Good Vs.Nice

He will save your life, doesn't mean he will be nice about it

Right, so last time I talk about how people with an Evil Alignment can still be friendly, polite, and even loving (and how that is what makes them scarier), so now I’m going to talk about good characters, and how they aren’t required to be nice to everybody. Now I want to say how there is a stereotype that good characters are a bunch of painfully nice flow children who frolic in the sunlight while petting puppies and sniffing flowers. Not to mention that they never swear, they never kill people even when people are charging at them, and they believe everything that people tell them too. Except…that isn’t really a stereotype. It’s more like an insult, used by people trying to justify/defend more dark/edgy characters, by trying to make good people look silly. That being said, the assumption of good characters being absurdly nice is a bit of a common assumption, which makes sense because people who care about ethics and morality are more likely to be you know…nice. But it can get tiresome for good characters to always have to be generic perfect poster children for kindness, manners and dental hygiene, especially if that is the only assumption for what they can be. Non conformity aside, it is important to note that being a good person, IE having a good Alignment doesn’t mean you have to be happy, polite, or even nice. Being good is based upon actions and intentions more than mannerism or personality, so somebody could be a real jerk, but still be good, if they do good things.

You could have a good person who not only a jerk, but outright mean. He can snap at people, be dismissive of other’s feelings, and be a raging egomaniac, but he can still have good intentions, and do good things. Clint Eastwood’s character “The Stranger” in “Fist Full of Dollars” is a good example of a total jerk that still is good, same with the Yojimbo played by Mifune from the Japanese film of the same name, which the former is based on. This is of course back before Clint directed the westerns and thus they were still good. Both characters were total jerks, but were still good people. On the flip side through, some people do good things, but for the wrong intentions, even if they aren’t evil intentions. A depressed knight who simply does his job out of a sense of duty opposed to any sense of actual decency is an example of that, a charity worker who is in it for the fame and glory, a lawyer who cares about the money. House, from the show by the same name wouldn’t be good, because he doesn’t care about other people while being a jerk, through he isn’t evil certainly (CN). However, an antisocial, rude, and egomaniacal man can still be a good person. Hell, from many accounts, Gandhi was really hard to put up with in person, but he was certainly a really good person from everything I know about him (granted I haven’t studied Indian history in depth sadly, so I only know the popular legend of Gandhi, but everything I know about him is really good). Another example is Eugene from Order of the Stick, Roy’s father (if you haven’t read it, skip to the next paragraph). Basically, he is a jerk; he is insulting, arrogant, snappy, manipulative, ill mannered, insensitive and has no qualms about taking advantage of his son’s life. But the thing is, in the comic he hasn’t done anything actually evil (until comic 664 at least, http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0664.html), he is just, well mean. He withholds information, but that doesn’t lead to any evil actions, just pisses off his son, he is nasty, but that isn’t evil, just jerkish, and he didn’t follow his blood oath to kill Xykon, that isn’t evil through, just cowardly/lazy. In short, while a nasty and mean spirited old man, people forget that we only see the bad side of him, he must have still done good things. Another example from OOTS would be Miko, at least pre fall. She is also mean, ill spirited, and a bully, but that isn’t what pushes her to the edge of the good alignment line, that is more the fact that she is close minded, fanatical and an extremist. However, that doesn’t actually make her lose her paladin status, just makes her on the verge. However, once she snaps and loses her paladin status, I’m pretty sure she ceases to be good, because she was barely good to begin with. However, until she crossed that line, she was still good, just a…socially inept bully. Now, I planned to go into the alignment of V from the same comic, but I realize that should be its own separate sub article.

Now being rude or mean isn’t exactly evil, but an argument has to be made for verbal abuse however. Being nasty and short tempered isn’t evil, just anti social, but considering how we know that psychological damage can be inflicted through words, as well as long term mental trauma, the issue gets a bit more complicated. For example, is neglecting your kid evil? A good deal of mental scaring can come from children who’s parents didn’t give them attention or properly raise them, but there is a vast difference from a parents who work all the time and can’t give there kids the time they need, and parents who simple ignore there children and snap at them, and leaving them without proper care. Or a parent who criticizing there kid sarcastically for bad grades and one who puts their child down for all types of trivial things for the sole purpose of hurting her/him. Sadly, child abuse is a massive and extremely complicated issue, so I think that as a general note, it is evil if the verbal abusing knows that the other person will be hurt by his/her comments. But even then, it is an extremely complicated and delicate issue, so I think that is a more case by case basis. On verbal abuse through, there is also a difference between being snarky to a comrade and being outright cruel. However is verbal cruelty really evil? I mean, the popular girls in everybody’s high school who torment the guys for looking funny, or subtly hurt other girls. Are they really evil, or are they just being mean/bitchy? Again, that is more a case by case basis.

Now apart from verbal abuse, there are other actions that are rather grey, but aren’t exactly evil. For example, and lets just prove Freud wrong as quickly as possible, sex. Now if you look at many Christian/Islamic/Jewish faiths, (Puritans for example), sex is an necessary evil, cause it is a vice and sinful ect. But D&D evil isn’t about vice. Vice itself isn’t actually evil in D&D, or most vices at least, it’s when it hurts others that it become a problem. Not to mention plenty of real world religions, philosophies, and ideals are pretty open minded about sex. So sex isn’t evil, but what about adultery? The Ten Commandments famous forbid it (for an Atheist, I bring religion up a lot it seems), not to mention numerous other faiths/beliefs, but in D&D is it actually evil? No. Being a ladies man and sleeping around isn’t evil, it just can lead to evil things if not controlled but there is nothing inherently evil. Now and again this is the whole “Good and Evil don’t = right and wrong” a lot of people, including various deities might not agree with it and will condemn premarital sex, adultery, polygamy, or for that matter, homosexuality as evil, or corrupt or impure, not to mention some players may find upsetting personally, or characters (personally I find polygamy revolting), but within D&D non of those are evil. Somebody might cheat on there wife cause they are a jerk, or because they are stuck in an unhappy relationship and have et somebody. Somebody might honestly fall in love and have sex before marriage, or manage a solid relationship with multiple women (or men I suppose), or a loving homosexual relationship. None of those are evil in any sense of the word, through again, some people within the world would object to any or all of them. However, it is worth noting, killing or harming somebody simply because they practice one of the above. For example, a priest might not allow a gay couple join his church, but he can’t kill them simply for being gay. Sleeping around isn’t evil either, for example, Martin Luther King Jr. was an infamous ladies man, and that guy a was amazing. It is worth noting however, that rape, pedophilia and (according to the Book of Vile Darkness) necrophilia are always evil.

Drinking is another one that can be iffy. Now I think the Book of Vile Darkness said that drug use is evil, (I don’t own it, so not sure there), which makes drinking kinda of odd as it is a pretty damaging substance. Especially for the underage, but drinking and driving isn’t an issue in D&D, so yeah. Basically, ignoring the fact that other drugs are evil, but alcohol isn’t, whatever, drinking itself isn’t evil, it just can easily lead to evil, such as abusive drinking parent, or rape during a party. But drinking itself isn’t evil, it can just lead people to do evil things (note, being drunk doesn’t excuse people from doing evil deeds).

Now I wanted to go into the final thing, racism, but that almost an article unto itself, so I’ll put that up later.

From
EE