GRRM didn't seem to think Joffrey was a psychopath, just a classic bully

[sweetsunray]

17 minutes ago, Protagoras said:

Pfft. You need to study some more philosophy before accusing others of lacking knowledge. Your response tells me that you don´t even understand the basics of what I am talking about and I doubt that you can prove that there are objective truths, you will just say you think there is and that is my opinion etc, which is an intellectually pointless argument (seriously, did you fail to understand what I wrote?)

To argue objective truth you would have to prove that there is an objective reality and how can you even start doing that when everyone percieves everything differently. You know - the thing you named "primary guidance for ourselves".

Oh, I know the philosophical point of moral relativism. Is there an absolute right or wrong from nature's POV? Nope. The universe itself is devoid of emotions and morals. It is amoral. As for nature? The survival of genetic material is its goal, which is an amoral goal. As for species? The survival of the species is its goal, which is again an amoral goal. However, one of the ways to increase species survival is group survival, rather than individual survival. And from it evolved a hormonal bonding mechanism for parent animals to nurture their young and with those hormones come the experience of sensations, which are filed as emotions the more cognitive the species is. From it evolved a neuron mechanism that ensures the species is prone to refrain from harming their own, which we call empathy. So, for us humans as a species there is a state of being that promotes the inherent understand of what is right and wrong, and this comes before whatever cultural standards there are since cultures are memes rather than hard wired hormones. And that is why fundamentally a human being who has empathy, cares about the consequences and impact of their actions and can feel guilty requires only himself or herself to judge right from wrong. People who are impaired in this can also judge right from wrong, but don't care enough.

[Sullen]

Just now, Cas Stark said:

And that might be true, save for the cat incident and the quote from Tommen.  They suggest that from a very, very early age, Joff was acting outside the norm.  Robert and Stannis reaction tells us that the cat incident was seriously disturbing.  Tommen's quote tells us Joff did something bad to him on an ongoing basis, we don't know what.

The cat incident was the product of curiosity, and a child experimenting. It's no different from children pitting insects against one another or burning ants with a looking glass. Or making their Sims die of hunger/exposure. That "bad" something is simply bullying. If George had meant it to be something like rape I highly doubt he would have called Joff "just a classic bully". Stannis being shocked by the whole cat thing sounds more like confirmation bias than anything. "Oh, remember when Joff killed a pregnant cat? That was totally because he is an abomination of incest! (Which makes me the rightful King)"

11 minutes ago, Cas Stark said:

When you add that in with the lack of empathy, he even turns on his mother eventually, the ability to feign emotion sucessfully when the need arises, the sadistic streak...it adds up to a personality disorder that is probably genetic, inherited from his mother.

He doesn't lack empathy, he very clearly loved and wanted to emulate his emotionally distant father, was distraught by his death, and kept him as something he aspired to be after he died. Him turning on his mother means absolutely nothing, I'm sure he still felt for her, he simply thought she was out of place once the power rose to his head.

[Cas Stark]

2 minutes ago, Sullen said:

The cat incident was the product of curiosity, and a child experimenting. It's no different from children pitting insects against one another or burning ants with a looking glass. Or making their Sims die of hunger/exposure. That "bad" something is simply bullying. If George had meant it to be something like rape I highly doubt he would have called Joff "just a classic bully". Stannis being shocked by the whole cat thing sounds more like confirmation bias than anything. "Oh, remember when Joff killed a pregnant cat? That was totally because he is an abomination of incest! (Which makes me the rightful King)"

He doesn't lack empathy, he very clearly loved and wanted to emulate his emotionally distant father, was distraught by his death, and kept him as something he aspired to be after he died. Him turning on his mother means absolutely nothing, I'm sure he still felt for her, he simply thought she was out of place once the power rose to his head.

We'll have to agree to disagree.  Cat killing isn't the product of childhood experimentation, not now, not in the past, not in GRRM fantasy.  Joff has no empathy or capacity for love [just like his disturbed mother], he identifies with his father as a warrior and king, that's a different thing.  His turning on his mother, who has loved, nurtured, protected and supported him his entire life, means nothing?  Okay then. 

[The Weirwoods Eyes]

23 minutes ago, Protagoras said:

Ah yes, the scans. My problem here is - of course, that these scans can´t measure the brains of ancient cultures - since they are dead.

In addition, I am sceptical to the idea immoral = psychopath. Lets say you studied the brains on an ancient civilzation and found out that most were psychopaths. Well, they are in the majority and decides what behaviour is acceptable and what symptoms that are seen as problematic. Maybe you are the psychopath since you differ from THEIR default setting.

Psychopathy have been changing its definition through the passage of time and that is because of this very issue if I am not mistaken. Sure, you might find a personality dimension, but nothing say that that personality is bad/wrong in its culture.

Are you trying to argue that the physical measurable differences in the brains of psychopaths could very well have once been the norm for homo sapiens? and that now there are simply fewer people with this brain type? but that because at this theoretical point in history they were in the majority that means they were not morally wrong. Due to societal norms of that theoretical culture. 

 

 

[Maxxine]

Draco Malfoy was a bully. Joffrey is much more sadistic and cruel. He enjoyed seeing Sansa upsest when he took her to view her father's head. I have a 12 year old son. I am around a lot of 12 year olds because of this. Everyone saying how cruel/mean etc 13 year olds are is kind of amazing me. Sure SOME are, but not most.  Maybe everyone that thinks that puberty turns them into little psychopaths have dealt with some really horrible pre-teens/teens.

This is the perfect comparison. Thank you for bringing it up. Draco is a teenaged bully. Joff is something more than that. Like someone else said if Joffrey was meant to be a character with more layers that we're supposed to be sympathetic or empathic towards him, GRRM had three books to make us see that the way JK did with Draco in Half-Blood Prince and to a certain extent in Deathly Hallows. The excuses made for Joffrey on this thread have been really surprising. There are plenty of people in these books who have bad parents and have seen some terrible things. Rhaegar's father was the mad King. Daeron's father was Aegon the Unworthy and his own father called him a bastard. Neither of them went around killing cats and making the KG beat little girls.

[Protagoras]

3 minutes ago, sweetsunray said:

Oh, I know the philosophical point of moral relativism. Is there an absolute right or wrong from nature's POV? Nope. The universe itself is devoid of emotions and morals. It is amoral. As for nature? The survival of genetic material is its goal, which is an amoral goal. As for species? The survival of the species is its goal, which is again an amoral goal. However, one of the ways to increase species survival is group survival, rather than individual survival. And from it evolved a hormonal bonding mechanism for parent animals to nurture their young and with those hormones come the experience of sensations, which are filed as emotions the more cognitive the species is. From it evolved a neuron mechanism that ensures the species is prone to refrain from harming their own, which we call empathy. So, for us humans as a species there is a state of being that promotes the inherent understand of what is right and wrong.

Morality is not science. Morality cannot be part of science.

The human mechanisms and their intended purpose is not relevant at all. What is, is how empathy actually work in practice and I can tell you that there is no objective definition of ethics despite all those mechanisms. If it were, we wouldn´t have this discussion.  Moral beliefs and practices have always been bound up with customs and conventions, and these vary greatly between societies. 

That some scientists fail to get this but instead try to figuring out moral truths with the scientific method are tragic. If these mechanisms all point in one direction -  why have so many people seem to have failed to discover the one true moral code. 

Again, you need to prove this objective and I think the fact that so many disagree means there is no inherent understanding of right and wrong. Just saying that everyone not susceptible enough means psychopathic behaviour is a weak, self-justifying argument mostly held by annoying rationalists, who refuses to analyze these questions as careful as they do with other data.

[Protagoras]

23 minutes ago, The Ned's Little Girl said:

I know Sweetsunray can speak for herself (and I hope she does), but I would like to assure you that she has studied this exact subject (psychopathy) in great depth. She also has real-life experience to draw upon. My own experience is that she knows whereof she speaks. I would like to ask you to re-read her posts and keep more of an open mind regarding what she says.

 

Respect is earned and after her post she deserved my counter-response.  Period

[sweetsunray]

32 minutes ago, Protagoras said:

Ah yes, the scans. My problem here is - of course, that these scans can´t measure the brains of ancient cultures - since they are dead.

In addition, I am sceptical to the idea immoral = psychopath. Lets say you studied the brains on an ancient civilzation and found out that most were psychopaths. Well, they are in the majority and decides what behaviour is acceptable and what symptoms that are seen as problematic. Maybe you are the psychopath since you differ from THEIR default setting.

Psychopathy have been changing its definition through the passage of time and that is because of this very issue if I am not mistaken. Sure, you might find a personality dimension, but nothing say that that personality is bad/wrong in its culture.

Actually wrong again. Studies have been done using Hare's defintion of psychopathy (and he's the one who developed it) on every documentation across past societies. Hare maintains from those studies that there never have been more than 1% psychopaths at any given time, no matter how brutal that society was. There has been no increase nor a decrease in psychopathy since written history. And it certainly cannot be argued that homo sapiens started out with more psychopaths than empathic human beings, because of primate studies and that we'd either be a non-existent species now or would have a far higher percentage of psychopaths in the population still. If such an evolution is impossible in a course of 80000 years, it's completely absurd to even think there were more psychopaths 2000 years ago.

What does make a huge difference is the social impact psychopaths can have on society, because it depends on the social hierarchy and power checks. An absolute ruler who is a pscyhopath will gather psychopaths around him with the majority of normal empathic people at the bottom of the pyramid, where violence is rampant. In our modern society we see similar pryamid structuring in some corporations, however as our society does have balances and checks on violence, we are more prone to witness it in financial chaos being the result of it. 

[ShadowCat Rivers]

In my opinion, this is a follow up from the author's part to the idea that the purple wedding was supposed to be a more nuanced scene and that we, the readers, weren't supposed to feel good for it.

Which I find somewhat of a failure if that was his really intention, to be frank. What I read in-text rather contradicts the "just another bully" characterization of Joffrey. Or maybe it's just because that's how all "regular" bullies would be if they were given power over life and death?

In any case, I didn't shed a tear for Joffrey and in-context, murder was a rather merciful manner to be dealt with. For him as well, but mainly everyone who would have to endure his rule.

[John Suburbs]

13 minutes ago, Maxxine said:

This is the perfect comparison. Thank you for bringing it up. Draco is a teenaged bully. Joff is something more than that. Like someone else said if Joffrey was meant to be a character with more layers that we're supposed to be sympathetic or empathic towards him, GRRM had three books to make us see that the way JK did with Draco in Half-Blood Prince and to a certain extent in Deathly Hallows. The excuses made for Joffrey on this thread have been really surprising. There are plenty of people in these books who have bad parents and have seen some terrible things. Rhaegar's father was the mad King. Daeron's father was Aegon the Unworthy and his own father called him a bastard. Neither of them went around killing cats and making the KG beat little girls.

Interesting. What if Draco had been king of all the wizards with unchecked, unlimited power at his disposal, and he grew up never having faced a single consequence for any of his actions? Would he have been more or less violent and cruel than Joffrey?

BTW, I feel sorry for Joffrey's whipping boy, whomever he was.

 

 

 

[Tijgy]

45 minutes ago, Protagoras said:

Pfft. You need to study some more philosophy before accusing others of lacking knowledge. Your response tells me that you don´t even understand the basics of what I am talking about and I doubt that you can prove that there are objective truths, you will just say you think there is and that is my opinion etc, which is an intellectually pointless argument (seriously, did you fail to understand what I wrote?)

To argue objective truth you would have to prove that there is an objective reality and how can you even start doing that when everyone percieves everything differently. You know - the thing you named "primary guidance for ourselves".

 

38 minutes ago, The Ned's Little Girl said:

I know Sweetsunray can speak for herself (and I hope she does), but I would like to assure you that she has studied this exact subject (psychopathy) in great depth. She also has real-life experience to draw upon. My own experience is that she knows whereof she speaks. I would like to ask you to re-read her posts and keep more of an open mind regarding what she says.

 

I must also say that what she says really represents the literature I read during my forensic psychopathology classes. (I think there are however people who have the same brain dysfunction in their scans but are not really psychopaths.)

There was something wrong with Joffrey. He had probably a predisposition for it; and this predisposition was realized by his dysfunctional family and lack of social/parental control. IMO The real problem is he could get away almost with anything. His "father" was completely disrupted by his behaviour, while one of Robert's big flaws is he closes his eyes to everything.

 

[Sullen]

3 minutes ago, Tijgy said:

There was something wrong with Joffrey. He had probably a predisposition for it; and this predisposition was realized by his dysfunctional family and lack of social/parental control. IMO The real problem is he could get away almost with anything. His "father" was completely disrupted by his behaviour, while one of Robert's big flaws is he closes his eyes to everything.

 

If Joffrey didn't directly show him the dead kittens, I highly doubt Robert would have cared, though.

I think the intensity of his reaction is more a question of being forced to react rather than a testament to the horrid nature of Joffrey's behaviour.

[Protagoras]

6 minutes ago, Tijgy said:

 

I must also say that what she says really represents the literature I read during my forensic psychopathology classes. (I think there are however people who have the same brain dysfunction in their scans but are not really psychopaths.)

I don´t doubt she uses the modern take on psychology and definitions (who havn´t existed for so long, yet somehow - without reflection I am afraid, is held up as truth). But this isn´t about psychology nor science, its about philosophy. 

[Little Lark]

41 minutes ago, Sullen said:

The cat incident was the product of curiosity, and a child experimenting. It's no different from children pitting insects against one another or burning ants with a looking glass. Or making their Sims die of hunger/exposure. That "bad" something is simply bullying. If George had meant it to be something like rape I highly doubt he would have called Joff "just a classic bully". Stannis being shocked by the whole cat thing sounds more like confirmation bias than anything. "Oh, remember when Joff killed a pregnant cat? That was totally because he is an abomination of incest! (Which makes me the rightful King)"

He doesn't lack empathy, he very clearly loved and wanted to emulate his emotionally distant father, was distraught by his death, and kept him as something he aspired to be after he died. Him turning on his mother means absolutely nothing, I'm sure he still felt for her, he simply thought she was out of place once the power rose to his head.

Gotta disagree with you on the cat thing. I worked in animal research for a couple of years and I can tell you that it's a very emotionally harrowing experience, and this is in a situation where you're trying to research while having the animal in as little pain as possible. Actually doing something like that to a living creature is not even remotely on the same level as killing off sims.

I do think you have a valid point about childhood experimentation. Kids aren't always aware of when they've gone too far. Nor do they always understand that other people and animals can feel things as acutely as they do. Also, like you said, Joffrey was absolutely starved for male affection. Where I disagree is that this would mean he is empathetic. The ability to crave love and attention and the ability to empathize are two totally different things.

[sweetsunray]

5 minutes ago, Protagoras said:

Morality is not science. Morality cannot be part of science.

The human mechanisms and their intended purpose is not relevant at all. What is, is how empathy actually work in practice and I can tell you that there is no objective definition of ethics despite all those mechanisms. If it were, we wouldn´t have this discussion.  Moral beliefs and practices have always been bound up with customs and conventions, and these vary greatly between societies. 

That some scientists fail to get this but instead try to figuring out moral truths with the scientific method are tragic. If these mechanisms all point in one direction -  why have so many people seem to have failed to discover the one true moral code. 

Again, you need to prove this objective and I think the fact that so many disagree means there is no inherent understanding of right and wrong. Just saying that everyone not susceptible enough means psychopathic behaviour is a weak, self-justifying argument mostly held by annoying rationalists, who refuses to analyze these questions as careful as they do with other data.

I noted you objected to immoral = psychopathy. You made a mistake there regarding psychopathy. Psychopathy is not equated with immorality, but with amorality. It is the absence of morals alltogether, whatever they are, that is the void partially behind psychopathy. Hence, their favorite argument is moral relativism.

Let us take the the pet animal. Any empathic human being who has bonded with their pet cannot conceive of purposefully and wilfully physically harmng it. Only when they witness the pet suffering from a grievous wound or illness will they consider killing it for mercy, and they will try to achieve it in the manner that will lessen not add more suffering, not even momentarily. A Roman, an Inuit, an Egyptian, a feudal peasant or lord, a hunter, child and adult will act and think in this way as long as they can bond and feel empathy. It does not matter what society they live in, as long as they have empathy and can bond. A horse breaks its leg? It is killed asap with the least added suffering possible with the means at hand. A hunter might use dogs to down a bear, but he'll weep (internally) over his whimpering dog who was mangled by the bear, and give it mercy, if he has empathy and bonded with the dog. Any of these people will frown and find it deeply disturbing if a fellow man ignores the suffering pet and lets it suffering continue or takes out of a knife and starts to torture it on top of it. They will all think  - there's something deeply wrong with that person. Sure, plenty might even think to themselves, "Must have been that father or mother who brought them up the wrong way," but they don't need a codex to instantly feel disturbed and ill by it.

It doesn't require social laws or social schooling or debate for the majority of people, who are empathic and who can bond, to figure that out. And this counts for most harmful behavior.

You argue, "but it is debated"... Well let's consider what is debated. A lot of the debate in this thread is not even whether it's wrong or right, but what might have been the cause for Joffrey to behave in this non-normal manner. And those who do debate that it's not wrong are a minority who display posting behavior and posting content that is aimed to provoke or lacks empathy. 

 

[Melisandre's White Pubes]

55 minutes ago, Cas Stark said:

We'll have to agree to disagree.  Cat killing isn't the product of childhood experimentation, not now, not in the past, not in GRRM fantasy.  Joff has no empathy or capacity for love [just like his disturbed mother], he identifies with his father as a warrior and king, that's a different thing.  His turning on his mother, who has loved, nurtured, protected and supported him his entire life, means nothing?  Okay then. 

Cat killing was a fun activity for an entire village in the past, actually.  In France they would build bonfires and suspend cats in wooden cages above the fire, and people would laugh and cheer as the cats burned to death.  The King would often attend these festivals to dance by the fire as the cats were burned.  This was not considered aberrant at all in medieval times, and continued into early modern times (though the last time the king attended a cat burning festival was 1640).

And in Belgium, Ypres had a celebration where they would throw cats from the belfry of a tall church.  They did this until 1817.  They still celebrate it, but not by killing cats, they have a parade with cat shaped floats.

In  "The Great Cat Massacre", it's noted that killing cats was almost universally considered funny in Europe until modern times.

[sweetsunray]

8 minutes ago, Protagoras said:

I don´t doubt she uses the modern take on psychology and definitions (who havn´t existed for so long, yet somehow - without reflection I am afraid, is held up as truth). But this isn´t about psychology nor science, its about philosophy. 

You try to frame it into being about philosophy in order to ignore the science about it. Philosophy is a method on how to approach a subject. And in this case you're claiming to use the method to dictate people that science shouldn't even study it or make conclusions about it. How convenient.

[Maxxine]

26 minutes ago, John Suburbs said:

Interesting. What if Draco had been king of all the wizards with unchecked, unlimited power at his disposal, and he grew up never having faced a single consequence for any of his actions? Would he have been more or less violent and cruel than Joffrey?

BTW, I feel sorry for Joffrey's whipping boy, whomever he was.

 

 

 

Draco wasn't a king, but from the context we got about him he did do whatever he wanted and didn't have consequences unless he was at school and even at school he did a lot of things without consequences. Look at how much Snape let him get away with and how much crap he did and still became a prefect. His family's money got him out of a lot. Obviously this is not to the same extent as Joffrey, but this is the closest comparison I can think of. But the point is, we do see another side of Draco than lend more toward bully than sadist. He cries over the thought of the consequences of failing to kill Dumbledore, he doesn't kill Dumbledore even though he has the perfect chance, and he doesn't tell when he recognizes Harry in Hallows. All this is done so we can see that while he's an antagonist, he's not 100% bad and the author wanted us to empathize with him. We don't get any semblance of that with Joffrey. If GRRM wanted us to empathize with him even a little bit, he didn't do a good job.

[Tijgy]

Just now, Sullen said:

If Joffrey didn't directly show him the dead kittens, I highly doubt Robert would have cared, though.

I think the intensity of his reaction is more a question of being forced to react rather than a testament to the horrid nature of Joffrey's behaviour.

The problem is this explanation actually ignores the fact Robert was horrified to see Joffrey on the throne. He did not felt comfortable with him. According to Cersei Robert "sometimes" "would say things" (it is not really explained against who and what). 

He was just really worried about Joffrey and he does care about the possibility of a "mad king". 

[redtree]

It's not just the cat though, Tommen once had a fawn and it got lost. Apparently Joff took the fawn and had it skinned, if it wasn't enough, he showed it off to Tommen in a jerkin form. Killing an animal is one thing, killing your little brother's pet is another thing, and having it skinned and later showing it off is WTF 

IMO, he's way ahead of bully