[Yamiken]

Originally Posted by azul120

You're overlooking the other things she did on-screen (killing unarmed civilians) as possibilities to those ends. And Cornelia wasn't the only one to lose loved ones. She was evidently able to find enough reason for happiness at the end, in that she had Guilford, for one.

I'm not saying Cornelia was guiltless. I'm saying she received more punishment than Ohgi and Villetta (much more, considering they got nil and she got the death and character assassination of her treasured younger sister; as for compensations to outweigh that, yes she has Guilford, but they have each other, and a cosy prime ministerial job for Ohgi) for equal or even slightly less guilt (for the sake of avoiding more argument, let's just call it quits at equal for the time being). Or, in short: she was in need of more punishment, but not to the same extent as Ohgi and Villetta were. In my opinion, anyway. Does that satisfy?

Originally Posted by azul120

But consider that it made him worse than Charles; it would have had to be THAT bad.

Not quite. To be exact, he would have to be seen as worse than Charles' memory. Those are two rather crucial distinctions: between image and actuality, and between memory and present experience. As I've already discussed, certain acts, such as running a police state, are seen as just as bad as others, such as mass murder, because in the long run they are; and since for all the world knew the Demon Emperor was there to stay, quite possibly for many decades, they would indeed be seen as such. However, given that in actuality they only lasted for a few months, whereas violent atrocities like mass murder are instantaneous, they are, in their actuality, not as bad.

In addition, what is present and immediate is, by the nature of human psychology, 'worth more', so to speak, than both memory of past experience and anticipation of future ones. So, the target Lelouch has to reach is further reduced. From both these points, I argue that, in lieu of any concrete evidence to the contrary, Lelouch was not, when the cold, stark facts are considered, as bad as his father.

Originally Posted by azul120

He helped frame the UFN, a legitimate world organization. That takes political leadership talent, something that can be used in peacetime decisions.

A necessary but not sufficient quality. At any rate, my basic objection to the idea that Lelouch would likely have made a good peacetime leader is this: Lelouch works best when he has a concrete goal to work towards. In wartime, he had that: the destruction of the Holy Britannian Empire and all that it represented (whilst keeping Nunnally safe, obviously). In peacetime, things are different; the closest you can come is 'maintaining world peace'. But that's a lot less concrete; lacking any sort of end point, you can't produce a specific road map to achieve it, but rather you have to create and adhere to a set of procedures and principles.

Or, to put it in TV Tropes terms (and I believe you are a fellow troper?): war requires The Unfettered; peace, The Fettered. Lelouch is the former (or at any rate a lot closer to it), and it is my belief that he'd have difficulty transforming himself into the latter.

Again: I'm not saying that Lelouch definitely would have made a bad peacetime leader. I'm just saying that he probably would have made a less than brilliant one.

Originally Posted by azul120

Zero is more than just a symbol. Lelouch basically WAS Zero; a cunning political and charismatic mind. Suzaku possesses none of his oratorical or intellectual skills.

Sure, that's what Zero really was, but I don't think that part would have been necessary in peacetime. The symbol, on the other hand, would have been more necessary than ever. Suzaku's not charismatic, nor is he a genius, no. But charisma is less important when a) you're already well-respected, nay hero-worshipped and b) you're not attempting to rally people in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds and difficulties. As for genius, that's Schneizel's purpose, to act as the new brains of Zero. That was why he got Geass'd rather than killed.

Originally Posted by azul120

No, I don't think Code bearers can negate geass commands. (Or else Lelouch could have requested that C. C. cancel the one placed on Euphie.)

This is getting a little tangential now, but whatever, I'll answer it: when? When would he have done that? Lelouch only made it out after Euphie in time to witness her fire the first shot. By that point, it was too late. There are other factors too: C.C. herself was somewhat incapacitated at the time due to Lelouch's Geass evolving and her contact with Suzaku during that; furthermore, as I've said before, you seem to assume that Lelouch would know about all of C.C.'s abilities. He wouldn't. C.C., at least at that stage, was never fully open with Lelouch; holding back a detail like that would be entirely in character for her. Nevertheless, the point about lack of opportunity is the main one here. The rest is mainly academic.

Originally Posted by azul120

What I mean is that Schneizel wouldn't have to be entirely under Zero's command every single moment. It would only depend on the commands placed by him, which could be vague enough to leave Schneizel to his own thoughts at least every once in a while. Moreover, Geass can be overcome, given enough willpower and motivation. (Ironic in Schneizel's case, I know.) Given the right circumstances, Schneizel could work his way out if it.

The only example we have of a Geass being successfully overcome is Nunnally's regaining of her sight. This, however, is a poor example, being unexplained in its mechanics, or even as to whether the symptom overcome was a primary effect of the Geass in the first place (it does seem to be indicated that Charles' Geass can seal off physical senses as well as other Geasses, but it's not made explicit, and until then the standard explanation was that Nunnally's blindness was psychosomatic, a hypothesis not invalidated by the revelation of Charles' Geass). Plus, it involves Charles' Geass, not Lelouch's, making it an even poorer example. There's no instance of Lelouch's Geass ever being overcome successfully in the series; the most anyone is ever able to do is delay its onset. Euphie and Nunnally both clearly tried very hard to defy it, but Euphie was only able to sort of manage it when she was on the brink of death and her brain was already in the process of shutdown, thus eroding the sway of the Geass, which by all indications is a purely mental thing. Barring some sort of freak occurrence like brain cancer, I think Schneizel's pretty safely under wraps.

Moreover, I reiterate: where's the case that he would cause trouble even if he were to attain some limited freedom from the Geass? I myself always got the impression that Schneizel believed that what he was doing was right for the sake of brining peace to the world. Shown another path, would he necessarily destroy it for the sake of his ideology? Due to my reasoning in the previous paragraph, I consider this point mostly academic, but I feel it worth saying anyway.

Originally Posted by azul120

I disagree with it being the least blood-stained path. He ended up killing more people than he did during his rebellion. Nowhere does it state, on the contrary, that he did it via propaganda. C. C. even lampshades how the people he had assassinated had the right to protest their lost privileges.

Assassination. Not genocide. Bumping off a few, or even a lot of, recalcitrant nobles or dogmatic zealots, or even some well-meaning revolutionaries, isn't pleasant, but it's not the same as the horror and widespread destruction of war. There was, of course, war under Lelouch's watch, but I remain adamant that it was shorter and, overall, less bloody than any other war or collection of wars that would have inevitably occurred had he taken a different path following the final confrontation with his father.

Originally Posted by azul120

You're going down the wrong tangent. I KNOW that the Zero Requiem meant driving everyone else away; that was part of the problem. And you're overlooking the gravity of him making brainwashed faceless meat shield mooks of his soldiers, and detonating Mt. Fuji over them, as well as Japan. Casualties aside, he made it a Luck Based Mission. What I meant was that if he went the Good Leader path, he would realign himself with his former comrades against Schneizel, and have much less of a conflict.

I'm not saying there was no gravity to brainwashing his army. It was one of the things that would have cemented his reputation as a horrible person afterwards. But I am saying that it did have the flipside of absolving his army of any responsibility for following him. That surely has to count for something. In addition, they're soldiers; they ran a high risk of dying whatever happened whilst war was still a fact of life in the world.

And I disagree that there would have been less conflict of the Good Leader route. You forget that the point of the Zero Requiem wasn't just defeating Schneizel; if that had been the case, then yes, you are in fact right, attempting to regain his former allies would have been more productive for that. The point was to remove everything and everyone that might cause future conflicts for the world, to as great a degree as is possible. Therefore, he gave the entire world something to hate equally, and in his short stint as world dictator would, I imagine, have done his best to reorganise things such that other potential incentives for war would be removed (decimating the Britannian aristocracy, for instance). For that reason, I disagree that the Good Leader path, even assuming he could have managed it competently, would have led to less conflict.

Originally Posted by azul120

Ultimately, and I say this knowing full well of what he went through, suicide is a selfish solution, especially with what went down as a consequence, and with that in mind, his real method of penance would have been to actually be a good leader, and fulfill his contract with C. C., taking her immortality. That would have been a much better Pyrrhic Victory for Lelouch.

Yes, suicide as a motive is, in itself, selfish. But just because one has a selfish motive for something doesn't mean one can't have an altruistic motive as well. Indeed, most would say it's impossible for human beings to have purely altruistic motives for anything, for the simple reason that altruism, for the vast majority of us, feels good, which therefore gives us a selfish motive to be altruistic. Ethical theory aside, if suicide had been Lelouch's only motive, he'd have just remained in the world of C or let Suzaku kill him. That wasn't all he was doing. He was trying to make the world a better place at the same time. Whether or not you agree that he was successful (or, perhaps phrased better, should have been successful under realistic expectations), you have to concede at least that much, surely.

Originally Posted by azul120

Only to an extent. Lelouch could have somehow predicted Schneizel's moves and possibly tracked him, given the latter's nature. Waiting for him to come out with more nukes was just naive.

No, it was a sensible appraisal of his opponent. Lelouch thought he could beat Schneizel; that didn't mean he thought he could curb stomp him. He was exercising due caution. Going after Schneizel directly but, for the most part, blindly, could very well have left him fatally open. So he waited, and dealt with some other opponents (such as Bismarck et al.) in the mean time.

Originally Posted by azul120

I don't mind a hopeful ending. What I don't like is one that rings disingenuous.

And that's fair enough. I'm just saying, to me it doesn't ring disingenuous at all. Well, that and that other people, not necessarily you, do seem too cynical to ever like any ending more positive than more-bitter-than-sweet. But since that isn't you, it needn't occupy any great space in this debate.