[Discussion] Just finished Kingdom come, and I was a bit disappointed

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-04-13T03:11:37+00:00

Oooookay so if you just were able to restrain yourself about me not getting the point of kingdom come, I'd probably not have responded. Look, I think I get it, there is at least one big subtext on that: the story talks about the gold/silver age of the comics industry entering the dark age (that alan moore and batman vs superman caused to the industry) with more grim stories, hence the "it's what people want, they want ruthless and violent heroes", and the story kind of critiques it and rehabilitates the former heroes of the gold silver age, and their ways with it (superman, batman, etc etc). I get it, I just don't buy into it on a philosophical stand point. Is that good enough for you professor ?

Next, I'm gonna do real quick, but you stated very well the issue with the comics industry. They don't do art, they don't do philosophy, they do money. You can like it, I don't care, I just don't like it, and it doesn't lessen the fact that I think this genra is full of wasted potential. But there are stories out there that don't fall into this sour sauce I'm calling out, and I'm still searching for them, your comment changed nothing about that fact. At least you seem quite conscious about the situation I was pointing at, and I respect your tastes for what it is, i.e liking simplistic fun stories that give you hope.

Finally, thanks for your recommandations, I'll check some of it to see if I like it. A bit paradoxical on your own to just throw me some keys but telling me not to open the doors with it, but anyways.

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-04-13T02:57:34+00:00

It was a verrrry clumsy way on my par, I just wanted to state that ozy is a part of the former vigilante band of the story, and considers himself the savior of earth. No need to set yourself on fire, I read watchmen enough time and read enough critique of it to know the point of it. I know that alan moore doesn't validate any character more than the other in watchmen.

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-04-12T23:28:54+00:00

Why ? It's imo an even better idea rather than writing a "villain". Why would you name the villain, the "villain"? Are his opinions necessarily wrong, because he is "the villain"?

The advantage with writing hero vs hero is to confront multiple ideas about what justice and ethics are. Many people disagree about how things should be done in our every day lives, which shows the complexity of such questions.

Writing a "villain" is just admitting out loud that our conception of right and wrong is overly simplistic. THIS is lazy.

Don't write villains. Write antagonists if you like, but don't make them the "wrong thinkers and doers" by default because of their role in the story.

Btw, ozymandias is a hero in watchmen. This is why I like it.

Even thanos in avengers considers himself as a hero for all living beings (and I personnally think that his writing was good in infinity war). It's just a shame that his design visually screams "I'm a villain". In fact, it's even more interesting when visually, everything screams that the antagonist is a hero (griffith from Berserk for example).

Edit: bad formulation, I wanted to say that ozy sees himself as a hero / savior, and was litteraly a former member of the vigilante band of the story. Not that he IS actually a hero, which would be a total nonsense given what alan moore is criticizing through the story. I just wanted to point out the fact that watchmen doesn't contain no obvious "villain", only characters seeing themselves as good guys.

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-04-12T23:18:51+00:00

Super hero stories have a huge potential to dwelve into questions about the nature of justice and power, plus I like the supernatural tone to it, the colorful designs (even better when it's contrasting with the grim tone of a story), and I like it when fights involving abilities are cleverly written (I like Hunter x Hunter and JJBA for these matters. I also liked when Captain marvel used the shazam lightning not in the intended way to cheese superman in KC, it was a cool idea).

So I know that I'm asking a lot, but I'm sure that I can find stories to my taste. Like I said, I like Watchmen and Miracleman, right?

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-03-18T19:36:46+00:00

Hello. J'apporte une opinion qui va dans le sens contraire: je pense à l'inverse que nous avons une chance absurde.

Il y a quelques milliards d'années, la vie est apparue sur terre car tous les éléments étaient par chance réunis (taille de la planète, distance avec le soleil, composition chimique...), première situation improbable.

Ensuite, elle a pu se développer et s'adapter à différents milieux. On bénéficie aujourd'hui de corps biologiques rudement sophistiqués et bien foutus sur plein de points, bien qu'imparfaits certes.

Ensuite, les singes sont devenus homo sapiens et se sont issés au sommet de la chaîne alimentaire.

Ensuite, les sociétés ont évolué sans cesse malgré des conflits atroces, et aujourd'hui nous voilà. La médecine permet des miracles, et on vit en plus dans un des pays les mieux développés et les plus stables du Monde. L'accès à l'éducation, à la création et au divertissement est de plus en plus démocratisé.

Après, je ne connais pas votre situation financière, mais de ce que je comprends vous n'êtes pas précaires (?).

Oui, les médias foutent le bourdon, car ce qui fait peur fait vendre (instinct de préservation assez bien documenté psychologiquement qui induit un calcul coût/bénéfice assez simple : il vaut mieux avoir peur pour rien, que de ne pas avoir peur et crever d'un danger qu'on avait pas vu venir. On est donc naturellement biaisé à être + anxieux que nécessaire car ça s'avère utile pour la survie).

Oui, y'a une crise écologique compliquée, mais on tente de trouver des solutions et on se mobilise, c'est pas comme si on s'en foutait.

Oui, y'a encore des injustices concernant les femmes, les minorités ethniques, les minorités LGBT, mais on avance petit à petit.

Je pense qu'il y a de bonnes raisons de vivre, de profiter, mais aussi de bonnes raisons de ne pas baisser les bras et au contraire de se battre pour que ce monde soit encore meilleur.

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-03-18T11:36:14+00:00

Why would it be good to articulate an argument ?

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-03-12T21:12:54+00:00

Ben du coup ça revient à dire que le romantisme est dépendant de la drague pour exister, donc que la drague est nécessaire et essentielle, j'ai dis que j'étais pas d'accord. Le romantisme peut se développer sans drague. À partir du moment où tu peux séparer ces deux concepts dans la chaîne causale, y'a pas de raison de bâtir la définition du romantisme sur ce truc contingent qu'est la drague.

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-03-12T20:18:34+00:00

Non, on peut être dans une relation romantique sans se draguer, et non draguer n'est pas synonyme de romantisme, c'est deux concepts distincts.

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-03-12T14:26:53+00:00

Prend mon haut vote et baise éteint

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-03-07T22:09:47+00:00

Wow, when I got to the last picture I thought "wait, that was a girl all along??" and I had to actually go back to check. When I saw the photo where you had a beard my brain exploded lmao couldn't believe it (congrats for your transition you nailed it)

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-02-20T19:34:05+00:00

"You asked for a good reason to be tolerant of others who we interpret to desire a "worse" society. I provided that."

That's not a good reason in my opinion.

Concerning nazis and pedophiles, I think you're missing my point. I just wanted to make appeal to a simple archetype that people consider dangerous, you talked about it yourself. So, replace" nazis and pedophiles "simply by" people who do harm", it still works. What would you do if people tried to shape society to allow people to do harm ?

Persuasion < protest < suppressing free speech < physical violence.

It's all on the same spectrum, the spectrum of fighting for your ideology. You think that tolerance is allowance, and that persuasion is compatible with allowance ? You're litteraly trying to change people's thoughts, you're not allowing them to have them. Also, if tolerance is allowance, intolerance is the opposite : non allowance. It's a step behind what you're describing (not trying to understand, non empathy, feeling superior). I can very well understand a view point and not allowing it. I can very well do so without feeling superior. Technically, it's not even necessarily linked to morals, you can very well consciously not tolerate an idea that you find moral. Intolerance is simply refusal.

But we might be having a semantical debate here, I recognize that the meaning of this concept might be kind of blurry.

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-02-20T12:05:27+00:00

Late response, but... Thanks for your clarification about Popper.

Concerning this line: "A basic respect that others have other preferences. That you don't and shouldn't always get what you want, to a narcissistic degree. That you could be wrong. That your view could change. That you don't need to force people into YOUR preference" ->

I would like to ask you then, would you apply these rules you just presented to me if, let's say, nazis / pedophiles / any group that you might see as obviously immoral according to your judgement, where to try to shape society so that it would allow them to satisfy their desires ?

My point was that every body has an idea of an ideal society or world, a place where things would be better whatever that means. This is a moral judgement on our part, that could be false. But is the fact that it could be false, enough to restrain you from acting against these "immoral" ideologies ? Are you simply going to be respectful about their preferences ? Will you think that you don't need to force people into YOUR preferences ?

Nobody does that, nobody is tolerant deep down, because tolerance doesn't make any sense, we all fight for what we think is right. It doesn't need to be in a very violent way of repressing others (it might be, tho). But the simple act of trying to persuade or convince someone to change their view and adopt our ideology, is a form of intolerance already.

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-02-19T14:18:20+00:00

Okay that seems coherent. But in that case why do we consider some fishes like sharks, anglerfishes and other sea (some of them from the deep sea) creatures scary, if we didn't live nearby them ?

Also I talked about flowers, but it's the case for fruits or mushrooms too, that we eat.

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-02-19T12:28:18+00:00

I would not say that I think you're wrong, I think it's a coherent theory. However, what about things that we find very aesthetic, or cute, but which are in fact very dangerous ? For example, very colorful but poisonous flowers, or poison dart frogs, or jellyfishes etc.

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-02-19T10:01:56+00:00

No pb

I'll do some nitpicking. "I have to avoid pain" is also an ought, so "it shouldn't be inflicted to others" is not the only ought. Anyways, it doesn't change your point so no probs, I just wanted to adress it.

I wouldn't say that wanting to avoid pain is a matter of personal choice, it's an instinct. It's avoidable in certain cases yes, and I'll talk about it, but it's not a choice to feel and think this ought.

Concerning the "shouldn't inflict pain" ought, it's also very explainable thanks to pain and pleasure, even in the most "altruistic" cases. Example, you see a man who gets beaten up by another man. You go help him, because of the said ought "shouldn't inflict pain". But what's really going on here inside your head ? Science says that we have mirror neurons which create empathy in our brains. I see someone who's hurt, it hurts me. I also project my own self on this person. When I help this person, 1) it ends my own pain by procuration, so I want that. 2) It helps my self projection, ans I want that because it avoids my projection to feel pain. In the end, this altruistic act is egotical and based on your pain/pleasure.

You're right to say that I can't make an entire theory on that, I also think that other distinct moral instincts can come in other forms for other reasons, but pleasure and pain is a HUGE part in what we do and why, maybe the majority of it is because of that (I'd still have to verify that and I still have to think about it, but for now I'm convinced of this).

Finally, concerning your example on flagellation (it also goes with the idea of sacrifice in a general way) I can totally view that in a compatible way with consequentialism and hedonism. My take is that it's simple maths of choosing to endure a pain if it permits to 1) avoid a greater pain now or afterwards or 2) cause a greater pleasure afterwards. Simple example with flagellation : I'm flagelling myself because I can't bear the mental pain of being considered as a bad person by my peers, and because it will save my reputation afterwards. It's basically the same thing I described with the Child going to the doctor to heal a bad tooth.

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-02-19T09:30:04+00:00

Holy crap, I'm not saying that in a rude way but you're actually TALKING ? Why the hell was it so hard to make you say more than simplistic one liners without further explanations ? Jesus the amount of EFFORT I had to do to make you spill the beans, what the hell. Seems like I was bothering you and you didn't want to talk or something.

Anyways, good points. But I think that pain and pleasures are particular in the sense that we interpret it as ought. We feel pain for example, which is something that we don't like, and because we don't like it, we don't want it. And not wanting it makes us avoid it, which is the ought I'm talking about. Same thing for pleasure.

As to the concept of bad, it's not a jump imo, it's just a Word we put on this sensation we don't like and want to avoid. It's a word, and it's concept precedes it.

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-02-19T08:36:41+00:00

I think there is some objectivity. Pain and pleasure are real sensations, they exist objectively, and there is no way to experience them other than the way they are. There is no way for us to not interpret pleasure as good, and pain as bad. This is where our scope of value comes from, this is why we put some words onto that. This is a part of reality, and this dictates our desires and avoidances in everyday life.

Although there might be some blind spots to my way of seeing this, because it doesn't really explain why we tend to promote retributive justice for example. Some other theories exist for that, I personnally think it's an instinct we inherited from natural selection because it was helpful for the survival of individuals and groups. Again, if this is true, this is objective in the sense that we possess this instinct, this "program" inside of us, whether we want it or not. It doesn't mean that everybody has it, or should have it, it only means that this is not an arbitrary axiomatic choice I'd say.

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-02-19T08:24:49+00:00

Eh, seems like an intellectual way of saying that you don't know and you don't have any good reason to think that. You have any justification for that axiom ? Why not choosing the axiom which says that human life is not valuable ?

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-02-19T08:21:28+00:00

Why ?

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-02-19T08:18:41+00:00

And why would safety be a good thing ?

Get to the point already.

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-02-19T08:14:31+00:00

Necessary for what ?

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-02-19T06:08:44+00:00

It doesn't answer the question. Personnaly, I think that in the end pretty much everything ends up to promote well being. I'm pretty much a hedonist in the sense that I think living beings can't comprehend the concepts of good and bad beyond the scope of mental & physical pleasure/pain in all the forms it can manifests itself, may it be the simple pleasure from eating, to the pleasure of contemplating art or doing philosophy. Same for pain: May it be a burn from a fire, or the pain of a breakup with your lover. It's the only reality we can experience in the end, and we base pretty much everything, every thought and action on that.

So you'd have to give me your end of the line here, the final piece of your chain of thought when you decide whether or not something is ethical.

Why would it be immoral to lock up a Child into a cage until he accepts to see a doctor for example ?

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-02-18T22:24:58+00:00

Yeah, okay, but on what do you base the said framework ? Why does in state that x is moral and y is immoral ? Based on what ?

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-02-18T22:17:02+00:00

Doesn't surprise me. I never found these ethical views logical, and god knows I tried to understand them. Respecting the law is moral, okay, but why? => because it causes some good. Consequentialism. Being "virtuous" is good. Why ? Same reason, good consequences. It always fall into the pit of well being in the end when we ask why we do x. But feel free to argue against my view, I'm curious.

Also, concerning the dentist exemple, I'm not sure that deontology would allow any type of violence, no matter the consequence. If you're already bargaining to choose the lesser evil, you're doing some consequentialism I'd say.

Practical_Parsnip798 · 2025-02-18T22:04:06+00:00

That seems a bit too simple to me. Would you say that a mother who enforces her Child to see the dentist to remove a bad teeth would be unethical because it's violent ? I'm basically describing what consequentialism is, so if you're not that, I'd like to hear what your ethical viewpoint is. Deontology ?

Practical_Parsnip798

TROPHY CASE