Biggest surprise when you read the book...

[Peelee]

*Afghanistan.

Since at the time it was written, the USSR invasion of Afghanistan was a real thing happening

The Mod on the Silver Mountain: Let's keep Cold War geopolitics to the fictional world of Watchmen, please.

[Cikomyr2]

The Mod on the Silver Mountain: Let's keep Cold War geopolitics to the fictional world of Watchmen, please.

Sorry. I just wanted to explain the context Moore wrote Watchmen. These events were contemporary to his writing of the story, not a historical fact he was calling back to (like the Vietnam war).

This was purely to refer to authorial intent, not actually discuss the politics.

[Tyndmyr]

Yes, that wouldn't be very heroic, but that's also a very narrow definition of "pragmatic". Idealistic versus pragmatic isn't just whether or not to act.

It is in this case.

In general, while pragmatics act, they act in accordance with the situation as given to them. To use the tired ol' trolley example that pragmatists are fond of, a pragmatist responds by making a choice. The hero finds neither outcome acceptable and attempts to create a third option. Perhaps he succeeds, perhaps he fails, but if all you're doing is picking one of the bad options handed to you by the villain, then you're not a hero.

Most people aren't heroes, at least most of the time.

This is exactly what makes them exceptional.

Which is why the ending of the movie sucks, but the comic version does present a giant psychic alien corpse to capture the attention.

That is more interesting, but as I stated before, the lie eventually will fail. It cannot do anything but fail. Perhaps someone will find the truth. The existence of the diary pretty clearly tells us this is a possibility, and there's the other hints as well. However, even if it doesn't face an immediate reveal, there are no aliens, and eventually the surprise will wear off. The humans remain humans, and everyone still has nukes and conflicting interests. It might delay apocalypse, but it most certainly cannot prevent it.

What you wrote is all nonsense to me.

Exposing Veidt would have destroyed his plan. Everyone would have realized Earth is not under threat by a third party, it was merely the action of an egotistical megalomaniac. There's nothing to stop the USSR and USA to continue on their path to self annihilation.

Yes of course. Destroying the villains plan is what the hero does. Obviously, this is framed to make this a difficult decision, that's inherent to deconstructing superheroes, I think. Yet nothing actually prevents self annihilation in Veidt's plan. It is ultimately only a misdirection that cannot be ultimately successful. If space squids are one day disbelieved, or disregarded(let us say that someone claims they have all been killed...after all, the only one we know of was dead)....we are back to the stage of annihilation.

Does one blow up another city and fake something else in the name of "peace?" Is it worth nuking a city every handful of years in hopes of staving off more murders? Is this not the same sort of ethics that would consider it reasonable to kidnap one person to harvest his organs and thus save a dozen?

Anyone who pursues such a path inevitably becomes a monster, unchecked, and committing great evils on the regular, with only their own conscience to guide them. Are we to accept that Veidt is in the right simply because he tells his friends that he has thought about the suffering of those he killed?

[Mordar]

Can you find counter-examples?

Green Arrow is ludicrously idealistic. Spiderman is defined by ideals. With great power comes great responsibility and all that. The canonical example of him sitting by and choosing to watch is very blatantly portrayed as the wrong decision, and not heroic whatsoever. It is a mistake that he learns from.

And yet they approach problems in a decidedly pragmatic sense. You know...based on practical considerations, not theoretical, and looking for the most effective way to achieve the desired solution. Not "I'm not cosmically powered so I take my ball and go home", because that doesn't solve the problem of Alien Death Rays, Super-Villain Domination Plots, Hyper-Powered Bank Robbers, or any of a number of things they might need to solve. You can pragmatically approach being totally outclassed, or having goals that must be achieved that may result in your death/disintegration/being turned into a skid mark.

Yes, that wouldn't be very heroic, but that's also a very narrow definition of "pragmatic". Idealistic versus pragmatic isn't just whether or not to act.

...since being pragmatic about the approach to a problem doesn't care about why someone is choosing to engage with the problem, I might suggest it is beyond "narrow". Disclaimer: Not a student of philosophy. Using established definitions and supported connotations, not referencing schools of philosophy.

Street level heroes have to be pragmatic to be able to keep saving people. And they don't have to present as idealistic to achieve that goal. "Because it is what I am supposed to do" doesn't read the same as "Truth, justice and the American Way!" to me at all.

- M

[Tyndmyr]

And yet they approach problems in a decidedly pragmatic sense.

They do not. When Spiderman is given a choice between saving a traincar full of people or saving one...he does not calculate expected values. He risks a great deal to try to save everyone.

By definition, that action is idealistic.

[Mordar]

They do not. When Spiderman is given a choice between saving a traincar full of people or saving one...he does not calculate expected values. He risks a great deal to try to save everyone.

By definition, that action is idealistic.

Does he do it by expecting that he should be strong enough to simply slow the entire train through his strength alone, gently reducing the velocity to ensure no one in injured by deceleration trauma...or knowing his abilities and limitations, make use of those abilities and the neighboring buildings and structures, chosing those that can serve as effective anchor points and distribute the webbing across those areas in order to save the lives of those in the traincar even if some might get injured? That is a pragmatic approach to the problem of "how do I save the people in this traincar?". A pragmatic choice can still result in the death of the chooser.

And barring really extraordinary circumstances, even for comics, saving a traincar full of people isn't a great risk for Spider-Man. If the Green Goblin caused the risk to the car as a distraction, and will re-attack once he is distracted saving the car...then yes. But even if it a risk, that doesn't mean a pragmatic approach prevents trying.

Were Spider-Man an idealist, would he ever be Peter Parker?

- M

[Batcathat]

It is in this case.

In general, while pragmatics act, they act in accordance with the situation as given to them. To use the tired ol' trolley example that pragmatists are fond of, a pragmatist responds by making a choice. The hero finds neither outcome acceptable and attempts to create a third option. Perhaps he succeeds, perhaps he fails, but if all you're doing is picking one of the bad options handed to you by the villain, then you're not a hero.

Most people aren't heroes, at least most of the time.

This is exactly what makes them exceptional.

If that's the definition of "hero" you want to use, that's up to you, but it's not how the term is commonly used (or at the very least, I've never seen it defined that way, feel free to quote your sources).

[Cikomyr2]

Yes of course. Destroying the villains plan is what the hero does.

Thats a circular definition of what a hero does.

A hero do good things. If that means stopping the Villain, then he does it. But if Lex Luthor has a plan that requires he first solve World Hunger before starting to do the evil stuff, Superman does not have the moral license to stop him solely because "he's the villain".

Obviously, this is framed to make this a difficult decision, that's inherent to deconstructing superheroes, I think. Yet nothing actually prevents self annihilation in Veidt's plan. It is ultimately only a misdirection that cannot be ultimately successful.

You make a judgement call here deciding that it "cannot prevent self annihilation". But we are proven in the comic that it did work. War is stopped.

If space squids are one day disbelieved, or disregarded(let us say that someone claims they have all been killed...after all, the only one we know of was dead)....we are back to the stage of annihilation.

You are jumping plenty of hoops already to reach your desired conclusion. In your scenario, people would have to suddenly decide they knew all Space Squids were gone, or that they didnt actually exist despite plenty of evidence to point to the contrary.

For sure, slow grinding disbelief in the possibility of the Squids returning is a possibility, but then it would have done its job of preventing the imminent nuclear war that was about to wipe out humanity.

Does one blow up another city and fake something else in the name of "peace?" Is it worth nuking a city every handful of years in hopes of staving off more murders? Is this not the same sort of ethics that would consider it reasonable to kidnap one person to harvest his organs and thus save a dozen?

No.

If the plan required more deaths in the future to keep it going, then its a ****ty plan. I am not advocating utilitarian logic of "its okay to kill people to save more people". Letting Ozymandias go after he killed New York is not "letting people die". Its accepting that the bad deed was already done, you cannot turn back the clock, and sticking with principle over pragmatism at that point would be a bad thing because it would actively endanger the lives of billions of people. Over a principle.

And that is wrong. If you rag against utilitarian logic that says "killing one person to save 5" is a moral choice, how exactly do you rate "killing 5 people is okay so you do not tell a lie"?

Anyone who pursues such a path inevitably becomes a monster, unchecked, and committing great evils on the regular, with only their own conscience to guide them. Are we to accept that Veidt is in the right simply because he tells his friends that he has thought about the suffering of those he killed?

No. I do not accept Veidt "is in the right". And i really dont care about whatever emo soul searching he is making himself to through.

I accept that Veidt.. could not be stopped. He won. The heroes could not prevent the death of millions. Maybe if they could, they should have. But the question is past them, and the only thing that is actually matters at that point is "do you bury this secret to give the best chance for peace, or you risk nuclear Armageddon and insist Veidt faces justice"?

This isnt about accepting Veidt or thinking he is in the right. This is about realizing that Veidt outsmarted and outplayed even the omniscient, omnipotent divine entity, and the best his friends could do is throw a tantrum and turn their back on him.

[Saph]

I accept that Veidt.. could not be stopped. He won. The heroes could not prevent the death of millions. Maybe if they could, they should have. But the question is past them, and the only thing that is actually matters at that point is "do you bury this secret to give the best chance for peace, or you risk nuclear Armageddon and insist Veidt faces justice"?

This isnt about accepting Veidt or thinking he is in the right. This is about realizing that Veidt outsmarted and outplayed even the omniscient, omnipotent divine entity, and the best his friends could do is throw a tantrum and turn their back on him.

The problem with this line of thinking is that this is exactly how corrupt regimes perpetuate themselves in the real world. Powerful people can always set things up so that if you try to blow the whistle on them, there'll be a lot of pain and misery. And so people go along with it, because it's always easier to let them get away with it than it is to hold them to account.

The fact that in Watchmen it's the monomaniac/fanatic who refuses to be an accessory to the crime, while the more conventionally "nice" and "likeable" characters are willing to compromise themselves, is actually very realistic.

[GloatingSwine]

That is more interesting, but as I stated before, the lie eventually will fail. It cannot do anything but fail. Perhaps someone will find the truth. The existence of the diary pretty clearly tells us this is a possibility, and there's the other hints as well. However, even if it doesn't face an immediate reveal, there are no aliens, and eventually the surprise will wear off. The humans remain humans, and everyone still has nukes and conflicting interests. It might delay apocalypse, but it most certainly cannot prevent it.

Yes, that's rather the point of the last two lines between Veidt and Manhattan:

"I did the right thing, didn't I? It all worked out in the end."

"In the end? Nothing ends Adrian, nothing ever ends."

It's deliberately ambiguous how long the new state of affairs will last, and serves to refute any "ends justify the means" argument because of it.

Remember though that the alien squid isn't the only part of the plan. Veidt has almost full control over the world's media (in a world without mass peer to peer communications) and nuclear tensions are as high as they are because he used that to ratchet them up, and he has the next phase of relief and rapprochement all lined up and ready to go. It's not a hands-off plan where he retires to a farm to eat beans, he's still playing his part from the shadows.

[Cikomyr2]

The problem with this line of thinking is that this is exactly how corrupt regimes perpetuate themselves in the real world. Powerful people can always set things up so that if you try to blow the whistle on them, there'll be a lot of pain and misery. And so people go along with it, because it's always easier to let them get away with it than it is to hold them to account.

The fact that in Watchmen it's the monomaniac/fanatic who refuses to be an accessory to the crime, while the more conventionally "nice" and "likeable" characters are willing to compromise themselves, is actually very realistic.

I dont entirely disagree with you, but this is comparing active evil vs past evil. Again, Ozymandias is not continuing his rampage and his evil, he done the evil he "had" to do to complete his plan.

And if he goes at it again, then you stop him. If he has done it again, you dont believe him a second time.

Yes, that's rather the point of the last two lines between Veidt and Manhattan:

"I did the right thing, didn't I? It all worked out in the end."

"In the end? Nothing ends Adrian, nothing ever ends."

It's deliberately ambiguous how long the new state of affairs will last, and serves to refute any "ends justify the means" argument because of it.

Remember though that the alien squid isn't the only part of the plan. Veidt has almost full control over the world's media (in a world without mass peer to peer communications) and nuclear tensions are as high as they are because he used that to ratchet them up, and he has the next phase of relief and rapprochement all lined up and ready to go. It's not a hands-off plan where he retires to a farm to eat beans, he's still playing his part from the shadows.

That's also my reading. Ozymandias did the unforgivable in the name of a good ending, but he ensured things keep going on, not that they "ended".

He picked that burden and will have to keep carrying until he collapse. Congratulation oh King of Kings, you shall never sleep peacefully again.

[Precure]

I think Jon actually cares about humanity, or else he wouldn't kill Rorschach. He also kept it a secret to protect Laurie and Dan's innocence, proving he cares about their mental health.

[GloatingSwine]

I think Jon actually cares about humanity, or else he wouldn't kill Rorschach. He also kept it a secret to protect Laurie and Dan's innocence, proving he cares about their mental health.

Yes, that’s the whole of Chapter 9. Manhattan comes to recognise value in humanity.

The whole dialogue on Mars is essentially pitting the Jungian concept of meaning in the search for meaning against nihilistic materialism and changing his perspective away from nihilism.

[gbaji]

I accept that Veidt.. could not be stopped. He won. The heroes could not prevent the death of millions. Maybe if they could, they should have. But the question is past them, and the only thing that is actually matters at that point is "do you bury this secret to give the best chance for peace, or you risk nuclear Armageddon and insist Veidt faces justice"?

While I get that this is presented as a binary choice in the comic itself, and it's certainly fine to accept it from an artistic pov (cause technically, the author is "right" in his own story), I'm not sure I accept it from a broader "is this right/herioc" pov (which I think it what we're actually kinda discussing here).

If the US and USSR being handed a common enemy in the form of an psionic interdimensional alien squid is enough to get them to set their differences aside and work together, why assume "Megalomaniacal madman who just created a fake psionic interdimensional alien squid and killed a million people with it" would not accomplish the same thing? Again. If we actually stop and think about it realistically and not through the lens of the author's own story/message that is. It's actually hard to imagine how exactly two enemy superpowers on the brink of nuclear war could "work together to fight aliens from another dimsension" in the first place? That's pretty much going to involve a race to develop a bunch of new technologies involving interdimensional detection systems, advanced anti-alien weapons, defenses, possibly launch of an entire industry related to studying and duplicating the psionic attack itself (which, you know, would never be weaponized).

All of those are "technolgies of war", and would (again, realistically) result in a ratcheting of tensions, and a new arms race.


But... Discovering that one super wealthy and powerful individual had enacted that kind of scheme against the world is the kind of thing that would bring them together. They'd have to share intelligence and resources to track down his many global businesses and shell companies. The fact that Veidt is an American, and destroyed an American city, eliminates any national angle to the issue (whereas if he'd hit a city in the Soviet sphere of influence the revelation of a US capitalist doing this would be seen as an attack by the US). So neither nation has any reason to blame the other. Neither has any reason to attack the other. The US has massive interest to go after Veidt because of the criminal act he just peformed, and the USSR would want to get him too out of concern that he might do the same to them.

Now, sure. Both sides would also presumably be looking to get their hands on whatever tech Veidt used to do it in the first place, and that might certainly create some tech-race style conflicts, but arguably no more (and quite possibly less) than if they believed the Squid attack hoax. It would almost certainlly cool down the immediate conflict quite a bit.


Again. It realy comes down to how much we absolutely just accept that Veidt was correct in his assessment and that this really was the only way to prevent nuclear war.

And maybe the irony here is that Roschach had more faith in humanity that Veidt? Or maybe he didn't care. Or... maybe.. a combination of the two. At the end of the day, telling "the authorities" (whomever they are) about what Veidt did, and trying to bring him to justice for his crime is the "right thing to do". The only thing holding you back is the villain's own claim that if you do that, nuclear war will happen? Gee. I can't imagine why Rorschach didn't buy that. It's more or less the same claim that pretty much every villain says to justify their evil acts. Magneto is sure that a war between humans and mutants is inevitable, so he believes in striking first to ensure mutants win. He certainly rationalizes it that in the long run, the world will be better off for it, right? And heck. We even have a few time travel comics to show us exactly what will happen if the humans "win" (days of future past, and a host of related stories over time). Yet.... The Xmen are the "heroes" because they fight against him anyway.

Rorshach's opinion in terms of opposing Veidt and wanting to defeat him and hold him resposible for his crimes is no less heroic than a host of similar confrontations in other comiic books out there at the time Watchmen came out. The position he takes is inarguably the one comic book readers would associate with "heroism". The only thing shocking in Watchmen is that, unlike other comics, the heroes didn't stand firm on principles and manage to find a way to make it all work out ok in the end. The "heroes" decided to just capitulate to the villain. And the one person who decides to continue trying to "do the right thing" is killed.


I will say, that's its a testiment to the novel nature of the comic that people still find so much to discuss about it, even so long after it was written.

[Moak]

(a little excursus in Earthsea land)

Yeah. Agree on the whole sequel thing. The books tended to meander, and touch on previously established things, but weren't necessarily at all a linear story. The TV series thing, was "ok". But it was basically set using the backdrop of the setting itself, and some of the things that were only tangentially mentioned in the books, then built a story off of that, and dropped in some of the characters into it. If you'd read the books, then watched the series, you recognized the places, and references and names, but it was otherwise a very much tangential story. Kind of like someone reading Tolkien's appendixes, and building a story based on minor mentions of names, places, and events.

At least, that was the sense I got out of it. It wasn't terrible, but it wasn't specifically about telling any of the actual stories in the books. It just kinda skipped across them instead, while telling a different story. Not a terrible approach IMO (and honestly not too much different from the approach in the books themselves). But not at all something where you could really compare one fo the other directly.

I bought a collection version of all Earthsea, and Le Guin explicitly told that she didn't want to write in Earthsea again, and that the sequel were more like some stories that she "heard were happening there".

I seemed like a strange change the fact that Tehanu connected things between the first three books... but it connects the people and the shadow of their stories. It was a very slow read to me, and bored me a lot. So, I don't think I've ever read the last book.

The Ghibli movie was a mish-mash of characters and events of all the books. It wasn't a bad film (I enjoyed it, and is one that my elder son love) but... was "inspired" by Earthsea. And didn't prepare me in any way in how much the Tomb was SO different.

When I read the first book, I tough "oh, is how Ged became Gandalf!" and then... what? A tomb? There are no dragons, young boys betraying his family?

I loved how you find out what is the truth of the Tomb with the girl (I don't remember the name... Tenat?) and I like how the story is introspective.

Compared to that, the 3rd book simply left me bored.

[Tyndmyr]

or knowing his abilities and limitations, make use of those abilities and the neighboring buildings and structures, chosing those that can serve as effective anchor points and distribute the webbing across those areas in order to save the lives of those in the traincar even if some might get injured? That is a pragmatic approach to the problem of "how do I save the people in this traincar?".

That has nothing to do with pragmatism. Either the idealist or the pragmatic can be knowledgeable, skilled, and use his environment.

The pragmatic is willing to choose the lesser of two evils. The idealist is not.

Thats a circular definition of what a hero does.

A hero do good things. If that means stopping the Villain, then he does it. But if Lex Luthor has a plan that requires he first solve World Hunger before starting to do the evil stuff, Superman does not have the moral license to stop him solely because "he's the villain".

I'm fairly confident that this has been an actual plot, Superman lets it go through...and then it turns out that Luthor was using it to cover for an evil plan all along.

Yes, people can change and all that, but when we're talking Luthor or the Joker, one can be relatively certain that they do not have good intent. And in this particular situation, Ozymandus's supposed higher goals do not change that his plan is pretty evil.

You are jumping plenty of hoops already to reach your desired conclusion. In your scenario, people would have to suddenly decide they knew all Space Squids were gone, or that they didnt actually exist despite plenty of evidence to point to the contrary.

For sure, slow grinding disbelief in the possibility of the Squids returning is a possibility, but then it would have done its job of preventing the imminent nuclear war that was about to wipe out humanity.

It does not. It requires only that there be no squids around to stoke further fears, and that there be people around to stoke further conflict. We, the audience, know this to be the case.

I accept that Veidt.. could not be stopped. He won. The heroes could not prevent the death of millions. Maybe if they could, they should have. But the question is past them, and the only thing that is actually matters at that point is "do you bury this secret to give the best chance for peace, or you risk nuclear Armageddon and insist Veidt faces justice"?

Perhaps he could have been stopped, but only earlier. Perhaps if people had taken Rorschach seriously to begin with. The man is ultimately right, but largely put off. Manhattan, in particular, by focusing on his efforts to avert nuclear war. Manhattan, perhaps more than all the rest, is trapped within his nature and a tool used, rather than a solution.

In the end, when Rorschach is revealed to have been correct, and Veidt utterly evil, the "heroes" choose to kill the former and let the latter live, and even remain publicly a good guy.

This is not a good action. This is the main trouble with embracing evil for good ends. You end up with a lot of evil. The evil needs to be covered up, so you must do more evil. What happens if the journal becomes believed by a few. Would it be acceptable to go commit more murders yet to cover that up? Where does it end?

What makes you different from a villain ultimately?

Yes, that's rather the point of the last two lines between Veidt and Manhattan:

"I did the right thing, didn't I? It all worked out in the end."

"In the end? Nothing ends Adrian, nothing ever ends."

Oh, I quite agree. This exchange is most certainly not meant to reassure us of a happily ever after, but the reverse. Not that the author particularly was aiming for a happy ending at any point.

Remember though that the alien squid isn't the only part of the plan. Veidt has almost full control over the world's media (in a world without mass peer to peer communications) and nuclear tensions are as high as they are because he used that to ratchet them up, and he has the next phase of relief and rapprochement all lined up and ready to go. It's not a hands-off plan where he retires to a farm to eat beans, he's still playing his part from the shadows.

To me, that seems to be pretty straightforwardly an evil overlord sort of situation. I agree that he'll most definitely remain involved, and believe he'll absolutely resort to further evil should his plans be threatened. This is what happens when evil wins.

[JNAProductions]

That has nothing to do with pragmatism. Either the idealist or the pragmatic can be knowledgeable, skilled, and use his environment.

The pragmatic is willing to choose the lesser of two evils. The idealist is not.

Which can result in the idealist doing less than the pragmatist.

I do agree that, when presented with two bad choices, you should strive to create a better choice. But if it's not possible? Then you should pick the less-bad choice.

[Mordar]

That has nothing to do with pragmatism. Either the idealist or the pragmatic can be knowledgeable, skilled, and use his environment.

The pragmatic is willing to choose the lesser of two evils. The idealist is not.

Perhaps this is the issue. I am using this definition: pragmatic = dealing with things sensibly and realistically in a way that is based on practical rather than theoretical considerations, or : a practical approach to problems and affairs.

I also like: "Pragmatism is about taking a realistic and sensible approach to things, and about making peace with the fact that things may either go your away or against it."

Pragmatic implementation of saving everyone on the train might be save the easiest first and move through them as quickly as possible, knowing that you might not save everyone (including yourself) but you will do the best job you can. Attacking the issue as you can, in the order you can.

One can say it is idealistic to think you can save everyone. But then you can be pragmatic in approaching how to save everyone.

But outside that, doesn't an Hero = Idealist imply you have to always be saving everyone you can. So can you recognize the need to eat, or things beyond basic necessities of life - to recharge, to live a life...taking pragmatic considerations into how to best save as many people as you can?

If Spider-Man were idealistic, would he *ever* take off the mask? How many people were robbed, beaten, killed while he was enjoying that picnic with Mary Jane, or grabbing lunch with Gwen? Surely that couldn't happen if he wants to save everyone?

- M

[Tyndmyr]

Which can result in the idealist doing less than the pragmatist.

I do agree that, when presented with two bad choices, you should strive to create a better choice. But if it's not possible? Then you should pick the less-bad choice.

That is a popular viewpoint. But deciding that stopping the supervillain is too unlikely, and cutting a deal with him instead isn't really the stuff of heroes, is it?

Instead the hero attempts the impossible. He is usually depicted as successful in this, but this part isn't strictly necessary. A hero dying in a futile attempt to save an innocent still generally reads as heroic. Inefficient? Perhaps. Yet perhaps the most efficient thing to do with Flash is to stuff him on a treadmill, and have him run 365 days a year to harvest maximum amounts of energy from him. In lives saved, the reduced pollution could easily outstrip the individuals saved from one off disasters.

This isn't hypothetical, this was actually depicted in The Dark Knight Strikes Again. The pragmatism there is all Lex's doing, and it isn't generally portrayed kindly.

If Spider-Man were idealistic, would he *ever* take off the mask? How many people were robbed, beaten, killed while he was enjoying that picnic with Mary Jane, or grabbing lunch with Gwen? Surely that couldn't happen if he wants to save everyone?

You are describing a pragmatic perspective here...Utilitarianism, to be precise, a fairly extreme form of it. This isn't idealism, this is a form of pragmatism. This is further evidence that Spiderman is not depicted as a pragmatist.

Idealism does not demand that one strive for maximal efficiencies, but instead that one make the right ethical decision. What that is depends on the precise flavor of idealism. Spidermans ideals are not the same as those of Rorschach. Both take a deontological view of the world. Spiderman isn't going to murder one innocent in order to save many more. He'll refuse. Rorschach isn't going to spare one evil person to save many innocents. He'll refuse.

In doing so, both reject the idea of pragmatically accepting an imperfect world in order to maximize good. They instead attempt to be as good as possible(within the framework of their particular ideology).

[JNAProductions]

Do you think it's better to die trying to save twenty people, leaving none of them saved; or to successfully save a dozen people (and not die in the process) but eight people die?

[Metastachydium]

I think Jon actually cares about humanity, or else he wouldn't kill Rorschach. He also kept it a secret to protect Laurie and Dan's innocence, proving he cares about their mental health.

Yes, that’s the whole of Chapter 9. Manhattan comes to recognise value in humanity.

The whole dialogue on Mars is essentially pitting the Jungian concept of meaning in the search for meaning against nihilistic materialism and changing his perspective away from nihilism.

And he also always knew he'll have been convinced by then, just didn't act on it earlier, because it's Jon. If Veidt is certainly right about something, it's that the (big) blue guy(s) operate in a way that's more than a tad unlike anything that would make sense for a human.

[Batcathat]

Do you think it's better to die trying to save twenty people, leaving none of them saved; or to successfully save a dozen people (and not die in the process) but eight people die?

In addition: is the person who saves a dozen people not a hero since they didn't try in vain to save everyone?

[137beth]

The play Glengarry Glen Ross does not explicitly tell you the rules of the "contest."

The Odyssey spends less than half of the text on Odysseus' travels.

Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde is not primarily from the title character's perspective.

Oz is real.

Spoiler: Matilda

Show

Matilda Honey loses her powers at the end.

Peter Pan

Spoiler: Peter and Wendy

Show

forgets Captain Hook, Tinker Bell, all his adventures, and almost everyone else he meets (but remembers Wendy for an unexplained reason).

[gbaji]

It does not. It requires only that there be no squids around to stoke further fears, and that there be people around to stoke further conflict. We, the audience, know this to be the case.

Well, for completenesses sake, the HBO series did address this by having some sort of system that Veidt set up that somehow grew squid and then transported them to random spots around the globe (or at least the US) and dropped them on people. So the continual threat of "squid falling from the sky" was at least... um... er... "present" there. And yes. It's just as silly as that sounds (but treated completely seriously in the series).

This is not a good action. This is the main trouble with embracing evil for good ends. You end up with a lot of evil. The evil needs to be covered up, so you must do more evil. What happens if the journal becomes believed by a few. Would it be acceptable to go commit more murders yet to cover that up? Where does it end?

Well... that would have been a wonderful angle to explore in the above mentioned HBO series. It *could* have been about the lengths to which a system, born out of an act of covering up the actions of Veidt, and required to continue that cover up, would go to maintain that cover up in the face of a small minority who had read the journal and did know "the truth". It *could* have been about that...

Sadly, that's not at all the direction they choose to go with the folks who read the journal though. Which... yeah. Oh no. They were in the series. And they were definitely painted as "really bad people to be hunted down and detained/questioned/killed on sight" by the authoritarian folks running things. But... not because they "knew the truth and were a threat to our authority if that truth gets out". Nope... Because... well... they actually are really bad people and they deserve to be hunted down. And that's all there is. You get to the final layer of onion and find nothing but a pile of onion layers laying on the floor. There was no actual substance there at all.

Yeah. That series, while it had some very cool parts in it (I actually found their treatment of Dr. Manhattan really well done for most of it, and even acceptable in the parts that weren't so great), was just so disappointing, on so many levels. Which is sad.

[Lord Raziere]

I mean again, problem is, what Veidt has going here is completely unsustainable.

like even if you let him deceive the world......how long can the deception be kept up? how much money did the first squid cost? take that, multiply that by however much more he needs to keep people convinced there is an alien invasion, plus however much money needed to adjust these things so that the atrocity isn't repeated because if he is such a genius he knows he can't keep destroying cities due to a number of factors, humanitarian ones especially, but also many others. so if there is a second squid they're probably not doing the same amount of damage, they're probably there just to job to the militaries because there is no superheroes anymore, and that in itself is suspicious because if the aliens launched one psychic bio-nuke why aren't they doing that again? people would want explanations sooner or later and Veidt would at some point have to come out and start spinning a lie that he knew about the aliens before anyone else but "knew no one would believe him" so he "started opposing them in secret and trying to foil them" and now has to come forward to provide information on what he knows which turns out to be very, very accurate and he keeps humbly saying "oh that was just a lucky guess, good thing I'm so good at this" and his advice and information just keeps being super-accurate to keep the casualties down and at a certain point its like "strange how you keep being the only one being right about these aliens Mr. Veidt" and he's like "I assure you! lucky guesses! I mean I'm also a super-genius but I like to keep myself humble" and its like how many coincidences and correct information before people start suspecting he's colluding y'know?

but problem is, to keep the up the deception would cost a lot of time, money, resources and so on to make more aliens if he went this route. enough I'd say, to bankrupt him. If he is truly a "super-genius" or whatever this should be obvious to him. Furthermore he murdered the people that knew the original plan, so now he has to potentially let more people in on what they're making with his corporations resources, even if its only in bits and pieces, and every little bit is a potential leak. also people might start asking where those people he murdered went, didn't they have families? if he sends back the bodies, why are they poisoned, Mr. Veidt? its not as if his glass dome in antartica is secret or anything, its featured in a public news article for crying out loud. if he concocts some way of disposing the bodies without evidence one might ask how exactly did a FIRE start to burn them to ash or whatever? why isn't any of the garden burned as well? details like that. there are already holes in this simply because he murdered like four people.

But lets assume he's going as low budget as possible, what lie to concoct for that? Perhaps he simply says he comes forward and says he is willing to devote his companies resources to detecting the alien threat to help the world, plausible, and so he builds some deceptive device to make it look like the aliens are coming.....eeeeh a long time from now, a few decades about equivalent to his remaining lifespan, long enough for him by his estimation, to manipulate the world into being more peaceful/united so that when he either dies or is confident enough that humanity won't annihilate itself, he just reveals the truth and tells them why or a video plays telling the world why he lied to them, hoping that enough time has passed that it works. seems a pretty good plan on paper right? eeexcept no. any device he constructs both has to hold up to scientific scrutiny and scientists trying to replicate the device, because Veidt if he really is the genius he is, knows that proper scientists won't accept his results without being able to confirm them without his biases, and they'd be very interested in knowing how his stuff works, what method he is using and such and so on. the second problem is that he is inherently trying to make peace by uniting people through preparing them for a war that will never happen. the same time he is uniting people, he is also arming and making them gear up for a conflict that doesn't exist and when the lie is revealed, they will be angry about it, which is not a good plan, because what will people do with the war preparation once the lie is revealed?

so that low budget long term plan is out but not entirely, the war needs to stop before it ever really starts for the deception to work. so he makes the device to detect that the aliens arrive....long enough for him to make a fake alien that comes as a diplomat say with terms and such that can convincingly act out a script so that he can look like he negotiated a peace with the aliens and saved the world from a war with them. hopefully everyone is united and too focused on this to start asking the fake alien questions or want to go with them to visit their alien civilization, holes like that. But if he gets the alien out of there quick he can hopefully ride that success to turning the cultures of Earth towards a true united peace and such and so on, so that when he dies or reveals the truth, its a sad day but one too late for anyone to do anything about. but even then he has to deal with scientists and such wanting to meet the aliens more, find them and pester him with questions about it. by doing this after all, he is making a grand performance on the world stage and there is nothing more annoying and persistent than fans of a performer's work, which is the bane of a con-man like him. So what to do to make sure the alien isn't asked more about? any backstory that I can come up with for the fake alien would have holes in it, also as years go by any location given in space other than like, some distant galaxy wouldn't hold for long as scientists develop more ways to observe the universe and it'd be suspicious of him to stop any research into normal, harmless observations of space.

Like, there is no path this goes where there isn't big problems with this. and all of them waste more money, more time, more everything for this deception. the moral decision IS to expose this deception, the question is WHEN, because at what point are heads cool enough for the deception to no longer be necessary vs. doing it as soon as possible so that people don't end being deceived for longer, because the longer it goes, the more the deception could be exposed by someone else and be presented in a more negative light which would be worse than if Veidt came forward to explain it himself. there is always a bit of risk of destruction, the question is picking the right moment so that its as low as possible.

or maybe Veidt makes some monster to make the nations involved fire all their nukes at the monster, thus spending all the nuclear arsenal it, and accepts a world where people fight more conventional painful wars as a cost to prevent nuclear annihilation and says mission accomplished, and like manipulates things so that no missile of that nature is ever made again. which given his willingness to spend lives, makes sense. if the cost of Not Destroying the world is more conventional warfare, I can see him seeing that as an acceptable price to pay. but y'know, how long would that last until people arms race things back to that point again? there is no guarantee his social engineering sticks. unless he starts doing experiments to become an immortal god-emperor and like, see the future and everything like Paul Atreides or something, its not going to hold forever and we know the consequences of that kind of power looks like in Watchmen's universe from Dr. Manhattan- you end up with a future you can't change, a perception that doesn't allow him to control the situation, but rather just be aware of how deterministic his actions really are. if he sees himself failing, he won't be able to alter the failure, and he might not even care enough to stop it, he would be gambling with finding out what fate has already decided would happen.

And if he simply does nothing? Well the memory of the alien will fade in time. People will wonder what ever came of that, with the risk of turning back towards fighting each other once again- but there will always be people, not everyone, but people who will look closer, who will try to figure out Why, and sooner or later....one of them is going to see the seams. Manage see beyond the magic trick, the stage show and once they do....they're going to the point the finger and sound the alarm, for good or for ill. At some point, someone is just going to say "No, I trust and believe they won't blow up the world" and just reveal it no matter how right or wrong they are about that- its not a moral thing, but a matter of belief and inevitability, because sooner or later you meet someone enough willing to believe things like that no matter how cynically you think of people in general. Three people can keep a secret if two are dead after all.

So yeah, no matter what Veidt does, he doesn't really have any good options out, and the more time passes the more the situation will fall apart. The moral question is not whether its right to reveal Veidt- it is right to reveal him- but WHEN is it right to reveal for the maximum chance of seeing justice done without endangering the world.

[Cikomyr2]

So yeah, no matter what Veidt does, he doesn't really have any good options out, and the more time passes the more the situation will fall apart. The moral question is not whether its right to reveal Veidt- it is right to reveal him- but WHEN is it right to reveal for the maximum chance of seeing justice done without endangering the world.

I can live with that.

Yes, it is right to ultimately expose him. The series at least did that right.

(I personally really liked the series, even if I consider an independent work).

[Tyndmyr]

Well, for completenesses sake, the HBO series did address this by having some sort of system that Veidt set up that somehow grew squid and then transported them to random spots around the globe (or at least the US) and dropped them on people. So the continual threat of "squid falling from the sky" was at least... um... er... "present" there. And yes. It's just as silly as that sounds (but treated completely seriously in the series).

Ah, I hate the series so very, very much.

In it, everyone seems mostly okay with Veidt despite him literally lording over slaves that he makes fight to the death for his amusement. The series had an interesting premise for the first episode....but one that was almost wholly unconnected to Watchmen, and then became more incoherent as it went. I'm not sure it's possible to sensibly treat it as a logical continuation of the graphic novel/movie, especially as Moore has stated he is “less than fond of these works.”

Granted, the dude seems grumpy about adaptations in general, but even if we discount his many sharp remarks, throwing different directors at each episode and not even really bothering with continuity really, really limits ones ability to treat it all as a consistent universe.

Hell, by like episode 4, it suddenly becomes the adventures of Lube Man, who we had never seen before, and who has the power of...double fisting bottles of lube. After he slides into a sewer, he is never mentioned again. This episode is called "If You Don't Like My Story, Write Your Own."

Well... that would have been a wonderful angle to explore in the above mentioned HBO series. It *could* have been about the lengths to which a system, born out of an act of covering up the actions of Veidt, and required to continue that cover up, would go to maintain that cover up in the face of a small minority who had read the journal and did know "the truth". It *could* have been about that...

Sadly, that's not at all the direction they choose to go with the folks who read the journal though. Which... yeah. Oh no. They were in the series. And they were definitely painted as "really bad people to be hunted down and detained/questioned/killed on sight" by the authoritarian folks running things. But... not because they "knew the truth and were a threat to our authority if that truth gets out". Nope... Because... well... they actually are really bad people and they deserve to be hunted down. And that's all there is. You get to the final layer of onion and find nothing but a pile of onion layers laying on the floor. There was no actual substance there at all.

Yeah. I was....very, very disappointed by the show as a whole. It wasn't coherent, it lacked any of the depth of the original, and there's...ultimately not much to explore as a result of it. The world as it was at the end of the original story was already fascinating, with a deep conflict to explore, and this just...didn't care about the original story at all. It had a different focus, and one that didn't mesh super well with the original world.

[Cikomyr2]

Ah, I hate the series so very, very much.

In it, everyone seems mostly okay with Veidt despite him literally lording over slaves that he makes fight to the death for his amusement.

Wait? Who is "okay" with Veidt in the series? Everyone hates him, the only people who stand him are the idiot clones left in his care (a fitting punishment if i ever seen one), and he cant stand them. He gets arrested immediately after the climax crisis is resolved and made to be paid for his crimes.

Do you mean the "audience" is okay with Veidt?

Or do you mean the legacy he left behind and how people remembers him in-story?

[Talakeal]

So what do people think is a worse sequel, HBO’s Watchmen or DCs Doomsday Clock?

[Rynjin]

Wait? Who is "okay" with Veidt in the series? Everyone hates him, the only people who stand him are the idiot clones left in his care (a fitting punishment if i ever seen one), and he cant stand them. He gets arrested immediately after the climax crisis is resolved and made to be paid for his crimes.

And yet despite everyone hating him and him doing ridiculously illegal and overtly evil things (by description, I thought the show looked garbage and never watched it) nobody did anything about him until the climax.

So clearly they were okay with everything he was doing up to that point.