This link has been bookmarked by 81 people . It was first bookmarked on 25 Jul 2006, by Zhe sto.
-
21 Aug 18
-
15 Oct 14
-
Ender has perfect knowledge of his own motives and the motives of others.
-
Yet although Card takes pains to point out how much he intends Ender to be Hitler’s moral opposite, he does admit that his introducing the issue of genocide was deliberate.
-
Fourth, the passages insist that the difference between Hitler’s genocide and Ender’s is that Ender’s was an accident. Ender thought he was playing a simulation whereas Hitler knew the gas chambers were real. This "science fiction element" (remote-directed war) serves in moral terms as yet another evasion; in reality, people do not commit genocide by accident.
-
-
10 Jun 14
-
We are given to believe that the destruction Ender causes is not a result of his intentions; only the sacrifice he makes for others is.
-
Ender’s Game is about “a child, our ultimate icon of vulnerability, put under almost impossible stress. It was when he decided to give up the enterprise that he won the ultimate victory; and then he became an almost tragic figure when it became clear that his victory made him obsolete, while his childhood training had left him unfit for any other kind of life.”
-
-
23 Mar 14
-
There's always moral instruction whether the writer inserts it deliberately or not. The least effective moral instruction in fiction is that which is consciously inserted. Partly because it won't reflect the storyteller's true beliefs, it will only reflect what he BELIEVES he believes, or what he thinks he should believe or what he's been persuaded of.
But when you write without deliberately expressing moral teachings, the morals that show up are the ones you actually live by. The beliefs that you don't even think to question, that you don't even notice-- those will show up. And that tells much more truth about what you believe than your deliberate moral machinations.
-
Through this abusive training Ender becomes expert at wielding violence against his enemies, and this ability ultimately makes him the savior of the human race
-
The novel repeatedly tells us that Ender is morally spotless
-
his assuming this guilt is a gratuitous act
-
The result is a character who exterminates an entire race and yet remains fundamentally innocent
-
what the late John Gardner called “moral fiction,”
-
“a child, our ultimate icon of vulnerability, put under almost impossible stress. It was when he decided to give up the enterprise that he won the ultimate victory; and then he became an almost tragic figure when it became clear that his victory made him obsolete, while his childhood training had left him unfit for any other kind of life.”
-
-
25 Feb 14
-
The extreme situation Card has constructed to isolate and abuse Ender guarantees our sympathy. After Ender is manipulated into entering Battle School, (he’s brought there by lies severing him from Valentine, his only protector) his abuse continues, deliberately fostered by Graff.
-
Other characters in Ender’s Game are also forced to do things they see as immoral, against their better natures, in the service of saving the world from the buggers. Graff, the orchestrator of Ender’s brutal education
-
and thus our condemnation of genocide reemerges as a sign of our prejudice and small-mindedness. Ender is not the victimizer, but the misunderstood victim of others’ fear and prejudice.
-
-
24 Feb 14
-
Ender and his commanders were aiming for this battle and they all knew it; thanks to the trick played on Ender it just happened sooner than it would have otherwise.
-
The extreme situation Card has constructed to isolate and abuse Ender guarantees our sympathy. After Ender is manipulated into entering Battle School, (he’s brought there by lies severing him from Valentine, his only protector) his abuse continues, deliberately fostered by Graff.
-
On the shuttle up to the orbiting school Graff singles Ender out for praise for the sole purpose that the other recruits will resent him. Before they even reach the school, Ender is forced to break the arm of Bernard, one of his tormenters. At every turn Ender faces hostility, scorn, and even physical assault. The result is an escalating series of challenges and violent responses by Ender. These sequences invariably follow the following pattern:
-
Even when authority figures know about this abuse, they do not intervene. In most cases they are manipulating the situation in order to foster the abuse of Ender
-
-
-
The novel repeatedly tells us that Ender is morally spotless; though he ultimately takes on guilt for the extermination of the alien buggers, his assuming this guilt is a gratuitous act. He is presented as a scapegoat for the acts of others. We are given to believe that the destruction Ender causes is not a result of his intentions; only the sacrifice he makes for others is.
-
The result is a character who exterminates an entire race and yet remains fundamentally innocent.
-
Because he has no alternative, Ender responds with intense violence, dispatching his tormenter quickly and usually fatally. Ender engages in this violence impersonally, coolly, dispassionately, often as much for the benefit of others (who do not realize or admit that Ender kills on their behalf) as for himself. Onlookers are awed by his prowess and seeming ruthlessness.
-
“Speakers for the Dead held as their only doctrine that good or evil exist entirely in human motive, and not at all in the act”
-
the passages insist that the difference between Hitler’s genocide and Ender’s is that Ender’s was an accident. Ender thought he was playing a simulation whereas Hitler knew the gas chambers were real. This "science fiction element" (remote-directed war) serves in moral terms as yet another evasion; in reality, people do not commit genocide by accident.
-
-
23 Sep 13
-
10 Jul 13
-
tleach726Over the years I have told a number of friends that, if I had had access to a nuclear device when I was in seventh grade, there would be a huge crater in upstate New York centered on what used to be West Seneca Junior High School. Had Orson Scott Card’s n
books e10atkhs psychology philosophy orsonscottcard scifi literature writing sf endersgame criticism
-
09 Jul 13
-
07 May 13
-
the morality of an act is based solely on the intentions of the person acting.
-
we are told,
-
If Ender dies, the last hope of the human race dies with him, thus making his self-defense an ultimately self-less act.
-
These enemies are cruel and, unlike Ender, enjoy the prospect of maiming or killing,
-
Ender persists in maiming Bonzo in order to insure there are no future attacks.
-
To be a killer you must intend to kill someone.
-
And even if you do intend to kill, you are still innocent if you do it for a larger reason, “selflessly,” without personal motives. And if you feel bad about being forced into doing it.
-
premise of his moral vision: that the rightness or wrongness of an act inheres in the actor’s motives, not in the act itself, or in its results.
-
insisting on a quality in the character that need not be demonstrated by action to be held as true.
-
Goodness is not a matter of acts, but of intentions, an inherent quality independent of what one does.
-
Peter, Stilson, Bernard, Bonzo.
-
We are never invited to wonder whether (and it is hard to imagine that) they might have a good motive for any of their actions.
-
Card thus labors long and hard in Ender’s Game to create a situation where we are not allowed to judge any of his defined-as-good characters’ morality by their actions.
-
The possibility that Stryka may have a legitimate reason to object to Ender’s behavior is never considered—her qualms are “fashion.
-
Ender is presented as a victim of the extermination of the buggers rather than its perpetrator
-
“I did what I believed was necessary for the preservation of the human race” (p. 336).
-
So despite the evidence in the book that the extermination of the buggers is at the very least a war crime, Card wants us to believe that Graff and Ender are not guilty. Any attempt to blame them is an injustice.
-
“This hurts me more than it hurts you,” might well be the slogan of Ender’s Game.
-
It offers revenge without guilt. If you ever as a child felt unloved, if you ever feared that at some level you might deserve any abuse you suffered, Ender’s story tells you that you do not. In your soul, you are good. You are specially gifted, and better than anyone else. Your mistreatment is the evidence of your gifts. You are morally superior. Your turn will come, and then you may severely punish others, yet remain blameless. You are the hero.
-
God, how I would have loved this book in seventh grade! It’s almost as good as having a nuclear device
-
The bullying I suffered, which seemed overwhelming to me then, was undeniably real, and wrong. But it did not make me the center of the universe.
-
Nothing is his fault
-
For an adolescent ridden with rage and self-pity, who feels himself abused (and what adolescent doesn’t?), what’s not to like about this scenario? So we all want to be Ender.
-
As Elaine Radford has said, “We would all like to believe that our suffering has made us special—especially if it gives us a righteous reason to destroy our enemies.”23
-
But that’s a lie. No one is that special; no one is that innocent. If I felt that Card’s fiction truly understood this, then I would not have written this essay.
-
he says that only intentions matter in making such judgments. This I absolutely reject.
-
-
13 Feb 13
-
16 Apr 12
Lysa FishCreating the Innocent Killer:
Ender's Game, Intention, and Morality -
20 Feb 12
-
There's always moral instruction whether the writer inserts it deliberately or not. The least effective moral instruction in fiction is that which is consciously inserted. Partly because it won't reflect the storyteller's true beliefs, it will only reflect what he BELIEVES he believes, or what he thinks he should believe or what he's been persuaded of.
-
But when you write without deliberately expressing moral teachings, the morals that show up are the ones you actually live by. The beliefs that you don't even think to question, that you don't even notice-- those will show up. And that tells much more truth about what you believe than your deliberate moral machinations.
-
We are given to believe that the destruction Ender causes is not a result of his intentions; only the sacrifice he makes for others is. In this Card argues that the morality of an act is based solely on the intentions of the person acting.
-
Orson Scott Card is often praised for writing what the late John Gardner called “moral fiction,” and invariably Ender’s Game and its sequels are cited as prime examples of Card’s probing examination of moral issues.
-
in Ender’s Game, adults or authority are never there to protect.
-
The effect of this is of course to increase our sympathy for Ender, yet we are also supposed to sympathize with the officers.
-
Graff’s judgment on the deaths of Bonzo and Stilson clarifies Card’s definition of a killer. Presumably, someone can kill hundreds, thousands, even billions (Ender eventually “kills” an entire race) and not be a killer. A killer is motivated by rage or by selfish motives. To be a killer you must intend to kill someone. And even if you do intend to kill, you are still innocent if you do it for a larger reason, “selflessly,” without personal motives. And if you feel bad about being forced into doing it.
-
“Speakers for the Dead held as their only doctrine that good or evil exist entirely in human motive, and not at all in the act” (Speaker 39).
-
Card seems to dare the reader to try to reject it—as if to say, if a morality of intentionality can stand up to this test, it can stand up to any.
-
The difference between Peter and Ender is not in what they do, but in what they are. Peter enjoys hurting people; Ender abhors it.
-
Andrew sighed at Stryka’s unforgiving attitude.
-
Ender is not the victimizer, but the misunderstood victim of others’ fear and prejudice.
-
First he sacrifices himself emotionally in order to save the human race physically, and then after the buggers are dead he sacrifices himself morally so that others may feel themselves innocent. History records him as a monster. In reality, the monster is a savior.
-
-
03 Dec 11
Nick GallWhy "Ender's Game" is a morally depraved work of purest evil: http://t.co/qM9k47He
Why "Ender's Game" is a morally depraved work of purest evil: -
01 Dec 11
julius beezerThe ends and the means; illuminated through discussion of Orson Scott Card’s novel Ender’s Game
-
27 Sep 11
-
07 Sep 11
-
10 Dec 10
-
08 Dec 10
-
06 Nov 10
-
28 Aug 10
Billie NapoleonEnder's Game Essay
-
20 Apr 10
-
02 Apr 10
SK ElkinsThe purpose of this paper is to examine the methods Card uses to construct this story of a guiltless genocide, to point out some contradictions inherent in this scenario, and to raise questions about the intention-based morality advocated by Ender's Game
-
The purpose of this paper is to examine the methods Card uses to construct this story of a guiltless genocide, to point out some contradictions inherent in this scenario, and to raise questions about the intention-based morality advocated by Ender’s Game and Speaker for the Dead.
-
“I don’t really think it’s true that ‘the road to hell is paved with good intentions.” Card stated in a 2002 interview.9 “Good people trying to do good usually find a way to muddle through. What worries me is when you have bad people trying to do good. They’re not good at it, they don’t have any instinct for it, and they’re willing to do a lot of damage along the way.” The import of this statement is that there are some people who are good before they act, and some others who are bad before they act, and that goodness or badness is exhibited in their actions. These "bad" people can’t do good, and “good” people can’t do bad.
-
The problem is that the morality of that abused seventh grader is stunted. It’s a good thing I didn’t have access to a nuclear device. It’s a good thing I didn’t grow up to elaborate my fantasies of personal revenge into an all-encompassing system of ethics. The bullying I suffered, which seemed overwhelming to me then, was undeniably real, and wrong. But it did not make me the center of the universe. My sense of righteousness, one that might have justified any violence, was exaggerated beyond any reality, and no true morality could grow in me until I put it aside. I had to let go of my sense of myself as victim of a cosmic morality play, not in order to justify the abuse—I didn’t deserve to be hurt—but in order to avoid acting it out. I had to learn not to suppress it and strike back.
-
We see the effects of displaced, righteous rage everywhere around us, written in violence and justified as moral action, even compassion. Ender gets to strike out at his enemies and still remain morally clean. Nothing is his fault. Stilson already lies defeated on the ground, yet Ender can kick him in the face until he dies, and still remain the good guy. Ender can drive bone fragments into Bonzo’s brain and then kick his dying body in the crotch, yet the entire focus is on Ender’s suffering. For an adolescent ridden with rage and self-pity, who feels himself abused (and what adolescent doesn’t?), what’s not to like about this scenario? So we all want to be Ender. As Elaine Radford has said, “We would all like to believe that our suffering has made us special—especially if it gives us a righteous reason to destroy our enemies.”23
But that’s a lie. No one is that special; no one is that innocent. If I felt that Card’s fiction truly understood this, then I would not have written this essay.
-
-
08 Mar 10
-
10 Oct 09
scelerus animus"...The result is a character who exterminates an entire race and yet remains fundamentally innocent. The purpose of this paper is to examine the methods Card uses to construct this story of a guiltless genocide, to point out some contradictions inherent
-
21 Sep 09
-
11 Sep 09
Ricardo DiraniWhat becomes of all those people who are the successful products of a strict upbringing? . . . anger and helpless rage, which they were forbidden to display, would have been among these feelings—particularly if these children were beaten, humiliated, lied
-
02 Sep 09
-
04 Jul 09
-
08 May 09
-
06 May 09
-
24 Apr 09
-
Because their abusers were secretly their friends, no anger against them is permissible. The repressed rage gets displaced, then acted out.
Disassociated from the original cause, their feelings of anger, helplessness, despair, longing, anxiety, and pain will find expression in destructive acts against others or against themselves .
-
For an adolescent ridden with rage and self-pity, who feels himself abused (and what adolescent doesn’t?), what’s not to like about this scenario? So we all want to be Ender. As Elaine Radford has said, “We would all like to believe that our suffering has made us special—especially if it gives us a righteous reason to destroy our enemies.”23
-
-
31 Jan 09
Hapax LegomenaEnder exterminates an alien race, gets credit for saving the human race, gets credit for feeling bad about it, and gets credit for expiating sins which he did not commit. First he sacrifices himself emotionally in order to save the human race physically, and then after the buggers are dead he sacrifices himself morally so that others may feel themselves innocent.
-
31 Dec 08
-
07 Oct 08
-
23 Aug 08
-
14 Aug 08
-
13 Aug 08
-
01 Aug 08
latriviataThrough this abusive training Ender becomes expert at wielding violence against his enemies, and this ability ultimately makes him the savior of the human race. The novel repeatedly tells us that Ender is morally spotless; though he ultimately takes on g
-
20 Jun 08
-
18 Mar 08
FruFru FourOneNice article about Orson Scott Card's novel, Ender's Game
-
18 Jan 08
Ratcatchershould have bookmarked this the first time i read it
sciencefiction books criticism ethics via:jeffdavis for:andysseus
-
02 Jan 08
-
09 Dec 07
-
06 Jun 07
-
25 Apr 07
-
02 Dec 06
-
01 Dec 06
-
29 Nov 06
-
18 Nov 06
-
tezcat tlatlahqui"As Elaine Radford has said, “We would all like to believe that our suffering has made us special—especially if it gives us a righteous reason to destroy our enemies.” But that’s a lie. No one is that special; no one is that innocent. If I felt
-
25 Jul 06
-
21 Apr 06
-
14 Jan 06
-
22 Jun 05
-
07 Jun 05
-
25 May 05
Would you like to comment?
Join Diigo for a free account, or sign in if you are already a member.