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Why is animate dead considered inherently evil?
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<blockquote data-quote="Baron Opal II" data-source="post: 8570279" data-attributes="member: 6794067"><p><em>"I don't want to be immortal through my work. I want to be immortal through not dying." - Some auteur more famous than me.</em></p><p></p><p></p><p>Indeed, most stories and warnings center around vengeance- everyone has been done wrong. If the dead are restless there is someone who is at risk, and sometimes the dead are not choosy about settling with the right target. Other times it is not the dead themselves, or more rightly who they were, that are angry. But, rather, an evil spirit or entity that finds opportunity to inhabit and raise the body to commit mischief. Then there is the original necromancy, disturbing the dead to interrogate them.</p><p></p><p>There is also concerns about robbing the dead of their due. If you disturb them and they rise, are you taking them out of Paradise, or at least a well-earned Rest? How could that be moral?</p><p></p><p>I don't know what the spell states specifically, but I can see that animating a cadaver can be a morally neutral act but culturally subversive. Much like utilizing cadaver's teeth in the past or cadaverous tissue for ACL repair today it is usually easier to accept if you don't know the donor. I'm doubtful of it spurring a major change, but mostly because of the presumed fragility of the labor. The bodies of zombies and skeletons would break down quicker than a living worker in the job. However, I am also reminded of Roman slaved working hamster wheels in mines to pump out the water. That was a horrible task- a zombie could do just fine in that lightless, air poor environment.</p><p></p><p>Making sentient undead always ends poorly. Does it need to? Well, I would think so if there is any kind of accepted afterlife where the good are rewarded, or at least given respite, and the guilty punished. They are denied their just desserts in the next life, although that might be desireable from a certain point of view. In literature they are almost always predators of humanity. At the most neutral they become alien and remove themselves from society. Means of immortality that don't receive social condemnation are those that usually involve some sort of divine boon, or faerie interference; which, again, usually ends up removing the person from society.</p><p></p><p>The main person who gains immortality and is actually happy is Nicholas Flamel. After he legendarily discovered how to make the Philosopher's Stone he said goodbye to his friends and he and his wife disappeared. Then there's the Slavic fairie-tale of the man with the magic bag. Death is afraid of him, Hell doesn't want him, and he isn't good enough for Heaven.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Baron Opal II, post: 8570279, member: 6794067"] [I]"I don't want to be immortal through my work. I want to be immortal through not dying." - Some auteur more famous than me.[/I] Indeed, most stories and warnings center around vengeance- everyone has been done wrong. If the dead are restless there is someone who is at risk, and sometimes the dead are not choosy about settling with the right target. Other times it is not the dead themselves, or more rightly who they were, that are angry. But, rather, an evil spirit or entity that finds opportunity to inhabit and raise the body to commit mischief. Then there is the original necromancy, disturbing the dead to interrogate them. There is also concerns about robbing the dead of their due. If you disturb them and they rise, are you taking them out of Paradise, or at least a well-earned Rest? How could that be moral? I don't know what the spell states specifically, but I can see that animating a cadaver can be a morally neutral act but culturally subversive. Much like utilizing cadaver's teeth in the past or cadaverous tissue for ACL repair today it is usually easier to accept if you don't know the donor. I'm doubtful of it spurring a major change, but mostly because of the presumed fragility of the labor. The bodies of zombies and skeletons would break down quicker than a living worker in the job. However, I am also reminded of Roman slaved working hamster wheels in mines to pump out the water. That was a horrible task- a zombie could do just fine in that lightless, air poor environment. Making sentient undead always ends poorly. Does it need to? Well, I would think so if there is any kind of accepted afterlife where the good are rewarded, or at least given respite, and the guilty punished. They are denied their just desserts in the next life, although that might be desireable from a certain point of view. In literature they are almost always predators of humanity. At the most neutral they become alien and remove themselves from society. Means of immortality that don't receive social condemnation are those that usually involve some sort of divine boon, or faerie interference; which, again, usually ends up removing the person from society. The main person who gains immortality and is actually happy is Nicholas Flamel. After he legendarily discovered how to make the Philosopher's Stone he said goodbye to his friends and he and his wife disappeared. Then there's the Slavic fairie-tale of the man with the magic bag. Death is afraid of him, Hell doesn't want him, and he isn't good enough for Heaven. [/QUOTE]
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