Ethics [Thursday, October 29, 1st period]

[sith_happened]

Judging from what Raven had told him about Tuesday night and what several members of his class had seen, Anakin believed that this lecture probably couldn't have come at a better time.

"Today we talk about diligence, temperance, and forgiveness," he said quietly, "and we're going to use examples from the midterm exam to do so."

He flipped the hologram to life with a wave of his hand and it focused in on a shot of Palpatine's face. "The goal was to save this man, the democratically chosen leader of your galaxy, at the cost--if necessary--of your own lives. After the Sith Lord arrived, you certainly had the option of retreating and leaving the mission for someone else to complete. A Sith's job, after all, is to kill Jedi, and there were only two of you against him. When does diligence turn to foolhardiness?"

The holocam switched to footage of two Jedi, blue blades flashing, taking on an older man wielding a red lightsaber. The battle was moving at least three times as fast as the exercise had. The older Jedi went ricocheting into a wall, then the second one, fire in his eyes, closed in on their opponent. A few moments later the Sith dropped to his knees with two lightsabers held to his throat.

The Jedi wielding the lightsabers looked an awful lot like their teacher.

"Temperance," Anakin said softly. "Do you kill him now? He's dangerous. He held the head of a galaxy-wide government hostage. He injured your partner. He certainly tried to kill you first. Or do you capture him and leave him to the whims of the courts?"

He shook his head. "Finally, forgiveness. You save the chancellor, at great personal expense, only to discover he's not the kind of man you thought he was. Your act of heroism has managed to make the situation at home much, much worse. How do you forgive yourself for it? Can you forgive the others who put you into that position?"

Comments

Re: Answer the discussion question: temperance

[onlysmokesnics.livejournal.com]

"Killing people because you think they're bad is wrong," Hayley said, with extreme vehemence. "Very, very wrong."

Re: Answer the discussion question: temperance

[glacial_queen]

"It depends on what they've done to earn that evil," Karla countered. "And why you think so. Do you think they're evil because it's what you've heard or because you don't like something about them? Or do you have real, first-hand knowledge of what they're doing? I think there are some times when it is right and proper to kill in the name of justice."

Hey Karla. Way to set back all of Hayley's progress there. Good job.

Re: Answer the discussion question: temperance

[onlysmokesnics.livejournal.com]

Hayley was so conflicted. On one hand, she still hated what had happened that night. But she could hardly bear the thought of disagreeing with Karla. Her face twisted and contorted, he mind wracking painfully in thought.

"...but you're not supposed to just drown people," she said. "No matter how many acrobats they killed."

Re: Answer the discussion question: temperance

[glacial_queen]

Oookay. Clearly Karla wasn't the only person looking at this through an intensely personal lens, unless Hayley'd just decided that 'drowning' and 'acrobats' made for an understandable example.

Hell's fire, in this world, maybe it did.

"I'm not saying there aren't other options," Karla said, trying to steer away from sounding all righteously vengeful. "But among my people, we believe that everything has a price. It's practically a canon mantra By killing however many acrobats, that person basically agreed to pay whatever price that would be exacted for their deaths. Drowning might not have been the optimal solution, but did the drowned person keep 'optimal solutions' in mind when they killed those acrobats? And depending how and why those acrobats were killed--sometimes people turn into mad dogs. You can't reason or argue with mad dogs. All you can do is put them down before they destroy something you love."

Re: Answer the discussion question: temperance

[onlysmokesnics.livejournal.com]

"...but she was the one I loved," Hayley said, quietly, and out loud for the very first time. She had tears in her eyes, and it twisted her stomach to admit what she'd just said. She thought such different things about it, and she didn't know which side to believe.

Re: Answer the discussion question: temperance

[glacial_queen]

Whoa. Yeah. Definite personal lens, there. Another time, Karla would have backed down a bit, reiterate that there were other ways. But she just couldn't not right now.

That didn't stop her from reaching for one of Hayley's hands, from offering warmth and friendship even as she made her point.

"How does your love differ from the love of the friends and families of the acrobats? Why does your love offer protection and absolution when theirs did not?"

She sighed, raking her fingers through her hair. "You don't have to believe me, Hayley. I'm from a different world, with different morals and laws and viewpoints. My ways are not your ways and what's right for me in my world might not be right for you in yours."

Re: Answer the discussion question: temperance

[onlysmokesnics.livejournal.com]

"I don't know what to believe," Hayley said, actually starting to laugh a bit out of nerves. It wasn't a mere nervous laugh, though. It was more sort of the laugh that could make other people nervous. "Bianca was a pretty bad person. And... she was helping torture a guy when it happened. I... I was helping torture a guy when it happened."

And that's the part that scared her about believing it was okay. Because she thought then it meant that it'd be okay for her to be killed as well.