Pretty true. Someone famous and clever (I forgot who it was) once said something along the lines of: "The true evil is indifference." -> I mean, killing a black chicken in the middle of a pentagram is much less evil than killing a wagonload of chicken and throwing them away for no other reason than that they are males and cannot produce eggs and are of a wrong race to let them grow to be eaten. (Not that eating justifies what we do to the others. And the early-killed ones are probably the ones better off. -> Don't get me wrong, I'm no emotionally-attached-to-chicken vegetarian (I tried, but didn't manage), I've lived on a farm and killed chicken myself, but at least I wasn't indifferent!)
"I know it's rather stupid to look for meaning in a comic fantasy series.." I wouldn't have said that. Terry Pratchett's books do deal with a lot of moral issues and serious problems, only in a more humourous way, so people often don't notice.
The one real problem is that in reality, things like good or evil don't exist. Everybody has both of them in themselves and often they are indistinguishable. There's no lable sticking to a thought inside your head saying 'good' or 'evil' so you can decide what to do. You always do what you think right or what others tell you is right. (Often they contradict...) Or sometimes neither because doing something considered wrong by yourself and others is just too much fun. Shit, this is all hard to explain. *fumbles with words and decides she could write a philosophy book (another one no one would read) about it* No wonder mankind has been trying to solve this for millennia. No one has yet agreed whether or not there is such a thing as 'universal moral' or if ethics are only a matter of education. Sorry if I bore you, but to return to the indifference-is-more-evil-than-evil-on-purpose: Do you know the film "Soylent Green"? (Probably. If not, don't read on!) It is not so shocking that they eat people (that's rather a logical idea) it's so shocking that no one cares for the individual anymore. (And that nothing beautiful of the world we live in has remained, but that's another topic altogether.) It's a very old movie and it's been some time since I watched it, but it made me think a lot about it all, back then. It's the same with murderand other things like that. If you kill someone you have reason to hate, I'd consider that far less evil (though it's a matter of opinion, really) than a general who signs orders to bomb a city to ashes and then goes home and leads a perfectly fine life, always treating his wife and children decently and going to church on Sundays. Reasons and purposes do not necessarily justify a deed, but for me something done with a feeling is always to be considered less evil. I'll stop rambling now, sorry.
One more thing: I think we all get corrupted by the mechanism of indifference somwhere during growing up. There is a point you either have to give in to feeling guilty or you decide to ignore certain facts and live on.
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Someone famous and clever (I forgot who it was) once said something along the lines of: "The true evil is indifference."
-> I mean, killing a black chicken in the middle of a pentagram is much less evil than killing a wagonload of chicken and throwing them away for no other reason than that they are males and cannot produce eggs and are of a wrong race to let them grow to be eaten. (Not that eating justifies what we do to the others. And the early-killed ones are probably the ones better off. -> Don't get me wrong, I'm no emotionally-attached-to-chicken vegetarian (I tried, but didn't manage), I've lived on a farm and killed chicken myself, but at least I wasn't indifferent!)
"I know it's rather stupid to look for meaning in a comic fantasy series.."
I wouldn't have said that. Terry Pratchett's books do deal with a lot of moral issues and serious problems, only in a more humourous way, so people often don't notice.
The one real problem is that in reality, things like good or evil don't exist. Everybody has both of them in themselves and often they are indistinguishable. There's no lable sticking to a thought inside your head saying 'good' or 'evil' so you can decide what to do. You always do what you think right or what others tell you is right. (Often they contradict...) Or sometimes neither because doing something considered wrong by yourself and others is just too much fun.
Shit, this is all hard to explain. *fumbles with words and decides she could write a philosophy book (another one no one would read) about it* No wonder mankind has been trying to solve this for millennia.
No one has yet agreed whether or not there is such a thing as 'universal moral' or if ethics are only a matter of education.
Sorry if I bore you, but to return to the indifference-is-more-evil-than-evil-on-purpose: Do you know the film "Soylent Green"? (Probably. If not, don't read on!) It is not so shocking that they eat people (that's rather a logical idea) it's so shocking that no one cares for the individual anymore. (And that nothing beautiful of the world we live in has remained, but that's another topic altogether.) It's a very old movie and it's been some time since I watched it, but it made me think a lot about it all, back then.
It's the same with murderand other things like that. If you kill someone you have reason to hate, I'd consider that far less evil (though it's a matter of opinion, really) than a general who signs orders to bomb a city to ashes and then goes home and leads a perfectly fine life, always treating his wife and children decently and going to church on Sundays.
Reasons and purposes do not necessarily justify a deed, but for me something done with a feeling is always to be considered less evil.
I'll stop rambling now, sorry.
One more thing: I think we all get corrupted by the mechanism of indifference somwhere during growing up. There is a point you either have to give in to feeling guilty or you decide to ignore certain facts and live on.