Heroes v Villains | Period 1 | Wednesday | August 18

[flipped-god-off.livejournal.com]

"So, it's the last class," Loki said, greeting the students once they'd assembled, "and you've all made it back here after some rough times. Good. I don't really have a final prepared because it's kind of hard to make one up for a class like this. That said, I hope you guys learned something. Even if your opinions didn't change, I hope you can consider other viewpoints now."

Even without a final, he wasn't just going to let them go without doing anything. "Here's what I want you guys to do for the last class. Remember that definition of heroes and villains we did first class? We're doing it again. This time, I want you to write it down and turn it in. That's it. A definition of a hero and a definition of a villain. Once you're done, you can go."

Comments

Class Activity | Defintions [HvV 08/18]

[flipped-god-off.livejournal.com]

Write down your definition of a hero and your definition of a villain and turn it in! Feel free to handwave!

Re: Class Activity | Defintions [HvV 08/18]

[give-areason.livejournal.com]

Her response was lengthy and rather cynical but essentially boiled down to: a hero and a villain were both people who brought some form of change about.

But that the change and their nomenclature had little to do with what they did--it was all about how other people viewed the change and had little to do with the reasons for it. A person with the best of intentions could be a villain, after all. And a person who'd meant harm could be called a hero.

It was, as was anything, in the eye of the beholder.

Re: Class Activity | Defintions [HvV 08/18]

[trigons_child]

Raven's response was a long essay about how it was impossible to truly define a hero and a villain because it was based on perfection for one, and for another sometimes heroes would take less-than-heroic actions for good reasons and sometimes villains did the wrong thing because they didn't know any better or had been tricked.

Re: Class Activity | Defintions [HvV 08/18]

[furnaceface]

Really, over the course of the summer, Jonothon's opinions on the matter hadn't changed terribly much.

'Heroism,' he wrote, 'and villainy are not concepts that are set fast in stone. What decides which is which is a complicated matter, which involves delving deeply into all aspects of a person's so-called heroic or villainous acts. What is their motive? How did they choose to carry that motive out? Is a person who sets out to harm a person with only the best of intentions for mankind going to be seen as a hero, or as a villain? And the person who ultimately saves lives, but only in order to achieve personal gain? If a person is driven to act out of desperation, should they be judged on the end result, or on the circumstances that drove them into action in the first place?

'What a person should or should not be judged on is all too often irrelevant. Society as a whole chooses their own heroes and their own villains, based on what little they know about a person, what little they can see. Rarely will the media set out to uncover the whole story behind the prettiest face, the easiest person to sell as a hero. And if people can find a reason- any reason- to single out another person as different from themselves and frightening in any way, then there's a good bet that a villain will be made out of that person, regardless of whether or not all that person ever wanted was to just be left alone.

'It doesn't matter if a person sets out to do the right things for the right reasons, or the wrong thing for the wrong reason, or anything for any possible motivation you might find between the two. People make their own heroes. That's what people do. And very rarely will you ever see one or the other laid out for inspection and waiting for a label, as clear as black and white.'

Re: Class Activity | Defintions [HvV 08/18]

[dontvotemeout]

Jason's answer was a lot longer than his answer from the first class. It was also probably spelled badly, due to the writing down part, but hopefully Loki would understand that his views had become much less black and white.