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Post by Mr. Dent on Apr 29, 2019 23:25:37 GMT -5
I know what the word deontology means.
You've also misunderstood me. Things that have happened in the past can continue to plague people long after they've happened.
As for the Baudelaires, why would they feel guilt about not forgiving Olaf? It's not like he cared about them at all. I understand why they'd feel guilty for betraying the expectations of people who loved and cared about them, but why on earth would they feel any iota of guilt over not forgiving a man who hated them to his dying breath and explicitly stated he did not want their forgiveness? Because he helped the one he loved? Plenty of evil people have had loved ones, but I don't think that means much to their victims. Why should someone forgive a man who's murdered many of their loved ones because he also had a loved one? Like I said, I think the Baudelaires came to understand him as a broken, tragic human being, but that's not the same thing as forgiving him. If you define forgiveness as merely the acknowledgement of a squandered potential, sure, then? They forgave him? But in my mind, forgiveness is a much, much more active process. In my mind, the end result of the Baudelaires forgiving Olaf would be the siblings coming to accept that Olaf wasn't a terrible person, and that his actions didn't really matter much in their present lives. But of course, that could never happen because Olaf truly was a terrible person, who did awful wicked deeds that ended and changed countless of lives for the worse, and the Baudelaires wouldn't be where they were or who they were at the end of the series if not for the trauma Olaf inflicted upon them. (Not that Olaf would have tried to become a better person had he lived, I absolutely believe he would not have made an attempt at all.)
Yes, forgiveness necessitates capacity for improvement, but it's much more than that, and at the end of the day the aggressor's capacity for improvement doesn't matter much at all in the face of a victim who can't overlook the pain they've been put through.
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The Seer
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Post by The Seer on Apr 30, 2019 18:44:22 GMT -5
As for the Baudelaires, why would they feel guilt about not forgiving Olaf? It's not like he cared about them at all. If you define forgiveness as merely the acknowledgement of a squandered potential, sure, then? They forgave him? But in my mind, forgiveness is a much, much more active process. In my mind, the end result of the Baudelaires forgiving Olaf would be the siblings coming to accept that Olaf wasn't a terrible person, and that his actions didn't really matter much in their present lives. They would feel guilty because not forgiving Olaf would mean they refuse to see him as a redeemable human. As you've stated, anyone can be better. Therefore, they would be refusing to see Olaf as a full human. However, I am noticing our debate is beginning to cycle around our personal definitions of forgiveness, and the difference between the two will soon invalidate the argument unless we settle on a shared definition.
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Post by Mr. Dent on Apr 30, 2019 19:27:51 GMT -5
But is Olaf redeemable? Everyone has the capacity for improvement, but that doesn't mean they actually will improve. Not only do I think Olaf wouldn't have changed, I don't think he would want to. I think that's simply a fact, and everyone around him knew it. Olaf could have been a brilliant and noble volunteer, but he wasn't and never would be, and certainly he never wanted to be. I think it's silly to say Olaf deserves to be forgiven over something that didn't and would never happen. Yes, he saved Kit, but as I already established that was a single good deed that was only made because of a personal connection he had to Kit.
Olaf saving Kit was not emblematic of Olaf turning a new leaf. It did not lead the Baudelaires to realize Olaf might have been a good man. It lead the Baudelaires to realize that he was a human being with his own history and desires beyond pure destruction.
I wouldn't forgive Olaf because "he didn't murder everyone he came in contact with," and I don't think the Baudelaires would either. At the moment of his death, Olaf was a vicious and violent man who was sharing a rare tender moment with the woman he loved. He was not a changed man, and would never be. The Baudelaires needn't forgive a man for hypothetical maybe futures that would never play out. I would say that perhaps the Baudelaires forgave him, or perhaps we the reader should forgive him, if Olaf had actually wanted to be forgiven, had shown any remorse at all, or shown a desire to change or improve, but the fact of the matter is that he cursed the Baudelaires with his dying breath.
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The Seer
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Post by The Seer on May 2, 2019 14:40:35 GMT -5
Olaf could have been a brilliant and noble volunteer, but he wasn't and never would be, and certainly he never wanted to be. I think it's silly to say Olaf deserves to be forgiven over something that didn't and would never happen. How do "could have been a brilliant and noble volunteer" and "never would be" work together? They seem to contradict each other. Also, he very much would've (and could've) been a noble volunteer if Lemony hadn't killed his father by accident and then immediately been manipulated by the WWHANB and the MHABANH. And also he did want to be, that's much easier to prove. before the aforementioned incident he did want to be noble, he wanted to help.
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Post by Dante on May 2, 2019 15:30:43 GMT -5
It would be best to remember that events unique to the Netflix series are not canon to the original books; not just on principle, but additionally because we know of at least one example where Daniel Handler explicitly did not provide his original solution to his fellow writers on the adaptation. Judgement of Olaf based on what we know of him from the books and what we know of him from the Netflix series should therefore proceed separately.
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The Seer
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Post by The Seer on May 2, 2019 17:02:38 GMT -5
It would be best to remember that events unique to the Netflix series are not canon to the original books; not just on principle, but additionally because we know of at least one example where Daniel Handler explicitly did not provide his original solution to his fellow writers on the adaptation. Judgement of Olaf based on what we know of him from the books and what we know of him from the Netflix series should therefore proceed separately. Okay, that makes sense. Without the evidence from the show, though, we still know he was originally a faithful(ish) member of VFD or and easily could've stayed on that path without whatever corrupting influence happened to him.
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tonyvfd
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Post by tonyvfd on May 2, 2019 17:10:58 GMT -5
It would be best to remember that events unique to the Netflix series are not canon to the original books; not just on principle, but additionally because we know of at least one example where Daniel Handler explicitly did not provide his original solution to his fellow writers on the adaptation. Judgement of Olaf based on what we know of him from the books and what we know of him from the Netflix series should therefore proceed separately. With all due respect I don't see much difference.If anything the books make it look worst as premeditated murder as opposed to an accident . Adding insult to injury, the noble people that did it continue to live their lives as if anything have happened, in the penultimate peril kit related the events of that night at the Opera calmly as if discussing the weather.
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Post by Dante on May 3, 2019 2:11:44 GMT -5
It sounds like you do see a difference after all.
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Post by Mr. Dent on May 3, 2019 11:30:55 GMT -5
There is no contradiction. Could and would are vastly different things.
Yes, you are right, he would have been a noble volunteer if absolutely everything was different, but absolutely everything was not different. I don't believe a child owes an abusive parent forgiveness because, maybe in a hypothetical world where things weren't terrible they were a good parent. At the end of the story, Olaf was a wicked and terrible villain and not a noble volunteer, and he showed no desire or drive to change that even at the very moment of his death. If this were the story of Olaf who's parents had not been murdered, and who tried and sometimes failed to be a noble person, yes perhaps he would have deserved forgiveness. But that's not how the story goes. This is the story of Olaf, who's parents were murdered and who committed violent atrocity after violent atrocity in an attempt to inflict bloody vengeance upon three innocent children, and who up until the moment of his death showed no sign or remorse or regret nor any want or willingness to change his ways. This Olaf is not the same person as the noble but conflicted Olaf from the ASOUE that doesn't exist, this is the Olaf from the ASOUE that does and he ought to be judged on what he was and would have been rather that what he wasn't but could have been.
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Post by Dante on May 3, 2019 16:26:26 GMT -5
I was a little flippant earlier, so here's a slightly more in-depth reflection on why we should separate the Netflix adaptation from the books here. The simple fact is that the two versions of the opera scenario are, in fact, mutually exclusive: - We know that Bertrand was involved in the events in the books, because when the Baudelaires mention their parents' presence at the opera, Kit refers to her interactions with "them" (TPP p. 9) rather than just a single of the parents; in the Netflix adaptation, Bertrand isn't part of the picture.
- We know that Kit was an active participant in events in the books, specifically on the Baudelaire parents' side, having "followed them to the snack bar and slipped them a box of poison darts before Esmé Squalor could catch me" (TPP p. 15); in the Netflix adaptation, she was a passive observer who knew nothing of what Lemony and Beatrice were up to.
- It's so strongly implied that it would be obtuse to deny that the opera incident in the books took place after the birth of the Baudelaire children, as they give no indication that the seemingly trivial incident of their parents taking a taxi when the car wouldn't start is merely an anecdote told to them by their parents many years later, it instead being presented in a natural fashion indicating they observed it in person; in the Netflix adaptation, the incident took place long before the Baudelaire children were born.
That's not to neglect to all the elements which were complete unknowns in the book; not just what exactly happened, but the motives driving it, and the characters of the individuals involved. Consider the following text-compatible theory: Olaf's parents were the most evil people alive, the Baudelaire parents were there to arrest them, and instead Olaf's parents committed suicide in a botched attempt to pin the blame on the Baudelaire parents. Is it canon? No. Can it be disproven? Also no. When we have the power to fill in our own explanations, as Lemony Snicket encourages us to, it also has repercussions for how we judge Olaf.
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Post by Uncle Algernon on May 3, 2019 17:31:41 GMT -5
- in the Netflix adaptation, Bertrand isn't part of the picture.
Actually, I believe the interview we held established that Bertrand is canonically the "admirer" who smuggled Beatrice her poison darts during the intermission.
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Post by Dante on May 4, 2019 3:34:17 GMT -5
Taking the Kit Snicket role, then; though this still puts him at arm's reach and with very plausible deniability.
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Post by Hermes on May 4, 2019 7:51:48 GMT -5
Things we know about Olaf (from the books):
- As a child, he was a volunteer in good standing, since he was at school with Lemony, and took part in an expedition with Beatrice. (This was after the schism, according to the TPP dating.)
- Nevertheless he already had villainous tendencies, as shown by his writing obscene anagrams.
- He had emerged as a clearly villainous character at the time of Lemony's sacking from the DP. and his breakup with Beatrice (which may have been about the same time).
- All this apparently happened before the death of his parents, which as Dante says seems to have happened when V and K were alive and old enough to remember. (Note, however, that 'left you an orphsn' is consistent with only one parent being killed on that occasion, if the other was already dead.)
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The Seer
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Post by The Seer on May 4, 2019 10:30:36 GMT -5
- Nevertheless he already had villainous tendencies, as shown by his writing obscene anagrams. I must have missed something... how does writing obscene anagrams equal villany? To me it seems more rebellious/playful.
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