[BoVD]Well, since I can't seem to post this on Wizards forums...

[SemperJase]

So therefore you don't really have a problem with evil characters, just with characters that think they're doing something evil? By that logic, someone could play Jeffrey Dahlmer, and be okay. Jeffy boy believed he was just keeping his lovers with him so they wouldn't leave him.

Now you are back to moral relativism.

I'll keep it simple. It is unhealthy for a player to play characters of evil alignment.

 

[Mallus]

A false premise. Lord of the Rings is most definitely black and white. It is also considered to be the best fiction novel of the last century. At least according to Amazon.com.

I love LotR, but I'll take Gatsby any day...

There's an admitted bias against the literature of the fantastic. But the root of this isn't just critical snobbery. It has more to do with goals, ambition. The assumptions is that that fantasy is merely escapism. It doesn't constitute a meaningful exploration {there's that word again} into the human condition, thus it isn't serious art.

There's more than a shred of truth to this. A kind of fiction that usually presents such a simplistic moral viewpoint doesn't seem particularly well suited to comment on real human experience. It doesn't further our attempts to understand the world/ourselves, it merely provide a refuge from the stress of said process.

And to suggest arts only goal is simple, clear instruction of 'right behavior' puts you in the same boat as Plato in The Republic --that is, as a cheerleader for a high-minded police state. Shall we begin rounding up all the poets?

Can fantasy fiction contain ambiguity? Can it provide both confrontation and escapism? I think thats something worth debating...

The literature of the fantastic certainly did both those things, back at its very start...

 

[RobNJ]

Now you are back to moral relativism.

I'll keep it simple. It is unhealthy for a player to play characters of evil alignment.

This is exactly my point. Morals are inheritly relatvistic. I'm not using any of my own definitions, I'm using yours. You said that if you had a character who believed he was doing evil, you thought that his player was doing himself harm.

I'm pointing out that there are plenty of characters (and people) who do really heinous things but think they're doing good. Ku Klux Klan members, men who beat their wives, Lou Perlemen and The Backstreet Boys. These are all people guilty of horrific crimes against humanity, but they all think what they're doing is not only okay, but the morally perfect thing to do.

So I put it to you again. Which of these characters is going to hurt me morally?

1) An elvish rogue who's basically a heroine, but she steals everything she really likes.

2) Same character, except she also engages in promiscuous, dangerous sex with unsavory characters (because she's selfish and thoughtless)?

3) Same character, except when she kills her enemies, she finds to her horror, she likes it? She fights mightly against this impulse but it's there nonetheless?

4) Same character, except she feels unrepentant about getting joy at killing hobgoblins, because they killed her entire family?

5) Same character, except she takes unrepentant joy in murdering anyone who gets in her way, and feels it's right, because she can, and therefore she should (might makes right)?

And so on. At some point a character goes from "good" to "bad". The problem is that in your mind, at some point, I am harming myself morally by playing this character. At what point does this occur?

Again, this is the inherit flaw in your perspective. There is no absolute line after which a person is damned forever, or after which the player of that character is undeniably hurting himself.

You previously said, "When the character thinks they're doing evil," but every example I gave above the character doesn't think they're doing evil.

 

[RobNJ]

Can fantasy fiction contain ambiguity? Can it provide both confrontation and escapism? I think thats something worth debating...

The literature of the fantastic certainly did both those things, back at its very start...

It's still doing it today. George R. R. Martin's Songs of Ice and Fire series (A Game of Thrones is the first book in the series) is a perfect example.

I personally get all ticked off when elitists look down on genre fiction. As far as I'm concerned, it has all the world building stuff to do, plus it has as much responsibliity to question the human condition as any other fiction (that is, as much as the writer decides to take on).

But with fans like we've got here, who seem to conclude that any questioning of moral precepts is akin to embracing the devil, it's no wonder we're in the ghetto.

 

[Mallus]

A moral decision. Killing is not necessarily murder. The moral absolute is that murder is wrong.

Sure, a moral decision made inside a relative moral context. I don't think ambushing enemy soldiers is wrong per se, but it falls under the category justified murder. I don't subscribe to the notion that you redefine morally questionable acts until they fit into a more pleasant-sounding moral framework.

 

[SemperJase]

So I put it to you again. Which of these characters is going to hurt me morally?

With all of these examples, you have taken alignment out of the question, which was my whole beginning premise.

To directly answer your question, it depends on the consequences of the actions. If there are none, then probably all of them.

That actually leads into a different topic about the effect a DM has on the moral context of a game.

Again, this is the inherit flaw in your perspective. There is no absolute line after which a person is damned forever, or after which the player of that character is undeniably hurting himself.

You previously said, "When the character thinks they're doing evil," but every example I gave above the character doesn't think they're doing evil.

You are right. That answer was not definitive or all inclusive. But it was not meant to be exclusive either. So I will repeat my clarification:

It is unhealthy to play a character of an evil alignment.

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

Even Gollum?

Can't really argue that Gollum isn't evil. After all, most of his desires revolve around killing various hobbits. However, he leads Frodo and Sam into Mordor more-or-less safely (more safely than their other possible route at least), and he himself destroys the One Ring, thus saving all of Middle-Earth from being covered in a second darkness.

Certainly his motives were black, but his results were white. What's that make him?

Damn, I got 150 pages into Return of the King before someone told me how the book ends....

 

[RobNJ]

It is unhealthy to play a character of an evil alignment.

At least we're finally becoming clear as to what your perspective is. This is valuable.

The problem is you're putting way too much power in the hands of the writers of the Player's Handbook to make moral decisions for you. You are suggesting that you become morally endangered solely on the basis of what they wrote? Here's the definition of evil as related by these moral leaders

http://www.opengamingfoundation.org/srd/srdalignment.rtf

Evil characters and creatures debase or destroy innocent life, whether for fun or profit.

(snip)

"Evil" implies hurting, oppressing, and killing others. Some evil creatures simply have no compassion for others and kill without qualms if doing so is convenient. Others actively pursue evil, killing for sport or out of duty to some evil deity or master.

If you're using this as some kind of moral compass, there are problems. The definition of "innocent", for example. Furthermore, whether or not your character feels compassion is an entirely internal thing. If you're playing a good character or an evil character, I have no way of knowing whether you feel any compassion for the victim of your attacks. In fact there are many times where unquestionably good characters don't feel compassion when they kill enemies.

Furthermore this doesn't address the concerns of such moral "damage" in other media. Are actors bound by those guidelines as well? If so, how do we make them aware of them? Angelina Jolie is too pretty to have her eternal soul imperiled that way, and I'll take it upon myself to personally warn her.

That is, if you're able to properly impart your received wisdom on the absolute nature of good and evil to me.

 

[Mallus]

It's still doing it today. George R. R. Martin's Songs of Ice and Fire series (A Game of Thrones is the first book in the series) is a perfect example.

I personally get all ticked off when elitists look down on genre fiction. As far as I'm concerned, it has all the world building stuff to do, plus it has as much responsibliity to question the human condition as any other fiction (that is, as much as the writer decides to take on).

But with fans like we've got here, who seem to conclude that any questioning of moral precepts is akin to embracing the devil, it's no wonder we're in the ghetto.

Sure, "Ice and Fire" by Martin is great. Its the first fantasy epic I've read hungrily in years. And the moral ambiguity of its characters fuels its drama... Those books surprised me regularly. I don't see why a person would read if not for that experience.

I'd add China Mieville's "Perdido Street Station". The early parts of Gaiman's "Sandman" --but not the end. Going back a little farther, Wolfe's "Book of the New Sun". Father still, anything by Angela Carter {I loved "The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman...}.

Sure, I believe the literature of the fantastic can take on all the functionality of more 'serious' fiction. But are we in the minority believing that? Is the demand simply for escapist fare? There's a place for that too. And I hesitate to say that constitutes a 'ghetto'. Though I've made that point many times to my friends who read Forgotten Realms novels.

 

[RobNJ]

I take a slightly more technical view of the problem: without the introduction of more moral ambiguity, can fantasy remain viable even as 'exciting escapist fare'? Where's the thrill in a compltely forgone conclusion?

What a refreshing hijack . It'd probably be best suited to its own thread, but I'll reply anyway. I think something can be exciting and escapist and still make us ask questions about ourselves. Earlier in this thread I invoked the movie Swingers. There's a lot of glitz and escapism and god-I-wish-I-talked-that-cool-ism in the movie, but it also makes you (or me) really think about relationships and men and women and my position as a man today (for the record, I mostly identified with Mikey ). Similarly, Quentin Tarantino's movies. Other than True Romance (which wasn't really his movie), they are escapist fun that also makes me think.

And of course, I'm a complete idiot and misread your main question. To whit: yes, I think that a lack of moral ambiguity can still result in entertaining escapism, however, familiarty breeds contempt. You can only get your rocks off by a cool visual for so long before you start to want more.

But I think there'll always be a market for the empty thrills.