How would you classify "Good by any means neccessary"

[FreeTheSlaves]

Consider the highly contrived situation of someone committing an evil act on an innocent person in order to save thousands of other innocents. It's my contention that it is a selfish act to NOT do the evil act, and not doing the evil thing is evil itself.

Why is it a selfish act? Because the reason you don't want to do it is because...

*It's a damning act and would sentence you to eternal damnation.
*You couldn't live with yourself afterwards.
*Etc.

And therefore, you're being selfish by not doing it. You can make the greatest sacrifice to save the others.

Discuss.

Well no good deed goes unpunished.

The person that abstains from evil may do so for many reasons. In the above contrived case they may end up suffering much more because of their morality - it could be their loved ones that get it in the neck. There are plenty of people that put their personal interests 2nd.

Not doing the evil deed may allow a great evil to occur. Then again doing the evil deed may allow the great evil to occur.

The ends has this nasty habit of having a will of its own - we can affect the ends but not as we choose. The world is much greater than our ability to control, the best we can do is influence it.

As an aside, I'm reading The Rommel Papers and he was one German General who was very very interested in getting immediate up to date information. He didn't use, need or regard the use of torture. It was dishonourable, slow and unreliable compared to conventional methods. When I think about it, Caesar was the same.

I think that torture is grossly overrated as an effective tool for true and timely information - morality aside.

 

[Phlebas]

D&D alignments don't have real world shades of grey so my take on it is that you have to define 'good' relative to your fantasy society. Since most PC's are quite keen on using excessive force you can't always play to this worlds moral standards unless you want PrC "Banker", "Accountant", "Lawyer" etc.

So trying to split hairs on acceptable torture is academic - make a ruling for your world and stick to it - good people can then do "bad" things but the important factor is that they know they're doing evil and will have to accept the consequences of their actions.

So define what you consider 'Idealised Good' in your world, and allow a little leeway for good PC's (especially if they feel guilty), more leeway for Neutrals (as long as they stick to the major ideals), and freedom for evil. Personally i'd never allow an evil PC but thats just me.

For example, IMC elves will happily use poison arrows as they have no moral problems with its use ("you mean you want us to come in range so you can hit us with the big club? let me think about that ....."<Twang>)

 

[delericho]

I've seen a scenario about torture played out before, but it was kinda disturbing. One of the group had a son that was kidnapped. He was buried alive, but we caught him. We had to decide wether or not to torture him to find out where the boy was in time, because there was no other way he would talk.

In that situation, and if convinced that this was the only option that would work, then I too would take part in the torture.

However, it is important to note that it would have to be the last resort, not the first one, which is distinctly different from the "Good by any means necessary" position. Additionally, I wouldn't try to justify it as anything other than an Evil action - just an Evil action that I have elected to take because I couldn't face the consequences otherwise.

Of course, it is also worth noting that in D&D, that sort of race against time, and the consequences of failure is actually very artificial (in the context of the game world, of course). Even if the child dies, all the party has to do is exhume the body and arrange a resurrection, and the matter is resolved without lasting consequence. So, that being the case, the torture is even harder to justify.

Even the cleric (NG) helped (by keeping the guy alive, not with the actual pain) and didn't lose her spells or any such, though she did repent and whatnot afterward.

Healing the guy's wounds to allow the torture to be more extreme than it otherwise could have been, and to allow the torture to be continued more quickly than it otherwise could have been is surely helping with the actual pain?

 

[HeavenShallBurn]

As an aside, I'm reading The Rommel Papers and he was one German General who was very very interested in getting immediate up to date information. He didn't use, need or regard the use of torture. It was dishonourable, slow and unreliable compared to conventional methods. When I think about it, Caesar was the same.

I think that torture is grossly overrated as an effective tool for true and timely information - morality aside.

It is grossly over-rated and largely unreliable, there's no way to tell when they're telling you the truth. It's far to easy to spin out a partial truth that the interrogator will believe, and more importantly once you began to use the worse methods there isn't any way to know whether or not they're just telling you what you want to hear because it will stop the pain.

Also, ultimately when speaking of objective morality and the concept of Honor the artificiality of the situation is shown. Knowing that Good is real and objective and that Honor isn't just a concept it's a Thing and tangible, makes it less important to respond with utmost swiftness and go to any means to save every single life. In a D&D world where the afterlife is a tangible thing it isn't that important that they die because they'll just end up with their gods anyway being innocent victims and not deranged demon cultists. So from that doing evil just to keep people from dieing isn't as attractive when it means compromising one's own personal Honor as a Paladin just to prevent a death that will eventually happen anyway.

 

[Kristivas]

Of course, it is also worth noting that in D&D, that sort of race against time, and the consequences of failure is actually very artificial (in the context of the game world, of course). Even if the child dies, all the party has to do is exhume the body and arrange a resurrection, and the matter is resolved without lasting consequence. So, that being the case, the torture is even harder to justify.

We were all pretty low level. Not near enough cash to be able to afford a raise dead spell. Our low level is also the reason we didn't find a magical way to get the guy to talk and had to resort to physical pain and suffering.

Healing the guy's wounds to allow the torture to be more extreme than it otherwise could have been, and to allow the torture to be continued more quickly than it otherwise could have been is surely helping with the actual pain?

I suppose you could look at it like that. At the time, we had a quick (5 minute) moral debate on it, which came down to "If it was your child, would you do whatever it took to save them?" to which everyone answered "yes". The cleric mentioned her goal was to keep the guy alive so that he could be arrested afterward. True to her word, after we found the kid, she turned him over to the guards for that and other such crimes.

Still, morally.. I'm not sure of what would have been right for her to do. Heal the guy, or let him die? Like I said, it's a good thing no one made a paladin that game...

 

[Kristivas]

All of this discussion has put an odd question in my mind. It'll start with an example of a man..

This man becomes a political leader, loved by his people. After a few years, he starts a war. Then another. Vicious deeds are committed at this leader's word. Millions die. Even more suffer. History recalls this man as the single-largest cause of human suffering of that particular century.

Now, some sci-fi stuff happens and you're sent back in time. Told by the person that sent you there that you have 24 hours in which you can kill this guy, and where to find him alone (can, not have to). You find a weapon and go, and once you arrive.. you find you've been sent back to a time when the man was a 3 year old child.

So, if it boils down to it... kill one 3 year old child and save MILLIONS of people's lives along with MILLIONS of people's needless suffering.

Tough decision, there. I'm not sure I could wax a child under any circumstances, but when I've asked other people they assured me they could if it would save millions. I think this applies to "good by any means necissary".

 

[Klaus]

All of this discussion has put an odd question in my mind. It'll start with an example of a man..

This man becomes a political leader, loved by his people. After a few years, he starts a war. Then another. Vicious deeds are committed at this leader's word. Millions die. Even more suffer. History recalls this man as the single-largest cause of human suffering of that particular century.

Now, some sci-fi stuff happens and you're sent back in time. Told by the person that sent you there that you have 24 hours in which you can kill this guy, and where to find him alone (can, not have to). You find a weapon and go, and once you arrive.. you find you've been sent back to a time when the man was a 3 year old child.

So, if it boils down to it... kill one 3 year old child and save MILLIONS of people's lives along with MILLIONS of people's needless suffering.

Tough decision, there. I'm not sure I could wax a child under any circumstances, but when I've asked other people they assured me they could if it would save millions. I think this applies to "good by any means necissary".

But how can you be certain that wacking the Evil Leader in his craddle will not cause something even worse from happening? And what right does the time traveller have to make that decision?

 

[delericho]

So, if it boils down to it... kill one 3 year old child and save MILLIONS of people's lives along with MILLIONS of people's needless suffering.

Tough decision, there. I'm not sure I could wax a child under any circumstances, but when I've asked other people they assured me they could if it would save millions. I think this applies to "good by any means necissary".

I've seen this question before. What it fails to take into account is that taking a single thread out of history has all sorts of knock-on effects that you can't foresee. Removing the tyrant might save those millions of lives... or it might see someone else in the leader's role, someone who doesn't make the mistakes that lead to that tyrant's eventual downfall.

Even if you do save those millions of lives, you prevent two wars, and the advancements that come out of those wars. If one of those advancements is the weapons technology that is later vital in allowing Bruce Willis to prevent the impending asteroid impact and save the world, well... oops.

The basic upshot is: don't mess with history.

But, to tackle the question at the root of this: is it acceptable to murder one person to save the lives of one million? Well, possibly. But, if you consider that a good reason, what about murdering one to save half a million? One thousand? Ten? Two?

But then, the moment you accept the murder of one to save two others, you have to eliminate yourself, since it is easy enough to find those two murderers who each would have had two victims. And, to save those two lives, it becomes acceptable to take one other, specifically your own.

Terry Pratchett, in "Thud", said something that I think is relevant. In it, Sam Vimes insists on being home to read to his son every night without excuse. Because the moment he admitted a good reason, he opened the door for a host of bad ones. I believe the same applies here: it's better to not do Evil even for the best of reasons, because as soon as you open that door for the best reasons, you open it for progressively worse ones.

 

[Terath Ninir]

This would be one of the reasons why many DMs don't use alignment -- it's hard to properly do shades of grey in D&D.

However, I actually *like* this sort of thing. I've had numerous important NPCs that are like this (good by any means) or close to it. I always have them as LE.

It's especially fun to do when you have another powerful NPC that is good, but misguided. He's doing what he thinks is right, but it's going to cause a disaster. Meanwhile, the LE bastard is doing the right thing. That is *fun* to inflict on players -- especially if they have a paladin around.

Oh, and PLEASE don't Godwin this thread, Kristivas! It's off topic and not nearly as interesting a question as it first appears.

 

[Seeten]

Yes, because all real people use torture and questionable means to find out what they need to know.

Good does not equate to Stupid. Good people succeed at things just as much as neutral or evil people do - I'd go so far as to say that they succeed more than neutral or evil people do. Good people can use force to find out what they need to know if needed; a beating does not equal torture on that scale. They can also use trickery, guile and deceit.

Check into CIA Methods used to extract vital information.

It isnt "Hey, pretty please tell me?!"