Fun Stuff > CHATTER
The most off-topic WCDT discussion ever
Storel:
--- Quote from: Westrim on 16 May 2013, 20:36 ---All this talk of dehumanizing is very interesting, but beside the point as far as Ender goes. The reason he existed in the first place was because his brother was too ruthless and his sister too empathetic, so they hoped he would be a medium, empathetic enough to anticipate the enemy and ruthless enough to annihilate them. Keeping him uninformed that things switched from games to reality was just keeping bothersome details out of his mind, because he couldn't de... sentient them. To use what I said earlier, he had the box of morality and not killing things, so they made sure he didn't know the box applied. Anything otherwise would have broken him- did break him, when it was over- because as Carl-E mentioned, most solders defense is their status in the chain of command. Ender was at the top, with no one to blame. And not just for killing the Formics, but all the soldiers on the ships, all the mistakes that might have killed more in a battle than could have been. He never could have ordered the suicidal final attack had he known he was ordering actual ships to die. He thought he was just delivering an FU to the jerks that programmed such an obviously hopeless battle, where there was no way any ships would survive as they always had before.
TL;DR, Dehumanization doesn't apply because Ender never knew there was someone at the other end.
--- End quote ---
Actually, you could see that as the most effective use ever of dehumanization: Ender literally didn't believe his opponents were even living beings, let alone human.
Method of Madness:
It actually went beyond that, as he didn't believe his own soldiers were either.
Storel:
Exactly.
Is it cold in here?:
--- Quote from: Kugai on 18 May 2013, 15:30 ---War is an ugly business Akima
A sense of honour and fairness should exist, and can exist in it, but it's hard to maintain in the middle of an engagement when you're nose to nose with your opponent(s) and ankle deep in gore with the guy in front of you trying to take your head of before you do the same to him/her.
--- End quote ---
True. That, however, was not the explanation for people sitting behind desks sipping coffee and ordering air raids on population centers.
Method of Madness:
They probably liked to pretend it was.
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