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Feedback wanted: Some questions on Ending (spoilerish)
Renegade_ Offline
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#95
RE: Feedback wanted: Some questions on Ending (spoilerish)

(12-17-2010, 11:55 AM)masochism Wrote: Ah, the child. Try to put it in perspective.

1. 18th century rural Prussia isn't a very nice place for a child without any of its family.
...

19th century Europe (you've got the wrong century) was well beyond the period of enlightenment and the industrial revolution, and into the period of civility, medicine, and modernity. Don't let the medieval castle setting cloud judgment of the morals of that time period. Murderously ending a child's life because you believe their outcome to be poor is appalling logic and yet we know that Daniel's intent was devoid of whatever good there is to be found in it (very little I might add). He did not kill the child out of some twisted form of compassion to save her from further suffering; no, in fact, he was the source of that suffering, and took her life savagely for loathsome reasons even he admits to: in a murderous rampage to save himself from The Shadow.

2.
And if the villagers were made aware, and the king's men brought, all the better to end it rather than Daniel further abetting Alexander's plan. Taking it upon himself to murder an innocent in some twisted fantastical hope that it will somehow contribute towards the better (not only was this not even Daniel's intent, but by that point Alexander's plan was already ostensibly 'evil') is the very same wishful thinking and willful ignorance that allows Daniel to commit such horrid acts in the first place.

3.
No human could ever hope to objectively quantify a life to the extent where they feel they are justified in murderously taking it (thus Alexander may be justified, but certainly not Daniel). Firstly, this sort of logic leads to all sorts of moral dubiousness: to whom do you give the authority to judge which life is more valued? And then further, how do you expect this to remain objective when it is the judge's own life that is in question (by your example Daniel is judge, jury, and executioner).

Secondly, again we already know this was not even Daniel's intention: his act was done in supreme selfishness and fear for his own life, not out of any attempt to objectively appraise the child's life (even if the child's life was truly 'worthless' there was no way he or any non-omniscient being could be sure of that). To believe, as he loomed there over the child with murderous intent, that he ended her life in cold blood out of a rational objective decision is to have failed to grasp the gravity of that situation entirely.

Furthermore Daniel did have many ways of stopping the torture: in the least he could have simply neglected to partake in it (certainly the acts of torture and the Baron's ultimate plan was only increased with Daniel's aid), and in the most he could have followed the advice he gave himself before cowardly drinking the Amnesia potion, and ended Alexander's life (and don't fool yourself into believing this was not possible: if such a powerful being could meet his demise from a few loosely toppled structures, then so too could he at the vengeful grip of an enraged human).

It's not to say that he was not under extreme stress or placed in dubious predicaments by a wily-tongued tempter, but at any moment I was not able to perceive Daniel's actions as forced. Coerced, or heavily influenced perhaps, but never forced. He always possessed a choice, and yet always displayed mild cognitive dissonance or doubt quickly followed by willful ignorance that allowed him to consistently make choices of increasing moral depravity at the direct expense of others' lives simply to save his own. And for that reason Daniel's character is to be loathed, and his end no more deserving than those he gave to others.
(This post was last modified: 12-24-2010, 02:05 PM by Renegade_.)
12-24-2010, 12:30 PM
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RE: Feedback wanted: Some questions on Ending (spoilerish) - by Renegade_ - 12-24-2010, 12:30 PM



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