Superman General

The reason we put such a large value on human life above other kinds of life is largely because we are sentient. it doesn't really have much to do with biological definitions.

Dracula is undead. But in terms of personhood, he's no different from you and me. He has memories, feelings, ambitions, dreams, etc. So, for all intents and purposes, by ending his undeath, you are killing him. it's not any different from killing a person, the end result is the same.

i would also consider destroying a sentient robot immoral. This is one of the main themes of science fiction actually, the idea that it is not biology that makes someone human, the "human spirit" is something much more intangible than cells and enzymes.

Wow, you guys must hate Buffy the Vampire Slayer then. She's like a mass murderer in your opinion.

edited 27th May '15 11:10:14 AM by alliterator

I haven't seen buffy but i probably wouldn't hate her if the vampires she was killing were assholes who were harming people, as vampires are wont to do in most stories. even if the vampires aren't bad people and simply have no choice but to feed, It's self-preservation. you can't expect humans to just accept being food for them.

i know this gets up brought up in this subforum a lot but the whole "no killing rule" is really painfully naive in the way that it's espoused most of the time. Even more painful than that is the contrived BS that some writers come up with so that characters don't have to break their code in situations where the characters probably didn't have better options.

I wouldn't necessarily be in a hurry to read a superman story where he's forced to kill someone but I don't think Clark killing someone in self-defense or to try and protect someone else would make him an irredeemably bad person. yes, he's supposed to be a role-model, but even the best people aren't perfect and do things they regret.

edited 27th May '15 11:28:06 AM by wehrmacht

Could you stop with those strawmans please? Look at the last few pages, it's getting you nowhere.

edited 27th May '15 11:19:05 AM by SaintDeltora

Quite - self-defense or defense of others is a valid motive for the use of lethal force. Buffy's vampires tend to be extremely hostile monsters requiring a proportionate response. Same goes for killer robots in general, it's not like superheroes go around attacking roombas or somesuch. It's just that the rule should also apply to the human-shaped monsters who order the killer robots to attack in the first place.

edited 27th May '15 11:24:36 AM by indiana404

But, again, killing a vampire is not the same as killing a person. Buffy doesn't kill vampires that attack her directly. Buffy kills any vampires that pose a threat.

Compare if she did that with humans. If she killed any humans who posed a threat, then she would be a mass murderer. Killing humans, even if they themselves are killers, is considered bad. Killing vampires is not.

Why? Because vampires are not considered human. Vampires are undead. Killing a vampire is not the equivalent of killing a human.

what makes a vampire different from a person besides shapeshifting abilities (depending on the story) and the need to drink blood?

i'm not really familiar with buffy but look at it this way: if someone is vampirized, in a transformation that only gave them fangs and the compulsion for blood, without changing their sentience, memories or personality, what exactly changed about them as a person besides their biological state? absolutely nothing. they are still the same person they were before. you might argue that their life doesn't necessarily have the same value because they are immortal, and so it isn't as fleeting and singular as a human life, but even with that, you are still killing a person no matter what.

edited 27th May '15 11:37:08 AM by wehrmacht

what makes a vampire different from a person besides shapeshifting abilities (depending on the story) and the need to drink blood?

Vampires in the Buffyverse are dead bodies inhabited by a demon. They are not the people they were before.

The only good vampires are Angel and Spike because they were given their souls back. Occasionally, there will be a sort of harmless vampire that doesn't really do anything too terrible (like Harmony), but most vampires are bad.

They are all, however, sentient. They are sentient beings. They are dead sentient beings, however, so killing them isn't the same as killing a living sentient being. (For instance: Buffy doesn't kill demons that aren't attacking people. There are good demons or non-bad demons.)

edited 27th May '15 11:42:04 AM by alliterator

Mind you, not every extra-judicial use of lethal force is considered murder, as opposed to justified self-defense. Would Indiana Jones killing the Nazis that are shooting at him count as murder? The way I see it, in terms of justification, behavior trumps biology every time.

@alliterator

Would you knock it off with the "wow you must hate insert story that is vaguely connected to the point under discussion".

Your Buffy analogy fails because there is no such thing as a vampire that isn't a threat. They're all driven to feed on people, and with the exception of the two en-souled ones, they all do feed on people. She's not a mass murderer; she's simply the only form of law-enforcement that an entire society of killers is ever going to see.

You seem to be missing the fact that the only person in this thread who thinks killing, regardless of context, makes you evil. Nobody is saying "Superman killed Brainiac and is therefore a bad person." They're saying "Superman killed numerous versions of Brainiac." Period, full stop.

You seem to be missing the fact that the only person in this thread who thinks killing, regardless of context, makes you evil.

You seem to be missing the fact that I'm not saying that. I'm pointing out that destroying Brainiac's body or disrupting Darkseid's soul is not the equivalent of killing. In fact, it has no equivalent, because it is fantasy.

You can't say, "in the real world, this would still be killing," because this isn't the real world, this is comics.

Except that Indiana's right. In the case of Brainiac, regardless of whether he's a machine or not, you're killing a sentient being with its own life's goals and independent motivation. Morally that's identical to killing a person.

As for "disrupting Darkseid's soul"...If a man has been shot, and paramedics are trying to resuscitate him, and I prevent them from applying the defibrillators because I don't want that man getting back up, I have killed him. It's the same situation with Superman making sure that Darkseid's death took.

Morally that's identical to killing a person.

Nope! Because, guess what, there is no laws on the book about killing sentient robots, because sentient robots don't exist. Morally, there is nothing wrong with killing robots!

Or there is something wrong. It depends on the story. You can't compare disrupting Darkseid's soul to something in the real world because the situations are not analogous. The whole morality is dependent on the story being told — if the author wants it to be morally wrong, it is; if the author wants it to be morally right, it is.

The readers may not agree, but that is their right.

I should also note that even when Lois Lane was at her lowest point in characterization, she was still a competent Intrepid Reporter—half the threats to her life came from crime rings she'd managed to expose without Superman's help. (The other half from being a danger junkie who hung out with Superman all the time.)

edited 27th May '15 5:10:15 PM by SKJAM

Death of the Author. It's a thing. What matters is not what an author meant to say, but what an author ended up portraying. The author can say "this is not a person" all they want, but if it walks like a duck, talks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, well, you get the point.

"The whole morality is dependent on the story being told — if the author wants it to be morally wrong, it is; if the author wants it to be morally right, it is."

Once again, the only one debating morality here is you. Nobody—nobody—is saying "killing Darkseid was wrong and that makes Superman a bad person". We're saying "Superman killed him". Whether it is moral to kill a person, and whether that person was actually killed are completely separate issues.

Sidenote, but leaving morality up to the author is a ludicrous notion. An author can present shooting all minorities as the right thing to do; that doesn't make it so. It is the author's job, not to tell us that something is morally right, but to show us.

So, prejudice against or killing sentient robots can't be used as an analogue or allegory to real-life situations, such as dehumanization or racism? Because if that's the case, then you'd better be ready for a butt-load of Sci-Fi Fans — yes, not just Superhero fans, but hardcore Sci-Fi fans — who will tell you differently.

Using situations that could not exist in the real world to serve as an allegory or metaphor for a situation that does is a common facet of fiction, and if you can't accept that, then you might as well not bother with fiction. This includes Superhero comics, as those show up on occasion too. (Like with Magnus Robot Fighter, of course.)

edited 27th May '15 7:28:09 PM by kkhohoho

I think s/he's trying to claim that since these particular writers weren't try to use it as such an analogue it doesn't qualify as killing somebody. The problem with his/her argument, of course, is that a) we can't know what the writers were thinking, and b) what they were thinking and what they portrayed aren't the same thing.

Once again, the only one debating morality here is you. Nobody—nobody—is saying "killing Darkseid was wrong and that makes Superman a bad person". We're saying "Superman killed him".

Well, since Brainiac is a being that exists outside of time and space, all those times that Superman "killed" him, he actually destroyed a shell. So, nope, he didn't.

And I was saying the morality was dependent on the story. If the story doesn't care if Superman destroys Brainiac, then the reader doesn't care. No emphasis is placed on Brainiac being a living being, only a computer.

edited 27th May '15 7:45:36 PM by alliterator

Nu-uh. Braniac has a personality of its' own; therefore, it's alive; therefore, if destroyed, he is killed, regardless of what the writers 'emphasize' on. End of story.

Nu-uh. Braniac has a personality of its' own; therefore, it's alive; therefore, if destroyed, he is killed, regardless of what the writers 'emphasize' on. End of story.

Really? What personality does Brainiac have? Please describe it to me. Because the only personality I remember is "I want knowledge. I will consume all knowledge and then destroy planets." That...isn't a personality.

Basically, Brainiac has been used as an Evil Computer most of the time.

edited 27th May '15 7:55:58 PM by alliterator

Brainiac is a cold-blooded sadist who can't stand anything being out of his control, and wants to increase the value of his personal storehouse of knowledge at the expense of all other beings. He considers himself superior to all other life, organic or otherwise, and, in his own words, is on a quest to "be everything there has ever been." He's the ultimate know-it-all, arrogant to the point of viewing himself as a more evolved being, and void of any and all regard for life.

That's a personality. It's a heinous personality, and there's a reason he starts qualifying for the Complete Monster list around the 1970s, but it is a personality.

And Brainiac existing outside of time-and-space is a retcon introduced in the New 52. Nice try.

edited 27th May '15 8:50:14 PM by AmbarSonofDeshar

And Brainiac existing outside of time-and-space is a retcon introduced in the New 52. Nice try.

Everything you just wrote was a retcon. In Brainiac's first appearance, he had none of those personality traits. Retcons are how the DC universe works.

That's like saying: you can't say Superman can fly, he can only jump really high! Flying is a retcon!

Also, I'd disagree on the "sadist" part. From what I've read, Brainiac derives no pleasure from pain. In fact, most of the things you wrote about are elements that have been picked up and dropped by a number of writers. Most of the Brainiac stories I've read only have him as cold, calculating, and computerlike.

edited 27th May '15 9:16:19 PM by alliterator

Trying to apply stuff retconned in the New 52 to previous incarnations of the character is just silly. Far more importantly, since Superman didn't know about Brainiac's "true nature" you can't claim that Superman didn't try to kill him.

You are cognizant of attempted murder, right? You do know that's a thing, and that it happens? You are aware that trying to kill somebody and actually killing somebody are in no way, shape or form morally different, and only barely legally different? Because your constant resort to "Superman didn't successfully kill insert character here" is rather painful. Intent is what matters, not results.

As for sadism, Brainiac once hooked Superman up to his computers after capturing him and tried to melt his brain with an information overload, just so he could watch him lose his mind as painfully and agonizingly as possible. He tortures captives, regardless of whether he's trying to obtain information or not, and derives a definite kick from watching people fail in the face of his vastly greater intellect. That's without getting into adaptations, and especially Smallville, where's he's a psychological and physical sadist of the first degree:

"Did I mention that Lana was in excruciating agony? She just can't show it."

EDIT: In Brainiac's first appearance he was an arrogant dick who stole because he wanted to, and spent the entire battle mocking Superman's inability to stop him. Not only is that a personality, but his subsequent personality is a logical outgrowth of it, as comics got darker, and antagonists more vile. As for the rest, Brainiac's need to enforce his domination over any intellect he encounters is about as consistent a personality trait as you're going to see in comics.

Am also getting roundly tired of your insistence that only the characterizations and storylines you like count.

edited 27th May '15 9:22:46 PM by AmbarSonofDeshar

Trying to apply stuff retconned in the New 52 to previous incarnations of the character is just silly.

I mean, you could say the same thing about trying to apply stuff retconned in post-Crisis. Or post-Zero Hour. DC retcons stuff all the freakin' time. Hell, this isn't even the first time they've retconned the fact that all of the Brainiacs Superman fought weren't the real Brainiac! They did that in the post-Infinite Crisis Superman, too!

And you keep trying to insist that Superman "tried" to kill Brainiac. But you can't read intent from a comic book panel. You can say, "Oh, look, here Superman is clearly trying to kill him." Because, as I've said before, Brainiac is Nigh-Invulnerable and "trying to kill him" looks exactly like "trying to stop him."

But we're clearly going backwards now because I've already explained all this and you keep bringing it up.

Now, if you would like, give me an example of when Superman killed Brainiac. Just one please. (And no JLU examples, just comics.)

As Ambar said, Braniac has a personality, and isn't just cold and calculating. I've even got a quote; a couple, in fact. Quote Number 1:

"Were they able to find you, I would confess my envy. [...] There are two ways to deal with envy. One is to admit, and therefore become free of the guilt of desire and learn how to live without. The other options is to merely take what you want."

So, Braniac can clearly be envious, and he's also ruthless in getting what he wants. And now for Quote #2:

"What to do with humanity, with its' hostility and predisposition towards violence. How I hate you all."

So he clearly hates humanity; that's a personality trait, if a rather despicable one. Mind you, both of these quotes are from JUSTICE, which is an Elseworld story, but hey, Convergence just declared all DC stories to have happened to exist on some other world, so JUSTICE must be as valid as the next DC story, at least according to your viewpoint in which the only stories that seem to matter are those that take place in 'current' continuity, which is a very limited viewpoint to have.

edited 27th May '15 9:51:12 PM by kkhohoho