The Hound's moral alignment?

[scotcat]

@Dicer.

You're absolutely right in what you say about Sam. It does make you appreciate that he's turned into an exceptionally moral man.

[JonCon's Red Beard]

Sandor is a survivor. Literally. He fled his house very young because he was afraid to be "mysteriously" killed. And he had to be the Lannister's dog to survive. Considering his older brother burnt his face, probably killed his other sister and got everybody traumatized and yet, was knighted, there is no wonder he has some twisted ideas about right and wrong: he IS amoral because he needs to, and as Jaime said, he's probably better by "going inside".

That doesn't mean he does not have some soft spots. And that seems to have been children. Despite his dislike for Joffrey, he played along with him. Also, he tried to protect both Sansa and Arya. I would say that he's trying to protect the innocence of others as he couldn't do much for his own, or at least trying to teach them how to be safe in this cruel cruel world.

Even though it's from the show, I think this defines the Hound's pretty much: "yes, I tried to sell this girl to her family, but even I have standards. Let's get the hell outta here".

[John Doe]

He quit, so he is not a good KG member.

Indeed.

[Seaworth'sShipmate]

He quit, so he is not a good KG member.

Sort of a compliment really, if the likes of Meryn Trant and Boros Blount are the "good" kings guard members.

Honestly, the only halfway decent members of the guard anymore are Loras and Aerys Oakheart (before he died)

[Frey Pie]

Like all characters in asoiaf it's never as simple as merely being a good person or a bad person.

Oh yes I forgot gregor suffers from headaches and Ramsay likes dogs so it's not as simple as them being bad, totally grey

[JonCon's Red Beard]

Oh yes I forgot gregor suffers from headaches and Ramsay likes dogs so it's not as simple as them being bad, totally grey

Gregor and Ramsay are probably the exceptions. And even Ramsay has some sort of a background story trying to explain why he is how he is.

[Dicer]

The Mycah thing was pretty bad admittedly.

But I get the sense the Hound regretted/felt badly about it. When Arya brings it up to him at one point, he tells her that if he mentions Mycah ever again he'll beat her bloody. This could suggest that he felt guilt and sorrow about killing him, and felt very badly about her bringing it up.

I stopped reading at the point where the hound threatens to beat a child bloody for even mentioning his murder of another child. I feel more bad for the kidnapped and threatened Arya here than for some supposed guilt that the hound maybe experiencing.

Can you imagine Ramsey reacting with anger and umbrage about someone scolding him over killing Kyra? No. He'd probably smile and go into great detail about what fun it was to kill her. Big difference.

If you have to compare the hound to Ramsay of all people to show him in a more favorable light, that should tell you something.

Also, you have to take in context of the Hound's time and station in life. He is charged with protecting the crown prince, and following his commands. He did not know that Mycah didn't threaten Joffrey's life, so he gave his prince and benefactor the benefit of the doubt.

I was ordered to do it is not a good excuse to defend vile acts. When it personally affected him, he left his job and the Lannisters. So he could have left any time instead of being a Lannister henchman. He knows pretty well what sort of person Joffrey is. He could have let Mycah live. There was no way that he actually believed that Mycah actually attacked Joffrey.

No, he rode down an innocent child trying to run away and brutally cut him down, almost in half. And then laughed about it because he found it funny and wanted to taunt Ned. Don't whitewash him or his actions.

Not that its right, but Im sure the Hound's violent upbringing "killing a man at age 12" and just the generally short lifespan of the peasantry from wars etc, perhaps made the Hound sort of devalue human life, or think it was "cheap" and not think of a butcher's boy as a big loss. I know it sounds bad, but I think it is sort of what the Hound thinks.

Well, it does not make it right just because the Hound devalues human life and did not think a child's life a big deal. I guess Ned and Arya were just not the average Westerosi unlike Sandor since they mourned Mycah's death.

In general I am not in favor of justifying or excusing someone's vile acts because they had a tough life. There are plenty of characters who have had it tough as children and still strive to do the right thing. I find that more admirable and likeable in a character than one whose self pity for his hard life makes him or her take it out on innocent folks. So a Sam trying to do the right thing at the wall makes me like him more than a Cersei or a Sandor who hurt the innocent because of their anger at what was done to them.

Sort of a compliment really, if the likes of Meryn Trant and Boros Blount are the "good" kings guard members.

Honestly, the only halfway decent members of the guard anymore are Loras and Aerys Oakheart (before he died)

I am not commenting on the Kingsguard as an organization. Just that according to the rules, he quit. So he's not a good KG. That was in response to someone saying that he was the most honorable KG since Aerys' time. Not in the slightest. In any sense.

[Frey Pie]

Gregor and Ramsay are probably the exceptions. And even Ramsay has some sort of a background story trying to explain why he is how he is.

By and large I agree with you but statements like that one do get on my nerves. Is there evil in asoiaf, yippee everyone's grey etc. These two are most definitely evil

Tywin is also not a grey character, especially after joanna

LF is also the smallest bit evil

Some have done evil acts and have atoned or done good acts to try and wash out the old so fair enough, grey. But not all

And Roose Bolton- I'm gonna kill your husband, and rape you under his still swinging body. Grey as grey could be

[Dya of Oldstones]

Gregor and Ramsay are probably the exceptions. And even Ramsay has some sort of a background story trying to explain why he is how he is.

Most abuse survivors don't become monsters, so there's something else going on. Littlefinger is a good example of someone who suffered less abuse than most as a child but still became a monster.

Another problem with the Micah incident is the way it twists the ideal of protecting children. This was what Sandor was ordered to do because a child was threatened but we as readers know the child he was sworn to protect was himself a monster. Nobody in authority prevented what was an innocent enough confrontation between children into escalating into something more deadly, so there's plenty of blame to throw around.

A big part of his arc along with many other characters are questions about obedience to authority, and well trained dogs are loyal to their masters. What happens when the only master you know is corrupt? He knows something is wrong, but it's going to take more growth arc before he's finally able to do something to change it.

[Seaworth'sShipmate]

I stopped reading at the point where the hound threatens to beat a child bloody for even mentioning his murder of another child. I feel more bad for the kidnapped and threatened Arya here than for some supposed guilt that the hound maybe experiencing.

If you have to compare the hound to Ramsay of all people to show him in a more favorable light, that should tell you something.

I was ordered to do it is not a good excuse to defend vile acts. When it personally affected him, he left his job and the Lannisters. So he could have left any time instead of being a Lannister henchman. He knows pretty well what sort of person Joffrey is. He could have let Mycah live. There was no way that he actually believed that Mycah actually attacked Joffrey.

No, he rode down an innocent child trying to run away and brutally cut him down, almost in half. And then laughed about it because he found it funny and wanted to taunt Ned. Don't whitewash him or his actions.

Well, it does not make it right just because the Hound devalues human life and did not think a child's life a big deal. I guess Ned and Arya were just not the average Westerosi unlike Sandor since they mourned Mycah's death.

In general I am not in favor of justifying or excusing someone's vile acts because they had a tough life. There are plenty of characters who have had it tough as children and still strive to do the right thing. I find that more admirable and likeable in a character than one whose self pity for his hard life makes him or her take it out on innocent folks. So a Sam trying to do the right thing at the wall makes me like him more than a Cersei or a Sandor who hurt the innocent because of their anger at what was done to them.

I am not commenting on the Kingsguard as an organization. Just that according to the rules, he quit. So he's not a good KG. That was in response to someone saying that he was the most honorable KG since Aerys' time. Not in the slightest. In any sense.

1. Yeah, the Hound was terrible for taking Arya under his protection and sending her to the Twins to rejoin her mother and brother. The Brotherhood without Banners was no worse than the Hound as to the whole "kidnapping part."

2. He wasn't really going to beat her bloody. It was an empty threat. People do say them from time to time i.e "Im going to kill him if he's late."

3. While he and Sam ( and Danerys) all had tough lives, they were different upbringings. While both Sam and Dany grew up with sociopaths of a sort ( Randyll and Viserys) neither was physically harmed to the extent Sandor was, or grew up with someone they genuinely believed might kill them ( Sam didn't think it about Randyll until the week or so before he went to the Wall.)

He and Gregor were probably raised to "make a name" for their very new noble house, and were probably encouraged to do violent things in order to gain Lord Tywin's respect and approval. Im sure Gregor holding his face in a brazier for a bit probably helped addle his mind. Just saying all hard lives are not equal, and one can't know for sure how one would react or behave if we were placed in one. Not saying hard life makes it inevitable one will be bad, it is just another handicap to overcome though.

I have read the bios of several serial killers, and while I am outraged and disgusted at what they did, I also can't help but feel sort of sad for them. Most of them seem to have had awful childhoods, filled with abuse and trauma of all sorts. I'd like to think I could have endured all that as a child,and still have turned out as nice and normal as I am now, but I honestly can't say for sure :(.

Im sort of mindful of Nick Carroway's advice from the "Great Gatsby" about not to judge other people too harshly who have not grown up with the same advantages and privileges that you have.

[Mal Malenkirk]

@Dicer.

You're absolutely right in what you say about Sam. It does make you appreciate that he's turned into an exceptionally moral man.

The thing, though, is that their childhood are not comparable.

If Sandor had grown up in Tarly's house, he'd be the favored son and a respected knight by now. If Sam had grown up in the Clegane's household, he'd have been killed before he turned twelve and we wouldn't be able to guss over how moral he is in spite of his childhood....

We're not talking equivalent abuse here, Sandor's childhood was an order of magnitude worse than Sam's. A sweet kid simply wouldn't have survived.

[Salafi Stannis]

I don't know, it seems a fair enough premise for a thread (hardly original, but those are few and far between, given the age of the board)

I mean. lots of people like the Hound, and see him as "not too bad", exploring why is not a bad idea.

As for "moral alignment", are you referring the Dungeons and Dragons "nine alignments" thing? Because those are far too simplistic to use as anything but a baseline for discussion.

Yeah, but when you look at the other threads they've posted, you'll get what I mean.

[scotcat]

The thing, though, is that their childhood are not comparable.

If Sandor had grown up in Tarly's house, he'd be the favored son and a respected knight by now. If Sam had grown up in the Clegane's household, he'd have been killed before he turned twelve and we wouldn't be able to guss over how moral he is in spite of his childhood....

We're not talking equivalent abuse here, Sandor's childhood was an order of magnitude worse than Sam's. A sweet kid simply wouldn't have survived.

This was my thinking too, if I'm honest. You simply can't compre their upbringings

[Lullipop]

I think the thing (perhaps the only thing, or maybe not) that keeps The Hound from being worse than he is now is his aversion to big brother. He wouldn't, for example, rape someone, even if he threaten or says he should (like he says he should have raped Sansa) because the mountain is a rapist and he doesn't want to go so low to the point of being like him.

But hey, not being evil because your aversion to someone instead of because is the moral thing to do doesn't exactly makes you a good person. But I do think his time around the Stark sisters changed him a little for the better, though, or would change if he spent more time with them, like one of those children you give a puppy so they learn to be more careful and responsible.

[Queen.Sansa.Lannister]

Since when does having a sense of humor = good person?

[Dya of Oldstones]

He escaped certain death at home to serve the Lannisters, so in a way went from one monster to another, similar to Sansa escaping King's Landing only to end up with Littlefinger.

I think of Sandor as more of a grey character than evil, roughly similar to Tyrion, but for different reasons. I don't excuse him for killing Mycah, but he's showing slow improvement Even at the time, Ned saw his eyes glisten behind his helm, so there's a chance that incident was one of several that got him to rethink who he is. For now, I'm giving him the benefit of a doubt because of his arc with both Stark sisters, and Gravedigger, but the road to him becoming a good person or even a better man will be bumpier than most.

[Faydra]

If you mean that chart with the alignment system, I'd say true neutral. He is practical and realistic, and always fluctuating between evil and good.

[Blazfemur]

id say either chaotic neutral, or true neutral. Moreso chaotic. definitely not lawful, definitely not good, but definitely not evil either.

somewhere between true and chaotic neutral.

[King of Vaes Tolorro]

No Sandor and Honor have nothing to do with each other.

What do you mean? He likes horses.

[mdw4950]

you cant overlook the bad things hes done because he might have good intentions sometimes. he doesnt necessarily like the life he lived but that never stopped him from having a very firm survival of the fittest type attitude. there might be a couple instances where he felt remorse for killing someone but there were way more times he enjoyed it. i never got the impression he was lying or trying to keep up an act all the times he mentioned killing be the sweetest thing there is.

his actions toward sansa and arya are perfect examples. even when he was being 'nice' to them, he wasnt really being that kind. he was just being nice by his standards. to the readers knowledge sansa is the only character he tells his story to. after that story he could have simply said keep that to yourself but instead says hell kill her if she tells anyone. when he tries to take her from kings landing he still holds a sword to her throat and forces her to sing for him. with arya, yes he was trying to keep her safe, but it was all for his own gain. he didnt care about arya, he cared that she was a potential key to money and his own protection. he mentioned that if robb was smart hed let the hound join him. he stood a much better chance with the north army than being a deserter on his own. without arya to deliver he also knows that robb would likely kill or imprison him the second he showed up at their camp.

sandor isnt all bad but hes still far from a good person. hes kind of the perfect anti-hero. if he does make a return to the series (cant convince me he isnt the gravedigger until martin says hes not. the question for me is if he returns or not) i hope hes not a completely changed man. i wouldnt mind if he lightened up a bit but i dont want to see a basically new character. if he does make a return its definitely not out of his character to be using the elder brother for his healing powers. i could see him simply getting up and leaving without saying a word to anyone on the quiet isle when hes back to 100%.