fandomhigh | Ethics class, 2-4pm Monday afternoon

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ethics

Ethics class, 2-4pm Monday afternoon

Tara leans against her desk, smiling as she watches the students come in. Some of the faces she recognises, and gives a nod. The room is filled with soft, comfortable chairs, which are positioned in a circle. Each chair has a wooden insert in one arm, to lean on while writing, and each wooden insert has a blank piece of paper on it.

When everyone has taken their seats, Tara begins.

"The first rule of ethics class is that you do not talk about things that happen inside of ethics class. The second rule of ethics class is that you do not talk about things that happen inside of ethics class. Allow me to clarify: you may discuss your revelations, challenge your friends and mock the teacher all you like. But if anything said inside this class is ever used against another member of it, you will answer to me, personally. You will have the opportunity to explain yourself before I drag you before Principal Connor. This class cannot function if people are afraid to speak."

She looks around the classroom, stopping briefly on each face. "This school is very unusual. Yes, obviously the squid is a bit odd, but what's more interesting to me is that there are individuals sitting in this room" she nods to Angelus, "who identify themselves as evil. That, ladies and gentlemen, is what the first section of the course will be discussing. Evil, good, and what makes the difference between the two. Your evil classmates have perspectives you need to think about and consider. Don't ignore them in a mistaken belief that they have no ethics."

"Each class runs for two hours. Ordinarily this will be broken up into two sections: discussion and debate - today, however, there will be two discussion sections instead. The majority of your assessment will come through your involvement in class discussions. Every student is expected to participate every week. If you are painfully shy, write your thoughts down and hand them in to me. If I don't know what you're thinking, you don't get credit for it. After this week a formal debate will be held once a week. For those of you unfamiliar with debating, this means two teams of three students taking opposing sides on an issue determined by me. You will each be expected to debate three times during the term, with a week's notice to prepare for each one. If I don't get enough volunteers, I will volunteer someone. At the end of semester a practical exam will be held. This will assess not what you choose to do, but how accurately you have come to an understanding of your own ethical code. I expect you to be honest with yourselves."

"Friday and Monday classes are identical. Please feel free to switch between them if you have commitments that interfere with your regular attendance."

"I will want two teacher's assistants for this course, whose function it is to prompt discussion and challenge your thinking. These students will be expected to attend both Monday and Friday classes. Today's discussion will serve as your audition. TAs are expected to prompt discussion and challenge other students to analyse their own responses as well as the tasks expected of any other student. If you are interested, please say so on your paper, or see me after class."

[OOC: Class will be open for responses for the next week, for those who need to slowplay. For those of you who read Friday's class, this speech is not directly cribbed. That would be totally irresponsible. I made two changes.]

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Tara clears her throat, waiting for everyone's attention before she continued. "Jonathan has raised an excellent question (http://www.livejournal.com/community/fandomhigh/225268.html?thread=10742772). Can sufficient cumulative good resulting from a death erase the taint of evil from the death itself?"

Professor? Is death neccessarily evil? I mean, no one wants to die, and we're all affected by the loss of loved ones, but isn't death a natural part of life?

"I'm sorry, Jonathan, you're right. That was very badly phrased, I meant to address murder, which most societies do view as evil." She leans in and whispers, "okay, that's two cookies."

*cocks head*

Possibly, you'd have to take into consideration what the consquences would be if the death in question didn't take place as well.

"Tough one in either direction," Angelus said. "Future's a tricky thing, and you can't believe everything you're foretold. Take me. I'm told I have a 50/50 shot of either destroying the world or saving it. That means anyone who helps or kills me has a 50/50 shot of being good or evil."

"Well, Machiavelli did say that if the ends justify the means..." Rory says quietly. "What I mean is, is death really evil if it's for the greater good? I don't believe so."

"Which begs the next question - who decides what is for the greater good? And if a person commits murder in the wholehearted but mistaken belief that every life on the planet could be saved by this one death, does that make the killing evil again?"

Rory shakes her head. "I don't think it makes it evil, per se. Misguided, stupid, yes, and that person should definitely face the consequences of what they've done. They're going to face the guilt of that murder for the rest of their life. But I don't think that 'evil' is exactly the word."

"Few so-called evil types do things because they think what they do is evil, though," Angelus pointed out. "Should a pedophile get a pass because he geniunely thinks he's helping his daughter by taking her virginity?"

Rory shakes her head. "There's a difference, though. Pedophiles are a form of psychopaths - the very definition of which dictates that these are people who are mentally unable to determine the difference between right versus wrong. But in this scenario, aren't we talking about an average person with no disorders? In which case - I still don't think that the word 'evil' can be applied."

"The problem with that - and here Johnny might want to step in since it's his area of expertise, not mine, but the problem with that is with the mind we all have to agree their mind is not working properly," Angelus said. "Someone breaks a leg the leg is broken without a doubt. But if someone's too happy or too sad all the time - who are we to say it's wrong? Time was if a woman enjoyed sex she was considered insane. Now she's supposed to seek help if she doesn't like it enough. How do we know today's madman isn't tomorrow's trend-setter?"

Rory bites her lip. "That's very true," she finally acknowledges. "And scary as all hell."

"No kidding," Angelus said. "Nothing like knowing you're only sane because enough people agreed. Makes you wonder who those people are, and why did their vote on the subject count more than yours?"

"Exactly," Rory agrees. "I mean, who's to say that any of us are really, truly sane? We all have our quirks - who dictates that those are merely blips in our personalities, and not an indication of insanity?"

"Perspective adds a lot too," Angelus said. "Bet you anything it wasn't too long ago somebody would've called you nuts for saying vampires were real. Heck, a lot still would. Doesn't mean you're wrong and they're right."

Rory smiles wryly. "I went home to visit my grandparents this last weekend. Topics not included in the conversation were vampires, zombies, aliens, my doppleganger...to name a few. So, yeah, perspective is huge. Definitely part of the whole 'seeing is believing' thing."

"Which makes you wonder how many insane people now have only seen things that we haven't?" Angelus asked. "Joan of Arc sounds like a nutcase until you've gotten a message from the Powers yourself."

"Sort of like how people are so willing to toss Ritalin at any kid who moves around too much. People overdiagnose to make a preceived problem go away instead of actually trying to understand what the problem is."

"It's like the saying that when you have a hammer, everything's a nail," Angelus said. "If your mind is stuck in a world where any quirk is illnesss or any vampire is evil, you're probably not going to be inclined to understand it's not always the way."

Re: Second Hour - extra credit question

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Re: Second Hour - extra credit question

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Re: Second Hour - extra credit question

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Angela shakes her head. "No. For example? A lot of people came to the civil rights movement -- which I hope we would all agree is a good thing -- because of the murders of Emmett Till and Martin Luther King. But I'm sure their families would still rather have those men alive."

She twists a piece of hair, trying to think of how to phrase the rest of her answer. "I'm not saying no good can come from a murder. Just that however much good there is, it doesn't erase the bad that was murder to begin with."

I dunno that it would *erase* that evil, but maybe, it would at least give the death more *meaning*. Whether that would matter to anybody else is debatable, but...

Wasn't the one who pulled the trigger, but I've helped cause the death of innocent beings in the hopes that it would stop somethin' worse from happening. (And, yes, this time I mean some children who hadn't done anything wrong, as far as I knew.) Does it make it less evil because more good came outta it? ::shrugs::

This question strikes Buffy deep within her heart and her soul. She hides her hands under her desk until she can get them to stop shaking.

"There's a difference between death and killing and murder. If there is an accident, a pure freak of nature, and someone is killed, that's death. How could that have a taint of evil around it or be for the greater good?" She swallows. "However, are we talking about killing someone? If we are talking about the act of murfer, then that is a different story." She looks at Angelus out of the corner of her eye and then focuses her attention on Tara. "Where I come from, someone I loved deeply became evil. He killed students and a defenseless teacher. When he first turned evil, I couldn't bring myself to kill him. His soul was gone and he was evil, but in that body was still some part of the man I had loved and my focus faltered."

Buffy takes a deep breath and her voice isn't exactly steady. "At the funeral of that teacher with my mentor, I realized that I had no choice. That man wasn't the one I loved and he needed to be destroyed. He opened up a portal to hell...and then...I killed him." She focuses her eyes on Tara, somehow gaining courage from her.

"My friend, Willow, she did a spell to bring back his soul, to try to circumvent the apocalypse he was trying to cause," Buffy's eyes are dark and it's clear that in her mind she's seeing everything again. "She managed to bring back his soul, but it was too late. The Hellmouth and the portal had already started to open and the only way to close it...was the blood of the one that had opened it. I saw in his eyes that he was back...he wasn once again the man that I loved...but...but..." Buffy swallows again, closing her eyes for a long moment. When she opens her eyes, they're bright with unshed tears. "He said my name...he didn't remember what he had done. It was too late, I had no choice. The portal had to be closed. So, I told him I loved him, and to close his eyes...and then I killed him."

Buffy shakes her head, trying to free herself from the memories. She looks at Tara, her voice a little unsteady.

"I took another life...a life of one whose body had done nothing wrong but house the evil that had been done in his form. That could be seen as evil. However, not killing him would have spelled the end of the world for all of humanity. I don't know if the cumulative good erases the taint of evil from a death like that. Sometimes, when you are forced to do the right thing, the last thing you think about is if your right deed that ends up causes good, results in the erase of that taint...that stigma."

Buffy runs a hand through her hair and her voice is soft. "Sometimes, it doesn't matter if the death that you caused is for the good of more. You will never erase the taint of that noble and ethical action from your soul. Nor will you ever cleanse the blood from that death off of your hands, no matter how much good you caused to be done."

"Thank you, Buffy," Tara replies quietly. "I can't imagine anyone understanding the cost of death more than you do. Thank you for sharing your experience with the class."

Phoebe had stopped to talk to Tara and drop something off, but Buffy's answer struck a chord in her. Her eyes filled with tears at the emotion in the girl's voice and she backed out of the classroom.

She's talk to Tara later.

"I stand by what I said previously, ma'am," says Archie simply.

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