Why is it evil to kill the prisoners?

[Henry]

...The body convulses. The eyes go dim. You've just killed someone in cold blood.
...And you say you can't see a reason why this is evil?

And you think man-to-man combat is any cleaner?

TV and movies have sugar-coated the fact that ANY killing is a messy and soul-altering business. Even if a person is forced to kill in self-defense, most police and soldiers tell you that it is a life-altering event. The old traditional saying goes that, if it gets emotionally easy to kill, it's time to get out and seek professional help.

On the other hand, I do have to re-iterate for Arcady that it is self-defense we are talking about here. The cliche for adventurers that go and loot the orcs' cave home for fun and profit does not apply to all games everywhere. In most of my game scenarios, I set it up so that it is the PC's who are being invaded, not the invaders. Orcs poison the town water supply so that they can take the human's land; Ogres are bullying cravans on toll roads. Trolls are exiting the swamps because they covet the goods in the human cities. In the world, they are the agressed, not the agressors.

I could run a morally ambiguous game, but I choose not to, because I play D&D for the same reason I watch Jet Li films: escapism, and having fun with friends.

 

[Henry]

Yes, that's the core of the question right there.

Why do ethics only begin when the battle stops, when you have your Hollywood moment?

It doesn't seem to fit for me for societies that exist in a framework of total warfare rather than limited warfare.

Tom Cashel had the answer right there: because "PCs fighting monsters isn't warfare, it's fantastical fictional heroism." It's Rambo, Commando, and the Second Terminator all rolled into one.

I believe it a fallacy to compare all D&D games to total warfare. That's a different thing, and not all campaigns are run in this way. If it WERE total warfare, You would see the PC's performing scorched earth tactics to the humanoid boltholes, on the understanding that they were going to try the same thing on the humans anyway.

Heroic literature has ALWAYS considered the heroes to be a step above their foes. If it isn't, it isn't heroic.

Fantasy, yes.

Heroic, no.

Anti-heroic, yes.

 

[Henry]

One last note:

Let's please try to keep this civil. If you don't agree with the concept of "kill everything" as evil, that's fine, and vice versa. But civility is a wonderful thing, and very difficult to retrieve when lost. Furthermore, it's kinda hard to apologize in a locked thread.

 

[Tom Cashel]

Hey, Henry--have you been assigned to Moderate me yet?

Just a joke...seems like every time I fly off the handle you're there to reattach me. Your Moderator Powers are truly puissant.

Cheers, and have a great weekend.

 

[Kichwas]

I'm just not satisfied with such non-logical notions as Fantastical Morality and 'just because'.

If I look into the morality of an action, I want to look into it wih depth.

A defensive action wasn't the framework I set out with when I posed the question, nevertheless I don't see why defense would change the nature of the conflict.

You could argue that US, Russian, and British involvement in WWII were self defense. Both sides in the Isreali conflict could put forth logical arguments that they are only engaged in self defense.

It doesn't change the nature of the conflict one bit once the conflict has begun. It only changes how you try to justify getting involved.

Once the conflictis under way, the moral questions are on how it is waged.

The specific question here -in this thread- is limited to one angle of conflict:

Once you have finished a bloody and lethal conflict in which both sides set out to kill the other... why do you suddenly feel a moral obligation to not kill anyone you have overpowered using non lethal means?

Maybe they surrendered, maybe you just overpowered them. Perhaps that is a relevant angle on the question... but ignoring it, assuming they did not go down willingly... why do you suddenly feel moral obligations towards them?

I find it interesting that people don't want to try and answer this question under those pretexts, where the question becomes most legitimate / complex, and where it is often likely to arise.

Some people are perfectly comfortable acting within their moral compass without ever wondering why it is the way it is. I am not, I exist to question my own actions. As a person not of the mainstream culture within the society I exist, I am forced to do this on a daily basis. I've come to enjoy the issue of ethics and of learning why people find this or that to be morally right or wrong.

As such, this question.

From my frame of view, I don't see why it is morally wrong to kill a prisoner in this context. But I meet gamers all the time who do, yet never try to give me the complex reasons I need to understand their viewpoint. Rather I get 'just because', 'tradition', 'it is fantasy', or attempts to redinfe their actions as something other than what they were.

 

[Ace]

RPG morality is very campaign specific

As a counter example IMC Reincarnation is an absolute scientific fact. To the average person it is sure and as real as gravity or air is to us

This leads to some societies having convience killing of prisoners. Its not like the person is anymore than inconvienced after all.

This leads to a lot of revenge killing and a general refusal to surrender.

This leads to bloodier wars and so on.

 

[Mouseferatu]

Total Warfare examples: Urban gangs, Vikings, US-Indian Wars, Columbus in Caribbean, Settlement of New Zealand / New Guinea, Biblical Warfare, Pre-Roman and Post-Roman European Tribal warfare (thus pre medieval kingdoms), Bosnia, Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and in many cases, WWI and WWII.

Vikings took prisoners. Both sides in WWI and WWII often took prisoners. And if Israel really wanted to wipe out the Palestinians, they have the firepower to do it.

(Quick note. That's not me taking sides in the conflict. I think the actions of both sides are revolting, immoral, and bordering on inhuman. I'm just pointing out that when it comes to military capability, one side is clearly superior.)

And history views almost every existing incident of "total war" as "evil."

You have a choice here. You can either view D&D through the lens of modern morality, in which case it's evil to kill the prisoners because it's no longer self-defense. Or you can choose to look at it through the lens of the "morality" of some cultures that did go in for "total war," in which case there's nothing wrong with killing the prisoners, but you're no longer acting in concert with the good alignments.

Remember that, for good or ill, the D&D alignments are constructed along relatively modern moral and ethical lines. If you don't like them that way, don't keep them that way. It's your game. But they're a part of the game that most people use.

You're speaking of "total war" as though it's outside ethical boundaries, and I don't think it is. So far as I'm concerned, any society that engages in a concerted effort at genocide is already evil (or at least its leaders are), so trying to explain whether or not it's evil for them to kill prisoners is a moot point.

 

[kenjib]

I see the fantasy struggle of good / evil, and of elf + human + etc vs. Orc + goblin + etc as total warfare. That's certainly how it seems to play out in all the literature, modules, and source material.

I disagree. It seems to me that such warfare usually begins with the expansion of evil, after which good must drive it back. Furthermore, many myths (such as Tolkein's) begin with an ideal state of good, which evil has maliciously corrupted from the start. Therefore, such wars are inherently fought from a position of aggression on the part of evil, and self defense on the part of good. That is what makes good, good, and evil, evil.

Two principles I find at work here:

1. Violences as a means, not an end. If an enemy has truly surrendered and is thus no longer a threat, an act of violence is fuelled only by revenge, which is not typically considered "good" behavior by the standards of Western Society on which the D&D alignment system is based. Of course, if the threat remains, then the enemy has not truly surrendered completely, but merely bluffs surrender to seek advantage. This is what distinguishes the surrender of an assassin who will come back to reattempt the murder if freed from the surrender of an enemy combatant on the losing side of a war, with nothing left to fight for, who will return home peacefully if released. This is an important distinction. This furthermore assumes a conflict of grievance, not the pursuance of punishment for a criminal act. This is what distinguishes the surrender of a criminal murderer (who must now be given due process of law -- possibly even "frontier law" if that is the de facto standard of the land, in which case the killing of a prisoner is justified) from the surrender of an enemy soldier in wartime. This is also an important distinction.

2. Judgement by actions committed, not by potential for actions committed. Malicious intent is insufficient grounds for punishment. A person must actually commit the act, not just think about committing the act or just having character traits which mean he might commit such acts in the future. A creature born irredeemably evil can still adhere to the law and if he has done nothing to deserve death, then such a killing is unjust. It is a matter of degree and manifestation.

 

[Caliban]

Seriously...


I just don't see it.

If someone is bent on killing you, and you've just finished killing all but a few of their companions...

If you've managed to morally justify this...

Why is it then suddenly evil to kill them because you've stopped fighting long enough to question them?

Who says it is evil?

There may be a law or personal code that makes killing someone who is not actively attacking you unpalatable, but most of the alignments in 3E wouldn't have a problem with it.

Even a Lawful Good paladin can "fight evil without mercy" (PHB, page 89.)

A Chaotic Good might be more inclined to let prisoners live than an LG.



It also depends a lot on the situation.

In situations where you are in an enemy stronghold, prisoners tend to put you and your mission at risk, so even a paladin is less likely to deal with them.

If it's brigands who attack you on the king's highway, many lawful characters will choose to take prisoners and escort them to the local sheriff if they can. Chaotic characters may consider beating the bandits unconcious enough of a punishment.

But in the end, it comes down to the characters personal code, rather than just their alignment. Any alignment can justify killing or not killing the prisoners, for different reasons.

If the PC believes that evil people can be redeemed, they will be less inclined to kill things that are not an immediate threat. Dead people can't be brought into the light.

If there are strict laws against killing, then a lawful person will be less likely to kill, because they are more concerned about technically breaking the law.

A PC who is out to make a name for himself might routinely let opponents live, so that they can spread tales about him.

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

This may be a more pragmatic response then anyone is looking for, but...

...too this most more in the realm of specific vocational ethics than general morality there are a variety of precedents.

Specifically I think that the situation of most adventuring parties is really more specific to the problems of ultra-light forces than total or non-total warfare. Which brings in two points:

1.) PCs generally operate under motivations and goals that are distinct from those which motivate larger formations of armed men on a basic level of organization not too mention the very real liklihood that they are not operating under the strict politicial ethics of most armies.

To illustrate: special forces or the Texas Rangers operate under very different protocols than regular military or police units and PCs are even less regular than they are. Heck PCs are often less regular than Conquistadors.

2.) PCs are nearly always operating very remotely from both support and control.

To rephrase a dynamic of the orginal question:

Why should you be worried about the ethics of not killing prisoners or pausing to take prisoners in any sort of traditional sense when you have already justified throwing down in the traditional we're a band of four people and we have both the means and the need to go in and wipe out a village in order to achieve or will?

That question seems more discrete than the simple question of total v limited warfare as you are already operating outside of the political and social context of warfare or civil behavior.

And it does seem to me to dodge the many of the moral requisites that govern prisoner taking in warfare. After all American Special Forces, to qoute as best I can and blindly, "do not encourage" prisoners. On the one hand you're not operating in that context and on the other you can't really support them in any sort of ethical manner.

So no, I see no imperative for adventurers to take prisoners.

Now, going out of your way to kill everyone does seem unprofessional for adventurers and a waste of time and a party could have its own reasons for taking prisoners...
...but a party should expect that there will be nasty consequences as a result of not taking prisoners.

I do, however, see a larger moral question that most parties do not address well, and that is how closely are the adhering to what justification, if any, gives them the right to act in the near totally unorthodox manner that most parties do?

I do think there are justifications, but I think that parties often assume them where they require special attention in any sort of larger moral context such as both alignment and the real world.