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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Urriak Uruk" data-source="post: 7870463" data-attributes="member: 7015558">I'm actually not really talking about the "ends justify the means," rather more how any argument made by bad people to justify bad behavior should inherently be considered untrustworthy.Consider Ozymandias from Watchmen; he kills hundreds of thousands (maybe a couple million) in New York to save many more millions and the world from a possible nuclear war. This is the "ends justify the means," example.But Ozymandias, even though his plan is pretty insane, actually does have good intentions, and as far as the book states does not have any ulterior motive beyond wanting to prevent a nuclear war (a fairly moral goal, done with fairly immoral means).This is very different than what I am saying is so wrong about agreeing with a racist's goals. If you're supporting the opinions of people who are making them for their own selfish reasons, you're inadvertently supporting selfish immoral people, and their goals.If Ozymandias was secretly a raging psychopath that wanted to destroy New York not because it would prevent nuclear war, but because he would enjoy it, how we view Ozymandias inherently changes. It would also make keeping Ozymandias' actions secret (which all the people who know of his plan save Rorsarch do) much harder to feel comfortable doing, as you're allowing a very immoral act made for selfish reasons to go unpunished. It would in effect make Rorsarch POV (to expose Ozymandias) the moral thing to do. To do otherwise would allow a psychopath to go free, and perhaps continue to kill (as the massacre would have happened regardless of the nuclear war justification). Whether or not it prevents nuclear war is unimportant in such a circumstance.It's why Ozymandias actions are at least justifiable, but the Comedian's actions (rape, murder, war) almost entirely immoral; the intent behind them is what makes them viewed differently, even though the outcome is ultimately similar. It's one of the reasons the Comedian is so terrified of Ozymandias' plan; that he'll not only outdo him in devastation, but do it for the right reasons.</blockquote>

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