The Way Of Kings Ch 36 Audiobook Reaction!
Added 2024-06-26 07:59:50 +0000 UTCCommissioned by Johnny Coleman!!
Comments
So Jasnah’s wealth or “privilege” or completely irrelevant to the morality here beyond that she didn’t need to be in that situation. Your overall critical framework is hot nonsense. Simplifying the moral question, she is a person who essentially has a super power that’s fatal to normal people she points at. Her 4 targets were murdering and raping people and there is a very good reason to believe she has the right people. The biggest victims of the kind of societal breakdown you reference, by far, are other poor people. Everyday that she allows poor people to be murdered and raped because of her inaction and hanging out in a library instead of a seedy bar to prevent crime, is probably immoral. There is an argument that she should have provided warning to them and tried to take them into custody, but that would have provided warning to other murderers and rapists and reduced her ability to combat crime. Her inaction before and the casual way that she does this are significant moral issues. She should have tried to find a non lethal method. In the end, this is a moral act, but there are significant issues, particularly ethical ones.
Mwill
2024-06-28 14:47:50 +0000 UTCI'm looking forward to the discussions on book club! It would (will?) be awesome to discuss these themes with you! In general, I think we have three main ways to approach this. Logically speaking, I think Jasnah did the right thing to solve the problem quickly and within her power. A better solution would be to solve the root cause, but I believe that to be beyond her power since even if she could influence the king himself, the "bribes" prove his control is ultimately reduced over the situation. And, for all purposes, those men were already judged and tried, they had just not been caught yet. From a personal point of view to her, this was basically a favor for someone who is hosting her, to solve a problem they otherwise were unable to solve. She added the philosophy lesson into it for extra utility to her actions, and I don't think there is a single question to the lesson, as this discussion proves by how many different points come up and are mentioned post-murdering. Finally, there is the moral question. I think this is trickier to discuss, as we live in a time that is morally enlightened comparatively. The norm there is a class-based society, with very strict power dynamics, both across classes and genders. In a way, she set herself as bait for an operation to catch the criminals, an operation she then herself concluded by killing them. This could have gone very wrong, they could have been shot with arrows, from the darkness. She put herself in danger, and her only real weapon the soulcaster, I don't think the power dynamic is as strong as you make it seem. However, I would also like to point out that this should not influence the morality of the situation, given the intentions from both sides.
Alexandre Antunes
2024-06-26 19:56:55 +0000 UTCI mostly agree with Nerdy that Jasnah was wrong to do that. I also think the thugs were wrong to attack two seemingly helpless individuals to rob/kill/rape them. Both sides are in the wrong but I think Nerdy wins this argument. Intent matters and she intended to go there and kill them partially to prove a point and partially to stop these criminals. They were criminals for assaulting them, after all, regardless of whether Jasnah knew these were the thugs committing crimes in the past, but Jasnah definitely set that up. It's kind of like a cop trying to sell drugs to entrap people into buying them and then arresting them, but on a more consequential scale. Also, Superman can fly faster than a speeding bullet, not just as fast as a speeding bullet. :-D
LightBlindedFool
2024-06-26 16:08:39 +0000 UTCIt really is.
Zyrus
2024-06-26 15:21:32 +0000 UTCNerdy's hatred of the aristocracy is a thing to behold.
Bluestar
2024-06-26 13:31:20 +0000 UTCAccountability within the system versus vigilantism. We judge people by appearances and context. Jasnah did not give us full context for those thugs, only a bit of history, and the bribery was speculation on her part.
Zyrus
2024-06-26 13:03:07 +0000 UTCGreat reaction and discussion, I usually Lurk but I just wanted to offer some moral support that I at least love your discussions about these sorts of things. Also, I have always loved how Jasnah's actions in this chapter reflect the way she describes "The Assuredness Movement" several chapters before, and how Shallan's reaction to those actions mirror her own reaction to said movement.
Liam Oram Wheeler
2024-06-26 12:56:44 +0000 UTCYou are forgetting that Jasnah killing those men was absolutely immoral because killing is a masculine art.
Nicholas Reed
2024-06-26 08:41:05 +0000 UTC
