I finally arrived at articulating the big thing that felt wrong to me about Ender’s Game.
The reveal that the game was real does NOT change the morality of what Ender did to me but the reveal is clearly meant to make us think it does.
He was training to do it for real. That was always the intent.
The reveal that the game was real does NOT change the morality of what Ender did to me but the reveal is clearly meant to make us think it does.
He was training to do it for real. That was always the intent.
Comments
Yes it was a fucked up situation with kids being groomed into child soldiers. But it was always about genociding the aliens.
If you're not ready to do genocide, there is no benefit for planning for it or running wargames about it.
Personally, what I disliked most was the Great Man Libertarian bullshit.
he wouldnt have made that call if he new it was real lives
This was also Ender’s ideology for things in “real life” too.
Directly.
I read Ender’s game just after I left that phase, and I could see my old self latching onto some bad things in that book.
It scares me that other hurt, bullied teens might see themselves in Ender and go to a dark place because of it.
Ender fought so he didn't have to fight an enemy twice. Total victory was the only option... which means he would have committed Xenocide. And that scared him enough to change and commit to peace
I didn't know it at the time, but this was another "Dark forest" type universe with intelligent life.
I know I’ve been very wrong about things I thought I remembered about Final Fantasy 7 before checking.
(Yes I know it predated Reddit but its more readily understandable and imo funnier to say it that way)
Like, the whole "freezing the legs as a shield" thing in the zero G fight sim or whatever it was - taking advantage of the simulation being a simulation with rules.
He didn't even know we knew where the Formics were to genocide them, let alone that that would be his mission
That doesn’t make him completely innocent, though.
It’s really fucked up for sure.
I just…didn’t like the execution of Ender’s Game I suppose.
I'll murder people by the dozens in something like Warframe, but I won't touch a gun in real life. If Ender had known it was a real battle - would he have actually fought it? Would he have refused?
But I was under the impression that while the teachers were clearly trying to train these kids for war, it was pitched to students as a game.
But my understanding is that yes, it was said that it’s a game, but it’s a game that is intended to train you to be an actual commander so you can do this for real in the future.
“The rules” were made to be the things they wanted Ender to disregard. Explicitly!
So he was shown to be capable of ending it as violently as possible, but had to be kept "in the dark" about the results.
Cuz he is less "like that" than his brother.
Kids do video game genocide all the time, but I doubt many would really massacre a village.
it's also not to be a "perfect" ending, where everything is neatly tied up, morally. kinda like watchmen.
Now to check in on modern Germany, right before taking a big sip of water.
To me at least, if that's correct, it makes sense. Dude can be the ultimate cold game theory guy right up until it's not a game. Then the weight of it crushes him with guilt.
I've always thought this was an allusion to that
He thinks he’s giving the teachers a massive *F*CK YOU I QUIT* in response to just how unfair the final test is.
Thinking he is doing a Kirk Kobayashi Maru while it is just *what he was engineered and groomed to do* lol
Like, they scrutinized *everything* he did. He broke the rules to win, to get out.
When pushed to a limit, "fuck you", hit first, hit last, break the game.
From killing bonzo, to killing the giant, to that.
There is an element of, a person exploring being 'evil' in a game and coming out the end better understanding themdelves where they draw lines in a positive way.
Undertale takes a look at that idea in a very effective way for instance.
You don't see the drone programmer on trial for what the drone does, afterall