History Main / GoodCannotComprehendEvil

Bob and Alice are being terrorized by [[NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast Doctor Deathmurderkill]]. He has hunted them, attacked them, and nearly gotten them killed on several occasions. Bob is convinced that Dr. DMK has [[KickTheDog kicked the dog]] more than enough times to warrant fighting back with lethal force. Alice, however, insists that he must have a good reason, or maybe that it's all just a big misunderstanding. Despite any evidence to the contrary, Alice refuses to believe that he can actually be 'evil'. After all, no one's that heartless, right?

This trope is, in its essence, a character who firmly believes they're in a world of WhiteAndGreyMorality, that everyone can be redeemed, and there is no MoralEventHorizon. Whether Alice is [[GenreSavvy right]] or [[WrongGenreSavvy not]] depends on the work's placement on the SlidingScaleOfIdealismVsCynicism. In an idealistic show, this attitude could very possibly lead to a HeelFaceTurn and a DefeatMeansFriendship. In a cynical one, expect her death to be the very thing to push the villain over the MoralEventHorizon.

While not AlwaysFemale, this trope is usually limited to the very naive and very young, or the very old and war-weary, who've grown tired of the "black and white, us vs. them" attitudes of those around them.

'''Note:''' Be careful not to just stick this trope onto any pacifistic characters, whether [[TechnicalPacifist technical]], [[ActualPacifist actual]], or [[MartialPacifist martial]]. The tropes are related, but one does not automatically imply the other.

* ''StarWars'': The Jedi Order suffers from this problem, and pay dearly for it, as the prequels show. In fact, the StarWarsExpandedUniverse has shown again and again that for a group that acts as champions of good, the Jedi Order has absolutely no understanding of the Sith. Even when they're starting to ''turn into Sith.''

* Most characters in ''{{No Country for Old Men}}'' also struggle with this, usually when they are facing [[CompleteMonster Anton Chigurh]]. Likewise, Anton Chigurh cannot [[EvilCannotComprehendGood understand why his victims always implore him to have mercy.]]

* Early in the ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' series, Granny Weatherwax of all people. The Duchess mocked Granny's attempt to make her have a HeelRealization, claiming that Granny was naive for believing that all people really are good deep down.

* In the first ''Franchise/KingdomHearts'' game, there's a bit where the cute and cheerful [[FinalFantasyVII ninja girl Yuffie]] says that she just can't understand why people like Ansem are so [[EvilFeelsGood intoxicated by the power of darkness]].

[[AC:{{Western Animation}}]]
* ''WesternAnimation/TheBatman'' has one episode where {{Batman}} actually tries to make sense of TheJoker. By the end, it is safe to say that Batman figures out that doing this is an exercise of futility and madness.
* [[WesternAnimation/AvatarTheLastAirbender Aang]] holds this view for the majority of the first season, in keeping with his pacifistic views. Even at the end, when he's facing a CompleteMonster like Ozai, he can't bring himself to kill him until [[spoiler: the lion-turtle gives him an EleventhHourSuperpower]].
* Henry Pim in ''[[WesternAnimation/AvengersEarthsMightiestHeroes The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes]]'' will often try to reason with enemies first, especially if they used to be his villainy-rehab patients. In his defense, it almost works on Wonder Man before Iron Man brings down an InterruptedCooldownHug.

This trope is, in its essence, a character who firmly believes they're in a world of WhiteAndGrayMorality, that everyone can be redeemed, and there is no MoralEventHorizon. Whether Alice is [[GenreSavvy right]] or [[WrongGenreSavvy not]] depends on the work's placement on the SlidingScaleOfIdealismVsCynicism. In an idealistic show, this attitude could very possibly lead to a HeelFaceTurn and a DefeatMeansFriendship. In a cynical one, expect her death to be the very thing to push the villain over the MoralEventHorizon.

* In the ''StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'' episode "The Savage Curtain", Surak, Spock and President Lincoln have a hard time understanding the motives and actions of the opposing "evil" side. Only Kirk seems to have a grasp of their potential for deceptiveness and duplicity.

* In Mass Effect 3 a defector from an evil organization thought that she had hidden families safely on a remote world, because she "couldn't imagine" the organization's leader coming after them. Shepard says "That's what evil counts on..."

Compare StupidGood, ThePollyanna, WhiteAndGrayMorality. Contrast EvilCannotComprehendGood, CompleteMonster, ThisIsUnforgivable.

[[AC:RealLife]]
* UlyssesSGrant's presidency was one of the most corrupt in American history. Historians often attribute this to Grant's political naivete - he himself was so morally upright that he couldn't see the shady dealings around him.

* Most characters in ''NoCountryforOldMen'' also struggle with this, usually when they face [[CompleteMonster Anton Chigurh]]. Likewise, Anton Chigurh cannot [[EvilCannotComprehendGood understand why his victims always implore him to have mercy.]]

Bob and Alice are being terrorized by [[NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast Doctor Deathmurderkill]]. He has hunted them, attacked them, and nearly gotten them killed on several occasions. Bob is convinced that Dr. DMK has [[KickTheDog kicked the dog]] more than enough times to warrant fighting back with lethal force. Alice, however, insists that he's just misunderstood, or maybe that it's all just a big misunderstanding. Despite any evidence to the contrary, Alice refuses to believe that he can actually be 'evil'. After all, no one's that heartless, right?

* ''StarWars'': The Jedi Order suffers from this problem, and pay dearly for it, as the prequels show. In fact, the StarWarsExpandedUniverse has shown again and again that for a group that acts as champions of good, the Jedi Order have absolutely no concept of the Sith.

->''"So that was Mrs. Lundegaard on the floor in there. And I guess that was your accomplice in the wood chipper. And those three people in Brainerd. And for what? For a little bit of money. There's more to life than a little money, you know. Don't you know that? And here ya are, and it's a beautiful day. Well, I just don't understand it.''"

* Henry Pim in ''[[WesternAnimation/AvengersEarthsMightiestHeroes The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes]]'' will often try to reason with enemies first, especially if they used to be his villainy-rehab patients. In his defense, it almost works on Wonder Man before Iron Man brings down HulksCooldownHugCorollary.

* Henry Pim in ''WesternAnimation/AvengersEarthsMightiestHeroes'' will often try to reason with enemies first, especially if they used to be his villainy-rehab patients. In his defense, it almost works on Wonder Man before Iron Man brings down HulksCooldownHugCorollary.

* In the ''StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'' episode "The Savage Curtain", Sarek, Spock and President Lincoln have a hard time understanding the motives and actions of the opposing "evil" side. Only Kirk seems to have a grasp of their potential for deceptiveness and duplicity.

* ''TheBatman'' has one episode where {{Batman}} actually tries to make sense of TheJoker. By the end, it is safe to say that Batman figures out that doing this is an exercise of futility and madness.
* [[AvatarTheLastAirbender Aang]] holds this view for the majority of the first season, in keeping with his pacifistic views. Even at the end, when he's facing a CompleteMonster like Ozai, he can't bring himself to kill him until [[spoiler: the lion-turtle gives him an EleventhHourSuperpower]].

* ''HarryPotter'': Dumbledore has shown that he can understand quite bit about Complete Monster Lord Voldemort. However, it turns out that Dumbledore was unable to figure out that Voldemort hid one of his Horcruxes in the Room of Requirement. Why? Because Dumbledore was a model student who never cheated and hence had no need to use the room. Harry, however, was certainly not a model student, he cheated a couple of times, and he used that room, so he could figure it out.

[[AC:{{Real Life}}]]
* To be honest, no ordinary person can understand an AxCrazy person, or TheSociopath.

[[AC:LiveTelevision]]

'''Examples'''
* The second CareBears film has an arguable example. OrSoIHeard.
* [[AvatarTheLastAirbender Aang]] holds this view for the majority of the first season, in keeping with his pacifistic views. Even at the end, when he's facing a CompleteMonster like Ozai, he can't bring himself to kill him until [[spoiler: the lion-turtle gives him an EleventhHourSuperpower]].
* Name any show with a target audience in the single digits, and you're sure to have at least once character with this view, who will teach everyone else AnAesop. (MoralDissonance nonwithstanding).
* Henry Pim in ''AvengersEarthsMightiestHeroes'' will often try to reason with enemies first, especially if they used to be his villainy-rehab patients. In his defense, it almost works on Wonder Man before Iron Man brings down HulksCooldownHugCorollary.
* SeenItAMillionTimes

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related to StupidGood "those poor defenseless hellspawn are just misunderstood!"

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Henry Pim in ''AvengersEarthsMightiestHeroes'' will often try to reason with enemies first, especially if they used to be his villainy-rehab patients. In his defense, it almost works on Wonder Man before Iron Man brings down HulksCooldownHugCorollary.

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edited: fixed spelling of title

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YKTTWBump

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Don't we have a trope with this name?

'''''One search later'''''...

Ah, we have EvilCannotComprehendGood but not this. I can't think of a specific example right now...except, what was that movie that has that {{narm}}ful line, "WHY ARE THEY SO MEAN?" It was ''{{IT}}''.

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''{{The Dark Knight}}'' goes out of its way to demonstrate that Batman is in way over his head in fighting the Joker with this exchange:
->'''Alfred''': With respect, sir, perhaps this is a man '''you''' don't fully understand, either. [. . .] Some men aren't looking for anything logical. They can't be bought, bullied, reasoned, or negotiated with. Some men just want to watch the world burn.


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Manwe in ''TheSilmarillion'' is afflicted with this. It causes more than a few problems:

-> "For Manwe was free from evil and could not comprehend it, and he knew that in the beginning, in the thought of Iluvatar, Melkor had been even as he; and he saw not the depths of Melkor's heart, and did not perceive that all love had departed from him forever."

(Ugh, YKTTW doesn't seem to like diaeresis).

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Tha Avengers character is Henry P'''y'''m, not Pim.

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I originally interpreted the title differently than what was intended: that good characters could not comprehend why evil characters do the things they do. The intent rather seems to be that certain good characters cannot comprehend that there is Evil as such. Those would be two rather different tropes, so the ambiguity worries me.

An example of the former (i.e., ''not'' what it seems this trope is supposed to be) would be ''The Silence of the Lambs'', where FBI have to turn to Evil character Hannibal Lecter to make any sense of the actions of the murderer they're looking for.

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Real Life Examples:

* Good people often can't understand evil
* Particularly writers who create shallow card-carrying villains who have little motive and don't behave realistically.

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Poor NevilleChamberlain is going to be roped into this trope. I think he has the best page quote, too.

->''"My good friends, this is the second time there has come back from Germany to Downing Street peace with honour. I believe it is peace for our time."''
-->-- '''NevilleChamberlain''', after returning from a Munich conference with AdolfHitler, 30 September 1938. 11 months later, [[WorldWarTwo the UK and Germany were at war]].

Note, this quote is often taken wrongly. As in PoliticallyCorrectHistory or PopularHistory. Chamberlain was not being willfully blind, he was making a strategic move. Whilst he genuinely wanted a peaceful solution to the problem, Hitler was moving to a war footing. If the UK did not sign a treaty then Hitler would have to treat the UK as an immediate threat due to the treaties it held. Chamberlain felt that the UK was in no state to fight a war thanks to StanleyBaldwin, so Chamberlain went to Munich, singed a treaty he expected to be worthless so that Hitler would take his time building up and the UK could get ready for war as well.

The very first thing he did on his return was meet with representatives of various industries to get them to ready for war, many factory workers did their first overtime ever in the weeks following the Munich treaty to meet the government's new orders.

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EvilCannotComprehendGood has "''A villain loses because he is incapable of understanding what motivates good people''" as its laconic definition. If we were to interpret GoodCannotComprehendEvil as an inversion of the aforementioned trope along the Good/Hero-Evil/Villain axis, then shouldn't it translate to "''A hero loses because he is incapable of understanding what motivates evil people''"?

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Sounds about correct.

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Why limit it to heroes? Surely this happens to minor characters, often just after they find they've been robbed/swindled or just prior to their injury/death. It sounds like a frequent reaction of said victims when the villain's villany is being established for the audience. Sadly, no specific examples come to mind just now, only dialogue like, "How could you?"

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Marge in ''{{Fargo}}'' seems to fit this trope, but just because she can't comprehend evil doesn't mean she can't fight it.

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The false Methos in {{Highlander}} The Series, who thought that all Immortals should play nice with one another. [[spoiler: the Villian of the Week takes his head halfway through the episode]].

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Bump. And the suggestion in my previous post still stands.

^^^ "Hero" and "villain" are used in the laconics because they are the most prominent characters to be affected by this trope, which does encompass good {{Innocent Bystander}}s and evil {{mooks}}.

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I wouldn't say this needs to be limited to cases where the hero ''loses''. Since heroes almost always win, that would be too narrow a trope, most likely. But certainly it's endemic to the trope that the hero is at a significant disadvantage because of his lack of full comprehension of the villain's motives.

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-->Marge: "There's more to life than just a little bit of money. Ddon't you know that? I just don't understand it."

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"In a cynical one, expect her death to be the very thing to push the villain over the Moral Event Horizon."

I disagree. An idealistic story will emphatically show the PhleBotinum which proves that in '''this''' Universe, Alice is right.

In a cynical story, Alice is The Scrappy and the Audience will cheer when Doctor Deathspurter devours her.

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^^^ I interpreted "lose" is in "lose either one battle or the entire 'war'". Besides, it's a laconic; it's supposed to convey the most basic form of the trope. The main article is there to clarify any details or variations.

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Bump?

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This trope has the wrong title. "good cannot comprehend evil" belongs to a different trope.

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^ Well, I ''was'' suggesting that we modify the description/definition to fit the current title and its supposed status as the OppositeTrope of EvilCannotComprehendGood.

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In {{Chinatown}}, Jake knows Cross is crooked (he doesn't know [[TheReveal how]] [[ParentalIncest crooked]]) just yet), and tied up in the water scheme, but can't puzzle out Cross's motives. "Why are you doing it? How much better can you eat? What can you buy that you can't already afford?"


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Another from Literature: The Party's motives are still just as incomprehensible to Winston at the end of book [[spoiler: post-brainwashing]] than they were at the start. The only difference is that [[spoiler: he dies a "willing" slave]].

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Another from Literature: Eddard Stark from ''ASongOfIceAndFire'' is a loyal, straightforward and honorable man who simply cannot imagine that somebody could be devoid of any shame or decency. This really gets him in trouble over the course of the story, culminating in him [[spoiler:getting his head chopped off]].

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Should we start a new YKTTW? Because the OP hasn't sanctioned the redefinition, meaning the OP is still a BadSnowclone.

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I don't see why we should make a new YKTTW from scratch. By the new YKTTW rules set down when the sponsorship concept was developed, if the original sponsor has not been active for around three weeks, another troper may take sponsorship with little to no "legal" reprucussions.

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So, what's the plan? Rename or redefine?

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Marge Gunderson: So that was Mrs. Lundegaard on the floor in there. And I guess that was your accomplice in the wood chipper. And those three people in Brainerd. And for what? For a little bit of money. There's more to life than a little money, you know. Don'tcha know that? And here ya are, and it's a beautiful day. Well. I just don't understand it. -- Fargo

{{Film}}
* ''StarWars'': The Jedi Order suffers from this problem, and pay dearly for it, as the prequels show. In fact, the StarWarsExpandedUniverse has shown again and again that for a group that acts as champions of good, the Jedi Order have absolutely no concept of the Sith.

{{Literature}}

RealLife
* To be honest, no ordinary person can understand an AxCrazy person, or TheSociopath.

Western Animation

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End of markup

-->'''Marge''' to '''Grimsrud''', ''{Fargo}}''

RollingUpdates, NeedsMoreExamples,

Ah, we have EvilCannotComprehendGood but not this. I can't think of a specific example right now...except, what was that movie that has that {{narm}}ful line, "WHY ARE THEY SO MEAN?" I remember that the NostalgiaCritic reviewed it, but I can't remember its name.