War Won't Save The World

[TheLastWolf]

1 hour ago, SeanF said:

The Allies were definitely the much better guys in WWII

Comparing turds 

[illrede]

5 hours ago, Mystical said:

Well India would have been screwed even more if the war had continued. Churchill said 'eff them, who cares' and took their resources from them during WWll to supply his troops. At least 4 million people in India died as a result (starvation mostly). None of the sides, Axis or Allies, in the war were good guys. At most you can say one side is maybe the lesser the evil.

Mukarjee's a crank. The Bengal famine was a perfect storm of two failed harvests in the affected zone (in the midst of a very large harvest on the national level), then the Japanese overrunning Burma (which had the food import links to the affected zone), the Battle of the Atlantic and the D-Day build up (which tied up shipping capacity). Local famine conditions were over-determined. The food relief was there. The bottleneck (and the decision to make) was transport. That had been solved before the end of the war.

[SeanF]

52 minutes ago, TheLastWolf said:

He was one bad racist motherf. 

Calling Gandhi half naked fakir is no issue compared to the WW2 policies in the colonies especially Indian subcontinent, namely India, Pakistan, Myanmar, Sri Lanka and so. 

And I thought the forced conscription and compulsory logistics manufacturing in WW1 was bad. 

1917. Take a bow Sam Mendes 

There was no conscription in India.  Vastly greater numbers of Indians volunteered to join the Indian Army than volunteered to fight on the opposing side. 

Trying to argue that there was no, or little, difference between the Allies and Axis is a viewpoint of extreme privilege. One would not be free to make such arguments had the Axis won.

[SeanBeanedMeUp]

20 hours ago, SeanF said:

I don't think that humanity as a whole should pay the price that was demanded of Craster.  War is preferable to that.

Thucidydes nailed it. States fight wars for reasons of honour, self-interest, and fear.  Very few people fight wars for reasons of pure selflessness.  That doesn't make it wrong to fight wars, necessarily.  The motives of the Nazis and the Japanese leadership were unquestionably evil;  it wasn't only the Holocaust; the Hunger Plan, Generalplan Ost, The Three Alls, were equally awful.  The motives of the Allies were a mix of good and bad, but I don't think there's much doubt about which side needed to win that war.  The world would be a much worse place than it is today, had the Axis prevailed. 

I'm pretty certain that the Others have reasons for their actions, and in all likelihood, have some genuine grievances.  Martin has modelled them off Tad Williams' Norns, who likewise have real grievances against men, but they are still a major threat to the world. 

I'd like to believe that the Others were the ones victimized first in the War of the Dawn, and that they're back to get payback and their homes. 

There are theories that speculate that the Starks are connected to the White Walkers by blood. If that's true, then I can definitely see the White Walker invasion mean something else entirely.

[TheLastWolf]

12 hours ago, illrede said:

Mukarjee's a crank. The Bengal famine was a perfect storm of two failed harvests in the affected zone (in the midst of a very large harvest on the national level), then the Japanese overrunning Burma (which had the food import links to the affected zone), the Battle of the Atlantic and the D-Day build up (which tied up shipping capacity). Local famine conditions were over-determined. The food relief was there. The bottleneck (and the decision to make) was transport. That had been solved before the end of the war.

Whose policies resulted in the famine I wonder? Colonial Imperialism is bad and the Allies were hypocrites. This fact doesn't make Axis good guys. Bad vs ugly. That's all 

11 hours ago, SeanF said:

There was no conscription in India.  Vastly greater numbers of Indians volunteered to join the Indian Army than volunteered to fight on the opposing side. 

Trying to argue that there was no, or little, difference between the Allies and Axis is a viewpoint of extreme privilege. One would not be free to make such arguments had the Axis won.

I was talking about the first so called great war. Plus we all know how voluntary it was the second time. Firsthand. European countries fooling around with their sons and daughters lives affecting Asian colonies. 

[CamiloRP]

11 hours ago, TheLastWolf said:

Whose policies resulted in the famine I wonder? Colonial Imperialism is bad and the Allies were hypocrites. This fact doesn't make Axis good guys. Bad vs ugly. That's all 

I was talking about the first so called great war. Plus we all know how voluntary it was the second time. Firsthand. European countries fooling around with their sons and daughters lives affecting Asian colonies. 

u la la, someone spent a few months in college! 

[SeanF]

16 hours ago, TheLastWolf said:

Whose policies resulted in the famine I wonder? Colonial Imperialism is bad and the Allies were hypocrites. This fact doesn't make Axis good guys. Bad vs ugly. That's all 

I was talking about the first so called great war. Plus we all know how voluntary it was the second time. Firsthand. European countries fooling around with their sons and daughters lives affecting Asian colonies. 

In general, Indian soldiers took a lot of pride in their service.

If one is Chinese, Russian, American, or an inhabitant of any European or Asian democracy, or a Jew, one should be extremely thankful that the Allies and not the Axis won, and of course, mostly they are.  In the long run, it was also better for the people of Germany, Italy, and Japan that the Axis lost.

 

[TheLastWolf]

12 hours ago, CamiloRP said:

u la la, someone spent a few months in college! 

Not yet Cam 

Plus being a commonwealth (commonly held by Royals wealth) citizen, my duty 

7 hours ago, SeanF said:

In general, Indian soldiers took a lot of pride in their service.

I never claimed that Sikh or Maratha regiments had brains as much as they had brawns, jingoistic toxic hyper masculine patriarchal oxen. Stupid ≈ Bravery in a chauvinistic era and place. 

Let me be much clearer. General Dyer ordered the Jallianwallah bagh massacre. Hundreds of men women children old people shot dead. Gandhi. Attenborough. Anybody? For peaceful protest gathering in a closed of garden. 

The gunmen were Indian sepoys

We in India have diluted cranial capacity. Large (re)productive population. Luckily I'm not fully affected 

[TheLastWolf]

Official Disclaimer. Some of you have taken my comments to mean that I didn't want the Allies to win. The Axis certainly were, by comparison, one bunch of maniacs. But that doesn't make the Allies saints. France in Africa. British all over the world. Southern Europe and Latin American natives. Australian aborigines. Europe and North American natives. Misleading term, Indians. Genocide founded empires. Plus all the brutality and racism in the colonies. Lesser evil that's all

[Loose Bolt]

3 hours ago, TheLastWolf said:

But that doesn't make the Allies saints. France in Africa. British all over the world. Southern Europe and Latin American natives. Australian aborigines. Europe and North American natives. Misleading term, Indians. Genocide founded empires. Plus all the brutality and racism in the colonies. Lesser evil that's all

I continue that list with anything that Mao and Stalin did. After all victorious Germany would not had allowed Middle and Eastern Europe to become part of Soviet empire and victorious Japan would had made sure that nobody would nowadays remember that Mao even existed. Or 2 dictators whose governments slaughtered even more people than Hitler's would be removed from power if Axis would have won WW2. 

Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan were beaten. But IMHO Soviet Empire and People's Republic of China were/are even worse. In fact if one happens to belong certain minority group in China that person will have similar destiny that Gypsies and Jews had in Nazi Germany. Or government of China will wipe out anybody who challenges them and sometimes just speaking different language or following different religion will be capital crime. 

 

[SeanF]

4 hours ago, Loose Bolt said:

I continue that list with anything that Mao and Stalin did. After all victorious Germany would not had allowed Middle and Eastern Europe to become part of Soviet empire and victorious Japan would had made sure that nobody would nowadays remember that Mao even existed. Or 2 dictators whose governments slaughtered even more people than Hitler's would be removed from power if Axis would have won WW2. 

Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan were beaten. But IMHO Soviet Empire and People's Republic of China were/are even worse. In fact if one happens to belong certain minority group in China that person will have similar destiny that Gypsies and Jews had in Nazi Germany. Or government of China will wipe out anybody who challenges them and sometimes just speaking different language or following different religion will be capital crime. 

 

If I was a Slav or Jew, and had to choose between Stalin and Htiler, I would not have hesitated to choose the former over the latter.  Stalin was a brutal tyrant, but at least he would not try to eradicate my entire people. 

A friend of mine also summed up the difference between the Nazis and Soviets quite neatly.  The Soviets basically had the mentality of a mob boss.  Their attitude essentially was "Sorry man, it is what it is" before putting a bullet through your head.  The Nazis would want to mock you, torture you, degrade you, laugh at you, before killing you, while telling each other how exciting this all was.

[Rondo]

Jon's arc is to continue to screw up and betray the greater good. He's not going to save the world.  Jon will hurt the world's chances for survival.  A more accurate title to this thread is "Jon won't save the world."  He had his chance after all.  He blew it because he couldn't get Arya off his mind.  

[CamiloRP]

16 hours ago, Rondo said:

Jon's arc is to continue to screw up and betray the greater good.

Ignoring the Arya bit, wich I will mention later, when did he screw up? how is that his arc? in fact, how is that an arc? an arc would be screwing up until he realizes he must do better and then actually doing better, but if a character stars screwing up, screws up in the middle and then ends the story screwing up, there's no arc there. Not to say that this would make a bad story, for example, Paddington doesn't have an Arc, neither does Superman in most of his stories, because these characters point is influencing those around, the 'arc' is: Superman is a good guy at the beggining, people are not, Superman is good in the middle, people see that and are inspired, Superman is good at the end, and those around him are aswell. The thing is, most people think Jon is a screwup from the begining.

 

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He's not going to save the world. 

I agree with this. No individual will save the world. There will be no Azhor Ahai, and if there is, he will be a villain. ASOIAF is a story about many, many people, one could even say a story about a society, a story with no one protagonist, an individual's actions won't be the endgame.

 

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Jon will hurt the world's chances for survival. 

I don't think so, as i explained above, I think his arc (or one of) is about him destroying 'otherness' and bridging gaps, uniting people, and I don't think George would make unity a damaging infuence. Furthermore I would say Jon has already improved the world's chances for survival (well, humanity's at least) greatly by letting the Freefolk cross. Why do you think he will hurt humanity's chances for survival?

 

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A more accurate title to this thread is "Jon won't save the world." 

No it wouldn't, cause, except for one out of nine points in the OP, I didn't talk about Jon. What I wanted to talk about was the (in my opinion) misconceived notion that war will be a force for good, based on what I consider to be a lot of evidence, including textual and metatextual support as well as the life and opinons of the Author. War won't save the world, and it doesn't matter if that war is waged by Jon, or Stannis, Bran, Littlefinger, Dany or Euron, so Jon doesn't matter, and that title wouldn't be fitting at all.

 

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He had his chance after all.  He blew it because he couldn't get Arya off his mind.  

I think that Jon blew it with the pink letter, but not because he wanted to attack south, but because he acted impulsively. Going south was not only right morally, but pragmatically, Bolton had threatened to attack Castle Black if he didn't turn over a bunch of people Jon didn't have, ergo, he was going to attack Castle Black, and Castle Black has no deffenses south. Also, even if he had the people Ramsay asked for, wouldn't the conventional wisdom about not interfering (that's not a part of the NW's vows) prevent him from interfering in favor of the Boltons as well?

And I don't think that sending Mance south was a mistake either, as said above, the not interfering bit is not in the vows, he doesn't have to follow it. Also, even Bowen Marsh thinks the NW should take a side, but he thinks they should take the side of the Lannisters. Besides, Jon had already interfered to save another person: Alys Karstark, and nothing happened there, because it was the right think to do, same as with Jeyne, because Jon was raised to think that heroes save women and protect them and, to paraphrase Spider-Man, if you have the power to save an eleven year ol from being raped and tortured, you have the responsability to save her, if you don't, her rape and torture lay on your hands.

[SeanBeanedMeUp]

Maybe the White Walkers will be the good guys in this story? Assuming if the Lannisters get too out of hand and if the Starks don't retake control of the North maybe the White Walkers will make things "right".

[Nathan Stark]

6 hours ago, SeanBeanedMeUp said:

Maybe the White Walkers will be the good guys in this story? Assuming if the Lannisters get too out of hand and if the Starks don't retake control of the North maybe the White Walkers will make things "right".

I don't see how that plays out. The Lannisters are already doing such a bang up job of things that I don't see any of them except Tyrion making it out of Winds. I think the Others are heading South regardless of whether the Starks retake the North. In fact, an invasion by the Others would probably be just what the Starks need politically to rally the North to them again. I don't imagine the Others' idea of "right" has much place for living humans in it.

[CamiloRP]

11 hours ago, SeanBeanedMeUp said:

Maybe the White Walkers will be the good guys in this story? Assuming if the Lannisters get too out of hand and if the Starks don't retake control of the North maybe the White Walkers will make things "right".

That would mean George has a really pessimistic worldview 'killing all humans is saving the world'. Which, I don't know, he might have soured in his old age, plus lately he's been exposed to a lot of really shitty people, but I don't think he believes the end of humanity would be good, actually.

[TheLastWolf]

11 hours ago, CamiloRP said:

but I don't think he believes the end of humanity would be good, actually.

It would be. For all the billions of other lifeforms. Doesn't matter what he, you or I believe. 

11 hours ago, CamiloRP said:

That would mean George has a really pessimistic worldview 'killing all humans is saving the world'

It isn't. Perspective. Existence of one virus like Homo Sapiens species versus all the other lifeforms. No Brainer. Nihilistic maybe. Pessimistic? Nah. Too lazy inappropriate wording no offense. 

[CamiloRP]

14 hours ago, The_Lone_Wolf said:

It would be. For all the billions of other lifeforms. Doesn't matter what he, you or I believe.

What he believes is what matters tho, it's his story, so 'objective truth' doesn't mean anything if he doesn't consider it true.

 

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It isn't. Perspective. Existence of one virus like Homo Sapiens species versus all the other lifeforms. No Brainer. Nihilistic maybe. Pessimistic? Nah. Too lazy inappropriate wording no offense. 

It is pessimistic tho, I don't think destruction of other beings is inherent to humanity, no matter how hard we try to prove otherwise, we can change and correct ourselves, so total species destruction it's an overreaction. Also, it depends on what you think is valuable, which is subjective, why do we consider humans more valuable than animals, or plants, or rocks? why is a living body more valuable than a dead one? Maybe you think art or creation is more valuable than life itself, so then you wont think the end of humanity would be good, it's subjective.

[TheLastWolf]

17 hours ago, CamiloRP said:

, no matter how hard we try to prove otherwise, we can change and correct ourselves,

[SeanBeanedMeUp]

On 6/22/2021 at 3:47 AM, Nathan Stark said:

I don't see how that plays out. The Lannisters are already doing such a bang up job of things that I don't see any of them except Tyrion making it out of Winds. I think the Others are heading South regardless of whether the Starks retake the North. In fact, an invasion by the Others would probably be just what the Starks need politically to rally the North to them again. I don't imagine the Others' idea of "right" has much place for living humans in it.

But what if the Starks lose? And then maybe some Other convinces the North to rally behind them? That would be a twist.

On 6/22/2021 at 8:36 AM, CamiloRP said:

That would mean George has a really pessimistic worldview 'killing all humans is saving the world'. Which, I don't know, he might have soured in his old age, plus lately he's been exposed to a lot of really shitty people, but I don't think he believes the end of humanity would be good, actually.

Why wouldn't George be pessimistic, especially after seeing Dumb and Dumber ruin the show?

Of all seriousness though I don't think it would be out of his character to have a pessimistic worldview express in his books considering how much of a common theme it is.