# Movies/Books where the hook is that to help someone, you have to hurt them. **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 27, 2009, 6:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-books-where-the-hook-is-that-to-help-someone-you-have-to-hurt-them/501154 "2009-06-27T06:35:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Isamu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/7c8e57/32.png) [@Isamu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isamu)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2009, 6:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-books-where-the-hook-is-that-to-help-someone-you-have-to-hurt-them/501154/1 "2009-06-27T06:35:32Z")
I’m trying to think of literary or film reference that uses this theme. Preferably where the ‘bad guy’ turns out in the end to have been the ‘good guy’ all along because he only did what he did in order to help the other person. I have one reference, from Fight Club, where Tyler ‘helps’ Raymond K. Hessel by threatening to kill him if he doesn’t follow his dream of becoming a veterinarian by a certain deadline. But that’s all I’ve got, and I know there are plenty more, but I can’t seem to recall them right now. Anyone else have some ideas? ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2009, 7:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-books-where-the-hook-is-that-to-help-someone-you-have-to-hurt-them/501154/2 "2009-06-27T07:21:31Z")
One of the most famous lines in HAMLET is when he tells his mother (but could as easily be telling Ophelia) “I must be cruel only to be kind”. If TV counts, the show _Burn Notice_ has used this with the character of Victor (Michael’s Season 2 rival turned ally) and with Management (personified by John Mahoney), who it turns out are his protectors as well as his antagonists. In the novel/miniseries _Shogun_ John Blackthorne (Anjin San), who is English and Protestant, has a very complicated relationship with the Jesuits in Japan; sometimes they are total bastards to him and yet they also save his life and give him invaluable assistance. Similar story twixt him and Portuguese pilot Rodriguez (played by John Rhys Davies in the movie). You could make something like this interpretation for _Devil’s Advocate_. Pacino/Milton/Satan/Dad is seen as tormenting and destroying all around Kevin/Neo/Ted, seemingly (to the audience) his nemesis, when it’s revealed that in a perverse way he’s the benefactor who is clearing the stage to offer him almost unlimited power and rewards. But I know I’m missing a couple of really obvious ones… ---
**Author:** ![Aspidistra](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspidistra/32/3894_2.png) [@Aspidistra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspidistra)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2009, 8:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-books-where-the-hook-is-that-to-help-someone-you-have-to-hurt-them/501154/3 "2009-06-27T08:01:23Z")
Severus Snape? (mostly with Dumbledore - his relationship with Harry is a little different, he doesn’t _have_ to hurt him, he just wants to) Half the characters in _Ender’s Game_ and sequels. Especially Ender and Bean, where Ender mirrors the same treatment which was meted out to him on the ship up to the station. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2009, 8:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-books-where-the-hook-is-that-to-help-someone-you-have-to-hurt-them/501154/4 "2009-06-27T08:29:13Z")
_Rescue Party_ by James White. Aliens attack Earth in a massive assault; they scoop up people by the starship-load, nuke emptied cities to prevent anyone from returning, that sort of thing. It turns out that the Sun is about to fry the Earth in a matter of days, and they need to get as many humans off Earth as possible _ **now** _, with no time to figure out how to speak our language and explain anything. Two of James White’s Sector General stories involved critters called the Protectors of the Unborn, who were so adapted to constant attack that NOT being attacked would kill them, due to the sudden lack of a constant flow of the equivalent of adrenalin. It’s not often that emergency treatment for childbirth includes beating on the mother with metal bars. In Alan Dean Foster’s _The I Inside_, the artificial intelligence named the Colligitarch is the unofficial ruler of Earth. It’s programmed for benevolence, but quite a few find it’s control stifling, and the main character ends up in a running conflict with it and it’s agents until escaping to a colony world it has no control over. It turns out that the colony world in question is full of people who are dissatisfied with the Colligitarch, and are quite happy to have found ways to sneak there. Except, it turns out that the Colligitarch knew exactly what they were doing, and specifically wants them to be a world that doesn’t want to be ruled by it. Unlike most such powerful AIs in fiction, it really IS benevolent, and doesn’t think that it is in humanity’s best interest to be dependent upon it. It can’t just shut itself off or tell humanity to go fend for itself; humanity would just build another. So instead, it’s deliberately creating a new human culture that has no desire to be under it’s control. ---
**Author:** ![Tangent](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tangent/32/3098_2.png) [@Tangent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tangent)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2009, 8:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-books-where-the-hook-is-that-to-help-someone-you-have-to-hurt-them/501154/5 "2009-06-27T08:59:33Z")
How about a song? **A Boy Named Sue** _…And he said: "Son, this world is rough And if a man’s gonna make it, he’s gotta be tough And I knew I wouldn’t be there to help ya along. So I give ya that name and I said goodbye I knew you’d have to get tough or die And it’s the name that helped to make you strong._ ---
**Author:** ![cactus\_waltz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/74df32/32.png) [@cactus\_waltz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cactus_waltz)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2009, 9:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-books-where-the-hook-is-that-to-help-someone-you-have-to-hurt-them/501154/6 "2009-06-27T09:11:41Z")
It’s a bit of a stretch, but in _Watchmen_, the villain saves humanity from a third world war by sacrificing the citizens of New York. ---
**Author:** ![Aspidistra](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspidistra/32/3894_2.png) [@Aspidistra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspidistra)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2009, 9:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-books-where-the-hook-is-that-to-help-someone-you-have-to-hurt-them/501154/7 "2009-06-27T09:55:03Z")
Other possible contenders: Julian May’s _Sage of the Pliocene Exiles_ - many of the characters are psychics, or latent psychics. It is specified that enduring great pain is one way for a latent to acheive “operant” status and this happens a few times in the books - mostly by accident, but sometimes very deliberately A great example in Neil Gaiman’s _American Gods_ is where an entire war between the “old” gods and the “new” gods is being engineered by Odin and Loki, pretending to be on different sides, in order to feed off the energy of the dying minor gods. This includes Loki actually killing Odin, with the intention of bringing him back to life later on. Ursula Le Guin’s _The Left Hand of Darkness_ - all of Estraven’s actions in Karhide are interpreted by the Ambassador as being obstructive, whereas he’s really trying to navigate tricky political waters on his behalf, to prevent him from being assassinated. ---
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2009, 1:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-books-where-the-hook-is-that-to-help-someone-you-have-to-hurt-them/501154/8 "2009-06-27T13:54:13Z")
Definitely Judas to Jesus in “The Last Temptation of Christ”. Arguably the same in “Jesus Christ Superstar”. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2009, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-books-where-the-hook-is-that-to-help-someone-you-have-to-hurt-them/501154/9 "2009-06-27T16:13:17Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > _Rescue Party_ by James White. Clarke. You’re thinking of _The Scavengers_ ---
**Author:** ![Sr\_Siete](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6de8d8/32.png) [@Sr\_Siete](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sr_Siete)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2009, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-books-where-the-hook-is-that-to-help-someone-you-have-to-hurt-them/501154/10 "2009-06-27T16:28:19Z")
The idiotic Michael Douglas vehicle"The Game" follows that premise. I would put it in a spoiler tag, but, please, a movie that bad doesn’t deserve the consideration. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2009, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-books-where-the-hook-is-that-to-help-someone-you-have-to-hurt-them/501154/11 "2009-06-27T16:48:35Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Clarke. You’re thinking of _The Scavengers_ Hmmm. He wrote two stories with similar themes. I think you are right that I was talking about _The Scavengers_; the other one had humans in a similar role and was named _Rescue Party_. I think. ---
**Author:** ![Oy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bc8723/32.png) [@Oy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oy)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2009, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-books-where-the-hook-is-that-to-help-someone-you-have-to-hurt-them/501154/12 "2009-06-27T18:01:47Z")
There’s the endlessly repeated theme of “being with me is a danger to you, but I know you won’t leave me because of that, so I’ll pretend to not love you in order to protect you.” I know I’ve encountered this plot a million times, but the only one that occurs to me at the moment is 2001’s _Moulin Rouge!_ ---
**Author:** ![I\_Am\_The\_Lorax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19adc/32.png) [@I\_Am\_The\_Lorax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/I_Am_The_Lorax)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2009, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-books-where-the-hook-is-that-to-help-someone-you-have-to-hurt-them/501154/13 "2009-06-28T00:21:57Z")
Of Mice and Men. George. ---
**Author:** ![HelenGawn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a88e4f/32.png) [@HelenGawn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HelenGawn)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2009, 4:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-books-where-the-hook-is-that-to-help-someone-you-have-to-hurt-them/501154/14 "2009-06-28T04:49:12Z")
> [@Oy](#): > > There’s the endlessly repeated theme of “being with me is a danger to you, but I know you won’t leave me because of that, so I’ll pretend to not love you in order to protect you.” I know I’ve encountered this plot a million times, but the only one that occurs to me at the moment is 2001’s _Moulin Rouge!_ Also **Stella Dallas** and **The Champ** , both directed by King Vidor. (Think he had parent issues?) ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2009, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-books-where-the-hook-is-that-to-help-someone-you-have-to-hurt-them/501154/15 "2009-06-28T05:32:11Z")
> [@Isamu](#): > > **Movies/Books where the hook is that to help someone, you have to hurt them.** Practically any military story where the premise is that cruel training is necessary to turn the trainee into a soldier. E.g., [_G.I. Jane._](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G.I._Jane) ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2009, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-books-where-the-hook-is-that-to-help-someone-you-have-to-hurt-them/501154/16 "2009-06-28T13:14:12Z")
The repugnant “V for Vendetta” seems to suggest that Hugo Weaving was RIGHT to deceive and torment Natalie Portman, and that he made her a better, stronger person in the process. ---
**Author:** ![emcee2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7bcc69/32.png) [@emcee2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/emcee2k)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2009, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-books-where-the-hook-is-that-to-help-someone-you-have-to-hurt-them/501154/17 "2009-06-28T13:31:04Z")
This seems to be the (arguably misguided) premise of “Our Land”. ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2009, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-books-where-the-hook-is-that-to-help-someone-you-have-to-hurt-them/501154/18 "2009-06-28T16:49:26Z")
The Belisarius series by Drake and Flint. Basic alternate universe series set in 600 Ad Rome [eastern empire, Constantinople] Rough gist, Roman general gets given an artifact from the future that needs him to change history by essentially stopping an evil empire from taking over the world by feeding him technology information, and some other odds and ends. As it involves warfare, there is a lot of death caused by he and his legions, armed with more advanced weapons off war than we actually had [gunpowder, grenades, rockets, cannons and so forth, and more modern ideas of how to conduct warfare] so I think it qualifies as he knowingly has to send a hell of a lot of soldiers to their death as well as aving to ignore any civillian collateral damage that he can’t do anything about at that precise time because if he can not manage to _win_ then the whole world after that will suffer. Better that a city of 200 000 people gets sacked and totally killed early on, then him try to prevent it and get killed. You can see it does effect him emotionally, and it emotionally impacts the people around him but it has to be done so they suck it up and get on with things. [i am just starting the last book … i hope he wins …] ---
**Author:** ![mbh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@mbh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mbh)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2009, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-books-where-the-hook-is-that-to-help-someone-you-have-to-hurt-them/501154/19 "2009-06-28T18:56:42Z")
In the last short story in Isaac Asimov’s collection _I, Robot_, the world is governed by super-computers. Two characters notice that there are still economic problems and civil unrest, even though the computers should be able to predict problems, and prevent them. They eventually conclude that utopia would be bad for humans, so the computers are deliberately causing problems. Frank Herbert’s _Dune_ novels make a similar argument. The cultures run by psychics who can forsee and prevent problems, eventually become stagnant and soft, and are pushed aside by warrior cultures who are willing to do things the hard way. _Semi-Tough_, a parody of 1970s self-help psychobabble, starring Burt Reynolds and Kris Kristopherson. _Conan the Barbarian_ opens with Nietzsche’s line “That which does not kill us, makes us stronger”. Midway through the movie, James Earl Jones attempts to convince Arnold Schwartzenegger that he is actually Arnold’s greatest benefactor. The novel based on the screenplay is actually more persuasive on this point. In an early chapter, “the Riddle of Steel” makes an analogy between forging the steel of a weapon and forging the soul of a warrior. “The heart of a man is like a piece of unworked iron. It must be baked in the fires of adversity, and hammered upon the anvil of despair and loss, nigh unto breaking . . . When your heart has become as steel, your sword will be your very soul.”