RSS
There has been extensive discussion online about the fact that the character of Ramsay Bolton on the HBO television show Game of Thrones was irredeemably psychopathic, cruel, and so ghoulishly sadistic as to be a cartoon of evil. But as a reader of the books I’ve generally shrugged off these complaints, because the character is even more perverse on the page than the screen. If you don’t believe me, this article in Vulture lays it out comparatively. It isn’t just that Ramsay kills people, most of the “nobility” in George. R. R. Martin’s world are butchers. It is who and how that is more shocking. For Ramsay killing is not simply a means, but an ends.
Not only is the book Ramsay even more inhumane than the television Ramsay, but he doesn’t exhibit an incongruity between his physical appearance and his behavior, as he does on the television show. That is, while the actor who plays Ramsay is handsome, in the books he described as not not physically attractive at all.
All this in and of itself doesn’t raise eyebrows. George R. R. Martin doesn’t write characters who are boy-scouts. He admits to preferring shades of gray. But Ramsay is no shade of gray. Who then is the equivalent to Ramsay? It seems that in this case Martin’s world is somehow unbalanced.
English
Arabic
Chinese (Simplified)
Dutch
French
German
Hebrew
Hindi
Italian
Japanese
Korean
Persian
Polish
Portuguese
Russian
Spanish
Swedish
Turkish
Vietnamese
I’ve only seen two seasons of GOT (I’d like to see more, but I don’t have a TV, and it’s become impossible to rent physical DVDs, which is what I did with the first two seasons), but a lot of characters got looks upgrades in the series. Tyrion Lannister is a very obvious example. Not only is he handsome instead of hideous, but his scar was nowhere near disfiguring enough (which might have been because the makeup would be too difficult). Brienne, Selyse Baratheon, and Shireen Baratheon are all less ugly than their book descriptions would suggest as well. At least Samwell Tarley is properly morbidly obese in the HBO version.
I assure you HBO will still be wildly rich after you pirate it. It's the most pirated show on television actually... (according to Google).
I could be wrong but I thought Brienne of Tarth (lawful good) was the opposite of Ramsy (chaotic evil). Sansa being the connection between them both. Though I've been told the book differs a bit on that. I would read but I'm averse to literacy.Replies: @Karl Zimmerman
real world is unbalanced too, bad people can kill many and good people can only help few or also find the means and the ability to kill the bad person only once. Life is unbalanced more towards the side of cruelty.
First of all, from *a* Christian point of view, human morality may not be the same as God's morality - meaning, the ultimate achievement of Good may come from events and men WE may consider evil. We do not know the fullness of God's plan and never will.
Second, even setting aside the Christian perspective of morality, we have no way of knowing whether the number of heinously and grotesquely evil people are "balanced" by an equal number of the saintly. Maybe there are or maybe there are not. Either way, that is not how one ought to tally the balance of morality in life, morality being a phenomenon that exists in the trancendental, not physical (though it can have physical expressions, obviously).
Finally, I will, however, agree with you a bit, but in a way that you likely did not intend. From *a* Christian perspective, people are flawed beings that are constantly tempted into sin by Satan. My own life experience and study of history tell me that most human beings are conformists and as such fall prey more easily to the seductions of banal evil than are attracted to the practice of positive good.
So in that sense, we may indeed experience terrible socities under which the vast majority of people go along with evil (but on the flip side, a society that encourages virtue will breed people who conform to virtue even if not conscious practitioners of the same). But that is precisely the issue - good and evil are not opposite and equal properties, i.e. it is possible to do evil unintentionally or nonchalantly through willful ignorance, but pursuit of good is always a positive act, not something done out of conformism or social approval. Good requires intention as well as consequence (in a way, that by itself makes good the higher moral value phenomenon, because it requires more than evil does). So, no, there is not a "balance" between the two as such in my view.
What this means for me personally, as a Christian, is that I do not expect this world to be just or "in balance." While we should all strive to do good because it is good and pleases God, we should not expect earthly justice in the end, because Christ confirmed that His Kingdom is not of this world. So I see the existence on this earth as my mother taught me - a place of pain and sorrow, one of trials and tribulations, puntuated by a few glimpses of Heaven (as for example, the Sacrament of Matrimony is).
So I am not disturbed by the "moral imbalance" in the world created by the writer of this series (which I only know through the show, not the books). It seems realistic to me in many ways (although the grotesque portrayals of characters like Ramsay Bolton seem over the top and and unnecessary except to create a sensation).
The people from the TV series with whom I identify are men such as Barristan Selmy, a proto-Christian warrior - someone who understands the delight of battle, but also knows that the deadly skills he wields ought to serve something greater and nobler than himself, perhaps something even transcendental or Godly.Replies: @Talha, @iffen
this is just false. please don’t assert bullshit on these threads. it annoys me. (also, don’t post a very long response to this, as i won’t let it through mod; you need to learn a little concision).
I’ve only seen two seasons of GOT (I’d like to see more, but I don’t have a TV, and it’s become impossible to rent physical DVDs, which is what I did with the first two seasons),
i ponied up for a free trial of HBO NOW (no TV as well). if the trial persists until next week i will just cancel after that. i’ll probably pay for the next 2 seasons though. you can watch the backlog of episodes too.
I imagine G K Chesterton and C S Lewis would have plenty to say about the warped modern imagination and preference for evil over good.
I’ve been tempted to try HBO NOW just for GOT, but I don’t have the time needed to binge watch at the moment. Maybe later this year.
there’s a balance. i haven’t read chesterton, but i find that lewis is too preachy and there isn’t enough narrative tension. there are genuinely evil people, but they’re rare. e.g.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Ng#Murders
ramsay bolton in the books is a character like this. i didn’t want to put it in the post because it’s vile, but in the books he hunts women, rapes them when he catches them, and kills them before flaying them if they gave him a good run, flays them alive if they weren’t entertaining. after they die he lets his sidekick rape the dead body, often after they’ve shit themselves (from what i’m to understand people who are killed traumatically often shit themselves as they die). it’s really a snuff film level of cruelty that starts to induce more disbelief than giant fire breathing reptiles.
My wife loves the books and the show, so I've watched it with her, and for the most part it reminds me of why I stopped reading the books. Neither Lewis nor Chesterton come to mind for me in doing a good job representing the breadth of human generosity and depravity, although both rank among my favorite authors. Tim Powers does however. He crafts characters that seem very real to me, although since he uses history for source material, I don't find this too surprising. At lot of the weirdest things his characters do are based on actual events.Replies: @notanon
just some probable counterparts, but i could be wrong; high sparrow, tyrion, brienne of tarth, barristan selmy, beric dondarrion(messed up with crazy catelyn) and maybe even jon snow.
But the sparrow as presented certainly walks the walk. He lives as he believes his faith demands, including simplicity and poverty, he seems conscious of his own weaknesses, and his backstory as relayed to the queen sounded plausible as a story of an honest conversion to humility, at least. It's all very Christian but his account of himself would sound equally plausible in a Muslim or perhaps Hindu context, and I have little doubt could fit within many religious traditions.
His manner is certainly less grim than that of his followers, but then that's usually how they get you.
But at least he's no hypocrite.
Barristan Selmy probably comes closest to the archetype of the noble lord in western culture, and as close to realization as that trope gets outside of the most unrealistic romances, just as Brienne represents the ideal of the wandering knight, or perhaps ronin, always seeking a master worthy of her.
Tyrion is hard to characterize. Like seemingly most viewers, he's among my favourite characters. He's closest to the archetype moderns want to see in ourselves- urbane, witty yet somewhat bookish, worldly-wise but with a sense of humour about it all. I think we flatter ourselves with this, but it's an ideal of sorts.
brienne seems to come closest. but is that her nature, or her situation and station in life? barristan had to serve shitty masters, but he served loyally. jon is seems close to brienne, but then again, in the books and lesser extent show he’s not been caught up within human machinations, as much as the wall (though his weird double dealing with wildings and such are close).
I’m pretty sure that everyone shits themselves to some extent when they die, unless they have absolutely nothing in their large intestine. The combination of the final relaxation of all of your muscles and gas pressure building up within your intestines makes it inevitable.
By the way, I remember reading that one of the "three feudatories" (the Chinese "war of the three feudatories") used to feed his enemies to the dogs in the later stages of his revolt. But I don't remember which one. Readers of this blog will undoubtedly provide details soon :)Replies: @iffen
I don’t think we’re meant to look at this as an axis of good and evil. One of the major themes of the series is the conflict between freedom and slavery. Ramsay is at one extreme of that axis in Westeros. His foil is Mance Rayder.
Tyrion, the Faceless Men and others mention that even slaves ultimately have a choice – the choice to die rather than continue as a slave. Ramsay subverts that by showing how much worse things can be than just death. The White Walkers take that one step further though – by making people slaves even after death.
I suspect Ramsay in the books will have one redeeming quality that show Ramsay lacks – which is loyalty to his father. I suspect it’s Mance who actually does the deed prior to Ramsay sending the letter. (Sorry to be cryptic – trying not to spoil too much).
What double dealings do you mean by the way though? Jon seemed pretty up front with the Wildlings, and he’s pretty transparent about his intentions there to his fellow brothers too.
when he initially joined the wildlings for a bit.Replies: @CupOfCanada
Quentyn Martell, maybe? He seems to be a genuinely good-hearted, decent boy given a task that’s beyond his capabilities, but who gamely steps up and tries to be heroic and dies for it.
I guess you could take Ramsay as a case study in class protection as well. If he wasn’t the heir to a premier vassal house to the Starks, he would have been hung years ago or sent to the Wall (like his low-class counterpart up there, Chett).
he got what he deserved i guess.Replies: @Brett
Tyrion, the Faceless Men and others mention that even slaves ultimately have a choice - the choice to die rather than continue as a slave. Ramsay subverts that by showing how much worse things can be than just death. The White Walkers take that one step further though - by making people slaves even after death.
I suspect Ramsay in the books will have one redeeming quality that show Ramsay lacks - which is loyalty to his father. I suspect it's Mance who actually does the deed prior to Ramsay sending the letter. (Sorry to be cryptic - trying not to spoil too much).
What double dealings do you mean by the way though? Jon seemed pretty up front with the Wildlings, and he's pretty transparent about his intentions there to his fellow brothers too.Replies: @Razib Khan
Jon seemed pretty up front with the Wildlings, and he’s pretty transparent about his intentions there to his fellow brothers too.
when he initially joined the wildlings for a bit.
Quentyn Martell, maybe? He seems to be a genuinely good-hearted, decent boy given a task that’s beyond his capabilities, but who gamely steps up and tries to be heroic and dies for it.
he got what he deserved i guess.
when he initially joined the wildlings for a bit.Replies: @CupOfCanada
Ah, gotcha. Thanks for the clarification.
Actually everyone does not soil themselves when they die. But some people do. I will see if I can find an estimate somewhere, but it is certainly not anywhere close to all or even most people. On the other hand, it is certainly more common in violent, frightening deaths (so, for example, in hangings). There are some reports of people ejaculating when hung (likely, improperly hung), but that is a very rare event (which did not prevent William Burroughs from putting it in “Naked Lunch”).
By the way, I remember reading that one of the “three feudatories” (the Chinese “war of the three feudatories”) used to feed his enemies to the dogs in the later stages of his revolt. But I don’t remember which one. Readers of this blog will undoubtedly provide details soon 🙂
Being improperly hung does not usually prevent ejaculation. It might reduce one's opportunities for help with same.
This is why I eventually stopped reading George R. R. Martin, something just seemed off in his world, and it drained all the pleasure out of reading the books for me. I think Ramsay Bolton’s character is a good example of this: the blackest-hearted villian that could be, yet there is no one of astonishingly virtuous character to counterpoint. This just doesn’t seem to match the real world, and so it broke the suspension of disbelief for me. Clearly, it doesn’t bother everyone.
My wife loves the books and the show, so I’ve watched it with her, and for the most part it reminds me of why I stopped reading the books. Neither Lewis nor Chesterton come to mind for me in doing a good job representing the breadth of human generosity and depravity, although both rank among my favorite authors. Tim Powers does however. He crafts characters that seem very real to me, although since he uses history for source material, I don’t find this too surprising. At lot of the weirdest things his characters do are based on actual events.
Geez, that’s some vile stuff. I almost needed a trigger warning.
2) there are passages permeating portions of ramsay related chapters.
i'll read the next book. but it needs to be as good as *storm of swords*
“The Man Who Was Thursday” would be a good place to start with Chesterton. It is short. If you don’t like it you won’t have wasted much of your time. Individual Father Brown stories are shorter.
1) condensed and somewhat sanitized.
2) there are passages permeating portions of ramsay related chapters.
i’ll read the next book. but it needs to be as good as *storm of swords*
Ser Barristan Selmy (book version) has my vote as Ramsay’s opposite; he is righteous and noble at every moment and even shuns bad thoughts (and in Martin’s universe, to a fault) – even quit the king’s guard on principle. He reminds me of a warrior saint.
Peace.
Serial killers!
Quite an important real world distinction between types of bad guy imo.
If they exist they’re on a remote island somewhere nobody else knows about.
#
Those two things combined is why good guys tend to be bad guys with a brake imo – like Ned Stark or Mr Snow.
#
Speaking of Mr Snow – i know this sort of thing annoys a lot of people but to me he’s a good example of a relatively uncommon phenotype i think of (probably wrongly) as Irish Sea Ainu
And his "phenotype" isn't uncommon. He looks a lot like the Aussie actor Luke Arnold: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm2315197/
Who looks a lot like the late INXS frontman Michael Hutchence (who was played by Arnold in a recent TV movie):
https://youtu.be/Zxnq8w-6IRQ
My wife loves the books and the show, so I've watched it with her, and for the most part it reminds me of why I stopped reading the books. Neither Lewis nor Chesterton come to mind for me in doing a good job representing the breadth of human generosity and depravity, although both rank among my favorite authors. Tim Powers does however. He crafts characters that seem very real to me, although since he uses history for source material, I don't find this too surprising. At lot of the weirdest things his characters do are based on actual events.Replies: @notanon
Yes, i stopped watching after the Theon torture.
(I can’t watch torture as it brings out my psycho side and my desire to kill the torturer makes me attack the TV.)
I started again later but i always watch after a gap so i know in advance from spoilers what i need to fast forward through.
Any scene with Joffrey, Theon or Ramsay I’ve skipped.
In a sword-based meritocracy I think his view is probably accurate – mostly bad people in charge with the occasional sadistic psychopath as people who were as genuinely good as Ramsay is bad wouldn’t survive in that environment imo – at least at the top – and with genetics the bad aristos would have bad kids.
The main exceptions would be people who were “bad guys with a brake” like Ned Stark or Mr Snow i.e. people who could “do the violence” when defending what was theirs but otherwise didn’t.
The world he created makes it difficult for good guys to stay clean, but i guess the point is that they come through in the end despite that. Also High Sparrow is probably a very good and saintly man from the perspective of his faith. I’m with Razib on the upcoming book. It better be very good. Anything else would ruin the whole series. Im not an optimist on this point.
By the way, I remember reading that one of the "three feudatories" (the Chinese "war of the three feudatories") used to feed his enemies to the dogs in the later stages of his revolt. But I don't remember which one. Readers of this blog will undoubtedly provide details soon :)Replies: @iffen
likely, improperly hung
Being improperly hung does not usually prevent ejaculation. It might reduce one’s opportunities for help with same.
I’ve neither read the books nor watched the show…and my desire to do so hasn’t increased after the description of the violence depicted in them. As someone who has read at least a few medieval chronicles, it seems pretty outlandish and bizarre to me…while there may occasionally have been individuals like Ramsay Bolton (e.g. Gilles de Rai), they certainly weren’t common. There undoubtedly was a lot of everyday violence in antiquity and the middle ages, but mostly of a much more mundane kind, so I don’t think GoT’s focus on rape and torture can be justified as being necessary for creating a “realistic” world…sounds more like torture porn.
Interesting. A friend of mine really reacts viscerally to the Faith Militant in general and even the high sparrow, and I can see that as the high sparrow can be considered a religious fanatic and my friend and I both prefer to watch the world of secular-minded, scheming aristocrats using up the poor for their own amusement…
But the sparrow as presented certainly walks the walk. He lives as he believes his faith demands, including simplicity and poverty, he seems conscious of his own weaknesses, and his backstory as relayed to the queen sounded plausible as a story of an honest conversion to humility, at least. It’s all very Christian but his account of himself would sound equally plausible in a Muslim or perhaps Hindu context, and I have little doubt could fit within many religious traditions.
His manner is certainly less grim than that of his followers, but then that’s usually how they get you.
But at least he’s no hypocrite.
Barristan Selmy probably comes closest to the archetype of the noble lord in western culture, and as close to realization as that trope gets outside of the most unrealistic romances, just as Brienne represents the ideal of the wandering knight, or perhaps ronin, always seeking a master worthy of her.
Tyrion is hard to characterize. Like seemingly most viewers, he’s among my favourite characters. He’s closest to the archetype moderns want to see in ourselves- urbane, witty yet somewhat bookish, worldly-wise but with a sense of humour about it all. I think we flatter ourselves with this, but it’s an ideal of sorts.
Can someone remind me what the redeeming quality of Gregor Clegane was? I guess unlike Ramsay Bolton, he doesn’t like to torture unless is is in the midst of battle rage. His evil merely runs hot, while Ramsay’s runs hot and cold. But I can’t really see any shades of gray to him whatsoever.
Book!Ramsay is not even that.
What Gregor Clegane did to Vargo Hoat (books only) certainly took some premeditation.
We could say that Gregor was more loyal to his Lannister liege than Ramsay was to the Starks, and to his own house as a bastard. Small virtue, but it’s something.
I don’t see how Ramsay’s counterpart isn’t the obvious choice: Jon.
Ramsay is evil because he causes suffering above and beyond what he needs to in order to simply achieve his goals. Conversely, good can be defined as causing positive change beyond what’s required of you, often at negative cost to yourself.
Jon’s never done anything evil and constantly goes above and beyond his duty to do good. He’s even willing to break his oaths and take on grave personal risk to do so: he spared Ygritte from beheading, he deserted to go help Rob before being stopped by his friends, he advocated for the Wildlings to cross the wall, etc.
Note that as a bastard in this world he has every right to act otherwise — spiteful, bitter, resentful of his siblings — yet he’s always chosen to turn the other cheek.
Sam Tarly also seems to be purely good, for similar reasons to Jon.
My other vote is Rhaegar. All first-hand accounts make him seem saintly, like Bariston telling Dany how he used to perform as a common musician and donate his tips to charity. What I think will be revealed in the final two books is how Rhaegar was acting on a deeply-felt prophecy that he needed to have a specific child with a specific person, and carried out that action knowing full well that it would lead to his reputation slandered throughout history, his family’s demise, countless innocent deaths, many years of war, etc… but in the end, his child will save more lives than Rhaegar’s actions destroyed. Selfless.
And now, thinking about it, Lyanna is also a candidate! 🙂 Look at her actions in the Harrenhal tourney, especially if you believe that she’s the Knight of the Laughing Tree. Again, selfless.
So I still believe Martin’s world is fairly balanced and accurate. In reality it’s much easier to viscerally detect evil than good, but the good is there…
Everybody in the books but the Starks are sociopaths, and little good does it to them. In a way, you could say that Martin’s fictional world reflects accurately real life, with its harsh realities . But I think he overplays his hand with the gore and violence.
Perhaps that’s why he’s know in the sci-fi community as George “Rape Rape” Martin. It makes you wonder what goes on in his mind. Better to write about your dark instincts than act upon them, I guess.
he got what he deserved i guess.Replies: @Brett
Davos Seaworth might be a good contrast to Ramsay as well. Davos started out in very humble circumstances, puts his life on the line to save the life of another (Edric Storm), and just generally seems like a good person even if he was a smuggler for much of his life.
Unlike Quentyn, I think Davos is going to turn out all right. I wouldn’t be surprised if at the end of the series, he’s Hand of the King/Queen to whoever is seated in that spot (probably Sansa – I don’t think Jon, Tyrion, or Daenerys are going to survive the series).
@Random Observer
“Complicated” is the best way I’d describe him. One unfortunate flaw of GRRM’s writing is that we don’t get a lot of outside perspectives on Tyrion once he’s back in King’s Landing. Even then, I found that I didn’t like him nearly as much on my big re-read of the series before A Dance with Dragons came out. His flaws loomed much larger – his temper, his difficulty in avoiding lashing out with insults and getting himself in trouble repeatedly, and the whole “fantasy girlfriend” thing he’s got going on with Shae.
The only incongruity with the character of Ramsay is success. Ramsay is close to the real life Gilles de Rais, who was not successful relative to his high born station, or ugly by any standards. The counterpart to Ramsay is Daenerys Targaryen, a character who I think owes a lot to Joan of Arc.
Indeed Ramsay's success is unbelievable. Everything he attempted, however implausible, succeeded. First his mother presented him to Roose who would normally have thrown the baby down a well. But she managed to obtain child support. Then he got away with murdering his trueborn brother and got admitted at his father's side at the Dreadfort. Then he married Lady Hornwood by force, and murdered her. He managed to save his kin by switching role with Reek. He swore loyalty to the Ironmen in Winterfell, recruited his father's garrison to win a battle at one against five in Winterfell against all the north. The sack of Winterfell (anathema in the north) was rewarded by legitimation, and the prospect of inheriting the Dreadfort and ruling the north.Replies: @CupOfCanada, @Mitleser
Is book-Ramsey definitely any worse than Kraznys mo Nakloz in A Song of Swords?
I remember feeling sorry for him, as the author was so obviously blackening his hat as much as possible to justify Dany’s coming treachery.
Just pirate it like 99% of the viewers out there.
I assure you HBO will still be wildly rich after you pirate it. It’s the most pirated show on television actually… (according to Google).
I could be wrong but I thought Brienne of Tarth (lawful good) was the opposite of Ramsy (chaotic evil). Sansa being the connection between them both. Though I’ve been told the book differs a bit on that. I would read but I’m averse to literacy.
Ramsay is so black that any grey character appears white compared to him, like the chesspiece illusion. That is his purpose. Hence we forgive Jon Snow for breaking his vows to save his little sister from the bastard of Bolton (in the book, I don’t know the show well).
If you don’t see that greyness recall what Donal Noye said in the first book when he scolded Jon.
“Yes. Cold and hard and mean, that’s the Wall, and the men who walk it. Not like the stories your wet nurse told you. Well, piss on the stories and piss on your wet nurse. This is the way it is, and you’re here for life, same as the rest of us.”
“Life,” Jon repeated bitterly.[…]
“Yes, life,” Noye said. “A long life or a short one, it’s up to you, Snow. The road you’re walking, one of your brothers will slit your throat for you one night.”
“They’re not my brothers,” Jon snapped. “They hate me because I’m better than they are.”
“No. They hate you because you act like you’re better than they are. They look at you and see a castle-bred bastard who thinks he’s a lordling.” The armorer leaned close. “You’re no lordling. Remember that. You’re a Snow, not a Stark. You’re a bastard and a bully.”
“A bully?” Jon almost choked on the word. The accusation was so unjust it took his breath away. “They were the ones who came after me. Four of them.”
“Four that you’ve humiliated in the yard. Four who are probably afraid of you. I’ve watched you fight. It’s not training with you. Put a good edge on your sword, and they’d be dead meat; you know it, I know it, they know it. You leave them nothing. You shame them. Does that make you proud?”
Totally prophetic. By the end of his tenure, Jon Snow has left his black brothers nothing but the perspective of dying beyond the Wall after having admitted the wildlings in the realm. This is why they (legitimately) assassinated him. From the point of view of Bowen Marsh, Jon is as bad as, say, Joffrey.
IMO, Martin’s fiction is mainly about moral ambiguity and moral relativity (and the author said so more or less).
Indeed Ramsay’s success is unbelievable. Everything he attempted, however implausible, succeeded. First his mother presented him to Roose who would normally have thrown the baby down a well. But she managed to obtain child support. Then he got away with murdering his trueborn brother and got admitted at his father’s side at the Dreadfort. Then he married Lady Hornwood by force, and murdered her. He managed to save his kin by switching role with Reek. He swore loyalty to the Ironmen in Winterfell, recruited his father’s garrison to win a battle at one against five in Winterfell against all the north. The sack of Winterfell (anathema in the north) was rewarded by legitimation, and the prospect of inheriting the Dreadfort and ruling the north.
I think that's kind of the point though. If you're just a naive do-gooder, you tend not to be very good at governing. Going to the other extreme is just as self destructive though. Ramsay is a failure. Even Roose is a failure. They're contrasts to Ned Stark's failure.
What I find interesting though is the apparent message on the persistence of culture. Ned Stark was far worse at governing than Tywin Lannister. His legacy is more resilient though.Replies: @Karl Zimmerman, @Mitleser
Though I have to admit, he isn’t all that different from Joffrey. I think Joffrey would have been doing very similar things (probably on a larger scale, due to being king) if there hadn’t been people to reign him in, like Lord Tywinn, etc.
Or poison him…
Yes, it was cringe-worthy how they tried to humanize him on the tv show. Like when they showed him mourning his mistress, or warming to his father’s praise. Ramsay in the book is just a monster. But the actor playing him is a handsome heart throb after all.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPuM5JXvD4w.
Indeed Ramsay's success is unbelievable. Everything he attempted, however implausible, succeeded. First his mother presented him to Roose who would normally have thrown the baby down a well. But she managed to obtain child support. Then he got away with murdering his trueborn brother and got admitted at his father's side at the Dreadfort. Then he married Lady Hornwood by force, and murdered her. He managed to save his kin by switching role with Reek. He swore loyalty to the Ironmen in Winterfell, recruited his father's garrison to win a battle at one against five in Winterfell against all the north. The sack of Winterfell (anathema in the north) was rewarded by legitimation, and the prospect of inheriting the Dreadfort and ruling the north.Replies: @CupOfCanada, @Mitleser
I’m not sure I would call much of this success. It’s Roose Bolton’s failure to cultivate a competent heir really.
I think that’s kind of the point though. If you’re just a naive do-gooder, you tend not to be very good at governing. Going to the other extreme is just as self destructive though. Ramsay is a failure. Even Roose is a failure. They’re contrasts to Ned Stark’s failure.
What I find interesting though is the apparent message on the persistence of culture. Ned Stark was far worse at governing than Tywin Lannister. His legacy is more resilient though.
Tywin's legacy is falling apart, but Ned's remains strong.
This discussion illustrates why I dislike Martin so much – even though the story-telling is great.
If there’s a good-bad spectrum and Ramsay Bolton is at one extreme then who is at the other extreme?
Most of the examples mentioned so far are still killers, it’s
– killer + greed
– killer + lust
– killer + sadist
etc
vs
– killer + empathy
– killer + honor
In a sword-based meritocracy I think that is probably realistic but in a modern cultural context if you leave out the “good” extreme – even if the good extreme is completely unrealistic – then you shift the perception of what average acceptable morality is towards the evil end of the spectrum – like shifting a morality version of Overton window.
#
Those two things combined is why good guys tend to be bad guys with a brake imo - like Ned Stark or Mr Snow.
#
Speaking of Mr Snow - i know this sort of thing annoys a lot of people but to me he's a good example of a relatively uncommon phenotype i think of (probably wrongly) as Irish Sea Ainu
https://tribzap2it.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/kit-harington-mens-journal-shirtless-valentines-day.jpgReplies: @Dave Pinsen
Kit Harington is a descendant of King Charles II: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kit_Harington#Early_life_and_ancestry
And his “phenotype” isn’t uncommon. He looks a lot like the Aussie actor Luke Arnold: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm2315197/
Who looks a lot like the late INXS frontman Michael Hutchence (who was played by Arnold in a recent TV movie):
This is, in my view, a very childish arithmetic of good and evil.
First of all, from *a* Christian point of view, human morality may not be the same as God’s morality – meaning, the ultimate achievement of Good may come from events and men WE may consider evil. We do not know the fullness of God’s plan and never will.
Second, even setting aside the Christian perspective of morality, we have no way of knowing whether the number of heinously and grotesquely evil people are “balanced” by an equal number of the saintly. Maybe there are or maybe there are not. Either way, that is not how one ought to tally the balance of morality in life, morality being a phenomenon that exists in the trancendental, not physical (though it can have physical expressions, obviously).
Finally, I will, however, agree with you a bit, but in a way that you likely did not intend. From *a* Christian perspective, people are flawed beings that are constantly tempted into sin by Satan. My own life experience and study of history tell me that most human beings are conformists and as such fall prey more easily to the seductions of banal evil than are attracted to the practice of positive good.
So in that sense, we may indeed experience terrible socities under which the vast majority of people go along with evil (but on the flip side, a society that encourages virtue will breed people who conform to virtue even if not conscious practitioners of the same). But that is precisely the issue – good and evil are not opposite and equal properties, i.e. it is possible to do evil unintentionally or nonchalantly through willful ignorance, but pursuit of good is always a positive act, not something done out of conformism or social approval. Good requires intention as well as consequence (in a way, that by itself makes good the higher moral value phenomenon, because it requires more than evil does). So, no, there is not a “balance” between the two as such in my view.
What this means for me personally, as a Christian, is that I do not expect this world to be just or “in balance.” While we should all strive to do good because it is good and pleases God, we should not expect earthly justice in the end, because Christ confirmed that His Kingdom is not of this world. So I see the existence on this earth as my mother taught me – a place of pain and sorrow, one of trials and tribulations, puntuated by a few glimpses of Heaven (as for example, the Sacrament of Matrimony is).
So I am not disturbed by the “moral imbalance” in the world created by the writer of this series (which I only know through the show, not the books). It seems realistic to me in many ways (although the grotesque portrayals of characters like Ramsay Bolton seem over the top and and unnecessary except to create a sensation).
The people from the TV series with whom I identify are men such as Barristan Selmy, a proto-Christian warrior – someone who understands the delight of battle, but also knows that the deadly skills he wields ought to serve something greater and nobler than himself, perhaps something even transcendental or Godly.
May God preserve you and yours.
Many times the banal evil is what is “good” for the individual while the “positive good” is that which is “good” for the group.
I’m only on book 4 so far and not going to watch the rest of the series (not out of dislike, just prefer reading), but does Dany ever actually do anything? Not being snarky, but she’s got this badass army with dragons and it’s like she’s the wandering tumbleweed of the world. Just rolling around with he breeze.
First of all, from *a* Christian point of view, human morality may not be the same as God's morality - meaning, the ultimate achievement of Good may come from events and men WE may consider evil. We do not know the fullness of God's plan and never will.
Second, even setting aside the Christian perspective of morality, we have no way of knowing whether the number of heinously and grotesquely evil people are "balanced" by an equal number of the saintly. Maybe there are or maybe there are not. Either way, that is not how one ought to tally the balance of morality in life, morality being a phenomenon that exists in the trancendental, not physical (though it can have physical expressions, obviously).
Finally, I will, however, agree with you a bit, but in a way that you likely did not intend. From *a* Christian perspective, people are flawed beings that are constantly tempted into sin by Satan. My own life experience and study of history tell me that most human beings are conformists and as such fall prey more easily to the seductions of banal evil than are attracted to the practice of positive good.
So in that sense, we may indeed experience terrible socities under which the vast majority of people go along with evil (but on the flip side, a society that encourages virtue will breed people who conform to virtue even if not conscious practitioners of the same). But that is precisely the issue - good and evil are not opposite and equal properties, i.e. it is possible to do evil unintentionally or nonchalantly through willful ignorance, but pursuit of good is always a positive act, not something done out of conformism or social approval. Good requires intention as well as consequence (in a way, that by itself makes good the higher moral value phenomenon, because it requires more than evil does). So, no, there is not a "balance" between the two as such in my view.
What this means for me personally, as a Christian, is that I do not expect this world to be just or "in balance." While we should all strive to do good because it is good and pleases God, we should not expect earthly justice in the end, because Christ confirmed that His Kingdom is not of this world. So I see the existence on this earth as my mother taught me - a place of pain and sorrow, one of trials and tribulations, puntuated by a few glimpses of Heaven (as for example, the Sacrament of Matrimony is).
So I am not disturbed by the "moral imbalance" in the world created by the writer of this series (which I only know through the show, not the books). It seems realistic to me in many ways (although the grotesque portrayals of characters like Ramsay Bolton seem over the top and and unnecessary except to create a sensation).
The people from the TV series with whom I identify are men such as Barristan Selmy, a proto-Christian warrior - someone who understands the delight of battle, but also knows that the deadly skills he wields ought to serve something greater and nobler than himself, perhaps something even transcendental or Godly.Replies: @Talha, @iffen
Wow – good stuff! For what it’s worth, the Islamic perspective on this subject (as I have imbibed from my teachers) is quite similar – really couldn’t have said it better myself. You have a very wise mother.
May God preserve you and yours.
IIRC, Chesterton’s The Man Who Was Thursday is the book real spies say is closest to portraying what real espionage is like, because it is so hard to tell who is really on which side. Won’t go further, lest I give out too many spoilers.
I assure you HBO will still be wildly rich after you pirate it. It's the most pirated show on television actually... (according to Google).
I could be wrong but I thought Brienne of Tarth (lawful good) was the opposite of Ramsy (chaotic evil). Sansa being the connection between them both. Though I've been told the book differs a bit on that. I would read but I'm averse to literacy.Replies: @Karl Zimmerman
I have no moral issue with pirating the show, given it’s impossible for me to stream it in a standalone fashion. It’s just that in my old age (I’m 37 now, heh) I simply don’t know where to download pirated things without significant risk of infecting your computer. Presumably some torrent somewhere, but the risk versus reward of finding the torrent doesn’t seem worthwhile to me.
I think that's kind of the point though. If you're just a naive do-gooder, you tend not to be very good at governing. Going to the other extreme is just as self destructive though. Ramsay is a failure. Even Roose is a failure. They're contrasts to Ned Stark's failure.
What I find interesting though is the apparent message on the persistence of culture. Ned Stark was far worse at governing than Tywin Lannister. His legacy is more resilient though.Replies: @Karl Zimmerman, @Mitleser
I know this is an aside from your main point – but you talking about “cultivating an heir” made me realize that it’s pretty obvious GRRM “leans towards nature” when it comes to characters. I mean, of course characters can have development. For example, despite having essentially the same upbringing, Joffrey is a monster, and Tommen is a nice boy. Gregor Clegane seems to have just been a sadistic psychopath from the beginning. GRRM of course allows for character growth as well – some characters start the series as seeming jerk-asses, and get better (like Jaime) while others become darker with time. But he doesn’t attempt to provide some humanizing backstory to explain why some people are monsters. They just are.
First of all, from *a* Christian point of view, human morality may not be the same as God's morality - meaning, the ultimate achievement of Good may come from events and men WE may consider evil. We do not know the fullness of God's plan and never will.
Second, even setting aside the Christian perspective of morality, we have no way of knowing whether the number of heinously and grotesquely evil people are "balanced" by an equal number of the saintly. Maybe there are or maybe there are not. Either way, that is not how one ought to tally the balance of morality in life, morality being a phenomenon that exists in the trancendental, not physical (though it can have physical expressions, obviously).
Finally, I will, however, agree with you a bit, but in a way that you likely did not intend. From *a* Christian perspective, people are flawed beings that are constantly tempted into sin by Satan. My own life experience and study of history tell me that most human beings are conformists and as such fall prey more easily to the seductions of banal evil than are attracted to the practice of positive good.
So in that sense, we may indeed experience terrible socities under which the vast majority of people go along with evil (but on the flip side, a society that encourages virtue will breed people who conform to virtue even if not conscious practitioners of the same). But that is precisely the issue - good and evil are not opposite and equal properties, i.e. it is possible to do evil unintentionally or nonchalantly through willful ignorance, but pursuit of good is always a positive act, not something done out of conformism or social approval. Good requires intention as well as consequence (in a way, that by itself makes good the higher moral value phenomenon, because it requires more than evil does). So, no, there is not a "balance" between the two as such in my view.
What this means for me personally, as a Christian, is that I do not expect this world to be just or "in balance." While we should all strive to do good because it is good and pleases God, we should not expect earthly justice in the end, because Christ confirmed that His Kingdom is not of this world. So I see the existence on this earth as my mother taught me - a place of pain and sorrow, one of trials and tribulations, puntuated by a few glimpses of Heaven (as for example, the Sacrament of Matrimony is).
So I am not disturbed by the "moral imbalance" in the world created by the writer of this series (which I only know through the show, not the books). It seems realistic to me in many ways (although the grotesque portrayals of characters like Ramsay Bolton seem over the top and and unnecessary except to create a sensation).
The people from the TV series with whom I identify are men such as Barristan Selmy, a proto-Christian warrior - someone who understands the delight of battle, but also knows that the deadly skills he wields ought to serve something greater and nobler than himself, perhaps something even transcendental or Godly.Replies: @Talha, @iffen
fall prey more easily to the seductions of banal evil than are attracted to the practice of positive good
Many times the banal evil is what is “good” for the individual while the “positive good” is that which is “good” for the group.
Martin makes much of Ramsey’s kind of evil as a sickness. His descriptions of the first Reek, Ramsey’s associate who was either his mentor or student, make it seem like the guy was suffering some sort of cancer. He was certainly tainted. Martin’s characters weren’t clear as to who was student and who was teacher, or whether the evil influence was mutual.
Ramsey’s father is just as evil, although more self-controlled. His judgement of Ramsey’s activities are utilitarian, not moral. I suspect a person would suffer much longer under an annoyed Roose Bolton than Ramsey in a dungeon, particularly if they made Ramsey mad enough to kill them (call him a bastard) and end the game. Theon suffers so much because he tries hard to avoid provoking Ramsey to kill him. He has a will to live.
Martin’s other characters like Varamyr Sixskin or the Lord of Bones were also cruel beyond what their circumstances necessitated. I don’t see much gray in those guys. But their cruelty is more easily accepted because of their barbarity. They are outside the moral universe of civilization.
Forgot to add,
Roose Bolton is also “sick”. Martin describes him as a pasty hypochondriac with an obsession with being purged, using leeches.
The badass army with dragons in the desert part of Game of Thrones (like so many other parts including the opposing ‘Houses‘) is lifted from Dune with dragons standing in for big worms,. After winning Daenerys, who has supernatural powers against fire like H Rider Hagard’s She-who-must-be-obeyed, will be similarly immolated I suspect
Honest question here – who would be the real world opposite of Hitler? I don’t think there is one. Why is that lack of symmetry a problem?
Penn & Teller might make the argument that it was Norman Borlaug. True, he never directly intervened and prevented anyone from being murdered, so that might disqualify from consideration as the anti-Hitler, but the results of his work speak for themselves.
Alexander Flemming? Ignatz Semmelweis? Some unknown sanitation engineer?
The problem with trying to find an anti-Hitler is that Hitler had all the subtlety of WWII. The really successful life-savers often succeed so well that we take their acheivements for granted.
Alexander Flemming? Ignatz Semmelweis? Some unknown sanitation engineer?
The problem with trying to find an anti-Hitler is that Hitler had all the subtlety of WWII. The really successful life-savers often succeed so well that we take their acheivements for granted.Replies: @Talha
“all the subtlety of WWII”
LOL!!!
He was a badass.
Book!Ramsay is not even that.
Indeed Ramsay's success is unbelievable. Everything he attempted, however implausible, succeeded. First his mother presented him to Roose who would normally have thrown the baby down a well. But she managed to obtain child support. Then he got away with murdering his trueborn brother and got admitted at his father's side at the Dreadfort. Then he married Lady Hornwood by force, and murdered her. He managed to save his kin by switching role with Reek. He swore loyalty to the Ironmen in Winterfell, recruited his father's garrison to win a battle at one against five in Winterfell against all the north. The sack of Winterfell (anathema in the north) was rewarded by legitimation, and the prospect of inheriting the Dreadfort and ruling the north.Replies: @CupOfCanada, @Mitleser
Roose is no kinslayer or bad father.
Roose needed a heir.
I think that's kind of the point though. If you're just a naive do-gooder, you tend not to be very good at governing. Going to the other extreme is just as self destructive though. Ramsay is a failure. Even Roose is a failure. They're contrasts to Ned Stark's failure.
What I find interesting though is the apparent message on the persistence of culture. Ned Stark was far worse at governing than Tywin Lannister. His legacy is more resilient though.Replies: @Karl Zimmerman, @Mitleser
Not in their homelands.
Quite the opposite.
Tywin’s legacy is falling apart, but Ned’s remains strong.