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Message: <blockquote data-quote="delericho" data-source="post: 2838676" data-attributes="member: 22424">I'm going to preface this post by saying that 'torture' includes physical, mental and emotional tortures, but that I don't consider the 'threat of torture' to be in the same league, or even to be Evil (as I do torture).For the purpose of this reply, therefore, I'm going to addressing the 'torture' part of the quote below, rather than the 'threat of torture' part. I'm replying selectively because what I have to say only applies to part of what is quoted, not because I haven't read the quoted post. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />That said...I am extremely uncomfortable with any suggestion that not torturing someone could be considered Evil. There are two general and one specific reason for this:1) Inaction is Neutral.2) A person carries moral responsibility only for his own actions. If the policeman does nothing, he does not kill the victim - the murderer does. Consequently, the murderer is Evil; the policeman is not.3) In this specific case, there is no suggestion that the policeman would be 'doing nothing'. There are plenty of avenues of inquiry that he could and would have been following, without resorting to the quick and easy route of torturing the murderer. Granted, they probably would not have been as effective, but that's far from saying they don't exist.Firstly, I disagree with the "just as evil" part quoted, for the reasons I've given above. Additionally, I would point out that in the metaphysical battle between Good and Evil, the forces of Evil win just as surely if they corrupt all the forces of Good (by forcing them to become Evil to stop them) as they do by wiping them out.And, since it bears repeating, a single Evil act in a lifetime of otherwise Good behaviour does not make a character Evil - it makes a Good character human. But a character who routinely makes use of Evil methods, especially where alternatives exist and are ignored for expediency, cannot be considered Good.</blockquote>

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