# Valid points made by villains **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 5, 2013, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579 "2013-12-05T16:05:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![grude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47774/32.png) [@grude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/grude)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 4:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579/41 "2013-12-06T04:49:50Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > In all fairness, Dantooine really wouldn’t have been nearly as good a demonstration as Alderaan. Agreed and the prequels and The Clone Wars make it even clearer just how much better Alderaan is as a demonstration since it is the cradle and hotbed of anti-Palpatine sentiment. It would be like Emperor Nixon blasting San Francisco or Berkley with his Deathstar.😛 ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 5:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579/42 "2013-12-06T05:29:48Z")
> [@shijinn](#): > > no, her true form is not a t-shirt. a better analogy would be insisting boobs are more scary than violence and gore and insisting that you cover it up in public. No, it would just be being naked in general. And we do legally forbid that in many places. But, actually, you analogy is completely inapt. Mystique isn’t hiding herself to be decent or because people don’t like to look at her form. Her argument is not that she shouldn’t have to change her looks. Her argument is that she shouldn’t have to hide the fact that she’s a mutant. It’s closer to arguing that she should have hide the fact that she is gay than any aesthetic preference. Or having to hide her ethnicity in a place where that ethnicity is poorly treated. As for the mutant prejudice–while there is some utility in knowing what the more dangerous people can do, that’s not the same thing as prejudice. The prejudice in that universe is everyone assuming that all mutants are dangerous. Sure, be on a bit of high alert if you are a law enforcement officer. But not systematic prejudice. As for registration: just make you have to register dangerous powers, like you would dangerous weapons. Don’t make it about the mutants as a whole, and it isn’t prejudice. ---
**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:** [December 6, 2013, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579/43 "2013-12-06T05:32:32Z")
> [@](#): > > I was away for a _few years_ and I came back to a world in _ruins._ Death, destruction, chaos, the endless fighting—it was like the Heterodyne Boys had never existed. Things were worse than ever. > > So I _stopped_ it. And I did it _my_ way this time. No more _negotiating._ No more _promises._ No more _second chances._ And I did it _alone._ Because I _had_ to. > > And it worked. Baron Klaus Wulfenbach from [Girl Genius](http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20040804). Someone _did_ have to impose order and stop the constant war. ---
**Author:** ![TorpedoTed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/da6949/32.png) [@TorpedoTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TorpedoTed)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 8:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579/44 "2013-12-06T08:01:39Z")
Klaus isn’t really a villain by any reasonably metric, though, nor does the comic treat him as one. He’s frequently (but not always) in the _antagonist_ role, but that’s because Agatha _does_ tend to genuinely be a chaos magnet, and even when Klaus is genuinely wrong in his actions, it’s usually due to inaccurate of incomplete information above anything else, and the comic takes great pains to show that his motivations are never selfish and malicious, and pretty much always understandable in the context. What’s more, the comic is filled with a number of very real, unrepentant villains, which Klaus is pretty much invariably fighting against. ---
**Author:** ![TheBoltEater](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/779978/32.png) [@TheBoltEater](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheBoltEater)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 9:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579/45 "2013-12-06T09:00:01Z")
Gary Oldman’s character in Air Force One (according to [this site](http://www.quotes.net/mquote/1041)) > [@](#): > > You who murdered a hundred thousand Iraqis to save a nickel on a gallon of gas are going to lecture me on the rules of war? Well DON’T. I remember thinking at the time, “huh, good point.” ---
**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:** [December 6, 2013, 10:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579/46 "2013-12-06T10:22:01Z")
> [@TorpedoTed](#): > > Klaus isn’t really a villain by any reasonably metric, though, nor does the comic treat him as one. [Non-consensual experimental brain surgery](http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20040107) on people is pretty villainous. ---
**Author:** ![RikWriter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/49beb7/32.png) [@RikWriter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RikWriter)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 11:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579/47 "2013-12-06T11:54:17Z")
> [@TheBoltEater](#): > > Gary Oldman’s character in Air Force One (according to [this site](http://www.quotes.net/mquote/1041)) > > I remember thinking at the time, “huh, good point.” No, actually it wasn’t. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 12:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579/48 "2013-12-06T12:06:17Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > [Non-consensual experimental brain surgery](http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20040107) on people is pretty villainous. What, like Doc Savage? ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 12:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579/49 "2013-12-06T12:13:15Z")
The Mad Monk in then **Doctor Who** episode, “The Time Meddler.” He was trying to change history to advance civilization; one of his goals was to have the original production of Shakespeare’s plays on TV. The Doctor’s reason for stopping him was “you don’t meddle with time.” As Count Scarloni said many years later, “Isn’t that what you do?” ---
**Author:** ![oft\_wears\_hats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/7993a0/32.png) [@oft\_wears\_hats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/oft_wears_hats)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 1:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579/50 "2013-12-06T13:48:05Z")
Roy Batty from **Blade Runner**. All he wanted was to be treated like a person, live a full life, and not die at four years old. The replicants do some awful things in that movie, but people are capable of pretty awful things when their back is against the wall. Even more so when they’re _born_ with their back against the wall. That said, I can certainly see an argument for Batty and the other replicants being the antagonists and Tyrell Corporation being the villain. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579/51 "2013-12-06T14:47:48Z")
> [@Sherrerd](#): > > So I’m thinking this question makes sense only for plots in which the antagonist has some political or social-change goal.\* > > By contrast, plots in which the antagonist is motivated by greed are automatically ones in which the villain has a “valid point”—Hans Gruber really DOES want that money. As do Mr. Potter and Harry Lime. Gordon Gekko might be considered to be in the Political/Social Change camp because of his famous speech—but in reality he was simply justifying his actions. He wasn’t setting out to change the world. I don’t think that simple greed constitutes a “valid point” for villains whose agenda is to enrich themselves without regard for ethical constraints. By this logic, the desire to placate their insane compulsions would constitute a “valid point” for villains who are just nucking futz, which you expressly reject: > [@](#): > > I mean, Norman Bates doesn’t really traffic in valid points; nor do Jack Torrance or Frank Booth or Annie Wilkes. That said, one famous example where the twain meet, Fritz Lang’s _[“M”](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M_(1931_film))_, has Hans Beckert raise a valid point when put on trial by criminals who have captured him (because the police manhunt for Beckert is bad for business and because even they are outraged by his actions) – he does what he does because of unwanted irresistible compulsions; they do what they do because they freely chose crime instead of honest work, so where do they get off posing as his moral superiors? ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579/52 "2013-12-06T16:33:39Z")
_The Cabin In The Woods_-All the supposed “bad guys”, whose sole purpose is to save the world, are killed off horribly by the bumbling actions of our “heroes”, and all Marty has to do to save the world is kill Dana…and even if he _doesn’t_ kill her everybody dies anyway. The final act of our “heroes” is to toke out and decide to let the world be destroyed. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579/53 "2013-12-06T16:46:28Z")
> [@Sailboat](#): > > Don’t agree. There are regular humans who are potential threats, but we don’t round up all humans. There have been, for example, Jewish terrorist groups. Does that make a hypothetical villain who would round up all Jews “basically right?” > > The fundamental mistake of prejudice is to extrapolate negative experience with one individual into one’s feelings about the entire group to which one has (correctly or incorrectly) assigned that person. In that sense, “mutants=other victims of prejudice” works very well, IMHO. Tell me what human - as an individual - is the kind of threat that Magneto is. An evil person on his own may kill a couple of dozen people and is a problem for the local police. Humans only get really dangerous and become national security problems when they organize into groups. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579/54 "2013-12-06T16:56:57Z")
> [@TBG](#): > > I disagree that that’s a valid point in the first place. If you’re fully capable of looking normal, it’s not society’s fault that you get treated like a weirdo when you don’t look normal. If you want to look like a freak, fine, but then you’re implicitly agreeing to being looked at as such. > > And no, this doesn’t apply to Nightcrawler or whoever that has no choice how they look. Think of Kurt as a burn victim. Yes, he looks different, but that’s not his fault, so maybe show him some respect. On the other hand Mystique, think of her as someone walking around with a T-Shirt that says “I’M DIFFERENT, FUCK OFF” on it in giant letters and a picture of a hand flipping the bird on the back. She doesn’t have to look like that, so if she chooses to, well, then she can just deal with it when I tell her to get out of my store/restaurant/whatever. Being blue and scaley is her natural appearance. As was explained in _First Class_, she’s capable of looking like a normal human but it requires constant effort. Think of it as the equivalent of a social convention that wanted you to always hold your hand up above your head. You could do it but you’d probably question why you have to. At some point, you’d most likely say “Screw it. I’m putting my arm down and the rest of you can just deal with that.” ---
**Author:** ![The\_Controvert](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dec6dc/32.png) [@The\_Controvert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Controvert)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579/55 "2013-12-06T17:16:16Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > _The Cabin In The Woods_-All the supposed “bad guys”, whose sole purpose is to save the world, are killed off horribly by the bumbling actions of our “heroes”, and all Marty has to do to save the world is kill Dana…and even if he _doesn’t_ kill her everybody dies anyway. > The final act of our “heroes” is to toke out and decide to let the world be destroyed. That’s a good example. It makes me think there could be a rather interesting sequel depicting the consequences of that decision. I’d like to see the humans valiantly attempt to fight off the gods, which proves to be futile and ruinous. At the eleventh hour, the humans come up with a new ritual that involves sacrifice and suffering on a whole other scale, but succeeds in distracting the gods. So the analogy is with the new generation of torture porn movies and it parallels the point made in the Saw series regarding the lengths people are willing to go to survive. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579/56 "2013-12-06T17:43:29Z")
> [@The\_Controvert](#): > > That’s a good example. It makes me think there could be a rather interesting sequel depicting the consequences of that decision. I’d like to see the humans valiantly attempt to fight off the gods, which proves to be futile and ruinous. As someone once said, perhaps they could slug it out in the PACIFIC RIM. ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579/57 "2013-12-06T18:02:41Z")
In the original \*\*\*Night of the Living Dead \*\*\*by George Romero, the ostensible hero is Ben, the brave, resourceful black man, and the ostensible villain is the buffoonish, loud, Archie Bunkerish middle-aged white guy, Harry. For the entire movie, we’re obviously supposed to be siding with Ben, and to regard Harry with scorn. And yet… Harry is the one who insists all along that everyone should lock themselves down in the basement. Ben says “NO! We must try to fuel up the pickup truck and escape from here!” Ben’s plan gets the young couple burned alive. Does Ben then see Harry’s wisdom? NO! He decides they must stay upstairs and barricade the windows. Ben’s barricades break, and Barbara gets eaten as a result. So, how does Ben himself survive the night? Why, by locking himself in the basement… just like the fat, dumb, bigoted white guy HAD BEEN TELLING HIM TO DO ALL ALONG! ---
**Author:** ![Push\_You\_Down](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/push_you_down/32/9095_2.png) [@Push\_You\_Down](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Push_You_Down)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579/58 "2013-12-06T18:04:42Z")
> [@Don\_Draper](#): > > **28 Weeks Later** : > > The story goes like this (spoilers!) - The eeeeevil U.S. army general issues orders that anyone seen breaking out of the re-settlement camp should be shot on sight. Robert Carlisle’s kids get homesick and sneak out of the camps to visit their old flat. A patrol guard sees them and says (paraphrasing) “Awww…they’re just a couple of widdle kids! I couldn’t shoot _them._” > > The kids discover their mother who was presumably killed and eaten by rage-virus ‘not-zombies.’ Army troops then arrive to take the kids back to the camp. Somebody suggests shooting the mother, but…not in front of the kids, man. And look at her - she’s totally not a raging not-zombie. > > Back at the re-settlement camp, the heroice brave, noble scientist / doctor woman detects the rage virus in the mother, and the eeeeevil U.S. army general wants her killed immediately. The heroic scientist / doctor woman argues that she has a natural immunity to the effects of the virus. Studying her may present an opportunity to create an antidote for the rage syndrome. No dice says the eeeeevil U.S. army general, kill her at once! Even if she is immune to the virus, she could possibly INFECT OTHER PEOPLE. (What an asshole! Right??) > > Anyway, while they are arguing, Robert Carlisle drops in on his wife (in her quarantine isolation cell) and gets himself infected with rage. He promptly kills his wife and then proceeds to run around the camp attacking people and spreading the virus. Hundreds of people are dying; the camp is in chaos. The eeeeevil U.S. army general then orders all the civilians in the camp eliminated. (Man! How much of an asshole can he possibly be??) > > Anyway, a pair of good guy soldiers (man and woman) get the kids out of the camp and an extended chase scene takes place in which they try to outrun both rage virus not-zombies AND clouds of poison gas dispersed by the eeeeeevil U.S. army. (What assholes!!!) > > The kids get separated from the soldiers and stumble around for a while, and the boy gets bitten by a rage virus not-zombie. “Am I infected?” asks the little boy in a quivering voice, “Do I have to be killed now?” His sister assures him that “No, you’re fine.” (Even though she can see the tell-tale sign of the eyes clouding over.) > > The woman soldier finds the kids and gets them to a helicopter landing point. The helicopter pilot is wary of taking two kids along with them, out of the county to France. He’d rather abandon the two kids to a wasteland full of not-zombies and poison gas rather than possibly spread contagion to the continent. (What a jerk!) But the woman soldier assures her that the kids are fine, and taking them away from there is the humane thing to do to save these kids. > > The very last scene of the film shows the wreckage of the helicopter - in France. The helicopter pilot and soldier who took the kids with them (despite quarantine regulations) have been infected with the rage virus by the little boy, and now the rage virus has spread to mainland Europe and quite possibly to all of Euro-Asia. > > All of which could have been avoided if the one officer on patrol obeyed the orders of the eeeeevil U.S. army general and shot the kids on sight when they snuck out of the camp! Actually…the General and the “kill all” order was only “right” in the end because another character (the father) screwed everything up. If he hadn’t broken the quarantine on his wife and got himself infected, everything would have been fine. The mother WAS immune and the scientist needed her alive. The containment and eradication plan clearly needed to be re-evaluated once a new revelation like that came up. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579/59 "2013-12-06T18:06:38Z")
In fairness to Ben, i don’t think you can pin “unlocking the pump via shotgun” on him. Even the best laid plans will come up short when executed by idiots. ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579/60 "2013-12-06T18:08:02Z")
Now for a complete change of genres and a totally different type of villain. Now, a LOT of SDMB regulars seemed to despise the Anthony character in Lynn Johnston’s \*\*\*For Better or Worse \*\*\*comic strip. I never hated Anthony. But Lynn Johnston clearly expected us to loathe Anthony’s cold, bitchy wife Therese. Why? Because Therese was always rude to and jealous of ELizabeth, Anthony’s former girlfriend. Well… as it turned out, wasn’t Therese 100% RIGHT to be hostile to Elizabeth? If she regarded Elizabeth as a threat to her marriage, wasn’t she 100% CORRECT? Anthony NEVER stopped pining away for Lizard Breath, and eventually divorced Therese to be with her. But Johnston couldn’t seem to see ANY reason at all why Therese might be suspicious or jealous of a woman her husband obviously still loved. DUH! She had damn good reasons to hate Elizabeth!!! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/valid-points-made-by-villains/675579.md?page=4)