers untouched but vast thousands of civilians refugees suffer very ugly deaths (who fled to dresden because it previously wasn't been bombed). (Germany had already basically lost war by feb 1945) US dropped 2 atomic bombs on japan mostly civilians in order to supposedly save many times the lives. 2022 politics is full of tradeoffs of lives, eg US leadership funds 1/3 of israeli military. Israel military at times locks down civilian palestinians into small areas contributes to 50% unemployment and people dying from lack of access to hospitals. Does that make US leadership "evil" (rather than misguided, etc)? US intervened in Libya 2014, a whole lots of civilians are dead in a civil war that continues to this day, a whole lot of women lost their rights including right to not be legally raped by husbands. Egypt and Turkey which fund opposing sides the civil war in Libya to this day are both funded/helped/supported in turn by US and much of Europe. (US spends 4x as much to help Egypt military as Egypt civilians) |
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Post by Polyhymnia on Jun 5, 2022 21:49:13 GMT
There's nothing misguided about Jeanne's story. That was just evil. 2 dead/suffering people traded for potentially vastly more people in safety. (not killed by overpowered/magic forest creatures who had a thing for invading court) That sort of thing happens on very regular basis in our modern real life world. Allies in world war 2 did a whole lot of bombing of germany including civilians. Dresden Feb 1945 saw 1 day of extreme fire bombings that left oil tanks and army bunkers untouched but vast thousands of civilians refugees suffer very ugly deaths (who fled to dresden because it previously wasn't been bombed). (Germany had already basically lost war by feb 1945) US dropped 2 atomic bombs on japan mostly civilians in order to supposedly save many times the lives. 2022 politics is full of tradeoffs of lives, eg US leadership funds 1/3 of israeli military. Israel military at times locks down civilian palestinians into small areas contributes to 50% unemployment and people dying from lack of access to hospitals. Does that make US leadership "evil" (rather than misguided, etc)? US intervened in Libya 2014, a whole lots of civilians are dead in a civil war that continues to this day, a whole lot of women lost their rights including right to not be legally raped by husbands. Egypt and Turkey which fund opposing sides the civil war in Libya to this day are both funded/helped/supported in turn by US and much of Europe. (US spends 4x as much to help Egypt military as Egypt civilians) This makes perfect sense from a Utitilitarian standpoint (e.g. the moral thing to do is to seek the best outcome for the most amount of people more or less) but that’s not the only morality out there, and it can indeed be evil to premeditatedly murder two people by using one as bait for the other, regardless of what good it may have done to others. |
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Post by pyradonis on Jun 6, 2022 14:15:01 GMT
There's nothing misguided about Jeanne's story. That was just evil. 2 dead/suffering people traded for potentially vastly more people in safety. (not killed by overpowered/magic forest creatures who had a thing for invading court) That sort of thing happens on very regular basis in our modern real life world. Allies in world war 2 did a whole lot of bombing of germany including civilians. Dresden Feb 1945 saw 1 day of extreme fire bombings that left oil tanks and army bunkers untouched but vast thousands of civilians refugees suffer very ugly deaths (who fled to dresden because it previously wasn't been bombed). (Germany had already basically lost war by feb 1945) US dropped 2 atomic bombs on japan mostly civilians in order to supposedly save many times the lives. 2022 politics is full of tradeoffs of lives, eg US leadership funds 1/3 of israeli military. Israel military at times locks down civilian palestinians into small areas contributes to 50% unemployment and people dying from lack of access to hospitals. Does that make US leadership "evil" (rather than misguided, etc)? US intervened in Libya 2014, a whole lots of civilians are dead in a civil war that continues to this day, a whole lot of women lost their rights including right to not be legally raped by husbands. Egypt and Turkey which fund opposing sides the civil war in Libya to this day are both funded/helped/supported in turn by US and much of Europe. (US spends 4x as much to help Egypt military as Egypt civilians) I don't really understand what point you are trying to make here, but anyway, can we please keep real world politics out of this? |
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