Ethics [Thursday, January 10]

[sith_happened]

Anakin walked into his classroom precisely on time and gave the students assembled there an appraising glance.

Except for how his glance lingered on a couple of faces as his eyes widened slightly, it wasn't possible to tell what he thought of them.

"I'm Master Skywalker," he said in a voice that was intended to carry, "this is Ethics, and we're going to skip the introductions--I'll figure out who you are--and move straight to our first discussion."

He paced around the room, cloak flaring out behind him, as he handed out the syllabus. "Today's topic," he said. "Self sacrifice: knowing the difference between saving people and being a pretentious twit."

"Any time I ask a a group of people what they would do to save someone they love, they all blither on about how they would set the world on fire, lie, cheat, steal, kill, die, et cetera, et cetera. I've been at this school too long to believe that half of you haven't already been put into this situation and I'm in no mood to hear adolescent ramblings about how wonderful you were or might hypothetically be. We're going to ground it in reality.

"Over the summer there was a woman who was in charge of this school. She had been placed in power legitimately, was allowed to punish in accordance with that power, and began pushing the boundaries of her authority almost immediately. She called students to her office, punished them for slights genuine or imagined, and began escalating the severity and frequency of her punishments, going over the line into what was no longer acceptable."

Anakin crossed his arms over his chest, the scars across his face very evident in the light coming through the window. "It eventually took a team of highly qualified adults to take her out. Today's topic: when do you draw the line? When do you admit to yourself that a problem cannot be solved, that to sacrifice yourself isn't a statement, it's merely pointless? How long does it take for you to check your ego?"

Comments

Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[sith_happened]

Would you wait until you've blown up a planet to realize you might've made a mistake?

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[raspberryturk]

The answer seemed simple enough to Reno, anyhow.

"You do what you have to do, when you have to do it. But I can't think of anything worth dyin' for, yo. Sounds pointless to me right from the get-go."

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[sith_happened]

"You'll find that to be a minority opinion at this school," Anakin said dryly. "Students were lining up to get hurt by this woman, thinking that each of them was the most special thing ever and their superior mind power or witty banter or nifty outfit would be enough to change the mind of a fully trained and clearly unhinged adult."

He snorted. "Idiots."

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[the_merriest]

Rikku gave him a curious look. "There's nothing you'd die for?"

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[the_merriest]

"Sacrificing yourself isn't always about ego," she said, frowning. "I think ... if you could save someone, or the world and all that, that's one thing. If you know. A maybe isn't the same thing. And ... I mean, if you do? Then it's over for you. You get to be a martyr and everyone else just has to mourn and blame themselves, and it's kinda unfair to ... everyone left behind."

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[sith_happened]

"But that wasn't the question," Anakin replied with a small smile. "I know there are moments when someone goes up in a blaze of heroic glory and it's the right choice. But it's not the only choice. And there are many, many more moments when it's the stupid, pointless choice. I want to know if you know yourself and your surroundings enough to realize when you're faced with an ugly reality--when coming forward and getting killed won't solve the problem, when telling the truth won't set you free. How comfortable are you in the gray places?"

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[ecirpnellehada.livejournal.com]

Adah pulled out her notebook and wrote down her response without even too much thought. It was, oddly enough, a subject she'd thought about often. When finished, she carefully tore out the sheet of paper from its perforations and offered it up.

"I draw the line very shortly. Self-sacrifice for a person in my condition is possibly one of the most moronic things I could possibly do. I wouldn't have the capability to save myself in most situations, let alone someone else. Especially since no one would probably bother saving me, either."

Not that Adah was bitter about any particular, specific events or anything, no. It continued.

"The one time I can think of where I may have done something out of 'self-sacrifice' was done entirely on accidentally and purely out of my own pride. What I did, I did not do for anyone but myself. I got nothing from it. I don't plan on doing something like it again. 'A thing is not necessarily true because a man dies for it.'"

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[walks-two-paths.livejournal.com]

Savannah's thoughts were troubled as she raised her hand. "Is it the same thing if you're not the one who offers to sacrifice themselves, but you are convinced by others that are older than you and that you trust that your self-sacrifice will be what saves other people and allows them to continue to live?"

Between Project Genesis and the Leah/Kristof situation, she had reason to ask for clarification.

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[vkandis-son.livejournal.com]

"Allowing yourself to die needlessly, chasing after death when it can achieve nothing, is selfish, and a waste of everything you might achieve in the future," he said quietly. "No one who loved you would want you to die for such a reason."

Karal closed his hands around his Vkandis medal before continuing. "But sacrifice does not mean needless death. If you beg the helps of the gods, if they are the only ones who save your people, there will be a price to be paid. Sometimes, that price may the willing sacrifice of your life."

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[minnesota-teen.livejournal.com]

"I would never willingly look for death, especially if I know the only outcome would be just that," she said, pausing as she considered her next words carefully. "I wouldn't like to consider myself a chicken, oh my gosh no, but I would turn around and go the opposite direction. It's why I'm here now. At Fandom."

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[cantjossme.livejournal.com]

"There's two points where you can draw the line: When what you do is going to be pointless or what you do is going to cost the lives or hurt other people," Mel replied. "However if you can do something to help? You can't ignore it and walk away."

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[lovelylana.livejournal.com]

"I don't know," Lana said honestly. "And I'm not sure that I would know until I was in that situation."

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[wannabehunter]

"You shouldn't go looking for the opportunity," Jo said slowly. "If you can save people in need and there's no one else who can do it..."

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[blessed_twice]

"You can't define when," Wyatt said. "There are too many variables. Running out and getting yourself killed for no reason is dumb, yeah. But if you can hold something back for the two seconds it takes for someone you care about to get to safety, then it's worth it. And for some of us it's our sacred duty to hold the line."

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[death-of-hope.livejournal.com]

"If something has to be done, then you do it. Sometimes that something is getting out of the line of fire," Anemone said, twirling her hair. "Deliberately being a martyr, that's just stupid. No one cares, and dead people can't change anything. You're just dead."

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[withoutverona]

"I have no answer, as I do not believe self-sacrifice, in the name of any goal, to be wrong," Romeo said, after a lot of staring at the ceiling and clenching his fists at others answers.

He was not in a mood to elaborate, but he would if asked.

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[wannabe-pan.livejournal.com]

Andrew did not think of himself as a hero. If anything, in a fight, he was pretty sure he would be the one trying to look busy in front of the nearest escape pod, so he could leap into it as soon as the doors opened.

"I'm not a fighter," he answered. "But, um, I think you should stick by your friends and help them if you can." He didn't want to sound like a complete wimp.

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[ashockingbitch]

Jenny should've fried that sodding Umbridge while she had the chance. She folded her arms across her chest and said, "I've died three times. Once was a surprise, once was because it was time, but once? It was to prove a point. So I've died. I've killed. I've sent good men to their deaths and sacrificed millions of innocents. I will do whatever I have to do to make a finer world." She lifted her head, her chin jutting out with determination, as if daring Anakin to challenge her.

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[im-afrog.livejournal.com]

"I don't think you can truly define when to draw the line," Adam began. "I know that I would try everything I could to help people until all my options were exhausted or something did work."

He was about giving up. If there was anything at all he could do that might help someone, he would do it without hesitating. "But doing something reckless that would ultimately result in death, isn't something that I would consider as a course of action." Though there were instances at home, where Adam knew he was in danger, it wasn't something he couldn't get out of and it wasn't a situation where he was going to lose his life. He knew his limits.

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[remember5th.livejournal.com]

"You do the right thing. If you have to die for your cause...sometimes problems are bigger than one person's life," she said simply, thinking of V, thinking of last year, and thinking of what she offered to protect him.

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[blackmagic-eve.livejournal.com]

"I like to think I'd realize the mistake before the planet exploding happens," Eve said. "But to be perfectly honest? There are people here -- at this school and in this class -- that I'd do just about anything for, mistakes be damned."

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[absolutesnark]

"I wouldn't go out looking for a reason to sacrifice myself," Summer said. "But I'd like to think I would do anything to help someone I care about. Honestly, though, I don't know what I'd do in a situation like that."

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[athosborn.livejournal.com]

"To me, there is great strength in numbers," Teyla said. "I cannot imagine attempting to solve a serious problem without the assistance of others, unless I was in a position where no help was available." Not that she was overly familiar with that kind of situation these days. "I would attempt to at least solve the problem before giving up, but if I and my allies were unable to help, I believe it would only make the problem worse if we did not seek out a higher power who might be able to do something we could not."

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[harrydresden.livejournal.com]

"I'm not interested in sacrifice, and I'm definitely not interested in getting myself killed," Harry said. "It doesn't make a statement, it just makes me dead. And I've been trying for a while not to be made dead. But I dunno."

Re: Answer the question! (Jan 10)

[itsjustlanguage.livejournal.com]

The question seemed rather timely considering what happened while her family was visiting San Francisco over the break, and Hoshi took a moment to remember her thoughts at the time before she replied.

"If sacrificing myself wouldn't help, I would just get out of there," said Hoshi. "Actually, that's what I did when it came to that. Papa and I were walking when I spotted a young man being chased by an angry mob. There was nothing I could do to protect him from such a big group, but Papa told me to run for help while he tried to help. I didn't even think about it. I just took off running and didn't look back."