6175 réponses à ce sujet

[Char]

My dog is capable of all of those things. Am I dehumanising him if I were to call him an it?

 

I've always thought of my pets as people totally different lifestyle, intelligence, code and understanding of the world, but they have always been individuals, and they learn about the world around them. When there are animals out there smarter than the average child, I can't really deny them personhood. They aren't human, but by my definition of a person they are people. You can't really dehumanise a non-human, in the sense that its literal meaning is "to take away humanity" but you can depersonalise them and take away their status as people and reduce them to an 'it', which in many cultures is synonymous with objects and property. Like I said, individual judgement is key in this issue

[cogsandcurls]

My dog is capable of all of those things. Am I dehumanising him if I were to call him an it?

 

Then you clearly have a more advanced pet than I do. My cats are of average cat intelligence but are not capable of self-awareness, self-reflection, advanced reasoning and complex thought processes etc as an average person is.

 

And I still wouldn't call either of them "it", because they deserve better than that.

 

Think we're going to have to agree to disagree on this one. To me, Cole is a person.

[Tootles FTW]

I'm interested to see how many people will still refer to Cole as "it" after meeting him in-game.  Even ME's Legion I see very, very rarely referred to as "it" by fans and he very decidedly has no care towards gender.  Knowing & (eventually) liking/disliking someone humanizes them whether the intent is there or not.

 

[Grieving Natashina]

 

 

People here need to be excellent to each other.

And party on dudes!

 

[Frikipolleces]

One thing I don't see brough up enough about Cole's murders is that he thought he would disappear (aka die) if he didn't kill those people. I find it hard to judge a person for killing for his own survival, especially if the victims "wanted" to die and even directly asked him to do it.

 

Would I do the same if I were in his shoes? I couldn't tell.

[Fialka]

i agree with the assessment that Cole should be considered a person.  Especially since he seems to have far more in common, even in the beginning of the book, with a human than any spirit or demon we have known. 

 

The way i understand it is this: Spirits seem to be an embodiment of a single virtue, and they can only act within that,  Demons are spirits that are the embodiment of more nefarious things, and with that seems to come the desire to experience reality (or the non-Fade, whatever you want to call it).  The tricky part is that some virtues have a darker side, or an extreme version of them that is far less benevolent (justice-vengeance, faith-zealotry (can't think of a better word), mercy-sacrifice?).  What neither seem to possess is personality, individuality, or even free will (beyond whatever idea they embody will allow, and whatever they need to do to further their narrow-minded goals - good or bad).

 

Cole already doesn't seem to fit.  He possesses self-awareness, a unique personality, a desire to understand himself. We do see a fledgling version of this with Justice as well, and it's pretty clear this is a result of his possessing human memories.  It's hard, because we have so little understanding of what spirits actually are, and one could argue that the things demons want (to experience life, to survive, to connect, to grow stronger in order to get the things they want) aren't all that different from what people want.

[Tootles FTW]

One thing I don't see brough up enough about Cole's murders is that he thought he would disappear (aka die) if he didn't kill those people. I find it hard to judge a person for killing for his own survival, especially if the victims "wanted" to die and even directly asked him to do it.

 

Would I do the same if I were in his shoes? I couldn't tell.

 

I actually would look down on his actions more if he did it for his own reasons over the needs of those he was "helping".  I believe it started as him being drawn to the despair of the captured mages, and being shocked when they could see him.  Having experienced his/Cole's own tragedy, he offered to kill them painlessly vs being forgotten.  When he killed that first mage I think only then did he realize that he felt the most real since Rhys stopped talking to him.  Only then did he think to get something out of the, er, transcation beyond just helping them in the only way he know how.  I think first & foremost - at least at the beginning - it was purely about helping others, though.

[Fialka]

One thing I don't see brough up enough about Cole's murders is that he thought he would disappear (aka die) if he didn't kill those people. I find it hard to judge a person for killing for his own survival, especially if the victims "wanted" to die and even directly asked him to do it.

 

Would I do the same if I were in his shoes? I couldn't tell.

This is true. I even have a theory that there may be something to the whole blood-letting needed for sustenance thing.  The fact that demons are drawn to blood magic, that they seem to be able to draw power from it outside of the Fade, isn't something we really understand all that well except that it exists.  Sill, regardless of whether he needs it or not, Cole believed killing was necessary for his survival.  Coupled with what I perceive as a not-yet-developed moral code, I find it difficult to really condemn his actions.

 

I could see him being presented much like the oft-used "good vampire" is in modern literature.  Many of Anne Rice's vampire heroes needed blood in order to survive, and got around the moral quandary involved by only killing evil people.  Granted, they had that handy mind-reading trick to help them out 

 

It's possible Cole needs blood-letting/death to keep himself going.  He just gets around the wrong-ness of it by only killing the bad guys.

[Fialka]

I actually would look down on his actions more if he did it for his own reasons over the needs of those he was "helping".  I believe it started as him being drawn to the despair of the captured mages, and being shocked when they could see him.  Having experienced his/Cole's own tragedy, he offered to kill them painlessly vs being forgotten.  When he killed that first mage I think only then did he realize that he felt the most real since Rhys stopped talking to him.  Only then did he think to get something out of the, er, transcation beyond just helping them in the only way he know how.  I think first & foremost - at least at the beginning - it was purely about helping others, though.

Yeah, despite my above post, it does seem that Cole viewed them as mercy killings, at least at first... things just got a little more complicated when he made the memory connection while doing it.

[Fortlowe]

I have already said in another post that more focus needs to be on the killers, to understand motivation and cause, and learn from that in order to prevent it from happening again. Very few human serial killers make parole for two reasons- the first that the rest of society finds it difficult to forgive, and therefore even the most repentant killer is always at risk of being killed in revenge for their crimes. The second is that at present we simply do not have the capacity to cure a psychopath. We are beginning to understand the patterns of psychopathy, we have some research as to the cause, but we are not yet able to change the wiring of the brain in an adult human. The victims should always be objects of sympathy and understanding and treated with respect, but looking at, or attempting to change the victim does not prevent further crime.

 

Whilst lack of understanding does not alleviate the need for punishment, in law we accept children, and people with mental illnesses to have diminished responsibility for their crimes as a result of a lack of understanding of the consequences and framing of their actions. There is nothing to suggest that with a full understanding of his nature, Cole would have still killed. Killing for survival is something our ancestors have all done, and our wild cousins continue to do. We are in a society that tells us that this is wrong only because it is no longer necessary for us to do so.

Did he originally have a sense of right and wrong? Perhaps. Will it be understandable from a human frame of reference? Who knows. If he has developed a human frame of reference, there is nothing to say he will not stick to it from now on.

 

Killing for survival is a universal truth. However I do have my reservations on whether or not this is the case for Cole. It lived many years in the Spire before it encountered Rhys. In that time either Cole killed for the same reasons it does after it meets Rhys, not to disappear, or it does not kill and already knows it can survive without killing, even in a diminished capacity.

 

If Cole started killing because it, at least, thought it had to to survive, then not only does it have a much higher body count than six, but it knows that the killing is wrong because it intentionally omits this information when discussing the matter with Rhys. If Cole started killing only shortly after Meeting Rhys, then it knows it can survive without killing and calls into question why Cole began killing at all.

Modifié par Fortlowe, 29 juin 2014 - 04:43 .

[Leoroc]

Your pronoun use besides being silly makes it difficult to follow what you are trying to say.

[Fortlowe]

Your pronoun use besides being silly makes it difficult to follow what you are trying to say.

Does this edit make the post more clear?

[Hanako Ikezawa]

One thing I don't see brough up enough about Cole's murders is that he thought he would disappear (aka die) if he didn't kill those people. I find it hard to judge a person for killing for his own survival, especially if the victims "wanted" to die and even directly asked him to do it.

 

Would I do the same if I were in his shoes? I couldn't tell.

Exactly. He felt himself slipping away and at the time obliging the requests of mages who wanted to die was the only way he knew to keep himself alive now. Calling him a murderer for that is like calling a hunter a murderer for killing animals in order to live. 

 

And once he discovered a way that didn't require that, he stopped. 

[Fialka]

However I do have my reservations on whether or not this is the case for Cole. It lived many years in the Spire before it encountered Rhys. In that time either Cole killed for the same reasons it does after it meets Rhys, not to disappear, or it does not kill and already knows it can survive without killing, even in a diminished capacity.

I actually agree with you here... erm... sort of.  The closest to agreeing with you I'll probably ever come, anyway 

 

Though the connection between blood-letting/blood magic/demons is interesting to speculate about in regards to Cole, I don't actually think Cole needed to kill to survive.  As you say, he didn't before, and I presume he didn't after, and he didn't die/disappear.  

 

I think he just believes it's something he needs to do - or more accurately, it's something he wants to do because the alternative (vanishing/not being real anymore) has become a lot more frightening now that he knows what it feels like to actually exist to another person (a feeling Rhys gives him - a feeling I don't think Cole had experienced before, so he didn't know to want it).  

 

Cole just goes about getting it back in a very messed up way... Fortunately, he's able to understand that it's messed up and is able to find an alternative - he finds a purpose to his existence, and he comes to understand that there's better ways to help others than just putting them out of their misery.

[Fialka]

Okay, I've liked Cole for awhile, but the (mostly civil) debate about him has been really interesting to watch.   Even when it comes to those I disagree with, there has been overall some very valid points on both sides.  It's been a good read.

 

 

I look forward to seeing how this debate progresses, provided that everyone remains mature.  

 

 

Just woke up to this debate and caught up to this discussion. I'll join you there and watch it unfold this time instead of debating myself.

 

So... how's that popcorn, guys? 

[Grieving Natashina]

So... how's that popcorn, guys? 

Pretty damn tasty.  

[Ali111g1994]

Like the character. Someone who feels he's neither real nor spirit. I wonder if there is something behind all of it. Maybe malicious yet tragic. Unable to be remembered. I wonder if he is a kind of malformed spirit/ghost/demon. Still what a intriguing character to add to the roster. Does he appear in any of the books?

[Grieving Natashina]

Like the character. Someone who feels he's neither real nor spirit. I wonder if there is something behind all of it. Maybe malicious yet tragic. Unable to be remembered. I wonder if he is a kind of malformed spirit/ghost/demon. Still what a intriguing character to add to the roster. Does he appear in any of the books?

His story is in Asunder.  I'd recommend it; it's a very good book.  Cole is one of a few memorable main characters in it.

[Ali111g1994]

His story is in Asunder.  I'd recommend it; it's a very good book.  Cole is one of a few memorable main characters in it.

Is it good as in it's Dragon age and everything about it rocks or as in it's genuinely well written? I've thought about it for a while but never really pushed myself to read it.

[Fortlowe]

I will address how and why I refer to Cole as I do as completely and concisely as I can, and hope those that disagree with my perspective will at least agree to disagree and no longer accuse me of some imagined bias against the transgender community.

 

The Cole we are discussing is a physical construct of its own making. It is the form of a twenty something human man. The Cole it has named itself for was a twelve year old boy. Obviously it has some control over the form it presents. If I were convinced that the shape it has taken is first, irreversible, and second not chosen out of convenience, then I would address it as 'him'. Convenience being, because a man was the first thing that came to mind when this body manifested, not that it felt some indelible connection to manhood.

 

I do not think Cole's present form is its permanent one. It could just as easily decide to take the form of a middle aged elf woman on a whim or perhaps given the proper motivation.

 

So there. I believe it is a shape shifter of sorts and it has no gender with which it can or does implicitly identify.

[Fialka]

Is it good as in it's Dragon age and everything about it rocks or as in it's genuinely well written? I've thought about it for a while but never really pushed myself to read it.

I thought the book was good.  Not great, mind you, but good.  Rhys and Cole were great characters.  Certain others I found a bit two-dimensional, and there's one I thought was really cliche, but it wasn't enough to detract me from enjoying the rest of the story.  There's some characters that return from Origins, and it is fun to 'see' them again and get more insight into who they are.

 

I'm a picky reader (I read A LOT and tend to be overly-critical of what I read as a result) but I did enjoy the book overall.  the story is interesting, and it gives some insight into what happened between the events of DA2 and Inquisition.  And even if you don't love it, it's a quick read - I finished it in a couple evenings.

[Grieving Natashina]

Is it good as in it's Dragon age and everything about it rocks or as in it's genuinely well written? I've thought about it for a while but never really pushed myself to read it.

Fialka gave a good overview, and I agree with it.  For the record, I thought the writing was pretty solid throughout the whole book.  I'm not normally one to buy EU for any game, but I made an exception for the DA books.  David himself wrote it, if that means anything.

[Ali111g1994]

I thought the book was good.  Not great, mind you, but good.  Rhys and Cole were great characters.  Certain others I found a bit two-dimensional, and there's one I thought was really cliche, but it wasn't enough to detract me from enjoying the rest of the story.  There's some characters that return from Origins, and it is fun to 'see' them again and get more insight into who they are.

 

I'm a picky reader (I read A LOT and tend to be overly-critical of what I read as a result) but I did enjoy the book overall.  the story is interesting, and it gives some insight into what happened between the events of DA2 and Inquisition.  And even if you don't love it, it's a quick read - I finished it in a couple evenings.

 

 

Fialka gave a good overview, and I agree with it.  For the record, I thought the writing was pretty solid throughout the whole book.  I'm not normally one to buy EU for any game, but I made an exception for the DA books.  David himself wrote it, if that means anything.

Okay I'm swayed, but is there any prerequisite for reading it?

[Grieving Natashina]

Okay I'm swayed, but is there any prerequisite for reading it?

Nope, especially if you're familiar with the games.  Just dive right in!  They do a good job of explaining Cole as well as the other major characters in the book.