Though I don't know much about ME and maybe in that world, the challenges present in the real world don't exist there.
> being a wholesome person is largely orthogonal to being a good king
I disagree with Martin here. Of course, not every good person also makes a good king, and not every good (i.e. politically effective) king was a good (i.e. morally upright) person. But the thing to realise is that the political power of feudal kings was much more limited than we often assume, and was based to a large part on the continued loyalty and goodwill of their vassals. In other words, a king's power rests on the relationships he has; it is both personal and relational.
This means, of course, that a king who is perceived by his vassals as being a bad person is unlikely to keep their support and allegiance for long. He might be able to cow individual vassals by force, but the more his relationships degrade, the more precarious his position will be. (For example, King John's scandalous behaviour and personal conflicts with his barons were one of the main causes for the Baron's Revolt and the Magna Carta.)
With that in mind, it is little surprise that medieval handbooks for rulers heavily emphasise a good character, loyal relationships, and morally upstanding behaviour as key to being a successful aristocrat. Tolkien understands this, and so his depiction of kings and aristocrats focusses strongly on the relational ties between them: the fealty and oaths they have sworn, the ancient friendships and marriages that connect them, the personal admiration and sympathy they have for each other. Put differently, medieval aristocrats would readily recognise Aragorn, Theoden, Eomer and Imrahil as model princes.
(For a more detailed discussion of medieval aristocratic values, see here: https://acoup.blog/2020/03/27/a-trip-through-dhuoda-of-uzes-.... For a discussion of personal kingship - based on Crusader Kings III - see here: https://acoup.blog/2022/09/16/collections-teaching-paradox-c...)
Heck, i think it's consistent at least in LotR, that Aragorn must be a good king. A world where it's literally the music of a good god. You literally can't miss by just doing the wholesome thing, as no good deed will go unrewarded.
Exactly. It even works in democracies; Dwight Eisenhower became US president from 1953 to 1961 largely because of his success as Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force in WWII. And Grant and Washington too, of course.
12 April 1945 Truman assumes presidency after Roosevelt's death
2 September 1945 WWII ends
2 November 1948 Truman elected president
2 November 1952 Eisenhower elected president
For both Republicans and Democrats, there were movements of support for General Dwight D. Eisenhower . . . . Unlike the latter movement within the Democratic Party, however, the Republican draft movement came largely from the grassroots of the party. By January 23, 1948, the grassroots movement had successfully entered Eisenhower's name into every state . . . . Stating that soldiers should keep out of politics, Eisenhower declined to run . . . . [0]
In July 1947, President Harry S. Truman considered him an ideal candidate for the Democratic Party, and wanted to "groom the general to follow him". That month, Truman even secretly offered to be the vice-presidential candidate if the general would run for president as a Democrat.
Hoping that Eisenhower would run for the Democratic Party, Truman wrote to him in December 1951, saying: "I wish you would let me know what you intend to do." Eisenhower responded: "I do not feel that I have any duty to seek a political nomination."
Although Eisenhower believed he would win the presidency more easily and with a larger congressional majority as a Democrat, he felt the Truman administration had become corrupt and that the next president would have to reform the government without having to defend past policies. The internationalist wing of the Republican Party saw Eisenhower as an alternative to the more isolationist candidate—Senator Robert A. Taft, the son of former president and chief justice William Howard Taft. Before the primaries, Taft was widely referred to as "Mr. Republican" [1]
0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1948_United_States_presidentia...
P.S. The comments on this thread are a tire fire. I feel like I'm reading random Twitter drive-by comments oh boy.
[1]: https://acoup.blog/2019/05/28/new-acquisitions-not-how-it-wa...
The idea of total war didn't become a thing until much later on.
Troy, Assyria, Babylon, Macedonia, Carthage, and Mesopotamia would like to have a word with you on that point. Or they would, if they hadn't been completely wiped out. The Mongol Hordes were known for total warfare. It was their whole spiel: join us, or be completely destroyed.
The very concept of not targeting civilian populations during warfare is so recent that there are people still alive today who were around when the idea was first proposed.
Rasczak, that you?
I'd also point out that destroying an entire city is not total war. Brutality in war and targeting civilians isn't enough to be total war in itself, especially if it's limited to exceptional circumstances -- in general, Rome was extremely happy to conquer new populations to increase their ability to extract wealth.
The context gives further support to the article's statement that George Martin didn't think things through very well before posing his questions. Or even read the books very carefully, for that matter. For example, Martin's questions about the orcs are answered, by implication, in Book VI, Chapter 5:
"[T]he King pardoned the Easterlings that had given themselves up, and sent them away free, and he made peace with the peoples of Harad; and the slaves of Mordor he released and gave to them all the lands about Lake Nurnen to be their own."
So as long as whatever orcs were left didn't take up arms against other peoples, they would be left alone in their own lands to make their own way. No genocide.
(In fact, it's not even clear that Martin understands what actually happened to the orcs and other creatures that Sauron had bred. He seems to think they were "in the mountains"--but that's what happened at the end of the Second Age, not the Third--the orcs that survived the War of the Last Alliance hid in various places in the mountains, and remained threats to travelers in the mountains during the Third Age. But it's made clear that that was because at the end of the Second Age, the Ring was not destroyed and Sauron's power was not forever taken away. At the end of the Third Age, it was. Big difference.)
So I also disagree with Martin's take on Tolkien.
My read has always been that Théoden was still unsure about what to do with Grima after what has been revealed. He is clearly angry at him, but it is also difficult for him to let him go, after he had has been his closest council for so long. When they meet Saruman and Grima at Isengard, Théoden even tries to plead with Grima again. And it doesn't make sense that Théoden is trying to lure Grima, because if he is trying to be cunning, he would well know that Grima would never bother, instead, it reads as Théoden still holding out hope.
So yes, it is questionable to send Grima away. And Tolkien isn't exactly subtle about it.
Theoden has been restored to his right mind and character. The whole thrust of the his character plot (in the books) is that he ends his reign as noble as any of his forbears; freed from the influence of the lies of Saruman, he becomes an exemplary king. And one kingly virtue that Tolkien presents again and again is that of magnanimity to defeated foes: Bilbo doesn't kill Gollum (which Gandalf explicitly praises), the Rohirrim don't kill the Dunlendings, Gandalf doesn't kill Saruman.
"Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgment."
I've only read the book twice and it was a long time ago I last read it but... The whole Saruman/Grima/Theoden thing is way different in the book. In the book by the time Saruman arrives at Saruman's tower, Saruman had escaped (I think by tricking one of the ent, smooth talking it).
Saruman then goes to attack the shire. It's Grima who kills Saruman, but in the Shire.
I don't think Theoden tries to plead with Grima? That's a Peter Jackson / LoTR-the-movie invention no!?
I don't remember enough of the book but the whole "Theoden pleads with Grima / Saruman slaps Grima / Grima stabs Saruman in front of Theoden" is definitely not happening like that in the book.
It's maybe even the biggest difference between the book and the movie (it kinda changes the whole timeline).
Edit: It's not the scene in the movie I confused it with, it's that Théoden does remark that he hopes Grima can come back after the incident, but he does not in fact plead directly with Grima.
Tolkien would disagree. So strongly in fact that he wrote an entire fantasy series about it!
If someone is a king, being a good person is synonymous with being a good king. Same with being a good loyal knight, ect.
There is no need to separate the individual and social role.
You have a moral archetype of for each social role, and judge the morality of the people in those roles against it.
You don’t get an epithet like that by being a nice fella.
Was Ivan a moral ruler? Can his morality as a ruler be separated from Ivan's morality a person?
The point Im trying to make is that that making dual and parallel judgments is a choice, and I think many people dont hold this distinction.
I think the more common view is that how a king rules is a huge factor in their moral standing as a human.
Sauron is not moral but corrupted. They were corrupted, and thus became amoral.
Hitler and Jesus are on equal moral footing. They are both the products of causality, whether you hold that to be governed by physics, or the character of their Immortal soul.
Are you saying that being corrupted by your social conditions allows you to remain good while doing bad? Are you saying that it is moral to steal with a spreadsheet?
What is morality if not resisting corruption and temptation?
I think it is much more coherent to believe that one's actions determine their morality, but not all people face equal tests. This makes more sense than trying to rationalize how a murderer is a moral person.
Anyways, back to it. What I'm saying is that a kings conduct to do governance doesn't tell me about their character as a human. We all curate profiles and have different moral standards based on the situation (see spreadsheet example).
So to say that it's an entirely level playing field isn't fair to social conditions and identity. A kings conduct is instrumental, whereas personal conduct, if done with grace, is often not. Me helping you without any favour returned is by all accounts something humans value. A king helping a vassal state implies more than just a deontological 'good for the sake of good'. To realize that is to, I feel, realize that politics exist.
>What I'm saying is that a kings conduct to do governance doesn't tell me about their character as a human.
This is where I disagree. If a king needlessly tortures and rejoices in suffereing, that tells yuo about their character as a human. The governance of Sauron or Jofferry tells you about their moral character.
>So to say that it's an entirely level playing field isn't fair to social conditions and identity.
This is where you lose me? Who said anything about a level playing field? IF you reread my last post, I said different people can find it more or less difficult to be moral. I see no problem with the idea that is more difficult to be both a king and a moral person, than a peasant and moral person. Just like some jobs are more physically strenuous, some are more morally challenging.
Back to reality, this is obviously the case. Different people are faced with different life challenges, and moral challenges. The playing field is not level.
It is easy for me not to beat innocent people. I do it without thinking and it takes zero effort. Take someone raised in an physically abusive household and this might not be so easy for them. The difference in challenge does not mean you can be moral while going around and beating innocent people.
Im fine with the idea that being a moral king, or a moral politician is a hard task. I dont think that it being hard means the bar for morality is lowered.
The same goes for corruption, which is where we started.
>Seems irrelevant. If someone is corrupted and does amoral things, the result is still an amoral person. Sauron is not moral but corrupted. They were corrupted, and thus became amoral.
I dont think power corrupting is relevant to judging if a king/politician/murderer is a moral person.
You asked: "So do you think then that power doesn't corrupt?"
My response was that power corrupting is irrelevant to judging if a person in power is corrupt or not. I dont think that additional challenge lowers the bar for morality.
You brought up the Mansons, social expectations, ect as examples of mitigations to consider in moral judgement.
I have doubled down on the idea that the moral standing of a human should be based on their actions, not on their circumstantial considerations or mitigations.
Doubling down is collapsing the moral landscape down to a hard and fast rules. We make moral decisions from circumstances, there are countless examples of this in psych research, like the Stanford Prison Experiment.
Now. Is that right? Is that fair? Probably not. I'd want my rulers to be good people and leave it at that, but the allure of power, the wanting of it, leads to corruption or at least gives us some indication that that abuse is possible and that we should be vigilant.
I fully understand that we make moral decisions based on circumstances. You brought up Sapolsky, who is basically a determinist, and I agree with him on the science.
What I am rejecting is the moral relativism. As more is understood about psychology and biochemistry, some people seem inclined to change the expectation for moral behavior based on these factors. Some people would be inclined to give the punishers a pass in the prison experiment because power corrupts. This is where I disagree.
"everyone was doing it" doesn't make bad behavior good, nor does the complex biochemistry around missing breakfast.
>Now. Is that right? Is that fair? Probably not.
Im not sure what this is in reference to. I think fairness has very little to do with moral judgement. Its not fair if someone was born in circumstances that turn them into a murderer, but someone else's circumstance lead them to a life of charity. This unfairness in circumstance does not make the murderer a moral person.
Circumstance can create immoral people and circumstances are unfair.
>the allure of power, the wanting of it, leads to corruption or at least gives us some indication that that abuse is possible and that we should be vigilant.
If you think circumstance excuses bad behavior, why be vigilant?
However, no matter how moral a person is, they are never perfect and they faulter. Judging a person independent of this human condition isn't fruitful, the point a person is at can shift on that fixed line. Murderers can reform and Kings can become murderers.
So we need to be vigilant of circumstances that allow for people to lean in to that corruption. A moral king isn't necessarily going to be moral forever. And unless we have purity checks, we really can't select the morals from the immorals when it comes to matters such as this. Doing so would also be pretty presumptuous too.
Now I may be misinterpreting you. And if so please correct me, maybe we actually agree (and I'm beginning to suspect we truly might) and this is just the nature of async back and forths. If so, apologies in advance.
There's a difference between good and great, having a major impact doesn't imply that the impact is good. Alexander the Great is another example of someone who had an outstanding impact, but was not a good king.