Evil People

[ftheking]

2 hours ago, Tianzi said:

And yes, Renly was evil, evil twice, cause he betrayed not only Stannis, but also Joff (as he didn't believe that Cersei's kids were bastards) and went on war not for any justice/goal for the kingdom's wellness, but out of vanity and greed.

Okay so he is evil for betraying his rightful king AND for not supporting your favorite usurper in betraying the rightful king. That makes a lot of sense!

Renly has no reason to support Stannis and a far better reason to usurp the throne, namely that Joff and the Lannisters behind him suck and he could d it better (and also stay alive).

I don't believe that you personally follow a code of ethics in which being against the heir of the last king being king for any reson is the definition of evil. Basically the most evil person you can imagine is a North Korean who hates on their supreme leader? Treason!

[Darkstream]

10 minutes ago, ftheking said:

Okay so he is evil for betraying his rightful king AND for not supporting your favorite usurper in betraying the rightful king. That makes a lot of sense!

Renly has no reason to support Stannis and a far better reason to usurp the throne, namely that Joff and the Lannisters behind him suck and he could d it better (and also stay alive).

I don't believe that you personally follow a code of ethics in which being against the heir of the last king being king for any reson is the definition of evil. Basically the most evil person you can imagine is a North Korean who hates on their supreme leader? Treason!

Renly did have a reason to support Stannis. Namely, he was his younger brother, and Stannis was the rightful heir to the throne. Obviously, that is a moot point to someone who is illegally attempting to usurp the crown for himself, but technically, by the customs and laws of Westeros, he had an obligation to support Stannis.

Of course, his actions don't make him evil. I think a lot of people here are using a very broad and inaccurate definition of what would constitute being evil.

[ftheking]

8 minutes ago, Darkstream said:

Renly did have a reason to support Stannis. Namely, he was his younger brother, and Stannis was the rightful heir to the throne.

This reasoning only applies IF you believe that Stannis was the rightful heir to Robert. You can not believe that Joffrey and Stannis are both the rightful heir. Renly had no reason to doubt that Robert's kids are Robert's kids, which made Stannis an usurper. Renly had zero reason to support him. (He pretty much didn't have a chance either since Stannis only came out of the woodwork after Renly already crowned himself)

[Tianzi]

35 minutes ago, ftheking said:

Okay so he is evil for betraying his rightful king AND for not supporting your favorite usurper in betraying the rightful king. That makes a lot of sense!

For betraying the rightful king (Stannis) and the king who as far as Renly knew was right (Joffrey). Namely, if you believe in Joffrey's legitimacy, it's the right thing to support him. If you don't believe it, the right thing is to support Stannis. Plus, as already mentioned, Stannis was his older brother. Out of all of the wannabe kings, Renly literally has the least right for the throne he wants.

Btw, Renly IS my favourite usurper, so, like, epic fail.

[Tianzi]

36 minutes ago, ftheking said:

I don't believe that you personally follow a code of ethics in which being against the heir of the last king being king for any reson is the definition of evil. Basically the most evil person you can imagine is a North Korean who hates on their supreme leader? Treason!

Um, I don't? Start reading the posts you're quoting?

But Renly WAS committing treason (as was for example Olenna poisoning Joffrey, and not many readers will condemn her for that), and we are talking here about people starting wars (you know, deaths, destruction) for weak reasons, so Renly is the prime candidate.

[ftheking]

29 minutes ago, Tianzi said:

For betraying the rightful king (Stannis) and the king who as far as Renly knew was right (Joffrey).

Aha, he was evil for not supporting Stannis without even knowing it, accidental evil. Come on, you have to understand how claiming Renly was "twice evil" was bs, you're just being stubborn now.

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Namely, if you believe in Joffrey's legitimacy, it's the right thing to support him. If you don't believe it, the right thing is to support Stannis.

As you say here either or, NEVER both. So Renly was "once evil" at most. For oppossing the rightful-by-heriloom king, who he judged as not fit to be king, which is the only legit reason to usurp I can think of. ETA: And we actually know he is right. Joffrey is the worst, whoever his father might be. So not evil at all.

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But Renly WAS committing treason (as was for example Olenna poisoning Joffrey, and not many readers will condemn her for that)

Yet you said Renly was "evil twice" for it, so I guess we can just agree you said something ridiculous.

[Tianzi]

1 minute ago, ftheking said:

Aha, he was evil for not supporting Stannis without even knowing it, accidental evil. Come on, you have to understand how claiming Renly was "twice evil" was bs, you're just being stubborn now.

OK, sorry, thrice. And as far as he knows, the queue goes:

1. Joff

2. Tommen

3. Stannis

(Or should we also count Myrcella?)

9 minutes ago, ftheking said:

For oppossing the rightful-by-heriloom king, who he judged as not fit to be king, which is the only legit reason to usurp I can think of. So not evil at all.

Very legit. Let's let every Joe or Steve run armed on whatever official they judge negatively. Also, unlike his TV counterpart, Renly was very clearly uninterested in justice of any kind, but motivated by ambition and greed.

Btw, as I stated before, if one heir is unfit to rule, we skip him and go to the next one, that's how inheritance works.

[teej6]

Renly was not evil, just a douchebag who deluded himself into thinking he could be a good king because he had love struck Loras Tyrell on his side. He may not have initially known that Cersei's kids were illegitimate but once he found out this was his response to Stannis "You may well have the better claim, Stannis, but I still have the larger army," which to me makes him a usurper and self serving scumbag with no loyalty or integrity. 

[Tianzi]

6 minutes ago, teej6 said:

"You may well have the better claim, Stannis, but I still have the larger army,"

Actually, out of the kingly bunch Renly was the only one without any claim to any throne whatsoever, making him the clearest case of an usurper.

[hiemal]

Evil is awfully hard to pin down. I'll go with most dangerous to friend and foe:

1. Ramsey Bolton

2. Littlefinger

3. Euron Greyjoy

[Helikzhan]

15 hours ago, The Wolves said:

A year did not pass between the tourney and the abduction it was most likely a few weeks or a few months but not a year. 

The Tourney at Harrenhal was in 281 AC.

The disappearance of Lyanna was in 282 AC. 

[Helikzhan]

12 hours ago, ftheking said:

Good grief you can't be serious. We don't know enough about the Mountain? We know about how many rapes, murders and other astrocities? We are not in his head so we can't know if like Tyrion he also once was an abusive arsehole to a sex slave, who will remember him and retch .... We also wouldn't care, because it wouldn't even come close to his top 100 evil acts. We care that Tyrion does it because we root for him or want to root for him or think we are suppossed to root for him. Or imagine the Mountain murdered that dbag singer Dareon and stole his boots. You wouldn't even shrug. When our hero Arya does it we take notice. If the Mountain did it, we would wonder if he is becoming nice, because everything else we read about him was 10 times worse.

Perpetual migraines would only be sated by endorphin rushes one would get from violence, sex and other hostile actions. So right off the bat you really haven't studied the condition to see how it would affect Gregor.

His whole life has been centered on pain and violence being the painkiller. Like Baelish said at the Ned hand tourney some boys have a natural inclination to violence. In this case it was very likely the migraines from his growth disorder were the root cause. 

Other characters have done just as bad. Like Cersei ordering the deaths of all Robert's bastards around the capital. Including knifing babies. They did this completely cool without pain or remorse involved. Even in the case of Cersei it's difficult to say because the order is not the same as the action. Janos Slynt reasoned that orders were orders but it was his hand doing the deed. The deed and the directive separated makes for some wiggle room on calling it evil. When considering the external forces it's VERY difficult to call any of these characters true evil. 

[WSmith84]

5 hours ago, 300 H&H Magnum said:

 

What evidence are you basing the idea that Robert and Ned were part of a conspiracy to overthrow the Targaryens? Because there is zero indication in text that they were. Rickard may have been (though I doubt it), but we've been inside Ned's head and there was never even a hint of it.

[Wm Portnoy]

Evil is hard to pin down.  Gregor's brain is not as smart as Roose even if he tortures for people out of pleasure.  Does it matter whether they get pleasure from doing evil?  Roose doesn't feel so does that make him any less evil?  Do you give Gregor a break because he's not smart?

I would classify  Gregor with Ramsay.  Roose and Arya belong to the same classification, whatever name you want to give to the label.  Fitting that Nan spent time with Roose at Harrenhal and some of Roose rubbed on her.  Bron should be in the same classification as Roose and Arya.  They have no pity and will kill anyone to get what they want.  I call it sociopath.  Gregor and Ramsay are killers who enjoy it.  I say Ramsay is more evil because he's smarter and should know better.  Ramsay can make the distinctions better than Gregor.

[ftheking]

7 minutes ago, Wm Portnoy said:

 Bron should be in the same classification as Roose and Arya.  They have no pity and will kill anyone to get what they want.  I call it sociopath. 

That is just not true that Arya feels no pity. How could you possibly get that from her chapters? She goes completely crazy with rage when she overhears that one asshole laughing about gangraping a young girl and killing her brother, so that she rushes to off to waste one of her kills on him instead of her enemies or the enemies of her family. That is more than pity that is EMPATHY. Everyone who feels empathy also feels pity, pity is easier. It obviously makes her the oppositte of a sociopath she is the oppositte of Roose. Bron is just a run of the mill selfish asshole. It's really like people are misreading Arya on purpose. 

[Darkstream]

31 minutes ago, Wm Portnoy said:

I would classify  Gregor with Ramsay.  Roose and Arya belong to the same classification, whatever name you want to give to the label.  Fitting that Nan spent time with Roose at Harrenhal and some of Roose rubbed on her.  Bron should be in the same classification as Roose and Arya.  They have no pity and will kill anyone to get what they want.  I call it sociopath.  .

What a joke. You have not a clue what you're talking about. Have you even read a single Arya chapter? Don't bother answering, your comments would confirm that either you haven't, or you're just trolling.

[ftheking]

58 minutes ago, Helikzhan said:

Perpetual migraines would only be sated by endorphin rushes one would get from violence, sex and other hostile actions. So right off the bat you really haven't studied the condition to see how it would affect Gregor.

I actually have a friend who has perpetual migraines, really seriously to the point of counting as fully handicapped and unable to work for a living. It fucking sucks. The day she decides to cut my arm off and rape my dog I'm still going to hold it against her, believe you me. Fortunately she didn't show any signs so far. 

Come the hell on. Gregor is an unfortunate fellow and he is 100% evil scum.

 

[Helikzhan]

9 hours ago, ftheking said:

I actually have a friend who has perpetual migraines, really seriously to the point of counting as fully handicapped and unable to work for a living. It fucking sucks. The day she decides to cut my arm off and rape my dog I'm still going to hold it against her, believe you me. Fortunately she didn't show any signs so far. 

Come the hell on. Gregor is an unfortunate fellow and he is 100% evil scum.

 

 

Put your sister in a Skinner's box where the rush of endorphins is only received by bashing another's skull or sexual gratification. What kind of person would she be then? 

[ftheking]

57 minutes ago, Helikzhan said:

Put your sister in a Skinner's box where the rush of endorphins is only received by bashing another's skull or sexual gratification. What kind of person would she be then? 

That's ridiculous, but I'd advice anyone lots of masturbation or suicide in that case. Definitely not torturing kids to death, I don't get how this is not obvious.

In general a person who has zero choice but being evil and cruel all the time would be seen as monster/demon and fully evil. These beings really only exist in fiction, vampires, orcs etc. and usually people claim Martin doesn't have such one dimensional villains. Now you claim the Mountain is not evil BECAUSE he is a monster, who can't and couldn't be anything but 100% destructive 100% of the time... and that is again proof of Martin's lack of black and white writing...?

Anyway the mountain is presented as a human being capable of thought and speech and knowing right from wrong and he chooses wrongtastic every time, because it makes him feel good - or as you would argue - better.  He is the poster boy for evil, no matter how much he hurts.

[Helikzhan]

7 hours ago, ftheking said:

That's ridiculous, but I'd advice anyone lots of masturbation or suicide in that case. Definitely not torturing kids to death, I don't get how this is not obvious.

In general a person who has zero choice but being evil and cruel all the time would be seen as monster/demon and fully evil. These beings really only exist in fiction, vampires, orcs etc. and usually people claim Martin doesn't have such one dimensional villains. Now you claim the Mountain is not evil BECAUSE he is a monster, who can't and couldn't be anything but 100% destructive 100% of the time... and that is again proof of Martin's lack of black and white writing...?

Anyway the mountain is presented as a human being capable of thought and speech and knowing right from wrong and he chooses wrongtastic every time, because it makes him feel good - or as you would argue - better.  He is the poster boy for evil, no matter how much he hurts.

It's not ridiculous considering the world of Westeros. It's a brutal and unforgiving world where people are murdered all the time for frivolous reasons. 

GRRM is clearly not writing a black and white, good vs evil story. I honestly don't know how you arrived at that conclusion given the entire Stannis and Melisandre story arc. The story is chock full of people governed by the external forces in their lives. Forces that make them do what they do. Gregor isn't the only example of this. Arya is also a great example being shaped into an assassin. You might want to argue that she doesn't kill anyone who doesn't deserve it. You'd be wrong. 

We sometimes look at things in a bubble of our choosing telling ourselves I'd do this or that if it were me. We're removed from the conditions influencing these characters so our opinions are worthless in that regard.