Was O’Chuls attack on the demon Roach morally justified?

[derfenrirwolv]

O’Chul should have fell for his violent, vicious, blood thirsty and unprovoked attack on the innocent demon roach. Obviously the author has no concept of evil or he wouldn’t let an alleged paragon of Goodness get away with such an atrocity.

O’Chul hated the demon roaches. They’d made light of his torture and when he got the opportunity his deep-seated hatred for the roaches came to the fore. O’Chul had no right to vent his frustration out on the roach who had no power to set him free! Without a calm, rational, and pure heart untainted by anger O’Chuls actions are more than suspect!

Now I know what you O’Chul fan boys are going to say. That the demon roach had called out a warning, letting Xykon know of the wonton destruction to his property. But the roach was not yelling out a warning when he was stabbed. O’Chul cannot judge the demon roach because he doesn’t know with absolute certainty what the roach was going to do next. Nor can the roach be judge based on their past actions, since those don’t necessarily indicate future actions. People are allowed to change. O chul, with his +20 bonus from being 5 size categories larger than the roach, could have easily intimidated it into silence. Instead, he silenced it by killing it. His violent attack was completely unnecessary, and thus evil.

Obviously, these actions DID call O’Chul to fall. That’s why he hasn’t used his paladin abilities ever since!

[Tryble]

This one's been done (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=111818&highlight=) already.

[Jane_Doe]

Well, if you want to bring that up, his act really WAS quite immoral... It's highly doubtful that anyone would hear the roach's warning with everyone so distracted by Vaarsuvius's attack, a position supported by the fact that his warning DID go completely unnoticed. This means that O-chul's act was motivated purely by a desire to lash out at one of the figures who had demeaned him during his imprisonment.

O-Chul had plenty of reason for wanting to make the roaches suffer - they mocked him at every opportunity, they facilitated the acquisition of bizarre creatures to use in Xykon's torturous games, they were the bookies who turned his life-and-death struggle into a game for the amusement of horrible monsters who conquered his hometown... These roaches took the failure of his life's mission, and used it to take from him his dignity. Without these roaches, he'd be tortured daily for information (or maybe prove boring enough that Xykon would just kill him outright) - but he'd be a resilient prisoner, and able to find solace in the fact that they'd gain nothing from him. With these roaches, his primary virtue was turned against him, and used to make him an amusement for the beings that he hated most - now, even his success in survival would provide his captors with some benefit.

But it is when we are acting against those that we loathe the most, that we must most carefully examine our motivations - we naturally wish to see those we hate suffer (or at least not prosper), and so when our actions relate to such people, we must be certain that our acts are actually in accordance with our morals, and not our hatred.

If we accept the premise that O-Chul wouldn't have casually murdered a demonic roach guilty of the same actions against another paladin (and I do have difficulty imagining him noticing the roach under other circumstances, let alone killing it), then we must find some reason why he acted differently regarding this demonic roach - and I'm afraid the most plausible explanation is that he wanted revenge for the roach's role in the three months of hell that he was put through. And while a desire for revenge is natural under the circumstances, killing someone in the pursuit of revenge is quite an immoral act.

This is not to say that the roach didn't deserve death, and wouldn't have been sentenced accordingly if brought before a judge - merely that, given the intimate nature of his relationship with the roach, he wasn't able to distance himself sufficiently to pass a fair judgment, and so should have allowed a different authority to handle the case. Roaches, being quite small and portable, could easily have been put into his pocket until he reunited with Hinjo and the other.

We also need to consider the negative ramifications that his act may have had - in killing the roach, he's demonstrated a distinct callousness towards the lives of others in front of a very impressionable character - particularly damaging when he's the closest thing resembling a moral force in the character's life. Teaching the strange creature in the darkness who can cast Wish and cause earthquakes at will that the lives of others don't really mean much if they're jerks and you can get away with it, isn't exactly a <i>good</i> lesson to be teaching someone who is (however weakly) on the side of the enemy. In committing an act of mild evil, he may well have inadvertently enabled many acts of greater evil. Temporarily depriving the occupation forces of their bookie is rather outweighed by this, I'd have to say.


Killing that roach wasn't necessary to escape, save Vaarsuvius's life, or to (attempt to) kill either a cruel dictator or psycopathic lich - it was nothing more than the casual murder of a sentient being motivated by personal hatred, and it may well have caused greater problems for everyone else in the future. Yes, it was an immoral act.

(This was just for fun, please don't hurt me! It was just too fun watching you get so frustrated in the Miko thread, and imagining your facepalm when reading this was just too entertaining to pass up ;) )

[Kaytara]

Wow. You weren't kidding about someone stepping on a bug.... XD

[Roc Ness]

The Roach was a-yelling for help

[ZeroNumerous]

A post of win

I love this post.

[Jagos]

I can't stop laughing...

XD

[pflare]

I have to agree with Kayatara he literally killed a bug. A demon bug. So not only did he rid the world of a cockroach but of a demon as well. Plus I'm pretty sure that killing something that is evil doesn't go against the Paladin code. Not to mention O-chul was in a time crunch; he had no time to do an intimidate check that may or may not have worked. Plus he did not fall because a.) we know what it looks like when a Paladin falls and it didn't happen and b.) he used smite evil after killing the coackroach which is a Paladin ability.

[Lamech]

The roach was merely banished. Seeing as how it "popped". It was actively aiding Xykon, and therefore needed to be stopped with a minimum of force. O-Chul used the minimum which, strangley, was a "lethal" attack in this case; say... breaking its jaw would have caused long lasting pain and suffering.

[Roland St. Jude]

Sheriff of Moddingham: Duplicate thread. Thread locked.