Undercutting your own message?

[golentan]

I'm putting together a paper on stories whose ending undercuts their own message by accident. Some spoilers may be ahead.

The best example's I have so far are:

"The Cold Equations," where the message that stowaways must be killed and jettisoned at all times for a spaceship to succeed are undercut by the knowledge that there wasn't so much as a padlock on the door to the spaceship.

"Inverloch," where the message of accepting people for who they are and not based on their species is undercut by the fact that the good guy turns out to have been an elf all along, and the chief antagonist is in fact the goblinoid expy that we thought the main character to be and all the goblinoids are at least complicit in the villainous plot while the elves at worst can be accused of being standard narcissistic elves.

And I can't think of any more really blatant examples right now, so I'm asking for any examples you can give for where I should look. Please put the title, the message of the story, and a brief summary of why you feel the story smashes it's own message into itty-bitty bits.

[Texas_Ben]

I can't remember the name off the top of my head, but there are multiple movies and/or shows decrying violence... which then proceed to solve their problems using violence.

[Soras Teva Gee]

Strongest example of this I know; "I'm a Mac, I'm a PC"

Because honestly do you know anyone that has said they were more likely to switch over after watching these? And cast the PC as a lovable everyman and the Mac as a snobbish preppy doesn't help. Or helps depending on why you like those ads.

(I've got another meta-example but it would quickly go from Comedy Central to politics so I must refrain...)

[Starscream]

Needless to say, there's a trope for it (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BrokenAesop).

One example I always thought was funny, was when the Nostalgia Critic pointed out that the first Pokemon movie is about how fighting is bad. In a franchise about fighting. Based on a video game about fighting. And it was followed by like six more movies about fighting.

[Mewtarthio]

The Mac/PC ads may be the best advertising that Microsoft has ever had (certainly much better than that aborted Seinfeld campaign), but that's more an example of marketing doing their job poorly. I think the OP was referring to stories which are supposed to get messages across but wind up subverting their own morals. "Violence is wrong; now stop it or we'll kill you" (The Day the Earth Stood Still) is a good example. In TV Tropes terms, it's a Broken Aesop (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BrokenAesop) (though the page is pretty inconsistent with its definition... and, really, who uses the word "aesop" instead of "moral"?).

[golentan]

The Mac/PC ads may be the best advertising that Microsoft has ever had (certainly much better than that aborted Seinfeld campaign), but that's more an example of marketing doing their job poorly. I think the OP was referring to stories which are supposed to get messages across but wind up subverting their own morals. "Violence is wrong; now stop it or we'll kill you" (The Day the Earth Stood Still) is a good example. In TV Tropes terms, it's a Broken Aesop (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BrokenAesop) (though the page is pretty inconsistent with its definition... and, really, who uses the word "aesop" instead of "moral"?).

Day the Earth Stood Still I see more as "We intend to survive. If you do too, you're going to have to convince the robots you won't kill us or get us caught up in this. It is a self-perpetuating system outside our control (implication: We may not have set it up, and were likely approached the way you were), and it takes out dissenters without moral judgement or compassion or anger. It works, deal with it."

Yeah, I'm looking for works of fiction. I'm reading through Broken Aesop now, so thanks for linking to that. But the big thing I'm hoping for is really egregious cases about morality of treating people certain ways that then go and prove themselves flawed before the end of the story without the author realizing.

Edit: So, just to be explicit Day the Earth Stood Still doesn't count because Gort is not a moral agent, and makes no moral judgements. Just "Stop killing or be met in kind."

[JonestheSpy]

The movie Wall Street is the most famous example I can think of for this. The movie was supposedly a critique of the greed of the the stock market industry and those who manipulate it, but instead Gordon Gecko became a roll model, and his "Greed is good" speech a thing to be admired instead of an illustration of how morally bankrupt he was.

P.S. No arguments about the actual content of the movie and whether you agreed with Gecko or not please, just pointing out that the movie seriously undercut what it thought it was saying.

[Oslecamo]

I can't remember the name off the top of my head, but there are multiple movies and/or shows decrying violence... which then proceed to solve their problems using violence.

Let's not speak of stoping the evil empire by comiting mass genocide and plunging countless people into chaos and misery.

[JonestheSpy]

Let's not speak of stoping the evil empire by comiting mass genocide and plunging countless people into chaos and misery.

Can you actually give any examples of that? I think you're kind of stretching, there.

[EleventhHour]

Strongest example of this I know; "I'm a Mac, I'm a PC"

Because honestly do you know anyone that has said they were more likely to switch over after watching these? And cast the PC as a lovable everyman and the Mac as a snobbish preppy doesn't help. Or helps depending on why you like those ads.


I actually like some of the things that Mac is trying to make fun of PC for.

Cupholders on the desktop tower? Well, okay! Superlong extension cords? Awesome. Bubblewrap. Because appearntly, Mac doesn't want to protect the shipping.

And the episode where PC gets a time machine to find out if Future PC still freezes. Okay, so Future PC still freezes. But I think you missed something important here, Mac ;

PC has A FREAKING TIME MACHINE.

/derailment
:smalltongue:

[Soras Teva Gee]

Can you actually give any examples of that? I think you're kind of stretching, there.

Probably a Sword of Truth reference. Not only is the main character right all the time, but for disagreeing with him you are evil and probably more so then the BBEG. And the author means it exactly like that.

[factotum]

"The Cold Equations," where the message that stowaways must be killed and jettisoned at all times for a spaceship to succeed are undercut by the knowledge that there wasn't so much as a padlock on the door to the spaceship.


I'm not sure that WAS the message of "The Cold Equations", assuming there was one. Anyway, the point was made in the story that any experienced spacer--who were the only people who were expected to be on board that ship in the normal course of events--would have known not to get aboard the scout ship.

[pita]

There were a few that I liked, that I can't remember right now.
Hmm...
Gamer is an action movie featuring an actor best known for playing a lovable serial killer as the villain, and the most memetic actor known for the hero, that makes fun of the action movie & Dexter watching crowd, who also usually enjoys dumb internet memes.
Also, it features the lovely message that violence IS the answer.
And it also had Peter Petrelli as a crazed rapist called Rick Rape. In my opinion, enough to make it the greatest movie ever made.
V for Vendetta knows about its problem: Either let everyone live under the rule of Adolf Hitler (If that is considered political, please tell me and I'll edit. Nazis are usually a gray area in political discussions (And ONLY there), and I don't think this is an invocation of the ever dreaded Godwin's Law) Adam Susan, or force them to starve to death.

[Nerd-o-rama]

There were a few that I liked, that I can't remember right now.
Hmm...
Gamer is an action movie featuring an actor best known for playing a lovable serial killer as the villain, and the most memetic actor known for the hero, that makes fun of the action movie & Dexter watching crowd, who also usually enjoys dumb internet memes.
Also, it features the lovely message that violence IS the answer.
And it also had Peter Petrelli as a crazed rapist called Rick Rape. In my opinion, enough to make it the greatest movie ever made.
V for Vendetta knows about its problem: Either let everyone live under the rule of Adolf Hitler (If that is considered political, please tell me and I'll edit. Nazis are usually a gray area in political discussions (And ONLY there), and I don't think this is an invocation of the ever dreaded Godwin's Law) Adam Susan, or force them to starve to death.Wasn't that the point of V for Vendetta? Exploring a situation where it really was possible that the only options were mass death or slavery?


I can't remember the name off the top of my head, but there are multiple movies and/or shows decrying violence... which then proceed to solve their problems using violence.

Gundam SEED Destiny is probably the most famous example of this in anime, that I'm aware of. Gundam 00 took this hypocrisy and spent a good deal of time analyzing it, why people would engage in it, and whether or not it could be effective. For a season. Then they got lazy and just slapped together a lot of explosions into a nonsense plot to sell toys, not that that's necessarily a bad thing, without ever really resolving the central theme of the moral gray area, which is.

That's another thing we can mention in this thread: stories that are rushed, lazy, or otherwise lose sight of their initial message as they're being made, which seems to be a decently common pitfall in sequels and long-running shows.

Also, the Left Behind series. I'd explain further but a) it's a tricky subject to talk about on these boards and b) The Slacktivist (http://slacktivist.typepad.com/slacktivist/left_behind/) has spent years analyzing the stupid things and done a far better job than I ever could. In summary, terrible writing and terrible editing join forces to make sure that the authors' already fringe theology is garbled and negated by their own plot.

[Parra]

I think the movie "Trading Places" would fit quite well in the 'Undercutting your own message' stories

[kamikasei]

I think the movie "Trading Places" would fit quite well in the 'Undercutting your own message' stories

Can you elaborate?

[bosssmiley]

Sign of the Labrys by Margaret St Clair (supposedly an influence on Gygax when it came to designing dungeons) is the single biggest Broken Aesop I know.

The author has an axe to grind that New Agey stuff is peaceful and noble and good and the only way humanity will progress, however
it's the protagonist's Aquarian love interest, not the ostensible Fingermen-style designated villains, who created and knowingly released the plague that killed 90% of the human race and forced the survivors into bunkers. So, yeah. Objectively, the 'heroine' is the unrepentant Big Evil.

Cue author filibuster on how The Man is bad ("M'kay?"), drugs and free love are good, and that only New Age types are 'real' people with proper souls. (Hmmm. Way to project your own issues with authority onto strawman hate figures Maggy.)
And after all this the author still expects the reader to be rooting for the official couple against the (as it transpires, wholly justified) designated villains at the end of the book. WTF?! :smallconfused:

FTLOG, save yourself a few hours of your life and never read Sign of the Labrys. The book makes the quasi-Hitlerian ideologywank literature of Ayn Rand look sane. :smalleek:

@v: I mean that as a literary critique, rather than an ideological one. Rand has the same repetitive, grinding "readers are idiots" writing style displayed to full and foul effect in "Mein Kampf".

[hamishspence]

Quasi-Hitlerian? That seems like a bit of a harsh judgement.

[Nerd-o-rama]

Well, it's only a half-Godwin at least.

I can see where the idea comes from based on bosssmiley's summary, though, given that it includes killing 80% of Earth's population being presented as a good thing.

[Tirian]

Wasn't that the point of V for Vendetta? Exploring a situation where it really was possible that the only options were mass death or slavery?

Yes, V for Vendetta's message is that it's hard when you have no good choices, and V chose what he thought was the best solution (terroristic martydrom after training your successor to love your ideals but hate your methods).

[hamishspence]

I can see where the idea comes from based on bosssmiley's summary, though, given that it includes killing 80% of Earth's population being presented as a good thing.

Not so much a "good thing" as "something that cannot be prevented"

It is the incompetance of the tyrants, that results in the deaths- since the intent of the scheme is for everyone who is competant, to go on strike and disappear- thereby resulting in the tyranny collapsing under its own weight, rather than an actual revolution.

Now the accusation might be a little more valid if directed at Terry Goodkind's Sword of Truth series (Richard Rahl is basically an absolute monarch with a tendency to resort to violence at the least excuse).

But perhaps not the Rand books.

If anything, the villains of these books are far closer- presenting the ideal of citizens laying down their lives to preserve the state.

which is not to say Rand wasn't averse to presenting revolution as a good idea early on (Anthem)

but later on, the tendency was to "Take a third option"

When dealing with a tyranny, you can:
1: Go along to get along- and the tyranny lasts forever.
2: Revolt- and either be crushed, or win- and end up with a new tyranny.

Rand's third option:
3: Go on strike- hide- encourage others to- and keep this up until the tyranny is so weak that it collapses.

[Nerd-o-rama]

Ah, well I misread bosssmiley's post there. I thought he was applying that adjective to Sign of the Labrys, where I think it would fit, from the perspective of eugenics and the like.

Ayn Rand, not so much. Demagoguish, yes, but not really that particular demagogue.

[hamishspence]

yes- the film of We The Living was touted in thirties Italy for its anti-communism message.

Then banned because they realised it was antifascist as well.

Which is not to say there aren't things to criticize in Rand's attitudes- just not that particular thing.

[AstralFire]

A rant I wrote about Ishmael a few years ago for a very bad class, half-asleep. The book itself is weakly supported and bad, but it doesn't actually undercut itself; the course, however, managed to undercut it when I used an assigned non-fiction book to provide evidence to the contrary. The professor loved this book.

Quinn's Ishmael is often lauded as an intellectually significant book; it finds itself on the required reading list of many Humanities and Social Science courses at varying educational ranges. Yet I cannot help but ask: Why? What merits does this treatise possess? It's hardly a novel, more of a Socratic account; thick dialogue so pervades every page that I hesitate to call it literature. It is well-written, and perhaps artistic at times, but it is not art - the art is clearly and largely subservient to the message here, rather than carrying equal weight. Not a novel. Therefore, let us examine the message. The bulk of the text is spent decrying human civilization - the 'Takers' - for how it has broken the laws of the community of life. Ishmael, or rather Goliath, would have us believe that 'Mother Culture' alone dictates our need to slay our competitors in the food chain, as well as our prey's competitors, and so on. This arrogant assumption of authority is what has caused us to spiral out of control, and he even suggests at one point that gazelles know they have nothing to fear from a Lion who has recently fed.

I question the existence of such foolhardy gazelles, but I do not know for sure. What I do know is the conclusive proof that many non-human animals have the capacity to engage in, and in some cases enjoy, the death of animals who provide an indirect threat to their role on the totem pole. We need only look to Goodall's Through A Window for proof of that; the stories of Passion's brutal infanticide and cannibalism, which Goodall herself hypothesized were meant to keep the community's attentions focused on the chimp matron, indicate that this is a trait which animals can share. This could be marginalized by generalizing this trait as a primate habit, except that Goliath explicitly shifts the evils of humanity away from our genes to a result of our 'Taker' culture. The same chimps he equates the 'Leaver' culture with share a criticized trait with 'Takers' - how odd, and how damning.

Goliath paints a picture in which 'Leavers' continue living in a concentrated rejection of 'Taker' values, but he leaves out culture shock. The 'Leavers' primarily vanished over the centuries, but the new archaeological evidence of the very peaceful arrival of Aryans in Vedic India is sufficient proof to say that it was not through war alone that they were wiped out, but conversion as well. Conversion became less common as the 'Takers' continued to advance, and I can only chalk that up to the mounting gulf causing greater and greater culture shock to the remnants of the 'Leavers'. I am sure many were scared away by the sheer quantity of change before even attempting an objective quality comparison.

What this all amounts to is this - the clever reimagining of the Fall of Man which Goliath paints for us is fairly groundless. An imaginative whimsy, predicated by the nature of the human mind to see patterns when given an incomplete array of facts. The necessity of 'Leavers' being killed off by 'Takers' and the presumption of 'Leavers' as somehow, inherently, more peaceful is not only challenged by the peaceful Aryans, but goes against the grain of the nature of peace. The more entrenched people are in agriculture and civilization, the more they have to lose, the more they fear Mutually Assured Destruction. For as deadly as our wars and weapons have become, they have also become fewer - things to be taken out more rarely. Economic sanctions are the main currency of enforcement, a reality Goliath never even addresses. Instead, he sweeps away the Ascension myth of the Takers for the guilt-ridden Degeneration myth which has existed since at least the time of Confucious if not before. We have degenerated, that is what Goliath really tells us, and the only thing that differentiates his story from a thousand like it is that Goliath admits that we cannot go back, which is also not new. The Renaissance was renowned for its ability to decry how far Man had fallen in one breath, and in the next speak of the heights which it had still managed to conquer since that Fall.

So here is what Goliath tells us that is useful: Global Birth Control as empty promises for the future will not work, and humanity must correct its own mistakes by ceasing the endless drive to destroy. Messages which have been repeated since the same 1960s that the narrator decries as useless.

I call Quinn's ape mouthpiece by his original name, as he represents an imposing creature which needs slaying more than he does a forgotten second branch of evolutionary history. Put the Noble Savage myth to bed; no form of civilization is inherently and morally superior to any other. Until we recognize that, we cannot move forward as a species and do what is necessary.

This is the same course I'm talking about in Kyuubi's sig of me. Such a waste of time... :smallannoyed:

[Closet_Skeleton]

I can't remember the name off the top of my head, but there are multiple movies and/or shows decrying violence... which then proceed to solve their problems using violence.


Gundam SEED Destiny is probably the most famous example of this in anime, that I'm aware of.

Not true. Gundam SEED Destiny managed it's message pretty badly, but it was not about decrying violence and then solving all the problems with violence. At all.

The end of Gundam SEED Destiny was about the morality of free will vs determinism.

One faction (Durandal's PLANT) believed that humanity could not be trusted to be peaceful and therefor needed overwhelming firepower to bring them into line and create a perfect society where there isn't any wars because there isn't any free will.

The other faction (Lacsus' Three Ships Alliance) believed that humans always have a right for free will and to fight for what they believe in (Kira doesn't like killing people and wants to stop wars but never claimed to be a pacifist).

These two sides were supposed to be equally valid and both fighting for their beliefs, but like Marvel's Civil War that failed completely.

Gundam Wing was about Pacifism (and handled that even worse than Destiny handled free will). Gundam SEED was always about making the choice to fight for your own morals and beliefs rather than for blindly following the orders and propaganda of your military superiors .

[AstralFire]

Gundam Wing was ultimately about how pacifism is a failure but that demilitarization is not, and the will of the people and junk. Whether this was intentional or not depends on whether you translate in your head 'total pacifism' as 'pacifism' and 'pacifism' as 'non-aggression.' Honestly, if it'd done that word substitition, it'd have worked out much better, since those things are more appropriate.

I mean, even after the show's conclusion, when everyone disarms their militaries, they still keep around 'preventer' units who are armed to keep the peace. I really don't think pushing pacifism as the way was the show's message.

[Nerd-o-rama]

But Gundam SEED Destiny's message as interpreted by most people is "Kira Yamato is right and you are wrong", hence why people tend to take a warped pacifist message from it, as Kira wants to be a pacifist (but as you say, puts fighting for his Lacus's other beliefs ahead of that).

I'm going to go ahead and say this wasn't the intended message, since Closet Skeleton is perfectly right, at least about the endgame of the show.

[Athaniar]

What about Xena?

First we have Dahak, the Bad Guy. He forcefully makes Gabrielle pregnant, in order to fulfil his plan to eradicate the Greek pantheon. He fails, and this is good.
Then, in later seasons, we have God, the Good Guy. He forcefully makes Xena pregnant, in order to fulfil his plan to eradicate the Greek pantheon. He succeeds, and this is good.

I hope mentioning that didn't break the rules, seeing as how I'm only talking about depictions within a fantasy universe.

[AstralFire]

I think the actual message there was that Gabrielle was smoking hot and everyone wants to get her pregnant.

[Lamech]

The start of the novel atlas shrugged. Funniest thing ever... Anyway this railroad cartel (National Association of Railroads) got all the railroads to sign an agreement that they would abide by cartel rulings. So the BBEG of the novel uses the cartel to shut down a competing railroad. This is a horrible thing because the BBEG's railroad is pretty crappy and can't ship the oil that is being produced and the country needs.

The message of the book is the free market is the way to go.

Also the book has major problems involving basic science. Ann Rand says science is what will make the world a great place. Not understanding how it works kind of undercuts your message.

[Lord Seth]

Strongest example of this I know; "I'm a Mac, I'm a PC"

Because honestly do you know anyone that has said they were more likely to switch over after watching these? And cast the PC as a lovable everyman and the Mac as a snobbish preppy doesn't help. Or helps depending on why you like those ads. Depends on the individual commercials. Some of them were genuinely funny and I thought did at least give some reasons to switch, but some aren't anything other than "PC SUCKS! TAKE THAT!"

To be fair, though, I don't think Microsoft's Windows ads are that much better, but really it's a tough market to do anything with. Ultimately, people just buy the computer they want based on which one they like more, and it's very hard for advertisements to somehow convince them that they suddenly like/dislike their current system.

[Nerd-o-rama]

The start of the novel atlas shrugged. Funniest thing ever... Anyway this railroad cartel (National Association of Railroads) got all the railroads to sign an agreement that they would abide by cartel rulings. So the BBEG of the novel uses the cartel to shut down a competing railroad. This is a horrible thing because the BBEG's railroad is pretty crappy and can't ship the oil that is being produced and the country needs.

The message of the book is the free market is the way to go.Ayn Rand means "free market" as a market free from cartels and syndicalism as well as from government interference and regulation. The real problem is that Rand fails to observe that, historically, you're always going to have one or the other.

[hamishspence]

the existence of the groups isn't the problem- it's their being powerful enough to get the government to pass laws in their favour- and shut down rivals- in the name of their "rights".

the "there is no such thing as group rights- only individual rights" thing.

[Lamech]

Ayn Rand means "free market" as a market free from cartels and syndicalism as well as from government interference and regulation. The real problem is that Rand fails to observe that, historically, you're always going to have one or the other.Ahh... free from goverment and monopolistic forces. That makes more sense. Regardless it wasn't made clear and explicit in the novel, or at least not as much as the anti-goverment speeches. And it seemed to hold with nostaliga a time when such monopolies did exist, and at least tried to such acts. (And IIRC from A.P. U.S. outright violence directed at strikers. So it is very well possible Rand did not understand the facts, which fits very well with the "science" in the book.)


the existence of the groups isn't the problem- it's their being powerful enough to get the government to pass laws in their favour- and shut down rivals- in the name of their "rights".

the "there is no such thing as group rights- only individual rights" thing. Yeah this was the entire rest of the novel. Groups getting "bad" laws passed. But for the NRA debacle the only "law" was enforcing the contract. BBEG did not go to the goverment and ask "shut down the effective railroad." He went to the cartel and had them shut down the railroad. The goverment was not involved.

I also fail to see how the result would have been any worse or better if BBEG had done it in the name of making a quick dollar and having a fancy contract; so I don't think BBEG's justification makes it not undercut Rand.

P.S. I'm doing my best to keep this politically neutral and I think I did. If anyone disagrees please do tell me.

[hamishspence]

the cartel's ability to shut it down was the example of excessive power.

And yes- it's very neutrally phrased.

My guess is Rand believed a lot in free competition- even if the end result was a monopoly. As long as the competitors didn't "cheat" using force and sabotage against their rivals.

Similarly with striking- everyone has the right to refuse to work. No-one has the right to force other people not to work.

Whereas the policies that supposedly prevented competition from being cut-throat, ended up crushing the less powerful but more efficient groups, anyway.

I'm not sure how good Rand's understanding of business and economics was though- I suspect there are probably totally business-centric critiques of her ideas that explain she didn't entirely get it.

[darkblade]

Folks I think this is a really good topic and I'd hate to see this thread locked so can we drop the very political Ayn Rand discussion?

In other news Superman At Earth's End. In the words on Linkara "That doesn't work. You can't have an anti-gun message in your comic when you solved everything with guns."

[hamishspence]

good point- business and economics tends to stray into politics very very fast.

So- we go back to "fiction (book, TV, movie, theatre, etc) whose message doesn't work.

Strawman Has A Point may be a subset of this.

[Altair_the_Vexed]

The film and first US editions of "A Clockwork Orange".

They miss out the events in the last chapter. The last chapter is the one where our droogy, Alex, grows up a little and gives up on ultraviolence and moloko plus, in favour of having a girlfriend, and maybe kids.
That was Burgess's point, the message he wanted to portray - you can't force kids to not rebel, they've got to figure it out for themselves.

The film was based on the US edition of the book, which missed out this chapter. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Clockwork_Orange#Omission_of_the_final_chapter) Burgess increasingly distanced himself from the film version. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Clockwork_Orange_%28film%29#The_novelist.E2.80.9 9s_response)

[Seraph]

Depends on the individual commercials. Some of them were genuinely funny and I thought did at least give some reasons to switch, but some aren't anything other than "PC SUCKS! TAKE THAT!"

To be fair, though, I don't think Microsoft's Windows ads are that much better, but really it's a tough market to do anything with. Ultimately, people just buy the computer they want based on which one they like more, and it's very hard for advertisements to somehow convince them that they suddenly like/dislike their current system.

I think microsoft has the right idea with some of their ads, namely the "bet you a computer you can't find an apple that does what you need for less than a grand" ones. It hits apple where it hurts, namely that they overprice things like its the end of the world.

[Myrmex]

The film and first US editions of "A Clockwork Orange".

They miss out the events in the last chapter. The last chapter is the one where our droogy, Alex, grows up a little and gives up on ultraviolence and moloko plus, in favour of having a girlfriend, and maybe kids.
That was Burgess's point, the message he wanted to portray - you can't force kids to not rebel, they've got to figure it out for themselves.

The film was based on the US edition of the book, which missed out this chapter. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Clockwork_Orange#Omission_of_the_final_chapter) Burgess increasingly distanced himself from the film version. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Clockwork_Orange_%28film%29#The_novelist.E2.80.9 9s_response)

The film just had a different message than the book with the omission of the 21st chapter. The movie was about a sociopath, the book about the sociopathy of youth.

[Exarch]

I'd say Shoot 'Em Up. There's a pretty distinct anti-firearm message in it, the main character is even anti-firearm. Yet what happens throughout the whole thing? He shoots people, in almost every way imaginable.

[Piedmon_Sama]

Quasi-Hitlerian? That seems like a bit of a harsh judgement.

Ayn Rand thought it was natural and just that the Native Americans got virtually wiped out by European immigration, since they weren't "properly using" the resources of their territory and thus had "no real ownership."

And she liked rape-play.

[Kalbron]

Probably a Sword of Truth reference. Not only is the main character right all the time, but for disagreeing with him you are evil and probably more so then the BBEG. And the author means it exactly like that.

To be honest, that's how the story was set up to be. Doesn't make it any less Mary Sue-ish, but hey, if the world says you're evil for disagreeing with him, in the context of that world you're evil. Simple as that.

The REAL broken aesop out of the Sword of Truth series is simply this: "Heroes are not needed because the brighter minds that created the superweapons had already placed failsafes to ensure their weapon could not be misused by evil people."

THAT is the horrible part of the series, because it essentially means people could have done nothing and the world would have righted itself because the smart people had gotten there first. Where's the incentive to improve and work for yourself that Goodkind was expousing in other novels? He invalidates half of his series with that twist at the end.

[Moglorosh]

I'd say Shoot 'Em Up. There's a pretty distinct anti-firearm message in it, the main character is even anti-firearm. Yet what happens throughout the whole thing? He shoots people, in almost every way imaginable.He also kills at least two people with a carrot. Down with root vegetables!

Edit: Actually, come to think of it, I have no idea how anyone could think there was an anti-firearm message there. They even go so far as to point out that the only reason the woman survived the initial hit attempt is because she had her own personal firearm.

[zyphyr]

I think the actual message there was that Gabrielle was smoking hot and everyone wants to get her pregnant.

This is a message I can get behind.

[Exarch]

He also kills at least two people with a carrot. Down with root vegetables!

Oh, he's pretty pro-carrot. They're good for your eye sight, you know.

[Moglorosh]

Oh, he's pretty pro-carrot. They're good for your eye sight, you know.Except, you know, when someone stabs you in the eye with one.

[JonestheSpy]

You can make a pretty good argument for Dune undercutting itself. A close reading shows that Paul is actually trying to prevent the jihad he sees will come, but can't and ends up being carried along with it as it's figurehead. It's really a tragedy, but a largely off-screen one, as the victims are the hundreds of millions who will die in the war that happens after the book ends. But it's hard to see- the hero survives, defeats the villains, gets the girl and becomes king; i.e. all the classic elements of a "happy" ending.

I can't help think that Herbert ended up downplaying the tragic aspects for the simple commercial reason that happy endings sell better.

[Lamech]

And she liked rape-play.
Ahh... yes the rape. Best way to undercut your message. Make your hero a rapist. The average person will then think that all of the rapists actions are evil incarnate.

[kamikasei]

You can make a pretty good argument for Dune undercutting itself.

It's properly read as part of a trilogy, as far as the points you mention go.

[Lamech]

My teacher was an alien: So this group of aliens decides that earth poses a threat and is filled with bad people. These bad people aren't always very nice to each other and have done things like kill other humans. So these good pure evil little aliens decide to kill a heck of a lot more humans than any human ever has; making them worse than the humans.

I'm not sure what the moral was exactly, something about humans being jerks, but the interplanetary council of making stalin look good kind of undercut the whole "humans are bastards".

Its a problem with a lot of movies/books that are "humans must shape up or be massacared by an outside force." If killing all humans is justified, killing any human is justified, and humans have done nothing wrong; that makes no sense, so the outside force is always even worse than the humans.

[Drakyn]

My teacher was an alien: So this group of aliens decides that earth poses a threat and is filled with bad people. These bad people aren't always very nice to each other and have done things like kill other humans. So these good pure evil little aliens decide to kill a heck of a lot more humans than any human ever has; making them worse than the humans.

I'm not sure what the moral was exactly, something about humans being jerks, but the interplanetary council of making stalin look good kind of undercut the whole "humans are bastards".

Its a problem with a lot of movies/books that are "humans must shape up or be massacared by an outside force." If killing all humans is justified, killing any human is justified, and humans have done nothing wrong; that makes no sense, so the outside force is always even worse than the humans.

I actually vaguely remember that series, despite never actually reading the first book in it (wasn't really 100% necessary anyways). The issue was apparently that not only were humans homicidally violent and morally stunted compared to everyone else (the existance of poverty and wars alone apalled the aliens at large), they were really, really, really smart. As in, progressing farther in a hundred years than other species had in 500+ in the old days. So they weren't so much voting on "should we murder all of them because they're icky?" so much as "should we kill these guys before they outtech us and then go on one of their periodic homicidal rampages, which will undoubtably kill absolutely absurd amounts of people all over the galaxy?"
It wasn't well set-up, and I personally am never a big fan of plots where (A) humans are sooooo super-duper special or (B) morally ambiguous judgemental twits try to throw babies out alongside bathwater. And I maintain that the ending was downright disturbing, no matter how positive the effect may have been.
The three human teens that are the main characters rediscover that humans are, in fact, a hiveminded telepathic species that shut down its links due to some prehistoric incident or another, giving all of them permanent emotional heebie-jeebies. So earth gets a suspended sentence so they can try and relink everyone. This is made a billion times creepier by the fact that the individual personalities of the three characters, whom you've been following for something like three to four books, are now basically GONE and replaced by the hivemind.

[Lamech]

,<snip>
The three human teens that are the main characters rediscover that humans are, in fact, a hiveminded telepathic species that shut down its links due to some prehistoric incident or another, giving all of them permanent emotional heebie-jeebies. So earth gets a suspended sentence so they can try and relink everyone. This is made a billion times creepier by the fact that the individual personalities of the three characters, whom you've been following for something like three to four books, are now basically GONE and replaced by the hivemind.The snipped out stuff doesn explain the actions of the aliens. The book makes sense. But it still seems to undercut the message if humans are the best around.

A lot of fictional authors have different takes on the "hivemind" some like... alpha centuri the hivemind is the ultimate victory. Its the new age of evolution. Its humanity becoming gods. The people are eager. In star treck its the borg crushing all freedom. Now authors spin it to their side because its fiction: alpha centuri no one is forced to become a super-being; in star treck the borg brutally crush all resistance. In the foundation series everyone in the galaxy becomes gaia the hivemind entity, and it is all good. So will you volunteer for the human instrumentality project? (It was the fusing of humanity right?) Ect. Ect. Ect.

[Starscream]

The three human teens that are the main characters rediscover that humans are, in fact, a hiveminded telepathic species that shut down its links due to some prehistoric incident or another, giving all of them permanent emotional heebie-jeebies. So earth gets a suspended sentence so they can try and relink everyone. This is made a billion times creepier by the fact that the individual personalities of the three characters, whom you've been following for something like three to four books, are now basically GONE and replaced by the hivemind.

Not exactly. We were never a hivemind, but we were telepathically linked. This basically made us noble and pacifistic like the other alien races. Only they didn't kill because it was against their instincts, we didn't because we would feel the pain of those we destroyed. Two different evolutionary means of ensuring that a developing species wouldn't destroy itself when it became smart enough to do so. Our greater intelligence than most species also made us naturally ambitious, so we evolved telepathy as a means to ensure our ambitiousness would not become aggression.

But it backfired. As humans became more numerous, the telepathic noise became a din that threatened to drive us insane. So we instinctively suppressed it. However, the loss of our connection basically made us basket cases. We instinctively felt a desire to come together, but the same instincts now drove us apart.

The three protagonists do not in any way lose their individuality when they regain their connection. Peter begs the aliens for another chance for his species, suggesting that they send teachers to earth (disguised as in the first two books) to help humanity. The goal is not to regain our telepathic contact (as that would drive us nuts if we all did it), but to help us overcome the fear and hatred we have for each other, as a result of our minds being severed.

They agree, on the condition that Peter return to earth to help them. He is upset about this, having wanted to travel the stars his whole life. But Susan and Duncan remain in space, and as he is connected to them he can share their experiences.

[Drakyn]

Not exactly. We were never a hivemind, but we were telepathically linked. This basically made us noble and pacifistic like the other alien races. Only they didn't kill because it was against their instincts, we didn't because we would feel the pain of those we destroyed. Two different evolutionary means of ensuring that a developing species wouldn't destroy itself when it became smart enough to do so. Our greater intelligence than most species also made us naturally ambitious, so we evolved telepathy as a means to ensure our ambitiousness would not become aggression.

But it backfired. As humans became more numerous, the telepathic noise became a din that threatened to drive us insane. So we instinctively suppressed it. However, the loss of our connection basically made us basket cases. We instinctively felt a desire to come together, but the same instincts now drove us apart.

The three protagonists do not in any way lose their individuality when they regain their connection. Peter begs the aliens for another chance for his species, suggesting that they send teachers to earth (disguised as in the first two books) to help humanity. The goal is not to regain our telepathic contact (as that would drive us nuts if we all did it), but to help us overcome the fear and hatred we have for each other, as a result of our minds being severed.

They agree, on the condition that Peter return to earth to help them. He is upset about this, having wanted to travel the stars his whole life. But Susan and Duncan remain in space, and as he is connected to them he can share their experiences.

Okay, talk with Starscream, because he actually remembers the story properly :p

[JonestheSpy]

It's properly read as part of a trilogy, as far as the points you mention go.

Perhaps, but there's still a huge dropoff of readers between Dune and Dune Messiah , not to mention the movies that clearly never meant to be part of a larger series- if the point can't be communicated in the first book more clearly, and it isn't imo, then Herbert definitely undercut himself.

[Lord Seth]

My teacher was an alien: So this group of aliens decides that earth poses a threat and is filled with bad people. These bad people aren't always very nice to each other and have done things like kill other humans. So these good pure evil little aliens decide to kill a heck of a lot more humans than any human ever has; making them worse than the humans.

I'm not sure what the moral was exactly, something about humans being jerks, but the interplanetary council of making stalin look good kind of undercut the whole "humans are bastards".You're misrepresenting things completely. First off, the aliens never even wanted to kill humans at all, some of them just felt there wasn't any other choice. The problem is that no other race in the universe according to the series was smart enough to master space travel, but stupid enough to have all of the problems humans have, like wars. The fear (and perhaps justifiable one) was that if humans mastered space travel, they'd start wars against the other races, which would of course result in massive deaths, more than destroying Earth would. One of the options to stop that scenario would be to destroy Earth, which was the one and only option guaranteed to keep the universe safe.

Claiming the aliens are "pure evil" and "make Stalin look good" when they're in such a situation is gross exaggeration if not outright incorrect. It's repeatedly made clear throughout the series that none of the aliens wanted to kill any humans, many (though not all) just felt that there was no other way to stop intergalactic catastrophe. When a third option presents itself (well, a fifth option, as there were four options for the aliens to make, one of which was the destruction of Earth), they take it.

[Lamech]

You're misrepresenting things completely. First off, the aliens never even wanted to kill humans at all, some of them just felt there wasn't any other choice. The problem is that no other race in the universe according to the series was smart enough to master space travel, but stupid enough to have all of the problems humans have, like wars. The fear (and perhaps justifiable one) was that if humans mastered space travel, they'd start wars against the other races, which would of course result in massive deaths, more than destroying Earth would. One of the options to stop that scenario would be to destroy Earth, which was the one and only option guaranteed to keep the universe safe.

Claiming the aliens are "pure evil" and "make Stalin look good" when they're in such a situation is gross exaggeration if not outright incorrect. It's repeatedly made clear throughout the series that none of the aliens wanted to kill any humans, many (though not all) just felt that there was no other way to stop intergalactic catastrophe. When a third option presents itself (well, a fifth option, as there were four options for the aliens to make, one of which was the destruction of Earth), they take it.The aliens did decide on destruction at the end right? Well depending on your definition of pure evil (for example, people who plan on committing genocide qualify IMO), the aliens may or may not qualify. But I can pretty easily show that they make Stalin look, if not good, not in the wrong.

One: The aliens believe it is okay to kill all humans.
Therefore: Any set of humans is a subset contained in the set of all humans and okay to kill too, if we go by the aliens.
Two: Murder is either worst act one can commit or tied for that position. Most people do not kill themselves after acts like mutilation, rape or torture, and the threat of death can cause most people to undergo such events.
Therefore: Since it is okay to kill any set of humans, all other acts against humans are also justified.
Conclusion: Since all acts against humans are justified, anything Stalin did is also justified.

You can't say the intended xenocide was anything but several hunderd fold worse than any human act and still condemn any human.

And last time I checked most people consider it wrong to kill one to save many. We don't cut people up for organs do we? We don't kill to save more.

[WitchSlayer]

Superman: At Earth's End.

It has an anti-gun message.
IN A COMIC WHERE OLD SUPERMAN KILLS TWIN CLONES OF HITLER WITH A GIANT CHAINGUN.

[Mewtarthio]

But that argument assumes that the aliens really do believe it is okay to kill all humans. They don't; they're wiping out Earth because they feel that leaving us alone could result in a much greater evil. It's like how most people believe that killing another human being is justified if it is done in defense of oneself or one's family, but would strongly disagree with the statement "killing people is okay."

Bah, I don't know why I'm defending My Teacher Flunked the Planet. It's been over a decade since I last read it, and I remember it being very weird, confusing, and not as good as the earlier books in the series.

[chiasaur11]

Superman: At Earth's End.

It has an anti-gun message.
IN A COMIC WHERE OLD SUPERMAN KILLS TWIN CLONES OF HITLER WITH A GIANT CHAINGUN.

Well, that's the sub-moral.

The central moral is that every war, ever, is Hitler's fault. Directly.

And who can argue with that?

[Lord Seth]

One: The aliens believe it is okay to kill all humans.What do you mean by "okay"? None of them liked it. None of them thought it was the right thing to do or moral. They thought it was the necessary thing to do, not the right thing. Again you're completely misrepresenting the entire reason they were considering doing it. Your entire argument rests on this faulty bit of reasoning.


And last time I checked most people consider it wrong to kill one to save many.Are you claiming that it is therefore right to do the opposite, and let many people die instead of one?

[Parra]

I think the movie "Trading Places" would fit quite well in the 'Undercutting your own message' stories
Can you elaborate?

well in Trading Places (not sure if you have seen it, if not DO. Its Eddie Murphy and Dan Aykroyd at there best) the story basically goes:
2 wealthy wall street fat cats, known as 'The Brothers' make a bet (one says it can be done, the other says it cant) that they can take a homeless crook from the street (Eddie Murphy) and turn him into a hot shot wall street type simply by treating him nicely and give him all the trappings off 'upper class' life.
While at the same time taking a Hot-shot wall street type (Dan Aykroyd) and having him being convicted of a minor-ish crime and cast out onto the street with the bet being that he would turn to a life of crime.
Basically its a nature v's nurture sorta thing
Once they succesfully do this they make another bet that they can also reverse the situation i.e. Eddie Murphy back on the street where he would revert to his life of crime and Dan Aykroyd back to Wall Street where he resumes his hot-shot wall street life.
OFC this all gets found out and after much hilarity and plotting Murphy & Aykroyd out smart the Brothers and completly bankrupting them by turning there illegaly gainied information against them and thus making them homelss crooks.

[Lord of Rapture]

Well, that's the sub-moral.

The central moral is that every war, ever, is Hitler's fault. Directly.

And who can argue with that?

I can!

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/hitlercard2.jpg

[kamikasei]

Two different evolutionary means of ensuring that a developing species wouldn't destroy itself when it became smart enough to do so.

*hiss*

Teleology! Kill it with fire!

Parra: I remember the plot of Trading Places, but I don't see where the movie itself subverts the message it's trying to convey. If you mean that the two brothers' plan backfires on them, that's not related to the thread topic, that's just irony (or comeuppance).

And yes, it's a great movie.

[Lamech]

What do you mean by "okay"? None of them liked it. None of them thought it was the right thing to do or moral. They thought it was the necessary thing to do, not the right thing. Again you're completely misrepresenting the entire reason they were considering doing it. Your entire argument rests on this faulty bit of reasoning.Okay... if they believe that killing the humans was wrong, why would they be doing it? If something is wrong, doing it makes you in the wrong. If you believe the circumstances somehow justify it, you are claiming it is not wrong. If the aliens claim every human is a justifiable target for lethal defense, everyone can make that claim. In fact a person earth has a much better claim because they can actually be attacked by a human.


Are you claiming that it is therefore right to do the opposite, and let many people die instead of one?Yes (well only if you force a binary choice; I would rather say its not wrong). Lets a bunch of people need organs, and you have a convient person with those organs. You don't cut the person up for those organs to save the dying. Lets say you have one person dying from lack of kidneys and someone who just happens to have two; you don't make him give one up.

First do no harm. The killing is wrong. Your not under a requirement to sacrifice to save someone. Have you given up your kidney?

[hamishspence]

Which is another way a phrasing the non-aggression principle- that person is not harming others- therefore you have no right to harm them.

Not even if, by doing so, you would help others.

Though there is a "if harm is inevitable, minimise harm" issue.

You are a pilot at the stick of a crashing aircraft. You know that, no matter where you land, someone is going to be hurt (you're right over a heavily built-up area and the best you can hope for is to hit the suburbs rather than the city centre.)

So, you aim the plane into the "safest" area. You know people will die from the plummetting plane, but you hope to ensure it will be as few as possible.

[Nerd-o-rama]

Okay... if they believe that killing the humans was wrong, why would they be doing it? If something is wrong, doing it makes you in the wrong. If you believe the circumstances somehow justify it, you are claiming it is not wrong.

No, one is claiming it is the lesser of two evils.

I've never read the My Teacher is an Alien series, but your logic needs some work here. What you're basically saying is that if killing is morally wrong, it is unacceptable for anyone to defend themselves, ever. That a nation defending itself militarily or even a person on the street fighting a mugger (which is admittedly a bad idea, but not morally wrong in my book) is, in fact, "worse than Stalin."

[pita]

I remembered what I wanted to say.
The Nostalgia critic theoretically makes us look at the bad movies of our past, and show us how bad they really were. Then he compares Batman to TDK, ignores all of the ridiculousness that was in the original Batman but not in TDK, and talks about his long love for Bob, and decides that Batman is a superior movie.

[Oslecamo]

In the recent sinestro wars, in the first few pages the black green lantern headshots a sinestro mook scout.

Then we have to endure the rest of the book with the rings of every other freaking green lantern telling their users they cannot kill people, to the point of turning themselves off.

Why the black green lantern could do it, nobody knows.

[Lord Seth]

Okay... if they believe that killing the humans was wrong, why would they be doing it?Because, quite frankly, sometimes there is no answer that isn't wrong, or at least no answer that's right. Remember the "sadistic choice" that the Green Goblin presents Spider-Man with in the Spider-Man movie, and how Spider-Man takes a third option and saves both? Okay then, here's a question: What if he couldn't take a third option, and literally could only save one? Can you truly say that either choice would be right?

Or, let's take a smaller analogy of what was going on in the series. You are shown a child, and told that there is a very high likelihood that if the child grows up, they will kill thousands or possibly more people. Killing the children would remove that possibility. The choice is either to kill the child, stopping all those deaths, or not killing the children, and potentially causing the deaths of thousands. Can you honestly say that neither choice isn't wrong?

This is why most series (like the aforementioned Spider-Man movie) have characters avoid the problem and take a third option. Which is, oh, wait, exactly what the My Teacher Is An Alien Series did!


First do no harm. The killing is wrong. Your not under a requirement to sacrifice to save someone. Have you given up your kidney?So let's just make your statement clear: You are saying that it is right to let "many" (let's say 100) people die by saving one. How is that right? It isn't. Neither choice is "right." You seem to be operating under the following thought: "Option A is wrong, so therefore Option B must be right." No, neither one is right, it's a matter of choosing the one that's less wrong, or to put it into a common phrase, choosing the lesser evil.

[TheSummoner]

I'd say its not right, but it certainly is easier. If you kill one to save 100, you may have saved those 100, but the blood of the one is still on your hands. If you let the one live and the 100 die as a result, your only crime is inaction. Its much easier to accept doing the wrong thing through inaction than doing the wrong thing through direct action. That and the old "One death is a tragedy, a million is a statistic" thing.

Sure, if all lives are to be considered equal (debatable depending on the individuals, but in this case where you know nothing about any of them it is assumed to be true), one life is worth less than 100 lives, but saving those 100 still requires you to dirty your hands by killing that one.

Then again, in spiderman's case, choosing between the bus full of kids and his girlfriend... In neither scenerio would he have to kill the party he didn't save. If he couldnt save both, saving MJ and not the kids would just be selfish.

[kamikasei]

Can you truly say that either choice would be right?

Yes: clearly, the right thing to do (for a hero, who's supposed to be all about saving people - whether a normal person would be wrong to put the life of a loved one over that of strangers is more debatable) is to save the tramful of people. It's not a sadistic choice because knowing what's right is hard, but because acting on that knowledge is.


not killing the child, and potentially causing the deaths of thousands.

Yes. "Not killing the child" is not "potentially causing" anything.

The problem with these kind of scenarios is that they're contrived way beyond what our fuzzy moral intuitions can handle - all-knowing visitors from the future who can infallibly predict that you and you alone must choose between one innocent's life and his hypothetical future victims are few and far between. But I think it's safe to say that most people would agree that, in general, you have less of a moral obligation to prevent someone else from possibly doing something harmful in the future than you do to refrain yourself from harming them in the present. That gets in to questions of responsibility and how we calculate harm, though, which are not going to be usefully answered in this thread.


No, neither one is right, it's a matter of choosing the one that's less wrong, or to put it into a common phrase, choosing the lesser evil.

That, of course, raises the question of what it means to talk about right and wrong, good and evil, at all. Doesn't it make it seem likely that there is never a right, the world being the muddy and muddled place it is? Or should we not say that choosing the lesser evil when there is no better choice is, in fact, doing the right thing?

[Mewtarthio]

In the recent sinestro wars, in the first few pages the black green lantern headshots a sinestro mook scout.

Then we have to endure the rest of the book with the rings of every other freaking green lantern telling their users they cannot kill people, to the point of turning themselves off.

Why the black green lantern could do it, nobody knows.

My knowledge of DC lore is fairly weak, but aren't Black Laterns evil? How does having an evil guy go against the message of your book undercut anything?

[kamikasei]

My knowledge of DC lore is fairly weak, but aren't Black Laterns evil? How does having an evil guy go against the message of your book undercut anything?

I don't think he's talking about a Black Lantern, but about a black Green Lantern (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Stewart_%28comics%29).

[UglyPanda]

He didn't headshot him, he fired a five-foot-wide beam from a light construct rifle. It probably hurt like hell, but there's no confirmation that it killed. It probably didn't as a Green Lantern has to want to kill someone in order to do so.

The rings used to shut off if they kill someone. If the character did die, then it's a plot hole. All evidence points otherwise.

Besides, them not being able to kill the Sinestro Corps wasn't a moral, it was a complaint. Since the Sinestro Corps thought they had nothing to fear, they just kept charging heedlessly. They were also capable of hit-and-run tactics that the Green Lantern Corps couldn't attempt because the Green Lanterns were dying, not simply being knocked out.

[Oslecamo]

He didn't headshot him, he fired a five-foot-wide beam from a light construct rifle. It probably hurt like hell, but there's no confirmation that it killed. It probably didn't as a Green Lantern has to want to kill someone in order to do so.


1-We see him build that construct rifle piece by piece pretty much like an actual rifle, wich is designed only to fire lethal shots.
2-We can see the mook's head disintregating. Unless he has his brain somewhere else, he's dead, Jim.
3-Pretty strange that none of the other green lanterns use those "stunning rifles" if they're so handy.

[Lamech]

Because, quite frankly, sometimes there is no answer that isn't wrong, or at least no answer that's right. Remember the "sadistic choice" that the Green Goblin presents Spider-Man with in the Spider-Man movie, and how Spider-Man takes a third option and saves both? Okay then, here's a question: What if he couldn't take a third option, and literally could only save one? Can you truly say that either choice would be right?Both are the right choice. He can't save everyone obviously. (I bet there was some one dying in africa because they were hungry right then.) So he saves some and he is praised for it. Saving the person is "right". Now saving more is better, but saving the one is not "wrong".


Or, let's take a smaller analogy of what was going on in the series. You are shown a child, and told that there is a very high likelihood that if the child grows up, they will kill thousands or possibly more people. Killing the children would remove that possibility. The choice is either to kill the child, stopping all those deaths, or not killing the children, and potentially causing the deaths of thousands. Can you honestly say that neither choice isn't wrong?First off your not "causing" anything if you don't act. Your not doing anything at all. Killing that child is murder. Maybe you need to remove the child from its parents, maybe you need to get a sniper 24/7 by the child in case it ever does something murderous, ect.


This is why most series (like the aforementioned Spider-Man movie) have characters avoid the problem and take a third option. Which is, oh, wait, exactly what the My Teacher Is An Alien Series did!That wasn't the original plan. It took efforts to stop the council right? The heroes averted genocide.


So let's just make your statement clear: You are saying that it is right to let "many" (let's say 100) people die by saving one. How is that right? It isn't. Neither choice is "right." You seem to be operating under the following thought: "Option A is wrong, so therefore Option B must be right." No, neither one is right, it's a matter of choosing the one that's less wrong, or to put it into a common phrase, choosing the lesser evil.Well if the choice is "saving" one or "saving" many the preferable option is "saving" the many; but both are good and right, seeing as how they both result in people being saved. If the choice is "killing" one and "saving" many the choice is "do no harm"; the non-agression princiable.

[UglyPanda]

1-We see him build that construct rifle piece by piece pretty much like an actual rifle, wich is designed only to fire lethal shots.
2-We can see the mook's head disintregating. Unless he has his brain somewhere else, he's dead, Jim.
3-Pretty strange that none of the other green lanterns use those "stunning rifles" if they're so handy.Ever since Green Lantern: Rebirth, he builds everything piece by piece. Said rifle didn't fire bullets.

If you're talking about the flash, it's a flash. Of course it washes out the colors. I don't have a copy on me, so the most I can find about it is that the shell was blown up. And it's a comic book, if he's not confirmed to be dead, he isn't dead.

And Green Lanterns use whatever they damn well please. They could have a nonlethal baseball bat if they wanted. There is nothing to indicate that a beam fired from a fake rifle is any more dangerous than the hundreds of perfectly normal beams fired throughout the crossover.

Besides, even if you're right, it's not a message. There is no moral in this. At worst, it's a plot hole.

Edit:
By doing some googling, I found someone claiming Bedovian is in this image somewhere. Link. (http://i227.photobucket.com/albums/dd187/EraOdd/GL007.jpg) I personally can't find him. He looks like a giant snail with arms.

[Oslecamo]

If you're talking about the flash, it's a flash. Of course it washes out the colors. I don't have a copy on me, so the most I can find about it is that the shell was blown up. And it's a comic book, if he's not confirmed to be dead, he isn't dead.


Actualy, it's completely irrelevant if he's confirmed to be dead or not. Comic characters get better from pretty much anything, from being impaled by stakes/incinerated in front of everybody else's eyes to being thrown to the End of Everything.

[UglyPanda]

I have no idea how to respond to that.

Look, since Green Lantern has had a no-killing rule for decades, you should just assume that nobody (up to a certain point) was killed by a ring. If not, it's a plot hole.

[Closet_Skeleton]

He didn't headshot him, he fired a five-foot-wide beam from a light construct rifle. It probably hurt like hell, but there's no confirmation that it killed. It probably didn't as a Green Lantern has to want to kill someone in order to do so.

Sounds like that panel from The Dark Knight Returns where Batman beats up two thugs off panel and blood splatters against a wall, so it certainly looks like he killed them but it wouldn't make any sense if he did.

[Joran]

You can make a pretty good argument for Dune undercutting itself. A close reading shows that Paul is actually trying to prevent the jihad he sees will come, but can't and ends up being carried along with it as it's figurehead. It's really a tragedy, but a largely off-screen one, as the victims are the hundreds of millions who will die in the war that happens after the book ends. But it's hard to see- the hero survives, defeats the villains, gets the girl and becomes king; i.e. all the classic elements of a "happy" ending.

I can't help think that Herbert ended up downplaying the tragic aspects for the simple commercial reason that happy endings sell better.

Well, I'd disagree that he undercuts his message. I read Dune and the subsequent books as Paul being a slave to his precognition. Sure, he ends up in a somewhat "happy ending", but he knows there's a darker time ahead.

In the later books, Paul definitely does not have a happy ending.

What message in Dune do you see as contradicting itself?

P.S. Batman from Batman Begins: "I won't kill you. But I don't have to save you."

I'm fairly sure that if it's in your capability to save someone, won't endanger your own life, and you choose not to, then you're still culpable in his death. Heck he reversed course in the next movie and saved the Joker =P

[Lord Seth]

Both are the right choice. He can't save everyone obviously. (I bet there was some one dying in africa because they were hungry right then.) So he saves some and he is praised for it. Saving the person is "right". Now saving more is better, but saving the one is not "wrong".While I'll give you a point for semantics, that's still avoiding the point I was making, in that you neither choice is the perfect one, and attempting to claim that one is all horrible and evil while the other is perfect and great is a fallacy.


First off your not "causing" anything if you don't act. Your not doing anything at all.You're still "allowing" it, however. If you have knowledge that not doing something will very, very likely result in the deaths of thousands, and you don't do it, and it then happens, then you have allowed all of that to happen. This is another case of using semantics to avoid the point.


Killing that child is murder.Therefore, killing to protect anyone is murder?


Maybe you need to remove the child from its parents, maybe you need to get a sniper 24/7 by the child in case it ever does something murderous, ect.Rather than throwing this stuff in that avoids the point, answer the question: If you don't act, thousands of people will very, very likely die. The choices are to either kill the child, ensuring those people won't die, or to let it live (none of this other stuff you're throwing in as an attempt to avoid the point) and with almost all certainty dooming those people to death.

Neither one is exactly "right" and neither one is exactly "wrong" so you can't really claim that the person who choose one option is horrible and evil whereas someone who chooses the other is all perfect.


That wasn't the original plan.There was no original plan. The aliens were not planning to destroy Earth. They were considering it, leaning towards that route, but had not made a definite decision and thus it was not the "plan" to destroy Earth.


It took efforts to stop the council right? The heroes averted genocide.Again, to claim they "stopped" the council is an exaggeration, but let's say they did. You're ignoring the point that the entire purpose of destroying Earth would be to avert far, far greater destruction.


Well if the choice is "saving" one or "saving" many the preferable option is "saving" the many; but both are good and right, seeing as how they both result in people being saved. If the choice is "killing" one and "saving" many the choice is "do no harm"; the non-agression princiable.Given that your entire argument is "it's better to do nothing and have great tragedy occur than do something that's a lesser tragedy" you kind of need to back it up with something better than just vaguely saying "the non-aggression principle." Whether you're pro-active or inactive, the choices produce the same results. Explain why causing the unwilling death of one person to save many is so horrible and vile and makes someone a monster, whereas allowing the unwilling death of one person to save many is, according to you, perfectly fine.

I'm not saying there's no difference between the two, but I'd like you to explain why there's supposedly such a massive gulf between the two, even though they produce the exact same results.

[Nerd-o-rama]

Lamech: You're aware that "First, do no harm" is part of the physician's Hippocratic Oath, which is meant to be instructions for a particular vocation and not a general moral treatise, right?

[Faulty]

I can't remember the name off the top of my head, but there are multiple movies and/or shows decrying violence... which then proceed to solve their problems using violence.

Iron Man, the movie.

"God, my weapons have done horrible things. I'll make a better one and just kill dudes personally!"

[averagejoe]

Iron Man, the movie.

"God, my weapons have done horrible things. I'll make a better one and just kill dudes personally!"

Well, he wasn't upset that his weapons were being used, he was only upset that they ended up in the wrong hands. That is, if I recall correctly. It seemed to be more about irresponsibility than pacifism.

[golentan]

Wow, I leave the thread for a little while and it turns into a morality argument.

Could I maybe ask that future posts leave things as "Title: What I thought the message was, how the story undercuts it?"

And if something is identified in the story as a message of practicality, could we leave it at "Not a moral message" and check it at the door?

For the paper that started the topic I'm not interested in what the morality being espoused is, or if it's defensible in any way, or the like. Just that the story is intended to make a moral point and sacrifices that along the story somewhere.

[pita]

For the paper that started the topic I'm not interested in what the morality being espoused is, or if it's defensible in any way, or the like. Just that the story is intended to make a moral point and sacrifices that along the story somewhere.

Sorry. Threads change their topic. I once saw a "5 things I hate about The Wire" thread that quickly became "Stop nitpicking & geography discussion" thread, partly because of me thinking that Great Britain and the UK are one and the same.
If it helps, the subject is one that really fit it. If you're going to say that X movie's message that guns are bad was destroyed because the hero wins with a gun, and somebody else thinks "but that was the point", there could be an evolution into gun control policies and stuffs.
Of course, that would get the thread locked because of the no political matters rule, but still...

I'd say its not right, but it certainly is easier. If you kill one to save 100, you may have saved those 100, but the blood of the one is still on your hands. If you let the one live and the 100 die as a result, your only crime is inaction. Its much easier to accept doing the wrong thing through inaction than doing the wrong thing through direct action. That and the old "One death is a tragedy, a million is a statistic" thing.

Sure, if all lives are to be considered equal (debatable depending on the individuals, but in this case where you know nothing about any of them it is assumed to be true), one life is worth less than 100 lives, but saving those 100 still requires you to dirty your hands by killing that one.


If you let people die through inaction, when it wouldn't cost you anything to act, it is your fault they died, just as it would if you murdered them yourself. I can't say a political opinion here, but suffice to say that if I could, I would say a pretty good one.

P.S. Batman from Batman Begins: "I won't kill you. But I don't have to save you."

I'm fairly sure that if it's in your capability to save someone, won't endanger your own life, and you choose not to, then you're still culpable in his death. Heck he reversed course in the next movie and saved the Joker =P

The Nolanverse is very bad with this sort of thing anyway. It's part of why I think the DCAU is the best Batman verse there is, particularly the Batman Beyond one. It rarely has a message other than "Beat up bad guys", but when it has a message, it sticks with it.


You're still "allowing" it, however. If you have knowledge that not doing something will very, very likely result in the deaths of thousands, and you don't do it, and it then happens, then you have allowed all of that to happen. This is another case of using semantics to avoid the point.

Therefore, killing to protect anyone is murder?
Yes. But sometimes murder is the only right thing to do. That's the point of moral dilemmas. Sometimes you have to do something morally wrong in order to stop something even greater.

I'm not saying there's no difference between the two, but I'd like you to explain why there's supposedly such a massive gulf between the two, even though they produce the exact same results.
I am saying there's no difference between the two. It's why... political stuffs I can't say on this forum, gah dammit. Morality discussions are impossible when you can't include real life stuff. I'd like a rule clarification: Can I discuss the Holocaust here?

[Teron]

Well, I'd disagree that he undercuts his message. I read Dune and the subsequent books as Paul being a slave to his precognition. Sure, he ends up in a somewhat "happy ending", but he knows there's a darker time ahead.

In the later books, Paul definitely does not have a happy ending.

What message in Dune do you see as contradicting itself?

P.S. Batman from Batman Begins: "I won't kill you. But I don't have to save you."

I'm fairly sure that if it's in your capability to save someone, won't endanger your own life, and you choose not to, then you're still culpable in his death. Heck he reversed course in the next movie and saved the Joker =P
That actually "fixed" it for me, as I chose to regard it as character development implying that, if he could do it over again, he would save Ra's al Ghul.

[hamishspence]

If you let people die through inaction, when it wouldn't cost you anything to act, it is your fault they died, just as it would if you murdered them yourself.

This is the bit a lot of people would take issue with. Especially when it does cost the person something to act- sleepless nights, an uneasy conscience- and possibly jail or even death, etc- Murder is, my guess is, not something you can "just do" with no repercussions to the murderer.

"Murder For the Greater Good is better than doing nothing- and thus being a murderer through inaction" appears to be the claim here.

[Killer Angel]

Didn't the whole "Dexter" TV serie, undercut itself since the beginning?
You enjoy a serial killer slaying other serial killers...


Are you claiming that it is therefore right to do the opposite, and let many people die instead of one?

Do we wanna discuss trolleys (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trolley_problem#Overview)? :smallwink:

[kamikasei]

Didn't the whole "Dexter" TV serie, undercut itself since the beginning?
You enjoy a serial killer slaying other serial killers...

What exactly is the message they're trying to convey, which they're undercutting there?

[Killer Angel]

What exactly is the message they're trying to convey, which they're undercutting there?

I don't know if I'm right, but the impression Dexter (which I like) gives to me, is the same of shows decrying violence, but solve said problems using violence. (NOTE: I've seen only the first serie, so cannot speak for the others).
The message I feel is: Serial killers are very bad people, and so it's ok to giv'em the same fate.
Eye for an eye pov was good in the old testament and for the Code of Hammurabi.

At least, it's contradictory. But it's an impression, and maybe it's only me.

[kamikasei]

But it's not a story with the moral, "serial killers are bad people". It's a story about a serial killer who wants to consider himself a less bad person by making only bad people his victims. That tension is part of the point of the story and character. There's no message to undercut. (If you feel the show wants us to consider Dexter to geniunely be a Good Guy because he kills Bad People, then that may be a moral position you disagree with, but it's not even contradictory, besides not being the point of the show.)

[Killer Angel]

But it's not a story with the moral, "serial killers are bad people". It's a story about a serial killer who wants to consider himself a less bad person by making only bad people his victims. That tension is part of the point of the story and character. There's no message to undercut.

It seems that season 2 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dexter_(TV_series)#Season_2) disagree on Dexter making himself a less bad person (see Doakes), but I see the reasons behind the "no message to undercut". Point taken.

[Quincunx]

In My Teacher Flunked the Planet, the aliens were discussing four options for dealing with homicidal humanity, not two. The first two I am fuzzy on, but one was accept them like any other space-faring race. One was to sabotage their science or otherwise lock them away in the galaxy so they couldn't find and destroy the rest of civilization. Pre-emptive genocide was plan D.

. . .our. Not "their". Our.

[Serpentine]

Suuuuure Quin, suuuuure :smallwink:

[Lord Seth]

In My Teacher Flunked the Planet, the aliens were discussing four options for dealing with homicidal humanity, not two. The first two I am fuzzy on, but one was accept them like any other space-faring race. One was to sabotage their science or otherwise lock them away in the galaxy so they couldn't find and destroy the rest of civilization. Pre-emptive genocide was plan D.To summarize it briefly: Plan A was to leave Earth alone in the hope that either humans would destroy themselves or get better, either way solving the problem. Plan B was to take over Earth and try to solve the humanity's problems themselves. Plan C was to work to prevent mankind from getting out of the solar system, by planting agents to sabotage their space travel advancements, setting up a blockade, and/or making a giant force field around the solar system. Plan D was to destroy Earth. We don't really have any definite information as to what the aliens would pick if they had to make the decision.

[JonestheSpy]

Well, I'd disagree that he undercuts his message. I read Dune and the subsequent books as Paul being a slave to his precognition. Sure, he ends up in a somewhat "happy ending", but he knows there's a darker time ahead.

In the later books, Paul definitely does not have a happy ending.

What message in Dune do you see as contradicting itself?



Well a couple of things; first, Dune is really a stand alone novel with sequels, not a series like Lord of the Rings - there's a huge drop off between folks who read Dune and those who go on to Dune Messiih (no I don't have exact stats, this is just an observation nad I bet if you conducted your own poll you'd find the same result). Certainly the movie adaptations simply end without any indication of further story being necessary. So saying that the message of Paul's tragedy is better conveyed in the later books doesn't really mitigate much, in my opinion.

And as I've said, my own observation is that most folks don't clue in to the tragic element of the story, certainly not on first reading - the traditional "haapy ending" elements are too powerful. So it's not that Herbert contradicts his own message the way the "anti-violence but winning through violence" stories people have mentioned do, it's that the real point of the story is overshadowed by the typical "young boy is the Chosen One and defeats evil bad guys and gets girl and becomes king" plot template.

[crescent20]

But I think it's safe to say that most people would agree that, in general, you have less of a moral obligation to prevent someone else from possibly doing something harmful in the future than you do to refrain yourself from harming them in the present.

In response to this statement I would only remind you of the idea that, "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing."

Certainly killing a child here and now not a desirable course of action for anyone. That does get changed slightly when presented with (assumed to be) accurate information about the future of said child from an (again, assumed to be) reliable source, i.e. the alien. How many people would go back in time if the only reason they were allowed to do so was to kill Hitler before he could start his definitively evil actions?

Yes killing a child named A. Hitler would still be an evil act, but the idea that sometimes we are forced, FORCED, to choose between the lesser evils has already been covered quite succinctly in this thread.

Foreknowledge is a gift. Failing to use it when available is IMO more "evil" than the other "lesser evil" options presented. Ex: Global warming debate (not to become political) Even if we aren't the direct cause of warming, isn't it reasonable that we should choose to act in ways that won't exacerbate the problem?

So, given the choice to save 100 people, one of whom may go on to do some good in the world, vs. blood on my hands for one person who is known to go on to do much evil in the form of killing those 100 people, I would probably choose the blood myself, morally ambiguous as I do admit the decision to be. Foreknowledge is a gift, but is it ever 100%? How would I know if it was or wasn't? How do we know one of those 100 people won't kill more than 100 other people? Lesser evil choices are never easy, and are always a morally slippery slope at best.

[kamikasei]

My point is that while some moral theories will say that you are responsible for the evil done by others that you could have prevented just as if you had committed it yourself, most theories and our moral intuitions do not say this. Of course, part of the reason for this is that in the real world we can't perfectly predict anything, so while a scenario of "you have inexplicably perfect and reliable foreknowledge" may change the rules it's also singularly useless as a guide to actual moral behaviour.

[crescent20]

Lamech: You're aware that "First, do no harm" is part of the physician's Hippocratic Oath, which is meant to be instructions for a particular vocation and not a general moral treatise, right?

Why shouldn't it be a general moral treatise? Isn't the only way to achieve a true CIVIL-ization, to get everyone to agree not to harm each other by choice?

Whether that harm is physical, emotional, social, economic, or otherwise shouldn't be relevant. Harm is harm. I'm cribbing this from Robert A. Heinlein stories, specifically those wherein "The Covenant" exists. It is an agreement, a social contract, and a quite effective one, aimed at putting the civil back into civilization. Great stories IMO.

[kamikasei]

Why shouldn't it be a general moral treatise?

Maybe it should, but it isn't. People don't live their lives or judge one another according to it. We don't use adherence to the Hippocratic Oath as our measure of whether a person is moral or not.

(Incidentally, "harm is harm" is a uselessly vague sentiment; harm is bloody complicated and defining what's "harm" and what's "existing in a changing world" is by no means trivial.)

At this point, though, we're resurrecting a morality debate gone rampant which would probably be better left to lie.

[hamishspence]

Hmm- we've had Rand, we've had Heinlein...

All things considered though, the basic individualist message is the same no matter who the particular individualist author is. Basically- do not be aggressive. Defend yourself, but do not go out and attack people.

And when faced with people who break this rule, only then, do things like the police and the army come into play.

But aside from that- it's a "if behaviour isn't harmful, banning it is morally wrong" attitude as well.

[Dervag]

I'm not sure that WAS the message of "The Cold Equations", assuming there was one. Anyway, the point was made in the story that any experienced spacer--who were the only people who were expected to be on board that ship in the normal course of events--would have known not to get aboard the scout ship.Dude, the scout ship was attached to a passenger liner. There were teenagers and uneducated migrant workers on board.

The original point of the story (dictated to the author by the editor) was that some disastrous situations are caused by the laws of physics, can't be outthought, and must be handled ruthlessly. The fact that the author instead wrote a story in which the problem is caused purely by criminal negligence on the part of the state can be interpreted as either the author's heart not being in it, or as the author being clever enough to subvert the message his editor required him to deliver.


Depends on the individual commercials. Some of them were genuinely funny and I thought did at least give some reasons to switch, but some aren't anything other than "PC SUCKS! TAKE THAT!"Like, say, the one complaining about the overzealous Vista security?
_______


The aliens did decide on destruction at the end right? Well depending on your definition of pure evil (for example, people who plan on committing genocide qualify IMO), the aliens may or may not qualify. But I can pretty easily show that they make Stalin look, if not good, not in the wrong.

One: The aliens believe it is okay to kill all humans.
Therefore: Any set of humans is a subset contained in the set of all humans and okay to kill too, if we go by the aliens.
Two: Murder is either worst act one can commit or tied for that position. Most people do not kill themselves after acts like mutilation, rape or torture, and the threat of death can cause most people to undergo such events.
Therefore: Since it is okay to kill any set of humans, all other acts against humans are also justified.
Conclusion: Since all acts against humans are justified, anything Stalin did is also justified.

You can't say the intended xenocide was anything but several hunderd fold worse than any human act and still condemn any human.I'm not at all sure that makes sense.

First, specifically, your argument breaks down right at the second line, between "One" and "Therefore." The trouble happens when you assume that "killing humans is justified in this case" implies "killing humans is justified in all cases." That doesn't make any sense. The very definition of "justified" implies that an action is sometimes OK and sometimes not- otherwise, you don't even bother to talk about it being "justified."

It's quite conceivable that it is sometimes justified to kill X for a specific reason, even though it would not always be justified to kill X for whatever the hell reason you want.
______

Second, and more generally, you're not thinking about this in terms of the aliens' perspective. They're dealing with an intelligent species that, bizarrely, actually seems to like to fight, to the point where they fight among themselves for no obvious reason and are capable of great cruelty. And sooner or later, you just know those guys are going to invent interstellar travel unless they kill each other off... at which point you're faced with the prospect of homicidal alien hordes pouring into your living room.

What are you supposed to do in a situation like that? You can't ignore it, because it may result in mass multiple-species genocide of many entire planets when the crazies develop the resources to do so.


And last time I checked most people consider it wrong to kill one to save many. We don't cut people up for organs do we? We don't kill to save more.This depends heavily on your ethical system. Utilitarians, for example, will often be totally OK with killing one person to save many. There are self-consistent moral philosophies in which that is not only permitted, it is required.

It's certainly not a "most people believe" situation; most people rely on very fuzzy moral concepts that can be bent into pretzels under certain conditions, as demonstrated by the sort of things you can get people to do during wartime.