111 replies to this topic

[Clarkrock7]

SerBarristan, on 05 April 2012 - 07:10 PM, said:

The relativists defense here is something like Ned is a "victim" of his time, when misogyny woven into the fabric of society. This defense is totally inadequate to me. This kind of reasoning basically silences minority voices, usually the victims themselves and also the conscientious few who speak out in moral outrage. Let's take the Civil Rights Movements in the U.S. I have family aging family members who hold very racist ideas because they were born in a time when those ideas were commonplace and accepted. Is that a valid excuse? No. Because then I'm essentially saying "everyone thought that way" when in reality everyone did not. It's like ignoring all the people who marched and protested and did freedom rides in opposition to an unjust system (and lest we forget a lot of those people died because of these efforts). You're whitewashing them from history like they didn't exist. The same could be said for the abolitionists before the Civil War.

Take it back to Westeros and gender norms. There are people like Arya and Brienne who do not live up to the expectations society places on them. Brienne in particular feels the full brunt of the society's misogyny and but still perseveres. She's an awesome character. I love her. But to forgive the Ned Starks and Robert Baratheons et al. for dishing out the abuse she receives because that's the cultural norm? Absolutely unforgivable. Because there are people who don't subscribe to these fucked up norms. Her name is Brienne.

Easy tiger!  By this rationale, every character is 'absolutely unforgivable' when you apply your modern morality.  Nearly everyone subscribes to gender roles in general.  You mention Arya and Brienne, what's interesting about them is that they aren't feminists pushing for or even espousing a belief in different gender roles, all they do is refuse themselves to do what is expected of them. They don't say 'this is wrong, girls shouldn't be made to act this way.'  they are perfectly accepting of everyone else continuing on as before, only that they won't abide by those same conventions.  The actual only example in westeros would be in dorne where gender roles are truly different and one could argue much closer to a modern day view.  There is no feminist movement afoot in Westeros that supports your analogy to the civil rights movement that your relatives lived through.

Isn't this exactly the same as saying that every single human being who believed that the world was flat was an absolute fool to think so, because it turns out it aint?  That the second one person said, 'hey wait a second, i'm not so sure' that absent immediate adoption of that viewpoint, they should be viewed in hindsight as morons?

Look at how every single character accepts a class structure of lords and monarchs with absolute power over the common man.  Isn't this 'absolutely unforgivable' when looked at through a 21st century prism where individual rights are promoted and protected?  Dany, your champion of feminist might, is an interesting character in this instance, as she may not be forcing anyone to follow or be subservient to her, but were the society different, the people would not be doing so. It is a society of kings or queens and their subjects, what the little people know how to do is to follow so that is what they do. Every one of them that does so is accepting the same social structure that we in the modern day find reprehensible.

[Fragile Bird]

Clarkrock7, on 05 April 2012 - 08:55 PM, said:

Easy tiger!  By this rationale, every character is 'absolutely unforgivable' when you apply your modern morality.  Nearly everyone subscribes to gender roles in general.  You mention Arya and Brienne, what's interesting about them is that they aren't feminists pushing for or even espousing a belief in different gender roles, all they do is refuse themselves to do what is expected of them. They don't say 'this is wrong, girls shouldn't be made to act this way.'  they are perfectly accepting of eyone else continuing on as before, only that thverey won't abide by those same conventions.  The actual only example in westeros would be in dorne where gender roles are truly different and one could argue much closer to a modern day view.  There is no feminist movement afoot in Westeros that supports your analogy to the civil rights movement that your relatives lived through.

Isn't this exactly the same as saying that every single human being who believed that the world was flat was an absolute fool to think so, because it turns out it aint?  That the second one person said, 'hey wait a second, i'm not so sure' that absent immediate adoption of that viewpoint, they should be viewed in hindsight as morons?

I'd say, in short, no.

However, since I'm off to slurp pinot grigio with friends, I'll save the rest for later tonight.

[Clarkrock7]

"I don't do this. Slavery is wrong no matter what time period. That wealthy Georgian should have been punished, or at the very least forced to provide real, adequate wages to every single slave he had."

Why?  Why should someone be punished for doing something totally acceptable at the time he did it?  I live in the middle ages, i dump my chamber pot in the street, just like everybody else does, I contribute to the spread of disease in doing so, because society is too stupid (read: haven't figured out yet) that this is a bad idea.  I am an immoral asshole according to your 21st century view.

I live at the dawn of the industrial age, I build a factory and I am so farsighted that I don't use child labor and I pay everyone a living wage including myself (no bonuses) and I give everyone free health insurance that hasn't been invented yet and I give lots of vacation time and I pay my taxes and insist on refusing any 'loopholes' and I don't lobby the government for advantages........but........I was unable to invent al gore and the idea of climate change/global warming is not even in my wildest dreams and my smokestacks pollute the air terribly hurting every single person on the planet today and all those to come.  According to your 21st century model, I am an immoral asshole.  I may even be unforgivable if I only employ men, no women having turned up to apply for the labor intensive factory work.

[James Arryn]

Silmarien, on 05 April 2012 - 03:02 PM, said:

I don't do this.  Slavery is wrong no matter what time period.  That wealthy Georgian should have been punished, or at the very least forced to provide real, adequate wages to every single slave he had.

Georgian nothing, you've just labelled 99.99999% of human history morally abnormal.

So, to clarify, what time period and geographic location has a monopoly on moral imperatives?

(I'm really not trying to sound like a condescending prick. It's hard in this medium about subjects like this. My apologies...believe it's not meant that way.)

Edited by James Arryn, 05 April 2012 - 09:26 PM.

[Clarkrock7]

Hypothetical boy, let's call him Mowgli, is raised by wolves from a few months old, has no interaction with other humans, grows to be 15 years old, is strong, tough, has learned to hunt, kill and fight.  Bumps into a lost boy scout in the woods, carrying his canteen and shovel.  That shovel sure looks sharp and ol Mowgli has no idea of the capacity of this new creature to harm him, Mowgli takes the opportunity and kills the lost boy scout.

Given:  boy scout had neither the intention or the ability to harm mowgli

Moral absolutism= Mowgli is an immoral asshole, he killed someone other than in self defense
Moral relativism=Mowgli acted morally, his lack of knowledge did not allow him the luxury to wait to determine the boy scouts intentions.

[OnionAhaiReborn]

Clarkrock7, on 05 April 2012 - 09:43 PM, said:

Moral absolutism= Mowgli is an immoral asshole, he killed someone other than in self defense
Moral relativism=Mowgli acted morally, his lack of knowledge did not allow him the luxury to wait to determine the boy scouts intentions.

Option 3= Killing the boyscout was an immoral act, but due to circumstances we do not consider Mowgli an immoral person. (This is the same thing I say about Ned Stark and the deserter)

I have yet to collect my thoughts and put down what I want to say exactly about the circumstances that prevent us from concluding that the actor is immoral, but I do want to press the idea that I think it is possible to hold to an absolutist stance on the acts but not an absolutist stance on judging the actors.

[butterbumps!]

hmm.   I think I unleashed something I didn't intend- this is a seriously loaded topic!

I don't know if we were trying to prove the existence of morality per se, but more to think about:

1.  Do you see certain characters as villainous?
2.  If so, what makes you see them as villainous?
3.  Are there characters that fall into shades of grey for you, and if so, what makes a character fall into lighter/ darker on the spectrum for you?

I apologize for not being a little clearer about that (we tried to be careful!).   I think we had presupposed that "seeing greyness" results from a kind of clash between sympathizing with a character's circumstances and applying our own sense of morality (modern, absolute, or otherwise).

Btw- Lykos, I love the mention of D+E.  That's what I think of too in terms of in world Westerosi morality.

[James Arryn]

OnionAhaiReborn, on 05 April 2012 - 09:48 PM, said:

Option 3= Killing the boyscout was an immoral act, but due to circumstances we do not consider Mowgli an immoral person. (This is the same thing I say about Ned Stark and the deserter)

I have yet to collect my thoughts and put down what I want to say exactly about the circumstances that prevent us from concluding that the actor is immoral, but I do want to press the idea that I think it is possible to hold to an absolutist stance on the acts but not an absolutist stance on judging the actors.

That distinction doesn't really serve any purpose other than to make us feel less judgmental, though.

[Clarkrock7]

Acts can't be moral or immoral, they're just the physical expression of ideas.  The ideas come from people, which is also where morality comes from.  Let's go back to the OP.

"....Jon Arryn was an immoral act (on the assumption that it’s immoral to kill except in self-defense)"

Why the need for the qualifier?  Because no one thinks you must stand there and die or else be immoral.  Yet, if the act of killing is immoral, then any killing is immoral.  All the disclaimer gives us is the why.

Why did you kill him?  Self Defense     ok-moral
Why did you kill him?  Greed          no-immoral
Why did you kill him?  Revenge   uh, well it depends, is it LF or Frey or Hitler or Stalin or somebody really really bad who really really deserves it-???????

Why did you kiss that married woman? Horny                                          no-immoral
Why did you kiss that married woman? Mistake, just lost my sight, thought it was my wife. ok-moral

There's a song called the Pina Colada song about a couple who independently attempt to cheat through a personal ad.  They communicate with what they each think is a new, different person, but ultimately they discover that they were talking to each other all along.  Their conduct is certainly immoral, they were attempting to cheat and thought that they were doing so.  the fact that they were failing at it makes no difference.

Back to the acts being neither moral or immoral, I expect that people may think of really atrocious acts as being impossible to justify, but even with really terrible acts, you can always dream up an even more insane scenario that would justify the act.  ie, psycopathic villain who gives a 'do this horrible thing or something even worse will happen'

Hypotheticals can be made that put the actor into a position where there is no 'moral' choice, which proves the impossibility of absolutism.

[James Arryn]

We're quoting Barry Manilow (sp?) on Moral Absolutes now.

This place is awesome.

(Not sarcastic.)

[OnionAhaiReborn]

James Arryn, on 05 April 2012 - 10:13 PM, said:

That distinction doesn't really serve any purpose other than to make us feel less judgmental, though.

The distinction isn't serving a purpose other than to draw conclusions. I'm saying it is a real distinction that we can draw conclusions from.

Clarkrock7, on 05 April 2012 - 10:17 PM, said:

Acts can't be moral or immoral, they're just the physical expression of ideas.  The ideas come from people, which is also where morality comes from.  Let's go back to the OP.

"....Jon Arryn was an immoral act (on the assumption that it’s immoral to kill except in self-defense)"

Why the need for the qualifier?  Because no one thinks you must stand there and die or else be immoral.  Yet, if the act of killing is immoral, then any killing is immoral.  All the disclaimer gives us is the why.

The 'qualifier' is an assumption that I'm not actively trying to prove at the moment. Like when you said, 'Given: boy scout had neither the intention or the ability to harm mowgli' in your Mowgli thought experiment you were stating an assumption to operate off of. So if you disagree with the assumption that there are moral absolutes, we're no longer operating on the same assumptions. Which is fine, but the point I'm making is that I can assume moral absolutes and judge acts but not necessarily actors.

Edit:
As butterbumps noted, the issue here isn't proving/contesting morality, but discussing how we apply our individual standards of morality. So if you believe in moral relativism, we're interested in how you apply that, not in how you can argue that moral relativism is better than moral absolutism. Contest, if you like, the logic of the conclusions I reach based on my assumptions; don't contest my assumptions- they're not up for grabs in this case. It's whether your absolutism/relativism does or does not lead you to judge certain acts or actors immoral. And, if they do lead you to call certain things immoral but not other things, what the key differences are to you.

Edited by OnionAhaiReborn, 05 April 2012 - 10:38 PM.

[James Arryn]

It's not the presence of moral absolutes that bothers me, theoretically.

It's the coincidence that almost every living being has had of living in the time and place that most realizes them that sticks in my craw.

IOW, we're always more right here and now.

I sincerely doubt that. Nothing else in any moral sense can be seen to be progressive. We've killed more of each other...or a higher % of each other...in the past 100 years than in any few centuries added together before that. We have invented weapons that could eradicate mankind...AND USED THEM. Etc.

I think modern morality is the morality we are most comfortable with, certainly. But if 1000 years from now we are seen as savages for our treatment of vegetables or more likely something we haven't even considered, I'd be w/e.

It's GOING to happen, that's about the only progressive that seems absolute. We always judge the morals of the past harshly. Even in Dark Age Europe, when they were conscious that the Classical age was more advanced in virtually every other way, they felt that their claim to superiority was a greater understanding of God and the rights and wrongs that entails.

Edited by James Arryn, 05 April 2012 - 10:34 PM.

[Clarkrock7]

It is wrong to take something from someone else (assuming you don't have their permission, or that they didn't take it from you first, or that if you don't take it they will die, or you will die, or somebody else will die, or the world will end, or a million other scenarios that would require me as a moral person to take this thing)

I can now judge that act of taking something from someone else.  My judgment is that I need more information on why the person did it before I can decide if it is moral or not.

Only the why matters.

[James Arryn]

What if possession is itself immoral?

What if we're meant to be collective, and only immorality has gotten us off course.

(Not just being a Phil 101 brat...there are cultures that have believed what I just said.)

[Clarkrock7]

Isn't that essentially what the native americans believed before we took over with our 'progressive' ideas of property rights?

Don't we endorse this immoral view by participating in it, owning land and so forth?

[Clarkrock7]

a

Edited by Clarkrock7, 05 April 2012 - 10:49 PM.

[Fragile Bird]

Hey, how about some application of theory to the books at hand?  Instead of painting conceptual pictures of morality, how about explaining your POV relative to all the case situations George Martin provides?  Pick one, anyone.  Hell, go all out, pick two.

[Summerqueen]

Martin is a modern author speaking to a modern audience. Yes, I think we are challenged to apply our modern sense of morality so that we can understand the meaning of the fictional work, even if only to question the nature and scope of contemporary morality. If Martin's book series were just some throw-away piece of entertainment, then maybe we wouldn't have to carry the burden of figuring out what the work actually signifies, but I find the series to be anything but disposable.

So, again, yes, we are meant to ask ourselves who are the "villains"? What does "villain" mean to us as modern (fantasy fiction) readers? What would it mean to people in Westeros (which, BTW, is not medieval Europe—not sure why people are confused about that)? Are "villains" villainous in a literary-trope way, or are they villainous in some other way? (Do readers even find it useful to think of others as villainous anymore? What would the criteria be?) Are we encouraged to excuse what we would consider to be the moral wrongs of these characters? Does understanding of a moral wrong and empathy for those who commit them preclude judgment and condemnation of that wrong, and do we hold the agent accountable?

Remember, we are approaching literature, not history. And that's an important distinction to make. We are not judging real cultures, no real people will be hurt by imposing a modern interpretation onto the story. Literature demands we acknowledge our contemporary critical standpoint and look at the modern cultural product as exactly that. Martin can change the culture at whim. There is a problem with pretending that Westeros culture and time refers to any culture or time in history—history is not a unified voice, but Martin's setting certainly comes from one man. None of this means anything unless we can relate it back to his moment and culture or our own.

For example, every time that we let Tyrion off the hook, we are being hoodwinked by his ability to charm us (Humbert Humbert comes to mind as the unreliable narrator extraordinaire—even pedophiles can justify themselves convincingly, and that's the horror of Lolita). Is he a villain? It's difficult to get a handle on that question. Certainly, his actions are those of a villain from time to time. Just because we are made to pity him and defend his right to live when we see how much wrong has been done to him, should we not question the urge to excuse him in other areas where he is the wrong-doer? His ability to self-justify and make his actions appear either reasonable or righteous is something that should be raising flags all over the place (it's very human and not at all objective). Not applying our own moral codes to his narrative is equivalent to giving ourselves a handicap right off the bat. We refuse to condemn or make judgments, we absolve ourselves of the responsibility. That's not what being an active reader is all about. That's being an accepting and passive reader who just shrugs off the analytical work.

[Lord Littlefinger's Lash]

butterbumps!, on 05 April 2012 - 08:24 PM, said:

wow.   After 12 pages of trying decipher the premise, it turns out that was really just a "Ned is stupid" thread.

Well that thread was spawned from the "Honor is indistinguishable from stupidity" thread.  .  And there were some other points of interest along the way.  So I would say it was more of an, any honorable character is Westeros is doomed thread. ...And Ned was stupid for not having realized that.

But I wanted to take a step back from the particular actions and decisions of Ned Stark.

I mean, I think the signature on each post is fairly clear.

A Stark with a head is a little like a mule with a spinning wheel. No-one knows how he kept it and damned if he knows how to use it HOUSE OF BAELISH
Whores Rarely Sink

“Your father was a stubborn man as well. Honor, he called it. Well, honor has its costs, as Lord Eddard learned to his sorrow..."

-Stannis

Edited by Lord Littlefinger's Lash, 05 April 2012 - 11:24 PM.

[James Arryn]

Clarkrock7, on 05 April 2012 - 10:47 PM, said:

Isn't that essentially what the native americans believed before we took over with our 'progressive' ideas of property rights?

Don't we endorse this immoral view by participating in it, owning land and so forth?

Whattya mean we, paleface?