Timeline for Painting ritualistic murder in a "good-guy" light?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
10 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Dec 7, 2018 at 19:27 | comment | added | wickermoon | @Standback Yeah, I get what you mean, probably agree, too. I never really watched the series because I dislike the premise of it, but for the series to work, the viewers had to like Dexter, a protagonist that kills people -> hence the connection to OPs question. | |
| Dec 7, 2018 at 1:05 | comment | added | TimothyAWiseman | @user57423 Something is sadistic only if it is done specifically to inflict the pain (and normally implies it is done because the person doing it enjoys inflicting pain). Surgery before modern anesthetics was horrendously painful but it wasn't sadistic because the pain was a by-product of doing something good rather than an intent. Whether the runes are more like surgery or more like torture depends on the way the OP structures the world and the effect of the runes. | |
| Dec 6, 2018 at 21:54 | comment | added | user34178 | I mostly agree, and would like to add: While many people would agree with killing certain criminals (a death sentence), less people would agree with torturing them to death, as the OP intends – because when his "good" guys "slowly carve runes onto them", that isn't just killing, it is sadistic. | |
| Dec 6, 2018 at 21:05 | comment | added | Standback | (Not that this is in argument with your central point here -- almost the opposite; it's rejecting the idea of "good murder". Just from within the text, rather than as a reason to dislike the text :D ) | |
| Dec 6, 2018 at 21:02 | comment | added | Standback | Oh, wow. My interpretation of Dexter is very different than yours -- I love the series, but I think Dexter is very explicitly a destructive psychopath whose best-case-scenario is "how do I hurt the world least". Doing real good is never really an option for him. That's why his driving motivation is despair and loneliness; what he wants is to be normal and have human relationships, but every season, we see that he's too warped and stunted to ever be accepted by anyone whose opinion is worth anything. (Up through S4; then Melissa Rosenberg left... :-/ ) | |
| Dec 6, 2018 at 0:45 | history | edited | wickermoon | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
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| Dec 5, 2018 at 9:11 | comment | added | wickermoon | @Galastel It doesn't matter. The definition of murder doesn't change for the reader. Create a world, where killing is legitimate, it doesn't matter. The reader lives in a world where it isn't; his moral system is built on that world (our world, our current society), not the world you create in your story. Again, you have to convince the reader that the killing was justified and good, not the MC, to make it convincing. | |
| Dec 5, 2018 at 8:58 | comment | added | Galastel supports GoFundMonica | Your definition of murder is restricted to a just and modern society. What if there's no law? Or, what if the law says "everyone who has blue eyes must be executed"? Louis XVI's death on the guillotine - was it "lawful", or was it murder? How about his kid son's death? What if you're in a "Wild West" setting, and the law is what you make it? Is catching and hanging a rapist in such a setting "malice aforethought"? "Murder" is bad, but the definition of 'murder' can be very fluid. | |
| Dec 5, 2018 at 7:30 | review | First posts | |||
| Dec 5, 2018 at 8:58 | |||||
| Dec 5, 2018 at 7:29 | history | answered | wickermoon | CC BY-SA 4.0 |