John Suburbs

No. You're wrong. None of these people were babies in the crib formulating evil thoughts. None of them wakes up in the morning and thinks, "gee, what evil thing can I do today because I'm so purely evil." Everybody justifies their actions, even Gregor, Joff, Ramsay, Vargo. Everyone. Let's look at Jaime. He is nearly universally reviled as an oath-breaker and kingslayer, and he pushed a little by out a tower window. And yet he performed probably the most noble, honorable act in the book, saving half a million people from terrible deaths. He justified both actions as the right thing to do. So Martin is not lying. Everyone in his tale is grey. No one is pure anything. That's the way life is.

And yet these "citizen/subjects" were rounded up and gassed by the millions. Why do you think that is? And why did no one defend them, in court or otherwise? Because the state deemed them traitors and subversives. When you run the entire machinery of the state, including the media, the laws on paper are meaningless. I'm not arguing that Ned is equivalent to anyone. I'm merely pointing out that desgnating him as pure or nearly pure is entirely subjective. Plenty of people in the south think all northerners are barely above savages, and that Ned is both a fool and a hypocrite. And yes, there are characters who are better and worse than others. That's my whole point. But nobody is pure.

Yes, they were all deemed enemies of the state, and since the Nazi's controlled the media, that's what the people believed. You and I can see them as victims, but at the time in Germany they were seen as criminals. This is what I'm talking about when trying to pin lables on people, either positive or negative ones. It's all subjective. If you want to call Ned pure or nearly pure, that's fine, but don't think that's a universal opinion. Most people in the south consider all northmen to be barely a step above savages, and Ned is both a fool and a hypocrite.

@Craving Peaches @sifth @kissdbyfire They were outlaws under German law. This is what I'm getting at. Nobody is pure or nearly pure good or evil, not even victims of great suffering. The German state declared them threats to peace and social order, regardless of what citizenry status they held. Murderers are citizens too. Elsewhere, they were victims, but in Germany they were outlaws -- extreme ones. So let's apply this to asioaf. People want to say Ned is "nearly pure good," and the people who knew him and (many of) his subjects in the north would agree. But Cersei and Jaime do not. They are the good ones in their own stories, and he is the interloper who would cast them down and steal the crown. The same goes for Robb. Is he nearly pure good? Not to the people of the westerlands whose homes he burned and goods he plundered. He is evil, and they laud Tywin Lannister as nearly pure good for having destroyed him. There will probably be a statue of Tywin in downtown Lannisport soon. So sorry, but it is a fool's game to try and label people as good or evil an any objective sense. Martin says that's not the way it works in this story, that everyone is a shade of grey, some darker than others. But no one is pure. No one. It's all subjective.

Martin is very clear that all human characters asioaf are shades of grey, some greyer than others of course. Pure good and pure evil are reserved for magical or divine characters, like God and Sauron and all the other evil dark lords that populate fantasy literature. He is not doing that here. There is no dark lord, no Mr Evil who wakes up every day contemplating what evil he is going to do, no evil minions all deformed and dressed in black . . . none of that. And there will be no final armageddon battle between the forces of good and evil to decide the fate of the world. All of that has been done to death, and he says he's doing something different. So there are characters who can be seen objectively as reasonably good people -- Ned, Robb, Sansa -- but even this is objective. If the PoVs were coming from the riverlands, few people would have anything nice to say about Robb, but they would laud Tywin. This is why trying to assign labels like good and evil to humans in this story is a false trail. Nobody was born evil, not even Joffrey or Ramsay or Gregor. They commit evil acts, but they are still humans, and whether we call someone good or bad, there is nothing pure about anyone.

Mute appeal. Cat uses this to describe Ned when talking about sending Jon away from Winterfell, and . . . Dany uses it when describing the look of the dead wolf king head in her vision in the Palace of Dust.

Sure, but killing a person is a serious matter. So when we talk about Ned being "pure good" or "nearly pure good" we must take everything into consideration. Ned may be a nicer guy than most, but there is nothing pure about him. Whether it's in combat or his duties as lord and warden, he has a lot of blood on his hands -- not to mention lies, selfishness, arrogance and all other things that some religions refer to as sins. To be even "nearly pure" you would have to at least never have killed anyone, directly and on purpose at least. Ned doesn't meet that standard. Virtually no one does.

@Craving Peaches @sifth The ordinary citizens killed in the Holocaust were killed because they were deemed to be traitors and subversives. Ned passes the same kind of judgement on Gared. Yes, desertion is a crime, but this was a special circumstance, which Ned would have understood if he bothered to listen. Military discipline remained perfectly intact after Gared left. If Ned had allowed him to tell his story, it might have alerted the entire realm to the real threat up north. Again, Holocaust victims were outlaws. They were an enemy force conspiring with the enemy to topple the reich. See how easy it is to rationalize your actions when you are the one who decides what is truth and what is lies? The law in Germany at that time was that Jews and other subversives (gypsies, homosexuals, etc.) were outlaws. When you have ultimate, unchecked power over people, the law is whatever you say it is. Ned certainly had it in his power to grant Gared a reprieve, at least temporarily, so his story could be told. He chose not to, and then killed him. All the top brass at Nuremburg were doing their duty as well. It still doesn't make it right, even if you couch it in modern legal concepts and not the medieval ones Ned is going by.

We're not talking about law here. We're talking about morality. Some laws are both unjust and immoral. So if someone carries them out just because that is their duty, does that make then "near pure good", "near pure evil" of something in between?

It's the same thought process, though, just carried out to a different scale. If Ned can still be considered "nearly pure good" despite doing his duty, then it stands to reason that no one at Nuremburg should be considered "nearly pure evil" for doing theirs'. Ancient or modern law is irrelevant to this point because we are talking about morality, not law.

They know what fear is. And Ned listened to the man and determined, without any knowledge of PTSD or modern psychology, that he was simply raving. And regardless of whether it is for ideology or duty, the question is whether this make Ned -- aka, the one who carried out his own order -- "nearly pure good", "nearly pure evil", or something in between?

Sure, but are the people who carry them out "near pure good", "near pure evil", or something in between?

No other lord had the standing of Tywin Lannister, Hand of the King. And even then, Tywin did not make the offer until the tourney at Lannisport in 276 when Rhaegar was 17 and Cersei was 10. And it's not accurate to say that no other lord had the same idea as Tywin. I'm sure all the lords with eligible daughters began conspiring to wed the crown once it got the point that there would be no eligible sister, nor any Velaryons or Celtigars that we know of, for him to wed. None were as foolish as to make a public offer, however, given that the odds of rejection are high and the insult would be known across the land.

Same as the other thread. No one is pure good or pure evil, near or otherwise. Petyr is playing a machiavellian game of self-interest. And I think by the time we are finished we will know what he was up to and who he was plotting with.

Nobody is pure good, just like nobody is pure evil. Ned beheaded a man who was frightened beyond his wits just because it was his duty. That's what leaders of the third reich claimed they were doing at Nuremburg.

Robb was heading right for the Crag. He went from Oxcross to Ashemark to Castemere. Look at the map to see what's next. The love potion is evident in the plot itself, as well as the history of the Spicer women and Robb's actions toward Jeyne by the time they reach Riverrun. It's as evident as RLJ and who really killed Jon Arryn.

They had no way to conspire after the Crag fell. What kind of workaround? Robb has taken control of the castle, including the ravens, and it is surrounded by 4,000 men or more. Plus, Tywin is on the march through the riverlands at this time, so any kind of overland approach would take months. It had to have been worked out before that. Robb's injury is not necessary. All they need is to get him to drink the potion. And if he doesn't, then there is no marriage, no fake alliance, no harm, no foul. Tywin needs to come up with some other plan.

Her involvement in the plan, starting with Robb's marriage to Jeyne, had to have been worked out before the Crag fell. Once Sybell lost her ravens, there was no effective way for her and Tywin to negotiate this deal. But that doesn't mean Sybell knew exactly what was going to happen at the Twins, other than that Robb was going to die. Only those who needed to know were in on the plot, and even then, only to the extent needed to play their parts. So she would have every reason to believe Raynard would be spared. The real question in all of this is how could Sybell guarantee that Robb would fall for Jeyne. You can find the answer by looking into the history of House Spicer.

I doubt he gave the rape command, if that's what you mean, but he had to know that Elia had to die if her children were going to die. Neither Clegane nor Lorch could very well leave her alive as a witness to their crimes, and it's inconceivable that she would not be with at least one of her children at a time like this. So while the rape was unnecessary, her death was vital.

It doesn't look like it's a right that can be denied. Lysa didn't deny it to Tyrion, even though she denied him his chosen champion, Jaime. Aegon IV didn't deny it to Naerys. In fact, no one has ever been denied this right as far as we can tell. If Robert tried to do this, it would seem as if he was afraid to put the charges in front of the gods, as if he knows they aren't true. And Robert isn't likely to kill Cersei in a rage. First, there is no proof, only an accusation, and words in a dusty old book. Only two of Ned's six children look like Starks, and one of them is a bastard. Plus, Jaime is there to protect her, and most of the household guard are Lannisters. This was why Cersei didn't kill Jon Arryn when he had the book, why she didn't kill Ned when he had the book, and why she didn't just destroy the book. She knows nothing short of a confession from either her or Jaime will place her in jeopardy.

Kind of an old thread to resurrect at this point, but . . . Cersei, not Robert, calls for a TBC. That's her right.

He is. And one of the reasons he is so capable is that he uses commoners to undermine the high and mighty -- people who they don't think are a threat.

Shae saw right through Varys' disguise -- almost like she knew it was one of his personas already. She also knew about the dwarf joust when Littlefinger was spending a lot of time and expense to keep them under wraps. And she is desperately trying to be at the purple wedding, once saying she specifically wanted to see doves fly out of a pie. Varys has plenty of little birds to be his eyes and ears; Petyr does not. Also, Bronn brought Shae into Littlefinger's orbit, just like he brought the Kettleblacks. And we know who they were working for . . .

I suspect Shae was one of Littlefinger's operatives, probably one of dozens of young women sent into the kingdom to get close to the high and mighty to winkle their secrets out through pillow talk. In this light, Shae was not hurt by Tyrion's actions, nor was she trapped. She used him until a bigger fish came along.

They "knew" in the sense that they were certain about it. It isn't that hard to see. But nobody is going to bring this to Robert without proof. All Cersei has to do is deny it, and that's the end of it -- and the accuser is left looking like a fool. Renly wanted Ned to take the crown and set himself up as regent. He can't do that if he also denies that Joffrey is the rightful king. So going that route leads to all sorts of issues in an already complicated and dangerous time.