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LividLiquid posted:Can you explain why saving the whole of humanity is a poo poo covered in sprinkles? Can you explain how the whole of humanity isn't a poo poo covered in sprinkles literally already causing extinction events? And then can you also explain how this medicine would "save" humanity and how humanity is already not saved, given that there are humans who are living, some much better than others, which is something we also do in the best of times.
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Mar 16, 2023 19:29
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Actually, the silly poo poo doughnut analogy is pretty good for this situation. Except instead of showing us a poo poo doughnut, the doughnut is just never in focus so it's a vague brown ring. It could easily be an out of focus turd, sure. But the characters say it's a chocolate doughnut, Joel never contracts the idea that it's a chocolate doughnut and the show proceeds as if it is a chocolate doughnut. And then folks who though the blurry brown thing was a turd at first claim it is impossible to imagine the story as being about Joel's choice between two doughnuts without seeing the supposed chocolate doughnut in more focus.
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Mar 16, 2023 19:30
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Khanstant posted:Going by what the show says at face value, still have a hard time faulting Joel since they didn't ask Ellie's consent. Even if they were going to do it without or without her consent, not asking at all makes me not give a poo poo if they die. Right. That element, to me, makes what they're doing so indefensible it's nonsensical.
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Mar 16, 2023 19:36
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I don't think additional context would make option B any less of a poo poo donut, which is fine. The fireflies don't need to be explicitly 'good guys.' The important part is that Ellie believed they were the good guys, and Joel's lie indicates that he also believed it to some extent, or at least understands how important that belief was to Ellie.
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Mar 16, 2023 19:43
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LividLiquid posted:Can you explain why saving the whole of humanity is a poo poo covered in sprinkles? Its not. The goal of saving humanity and the method of saving humanity are not the same thing.
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Mar 16, 2023 19:44
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Would it matter if the procedure to obtain a cure wasn't guaranteed to kill Ellie? Like what if the odds were 50/50 with their poorly trained doctor performing brain surgery for the first time? 60/40 she lives? 75/25?
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Mar 16, 2023 19:45
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SchwarzeKrieg posted:I don't think additional context would make option B any less of a poo poo donut, which is fine. The fireflies don't need to be explicitly 'good guys.' The important part is that Ellie believed they were the good guys, and Joel's lie indicates that he also believed it to some extent, or at least understands how important that belief was to Ellie. They don't need to be good guys, they need to be competent. If they aren't then you don't trust the fate of the only immune person to their hands. They are very much not shown to be competent. And lets not get into what Ellie believed. She believed she would go with Joel after her work was done and nobody even gave her the dignity of a choice otherwise.
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Mar 16, 2023 19:47
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For what it's worth I never thought "The Choice" was Joel deciding to save Ellie (because Joel didn't decide, he was always going to protect his surrogate daughter no matter what), but Joel deciding to lie about what happened to save Ellie the heartbreak.
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Mar 16, 2023 19:48
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E:nm
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Mar 16, 2023 19:50
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Chello De Don posted:For what it's worth I never thought "The Choice" was Joel deciding to save Ellie (because Joel didn't decide, he was always going to protect his surrogate daughter no matter what), but Joel deciding to lie about what happened to save Ellie the heartbreak. Exactly this, although I think it's ambiguous whether it was a lie meant to save Ellie the heartbreak or a lie meant to avoid damaging the relationship Joel had come to value (or some combination of the two, most likely).
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Mar 16, 2023 19:56
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Bright Bart posted:Would it matter if the procedure to obtain a cure wasn't guaranteed to kill Ellie? Like what if the odds were 50/50 with their poorly trained doctor performing brain surgery for the first time? yeah absolutely. the only way you can imagine enough extra poo poo to make this a hard chance involves the medicine they make being created 100% of the time and easily mass produced and even then big whoop, great news for future bite victims with access to the medicine (this medicine would neeEEeever be used in some weird powerplay by any groups, right?) given that the wildest dream of good use for a medicine scraped out of ellie's brain in mediocre as hell and doesn't actually change the fact everyone lives in a world full of dangerous animals that can kill them. humans have conquered that kind of world before, and they're already managing to cling on in it again. the ecosystem changed and one medicine ain't gonna change it back. the stakes aren't "kill 1 to save all" its "kill 1 to empower at least one group with a medicine." not that kill 1 to save all is a very interesting question when the answer is "loving parents love their children a lot"
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Mar 16, 2023 20:14
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Chello De Don posted:For what it's worth I never thought "The Choice" was Joel deciding to save Ellie (because Joel didn't decide, he was always going to protect his surrogate daughter no matter what), but Joel deciding to lie about what happened to save Ellie the heartbreak. but that is also barely a choice. he knows "i killed everyone, including Marlene" wont go over well. So he makes the very human choice to try and live in denial for a little bit longer with his adopted daughter. And as of the ending, Ellie does not have much else to do but grudging accept it, even if she knows he is not being honest, because what else does she have at that moment? I'm sure the consequences of that are going to manifest in season 2.
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Mar 16, 2023 20:16
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Bright Bart posted:Would it matter if the procedure to obtain a cure wasn't guaranteed to kill Ellie? Like what if the odds were 50/50 with their poorly trained doctor performing brain surgery for the first time? The odds don't matter if Ellie isn't offered the choice, period.
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Mar 16, 2023 21:06
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Madurai posted:The odds don't matter if Ellie isn't offered the choice, period. Yeah, again, imagine Ellie is offered a 50/50 shot and she agrees to be put under, but Joel can't handle it and kills everyone and tells her raiders did it. Same endpoint but way more interesting situation, Joel's character arc is more defined, and there's more reason for Joel to feel guilty + want to hide the truth. You could even make her consent scene do a callback to their "we do this all the way" scene with the giraffes.
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Mar 16, 2023 21:12
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bucketybuck posted:They don't need to be good guys, they need to be competent. If they aren't then you don't trust the fate of the only immune person to their hands. Competence is not some kind of vague catch all. My neurologist probably couldn't fight off a group of fungus zombies while trekking across a wasteland, and yet, somehow I still trust him to prescribe epilepsy treatments to me. I'd go so far as to say the two things are completely unrelated. That's why it sounds like you're just viewing the entire firefly org as either "good" or "bad" in a very black and white way. Marlene is a bad leader, their soldiers are bad fighters, their terrorists make sloppy plans, therefore their doctor is inexperienced and never did brain surgery before now? They doesn't follow at all and smacks of confirmation bias. You've decided the fireflies are incompetent in some universal way, aka they're "bad", so every new piece of evidence you see is interpreted as reinforcing that belief.
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Mar 16, 2023 21:21
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Marx Headroom posted:Yeah, again, imagine Ellie is offered a 50/50 shot and she agrees to be put under, but Joel can't handle it and kills everyone and tells her raiders did it. Same endpoint but way more interesting situation, Joel's character arc is more defined, and there's more reason for Joel to feel guilty + want to hide the truth. Exactly
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Mar 16, 2023 21:49
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XboxPants posted:Competence is not some kind of vague catch all. My neurologist probably couldn't fight off a group of fungus zombies while trekking across a wasteland, and yet, somehow I still trust him to prescribe epilepsy treatments to me. I'd go so far as to say the two things are completely unrelated. How many times do I need to repeat this, but a doctor that goes straight to killing the uniquley immune patient mere hours after meeting her for the first time is not a competent doctor. Not in some nebulous, universal way, but in a very straightforward and specific "what a loving idiot" kind of way. Is he a good brain surgeon? Well I do know that he is about to do brain surgery on a patient who has not had her head shaved anywhere, does that seem competent? I know that he does not have consent from his patient, is that a good doctor? I know he intends to kill his patient, is that a good doctor? I know he is proceeding despite the fact that there is a madman killing everybody in the hospital, when the sensible doctor would wait until it has been established that he can complete the procedure. Is that competent? I have never once said anything about good or bad, you are not arguing with what I have actually said. I said competent and it is not a catch all, it is a very specific word that I use because what I see on the screen calls the competence very much into question.
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Mar 16, 2023 21:53
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bucketybuck posted:Is he a good brain surgeon? Well I do know that he is about to do brain surgery on a patient who has not had her head shaved anywhere, does that seem competent? I know that he does not have consent from his patient, is that a good doctor? I know he intends to kill his patient, is that a good doctor? I know he is proceeding despite the fact that there is a madman killing everybody in the hospital, when the sensible doctor would wait until it has been established that he can complete the procedure. Is that competent? No, I would say that none of those have any relevance to his experience as a brain surgeon nor to his ability to understanding of human or fungal biology. No point in shaving her head if he's gonna peel off her entire scalp and then cut off the whole top of her skull. You could say he's not a good "doctor" in the sense that he's killing his patient, but that is irrelevant to whether his proposed methodology regarding the cure is true science or not. It's almost like a reverse appeal to authority, where you're saying that since the doctor isn't trustworthy, he's incapable of saying anything true. In 1942 Jonas Salk himself led a study that injected insane-asylum patients in Michigan with a experimental flu vaccine. Without consent, of course. That has nothing to do with whether his polio vaccine worked or not. Scientific truth exists independently of the author's capabilities.
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Mar 16, 2023 22:10
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XboxPants posted:No, I would say that none of those have any relevance to his experience as a brain surgeon nor to his ability to understanding of human or fungal biology. No point in shaving her head if he's gonna peel off her entire scalp and then cut off the whole top of her skull. You could say he's not a good "doctor" in the sense that he's killing his patient, but that is irrelevant to whether his proposed methodology regarding the cure is true science or not. They are relevant because they are actual information on screen that I have to go on. It is certainly a lot more than the opposing view which relies solely on fan wank and imagination. Which is ironic after your post about confirmation bias. One of us has valid concerns about the doctor based on the text, the other just assumes that he must be competent. So where is the bias really.
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Mar 16, 2023 22:27
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bucketybuck posted:They are relevant because they are actual information on screen that I have to go on. It is certainly a lot more than the opposing view which relies solely on fan wank and imagination. I am also biased, I admitted this. I am choosing to believe his science might be real because that makes it more interesting to me.
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Mar 16, 2023 22:30
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I think it's fair to say his methods working would make things less uninteresting, but saying it's "more interesting" carries an unearned weight.
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Mar 16, 2023 22:32
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am i gonna be the rear end in a top hat here who says that it doesn't really matter if Ellie consents anyway? a 14 year old cannot consent to being killed and having her brain cut out no matter how much she really wants to or how much the doctors might be right about what a cool idea it is. her opinion on it doesn't matter in anything beyond her feelings on it, but it's not actually a choice she's entitled to make maybe I'm crazy
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Mar 16, 2023 22:50
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Khanstant posted:I think it's fair to say his methods working would make things less uninteresting, but saying it's "more interesting" carries an unearned weight. Even that is fair. I just don't care whether the show "earned" my engagement. I enjoy thinking about interesting things, I'm not gonna punish myself to spite the writers for failing. For context, this is the attitude I've developed after spending hours and hours in quarantine during COVID, first watching good new shows, then rewatching good shows I'd seen before, then eventually watching kinda mediocre shows and just making the best of trying to find whatever interesting aspects I could. I find I can make just about anything interesting if I really want to, so it makes me feel like its on me if I don't. It's like, I just take media as prompts for me to think about life and myself and humanity and philosophy. It's like being in an English class, if a teacher made us all write our amateurish little stories, and said "come up with an interesting analysis of Aubrey's story", and I couldn't, that didn't mean the story failed, that meant I failed.
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Mar 16, 2023 22:59
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Mandrel posted:am i gonna be the rear end in a top hat here who says that it doesn't really matter if Ellie consents anyway? a 14 year old cannot consent to being killed and having her brain cut out I think she was mature enough to consent to that, inasmuch as anyone really has the ability to consent to being killed when not terminally ill
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Mar 16, 2023 23:04
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Mandrel posted:am i gonna be the rear end in a top hat here who says that it doesn't really matter if Ellie consents anyway? a 14 year old cannot consent to being killed and having her brain cut out no matter how much she really wants to or how much the doctors might be right about what a cool idea it is. her opinion on it doesn't matter in anything beyond her feelings on it, but it's not actually a choice she's entitled to make You're not the first person to say this and I think it's pretty ridiculous. This isn't a teenager in the modern suburbs trying to get a neck tattoo or run off with her creepy boyfriend. And it's just absurd to be like "podft she's too young to have any bodily autonomy or thoughts or opinions anyone has to respect or consider so let's just murder her without asking." What? If you're bringing up consent like it's a bastardized legal concept in 2023 then that authority would still fall to Joel, the de facto guardian, who was not asked either.
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Mar 16, 2023 23:04
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XboxPants posted:Even that is fair. I just don't care whether the show "earned" my engagement. I enjoy thinking about interesting things, I'm not gonna punish myself to spite the writers for failing. For context, this is the attitude I've developed after spending hours and hours in quarantine during COVID, first watching good new shows, then rewatching good shows I'd seen before, then eventually watching kinda mediocre shows and just making the best of trying to find whatever interesting aspects I could. I find I can make just about anything interesting if I really want to, so it makes me feel like its on me if I don't. It's like, I just take media as prompts for me to think about life and myself and humanity and philosophy. As I've said before, there are plenty of interesting ways to analyze the story even if you don't make up some extra text where the story tells us the Firefly's plan is likely to work. Should Joel trust the people who say they're going to kill someone he cares about but they totally have a good reason? He chooses not to in episode 1, and in episode 8, and in episode 9.
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Mar 16, 2023 23:05
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Mandrel posted:am i gonna be the rear end in a top hat here who says that it doesn't really matter if Ellie consents anyway? a 14 year old cannot consent to being killed and having her brain cut out no matter how much she really wants to or how much the doctors might be right about what a cool idea it is. her opinion on it doesn't matter in anything beyond her feelings on it, but it's not actually a choice she's entitled to make No the people posting about this are nuts. Especially the poster saying that even if they plan to go through with it either way, it's better to ask first. If I go up to a 14 year old girl and ask her if I can cut her head off, and she says no, and I do it anyway, that does not make it any better and it does not count as asking for consent. If it's not reversible, it's not consent. If that scenario sounds too extreme, imagine a guy going to a bar. He see a woman he wants to hook up with and asks her to go back to his place. She says no so he kidnaps and rapes her. This does not qualify as asking for consent.
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Mar 16, 2023 23:05
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I don't think anyone is saying "Ellie can't consent, so let's kill her", my guy
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Mar 17, 2023 00:15
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So you're saying it's less bad to not ask? Why? How is that less bad? And what answer to that means you should care if Joel blasts them?
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Mar 17, 2023 01:20
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Still gets me that Marlene snaps at Joel that he KNOWS that Ellie would agree to the sacrifice.... the sacrifice that Marlene explicitly did NOT ask her to make. Where was your confidence then, lady? 
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Mar 17, 2023 01:40
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Khanstant posted:So you're saying it's less bad to not ask? Why? How is that less bad? And what answer to that means you should care if Joel blasts them? What? No, it's equally bad either way. "Asking" someone for consent, when they fully plan to ignore her answer regardless of what it is, is not actually asking for consent. At no point are they actually giving any autonomy to Ellie, only the illusion of autonomy. (though, you could say not asking is less bad because you are being more honest) If they say to Ellie, "Listen, we'll do whatever you want here", and that's complete bullshit, that does not make them a better person compared to just saying "Listen, we're going to do this regardless of what you want." It would be like putting Ellie in a room with one button that says "sacrifice myself" and the other one says "let me go", except that button isn't wired up to anything, and claiming you're giving her a choice. Khanstant posted:And asking if Ellie wants to be sacrificed for a medicine does make a difference to me, even if they are willing to do it without her consent. You have zero understanding of how consent works. I'll make it simple: If "no" is not an option, it is not consent, it is coercion. XboxPants fucked around with this message at 01:52 on Mar 17, 2023 |
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Mar 17, 2023 01:49
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I do think it's a lot more dramatically interesting a situation if it could work, so I go with that rather than go on about the logistics of it, but I do think it's a failure of the writing that the latter comes up so often.
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Mar 17, 2023 01:58
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Surely the only relevant factor to Joel is - that's his daughter they're killing and he's going to save her. Nothing else matters.
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Mar 17, 2023 02:25
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Then it's not consent, but it's still marginally less bad than not even considering the possibility of not murdering a little girl. They're evil either way for myriad reasons. It's the difference between doing evil no matter what, and opting not to do evil if your goals can be realized just as well or better with the minimum effort of a false choice. It's actually likely she would've agreed. And if the game or story were a little better thought out, there could be an arc of both of them spending time with the fireflies with not all fireflies being down for the "flash bang n quick murder" route, with tension and conflict related to that before they get to a point of deadly science experiments. I think all they really wanted was "violent dad does anything to protect kid including... *Gulp* violence..."
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Mar 17, 2023 02:37
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SchwarzeKrieg posted:I don't think additional context would make option B any less of a poo poo donut, which is fine. The fireflies don't need to be explicitly 'good guys.' The important part is that Ellie believed they were the good guys, and Joel's lie indicates that he also believed it to some extent, or at least understands how important that belief was to Ellie. I feel like Joel might have had motive to conceal to a fourteen‐year‐old that building full of people, including her godmother, attempted to murder her, and that her adoptive father killed them all to stop it. Joel may have been wrong in thinking that the lie was moral or sustainable, but it’s a lie that he would have told even if the Fireflies had had no ability or intention to cure cordyceps and had tried murder Ellie as part of a religious ritual.
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Mar 17, 2023 02:57
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Khanstant posted:So you're saying it's less bad to not ask? Why? How is that less bad? And what answer to that means you should care if Joel blasts them? No I'm just saying that nobody is arguing that Joel was wrong AND she couldn't consent Anyone saying she can't consent is, presumably, already arguing that they shouldn't chop her up
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Mar 17, 2023 03:07
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XboxPants posted:No, I would say that none of those have any relevance to his experience as a brain surgeon nor to his ability to understanding of human or fungal biology. No point in shaving her head if he's gonna peel off her entire scalp and then cut off the whole top of her skull. You could say he's not a good "doctor" in the sense that he's killing his patient, but that is irrelevant to whether his proposed methodology regarding the cure is true science or not. Salk’s study was unethical, but that’s different than being incompetent. I think that a real brain surgeon, even an evil one with no intention of saving the patient, would shave the head just out of force of habit. I mean, they’re all gowned up and masked, right? Is that only for their own protection? Maybe. In the real world, even doctors who administer lethal injections for the state swab the arm with disinfectant and use sterile needles. That said, I don’t think that we should read too much into the hair being left on because ultimately the writers don’t want Ellie to be bald in the next scene. The specifics of the portrayal are not driven by what a competent doc would or would not do.
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Mar 17, 2023 03:54
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XboxPants posted:It would be like putting Ellie in a room with one button that says "sacrifice myself" and the other one says "let me go", except that button isn't wired up to anything, and claiming you're giving her a choice.
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Mar 17, 2023 04:36
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Khanstant posted:You're not the first person to say this and I think it's pretty ridiculous. edit nevermind reading your subsequent posts I am definitely not agreeing with you lol Mandrel fucked around with this message at 06:00 on Mar 17, 2023 |
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Mar 17, 2023 05:57
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Jerusalem posted:Still gets me that Marlene snaps at Joel that he KNOWS that Ellie would agree to the sacrifice.... the sacrifice that Marlene explicitly did NOT ask her to make. Where was your confidence then, lady? it's very funny to me how thick she lays it on with the "i was there when she was born" crocodile tears, leaving out the part where she immediately dumped her in a fedra group home and peaced out until she happened to find out ellie might be useful to her via one of her child soldiers loving up just an absolute snake, id have shot her again
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Mar 17, 2023 06:05
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