December 21st, 2021
21 Dec 2021 · page 1093 of 1306
Sweaty philosophy hour
Cast: Lei Feng, Verity Cunningham
Comments (42)
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Wow. Verity is wiser than I thought.
Oh, some people in "society" may claim that you are locked into a role, but you are actually under no obligation to conform to "society's" judgment of your role. The power to define your role belongs to you and you alone. No-one can take it from you, though many may claim the right.
You can choose to do good. You can choose to take offense. You can choose to become angry. You can choose to be kind. No-one can make you do good or to be kind. No-one can make you angry or offend you without your leave. These things are actually your choice, and therefore your responsibility.
IRL it is a bit of both though, just like nature and nurture. We are limited by our biological bodies, our genetics and how these things interact with the environment around us. Choosing may be much much harder for some than for others, or how "good" is perceived may be different based on brain function. Getting angry is not always a choice, for example. In most cases, how one expresses the anger is a choice, but not always. All of us can try to do better, but which better and how much better may not be something we can control.
Yeah, and there are always extreme examples. In general, I think someone's initial instant reaction/emotion is a lot harder to control than emotions and reactions to something hours, days or years later. For a really extreme example, if someone tortures and then kills another's loved ones in front of them, I really doubt that the majority of people would be able to initially suppress their anger against them.
I would like to subscribe to that Philosovee.
Life is not black and white, but a million shades of grey ^_^
In one page, my brain went from "Verity is okay, I suppose, getting used to her" to "Verity is my favourite character in this whole damn comic".
~good is a choice not a state of being~
An unending series of choices, even.
Uff...
People talking in absolutes when they should be clearly smarter to understand what is meant with words like "good people" and "bad people".
Like that time when I got into an argument over everyone being secretly evil bad racist, when the person I was talking about wasn't talking about the people who intentionally do bad choices in regards others based on their culture or outer appearance, but rather was talking about how everyone everywhere does choices on first impressions to which others outward appearance and actions play A MAJOR role.
Because they didn't want to talk about "vague terms", while perfectly happy judging people based on their ability to make first impression decisions while in no way having any other measurement, but gut feeling for "how much racism is okay to have that you don't go hug a person with a knife" and yes, racism has nothing to do with having knives (except for some cultures, but that's beyond the point), but that's pretty close to their take on it, so it was still vague as heck!
Or like when I told a doctor person I had been too long in cold and caught a cold. "Ah, but you see. Really, you can't catch a cold from cold, lollol. It's not scientific, you see. You at most stressed your body and thus it was more vulnerable to outside influence."
...
Yes. And while I was bombarded by outside pestilence, the last thing to be a changing factor was my extended time in cold condition with inadequate insulation, thus meaning the cold was the tipping point for me to catching the cold, thus cold caused me to catch cold, you effing brick!
from Lei's reaction in this, it seems that what Verity is saying about good people and bad people is what Lei meant by the terms
otherwise it wouldn't be working to help her feel better
if you want to say they're both using it wrong, that's fine, but then they're both using it wrong in the same way so it doesn't really matter that they are
I want to say that they aren't right, or wrong. But that they do talk about it like there was one definitive way of looking at it.
There definitely are good and bad people, and Lei isn't in a way too far of with her ideas, but she's also handling them like they are the ultimate opinions. That if you are in some sense "a bad person", you have to work hard to reinvent yourself as "a good person".
But then Verity just throws in "there's only grey, people can do whatever", while simultaneously saying "wouldn't it be an easy excuse". She's herself giving a grand excuse of doing whatever your heart desires 'cose "there's no moral good or bad, it's just all meh!"
Though the other reply had some good points, just needed some spacing. I wonder where it went...
Still it's definitely true that at this moment they don't need to be breaking down the reality of morality, they need to break the heck out of the boiler room. So if to that end they can have an "indisputable" reasoning they can both agree on, then that works for the situation just fine.
Lei is worried that she is herself a bad person.
It's one of those "if you have to ask..." things, where only a person who is capable of changing their ways would be worrying about not being able to change their ways.
Verity doesn't say there is no moral good or bad. She says there are good or bad actions, and when someone realizes they have been doing wrong/bad actions, they then can choose to do good things next time. She doesn't deny that Pryce does bad things. She takes away the excuse that he does bad things because he's a bad person/can't help it/that's just who he is. No, at any time he could decide to do good things going forward. As can she and Lei. Growth mindset for ethics.
I think I get what you're saying, but like, you can't improve the kind of person you are if you are locked into the mindset that you're a bad person. And it's not, "oh, I engage in a lot of toxic behavior, I'm not a good person, I should improve," but more, "I can never improve because I'm a bad person," which is more along Lei's thinking. She needs to know that she isn't a bad person, she's a person who did really bad things. If she's too busy making that mean that she's bad, she can't focus on the thing that changes it: just changing her behavior, her motives, her ideals. She's making the whole thing out to be far harder than it has to be. She could change at any time and it's not necessarily a transformation of internal nature; imo for her, it isn't that at all because her nature is already to want to do good and not hurt people, so now she just has to stop justifying every mess up as, "I'm stuck this way, of course this would happen," to just, "Oh, whoops! Okay, this is how I made the mistake, next time I'll avoid that," or, "Oh, yikes, I didn't do so well, we'll make a bigger effort next time." If you have that mindset that you're a wicked person, it's exactly as Verity said: It's hard to change because you assume you're going to just keep messing up. Changing who you are becomes this gigantic, impossible quest. So this concept is extremely important. Good person and bad person are useful shorthands for, a person who keeps engaging in crappy/excellent behavior with no sign of changing it, but it's vital to self improvement not to slather a label on yourself and then wallow behind it, as Lei here has done.
Just as it's useful to know that the cold does not give you a cold but rather the interaction with your immune system because then you understand that it's not just straight up the cold that's deadly, but your lack of preparation for it, giving you better ability to judge whether or not, if it's avoidable, going outside is a good idea, or something (like drying out if you're wet) that is important to do first, instead of just assuming any contact in any circumstances to cold will get you sick. When you get sick that way, it's not useful to use the long-hand. It's useful to just use the shorthand of, "I got a cold from the cold." We all know what that means. And even expressing, "the cold will get you sick like that!" is a useful shorthand that oughtn't be corrected because the understanding of how is implied. But it is good to know the mechanics because it makes a difference.
I'm still don't see why Mr Pryce is a Villain. I'm sure that an American millionaire with that villainous moustache has done all sorts of bad things, from unethical business practices to having inconvenient people bumped off, but we haven't seen any of that so far. All he's trying to do is open up the fourth anchor for the many societal benefits. All right, so his henchmen were a bit robust in asking 'Harry Barber and Fifi' to come to a consultation, and he did shake up a couple of swindlers, although they were never in any real danger. On this trip he's probably guilty of getting his daughter and Patience to harvest Elan Vital without permission, and possibly breaking a few health and safety regulations (if such things exist in the USA in the 1830's). And again, it's his over-enthusiastic henchperson who's tied a couple of spies and saboteurs to the steam engine to shake them up a bit, knowing that it will be easy for them to escape before they come to any real harm.
fwiw she isn't talking about pryce here at all :)
In fact it's a justification for why it is morally acceptable to break into other people's crates and nick their biscuits.
In a lot of places, kidnapping is considered a bad thing. Illegal, even.
Kidnapping someone at gun point happens all the time in Widdershins.
[https://www.widdershinscomi...](https://www.widdershinscomic.com/wdshn/november-2nd-2011 "https://www.widdershinscomic.com/wdshn/november-2nd-2011")
I said it back in the day that it would be hilarious for the spirit O'Malley saw to be a spirit of greed, but it turns out all he wanted was some entirely above-board moneymaking venture like merchandising or something.
It seems he also wants to teleport the Fourth Anchor to more habitable climes for his personal use and enrichment regardless of what that does to the other Anchors! Or their witches. (It also appears he expects his daughter to be the witch of that Anchor.)
Oh I'm sure he has an Evil Plan that will destroy us all, but so far we've seen nothing that would hold up in court. We're just assuming on the basis of his villainous moustache.
But I'll be disappointed if it isn't Theodora who is screaming defiance from the top of the tallest tower - or in this case mast - preferably in a thunderstorm.
No, I'm assuming on the basis of O'Malley as a judge of character.
He was about to froze Ben and Eliza in the previous chapter.
They were never in any real danger. There was a large and obvious safety lever to open the door. He was just shaking up a couple of grifters who were trying to cheat him. I suppose he could of called in the police, but being from the wild frontier he’s not used to having that luxury - you have to look after yourself.
Still awaiting the moment where Verity ruins this great scene by casually revealing that she could have escaped their current predicament at any time.
Would it help if she did so with intent to free Lei, only for Lei to reveal that she'd ALSO freed herself?
Not any time. Only when it's funny.
It’s a nice detail that the longer they sit here in the steam, the damper and more disheveled their hair gets.
Verity and I may disagree on whether there are good and bad people, but I think that is largely a matter of semantics.
Verity's argument hangs together tolerably well, right up to the moment when you realize that it then logically follows that [Your Favorite Horrible Person] isn't actually bad.
Well isn't that how most justice systems function? You're not being judged for being bad but for doing bad.
Actually, the point Verity makes is more subtle than that: [your favorite horrible person] did evil things even though they had the choice to do otherwise. Vee argues that saying someone is 'bad' kind of lets them off the hook for the bad things they've done, since it takes the pressure off people who do evil by suggesting that they really didn't have a choice.
It's the difference between 'corrupted' and 'bad'. I'm not sure I agree with her, as I think that the meaning of 'bad person' includes that of 'corrupted person,' but I see what she's saying.
Mogunya Sa
"and now I've about finished freeing myself"
Verity is not only right, but looks cute in this scene
That was... surprisingly insightful
The expressions on this page are chefs kiss ahhh-maaazing
It's moments like this when I remember why this comic is so dear to me.
Verity really is the person to teach Lei, it seems.
Well that's certainly a functional psychopath's concept of ethical behavior. Verity is missing one essential point: It isn't doing bad things that makes you a bad person, it's deriving enjoyment from doing bad things that makes you a bad person. "Everyone has moral or ethical lapses" is a far cry from intentionally inflicting pain or suffering on others for your own amusement.
Responsibility. Someone gets it!
I have certainly known people who describe themselves as "trash"... and they live up to their self-given title... because that's _easier_.