The Dresden Files > DF Spoilers

Jury Duty and the Peace Talks

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Bad Alias:
Amoral is defined as "lacking a moral sense; unconcerned with the rightness or wrongness of something." Now if you want to call that a subset of evil, I'm fine with that. I just think it's useful to distinguish between evil, defined as "profoundly immoral and wicked," and amoral. One who is amoral could always do the right thing because the right thing is always beneficial. One who is evil will choose the wrong thing because that's what evil does.

Practically speaking, an amoral person is likely to act just as harmfully as an evil person, so it can end up being a distinction without a difference.

I do think Lara could choose to be less harmful. Thomas usually has, therefore Lara can.

Arjan:

--- Quote from: Mira on September 21, 2020, 03:40:41 PM ---I think she does know the difference between good and evil, the only problem is her point of view
is very different.  She will on occasion feed upon her victims until death, we call it murder, evil, however she sees it no different than a lion killing and eating it's prey, good.  She does try to keep that in check because she understand the problems politically etc it brings her. 
She has the time for it when it is to her advantage as when she has allied with Harry for the greater good, which is also to her advantage.

The answer is no, in my opinion because her view point is so different from our own.

--- End quote ---
In real life good and evil are relative dependent on the culture of group you belong to and ultimately based on the human herd instinct. What is good for the group is good. That is why in war the enemy is dehumanized, placed outside the group and that is why vegetarians emphasize the relatedness of humans and animals. We are all animals. People who eat animals usually make a bigger distinction between humans and animals.

If we dehumanize vampires, and they dehumanize themselves, good and evil are no longer relevant for our instincts and we can just eradicate them as pests, dangerous predators or whatever.

That is exactly why they dehumanize themselves, to make the killing of humans easier. But they had a human youth, they can reproduce with humans and they have some very human emotions. You can see them as highly specialized warlocks if you want but then the white council has to start a war and they have enough on their plate.

This is all about how relative good and evil are and how important your point of view is. But in the Dresdenverse good and evil are not relative. Black and white does exist. And we do have a standard and Michael described evil ultimately as when you stopped caring.

Lara stopped caring about anybody except her siblings. She is evil by dresdenverse standards. She made Her choice when she made her first kill and she showed no remorse at all, she indulges in it.

That is the standard in the dresdenverse. She is on the southbound train.

In real life we would probably still see them as human because biologically they are. We would lock them up as multiple rapists and killers and then at some point their hunger would eat them. Or we would lock them up as not accountable but dangerous In special institutions and then at some point the hunger would eat them.

Bad Alias:

--- Quote from: Arjan on September 21, 2020, 06:44:28 PM ---But in the Dresdenverse good and evil are not relative. Black and white does exist. And we do have a standard and Michael described evil ultimately as when you stopped caring.
--- End quote ---
But we also have Shiro telling Harry, I think in his letter, that Harry has a harder path because he lives in the grey.

Arjan:

--- Quote from: Bad Alias on September 21, 2020, 06:51:45 PM ---But we also have Shiro telling Harry, I think in his letter, that Harry has a harder path because he lives in the grey.

--- End quote ---
He walks in a world full of grays but black and white do exist. It is just harder to find your way.

Bad Alias:
So it's useful to be able to distinguish black, white, and the various shades of gray. The better to not get lost. There's a reason the warden's wear grey cloaks. It always reminds me of the Grey Council in Babylon 5. For those not familiar: https://babylon5.fandom.com/wiki/Grey_Council. The part that reminds me is their invocation. "I am Grey. I stand between the candle and the star. We are Grey. We stand between the darkness and the light." Especially that last sentence. That's basically what the Wardens do. We have the White Council and the practitioners of Black magic. They are the Grey, standing between and guarding the White.

As long as we're talking about grey and wizards, I always liked the name Gandalf the Grey better than Gandalf the White.

And back to the OP, is the FBI hounding Dresden? They're surveilling Justine, sure. Investigating the White Court and a explosions at that weird apartment complex seem like pretty legitimate things for them to do. Local government corruption and explosions are things the Feds are always interested in.

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