Why aren't all Hollows killed?

[DMurphy]

Originally Posted by Polarpew

Then there's no need to kill hollows at all I guess since in the end, it's not like those souls matter, whether to us or to them since without memories they aren't the same people even if they have the same souls. Like a mother is only worth being a mother in this life where they have memories of you, when they die then the bonds are severed completely. I suppose we should just value those that are 'alive' rather than the dead.

Now you're just sulking.

You're also deliberately missing the point so that you can sulk more effectively: The point isn't a coldblooded 'well, these people don't matter', it's a 'we can afford to take the time to find a way to save everyone - arrancar and the souls both - because ultimately, whether those souls are freed now or in a thousand years won't make any difference to them. They won't suffer more or less because of it.'

[Saravis4]

Originally Posted by Polarpew

From what I understand from reading Bleach all these years, there is the elephant in the room that everyone seemingly avoids talking about.
Hollows, and why aren't all of them killed on sight?
A hollow is a human soul,

Sayde pretty much covered the main problem with exterminating hollows; balance. However, I would go even further and say that, balance aside, its not even possible to exterminate all hollows. Hollows are potentially born from dead humans. How many humans die in the world of Bleach? How many Hollows are born each and every day. So long as humans exist, exterminating hollows would be futile.

[Polarpew]

Originally Posted by Saravis4

Sayde pretty much covered the main problem with exterminating hollows; balance. However, I would go even further and say that, balance aside, its not even possible to exterminate all hollows. Hollows are potentially born from dead humans. How many humans die in the world of Bleach? How many Hollows are born each and every day. So long as humans exist, exterminating hollows would be futile.

I never meant permanently kill them all, but more along the lines of purifying anything from Gillian and above, maybe store the excess souls and gradually release them into SS. After that you're left with basic level hollows which is the mass majority of the population in HM, at that point you can just set up a quota system so the amount purified at any given point never hits the over saturation point of SS. Since at that point the basic hollows are essentially a single person turned hollow, it won't offend those people who cares about ethical treatment of hollows, by killing them

Also just because people aren't aware that they are in a bad situation doesn't justify not immediately helping them. It's like living with cancer, despite not being aware of it, your doctor does, but he delays treatment since A you're not aware, and B he can always treat you later as long as it's not terminal

[DMurphy]

Originally Posted by Polarpew

Also just because people aren't aware that they are in a bad situation doesn't justify not immediately helping them. It's like living with cancer, despite not being aware of it, your doctor does, but he delays treatment since A you're not aware, and B he can always treat you later as long as it's not terminal

That's a terrible analogy.

For starters, cancer gets worse over time, and treatment (which is always a risky business) gets more difficult and more traumatic the longer you leave it. Also, cancer is always terminal if left untreated (and a decent amount of time, even when treated - there is a very good reason cancer prognoses are given in percentage format), there's no such thing as non-terminal cancer.

Also, exactly what cancer treatment requires murdering another person? Is there some newly discovered form of cancer I don't know about, which is entirely non-fatal and where the most effective treatment is human sacrifice? I did a quick google search for 'cancer cured by stabbing another person to death', but I came up bust.

Not to mention, if that was a thing - a form of cancer only curable by murdering someone else - no society or medical organisation in the world would condone performing that treatment. We would do exactly what you just said, and delay the treatment of those patients while we searched for a better cure.

That's not remotely the same situation as the souls, who are not getting older, not getting sicker, never suggested to be suffering or even conscious, and if they are reincarnated, won't remember anything anyway, and who the prescribed way of freeing does actually involve killing someone.

[Polarpew]

Originally Posted by DMurphy

That's a terrible analogy.

For starters, cancer gets worse over time, and treatment (which is always a risky business) gets more difficult and more traumatic the longer you leave it. Also, cancer is always terminal if left untreated (and a decent amount of time, even when treated - there is a very good reason cancer prognoses are given in percentage format), there's no such thing as non-terminal cancer.

Also, exactly what cancer treatment requires murdering another person? Is there some newly discovered form of cancer I don't know about, which is entirely non-fatal and where the most effective treatment is human sacrifice? I did a quick google search for 'cancer cured by stabbing another person to death', but I came up bust.

Not to mention, if that was a thing - a form of cancer only curable by murdering someone else - no society or medical organisation in the world would condone performing that treatment. We would do exactly what you just said, and delay the treatment of those patients while we searched for a better cure.

That's not remotely the same situation as the souls, who are not getting older, not getting sicker, never suggested to be suffering or even conscious, and if they are reincarnated, won't remember anything anyway, and who the prescribed way of freeing does actually involve killing someone.

Yea it was a bad analogy, but I feel we're going off tangent. It seems to me, for a lack of better solution you're more willing to maintain the status quo and wash your hands of the responsibility. Rather than view the issue from the outside as an observer without anything to risk, try to see it through the eyes of a Shinigami. Yes in a perfect ideal situation we can deal with hypotheticals of saving hollows after waiting for a future scientist to join the ranks of the Gotei 13, as they have now, to come up with a solution. I just feel a bit annoyed at how the situation just seems to get worse and worse for so many years while hoping a solution will come along when something could be done about it immediately. The longer you wait, the more time potential Adjuchas and above will come into being and more and more people you can't kill because of influx of souls released hurts the balance. That's not to even mention hollows killing each other for reasons besides consuming, damning all those souls that are not purified to being destroyed since a shinigami didn't do the killing. Base hollows are more inclined to eat each other, preserving the souls whereas a cero to the face would destroy the sum total souls of the defeated hollow

[Saravis4]

Originally Posted by Polarpew

I never meant permanently kill them all, but more along the lines of purifying anything from Gillian and above, maybe store the excess souls and gradually release them into SS.

I still don't think you realize just how impossible of a task what your suggesting is. According to google, in the real world, over 6,000 people die every hour. If Bleach's world is anything like ours, then that means potentially 6,000 hollows every hour and thus potentially multiple gillians every hour. That is a possibility that the Shinigami would have to deal with for every hour of every day until the unforeseeable end of humanity. At that point, forget Soul Society, there would be no point in the Shinigami leaving Hueco Mundo.

As for storing the souls, even if that is possible, which I'd question, the problem with that is that the number of souls going in would be greater than the number of souls going out. The storage device would have an ever increasing number, resulting in the same imbalance problem.

[DMurphy]

Originally Posted by Polarpew

Yea it was a bad analogy, but I feel we're going off tangent. It seems to me, for a lack of better solution you're more willing to maintain the status quo and wash your hands of the responsibility. Rather than view the issue from the outside as an observer without anything to risk, try to see it through the eyes of a Shinigami. Yes in a perfect ideal situation we can deal with hypotheticals of saving hollows after waiting for a future scientist to join the ranks of the Gotei 13, as they have now, to come up with a solution. I just feel a bit annoyed at how the situation just seems to get worse and worse for so many years while hoping a solution will come along when something could be done about it immediately.

No, no, no, no, no, you were the one who brought up that analogy, and it's hilarious, you can't just brush it under the carpet now that you realise how stupid it was. I still want to know about this non-terminal, painless cancer which can only be cured with murder, it sounds fascinating.

(Between this, and the weird sulking earlier, I'm starting to think you're a tad too emotionally attached to the fate of fictional cartoon ghosts, but let's run with that, okay.)

Here is the thing: Nobody in-universe would actually be risking anything by working on a peaceful solution. At all. No risk.

As we've already established, there isn't any risk to the souls involved, because they are unageing and eternal, not suffering, and won't remember any of this. None of the souls involved are at risk here.

There also presumably isn't any serious risk to the balance of souls, since it was functioning just fine pre Winter War, where we can fairly assume that nearly zero Gillians, Adjuchas, and Vasto Lordes were being killed, since Rukia had only ever heard of one appearing from her textbooks, despite being close to two captains and a lieutenant.

Also, nobody would need to wait for a future scientist to join their ranks. Urahara, Mayuri, and Hikifune are all already there. We're not waiting for them to appear, they're there, and not on terrible terms with each other. You're probably also overestimating how long it would take, given that the technology to create a functional soul already exists, and Urahara has already been researching Hollows for over a century.

Also, if we're talking about how souls shouldn't be trapped together to form emergent personalities and should be freed immediately, then you also need to destroy all zanpakuto, since it's canon now that they're created almost exactly the same way as Menos are, just with less eating involved.

Actually, I would think that should be a higher priority than killing off arrancar, since zanpakuto take their personalities from their wielders anyway - they're not true, emergent people. #BreakAllZanpakuto2016.

[Polarpew]

Originally Posted by DMurphy

No, no, no, no, no, you were the one who brought up that analogy, and it's hilarious, you can't just brush it under the carpet now that you realise how stupid it was. I still want to know about this non-terminal, painless cancer which can only be cured with murder, it sounds fascinating.

(Between this, and the weird sulking earlier, I'm starting to think you're a tad too emotionally attached to the fate of fictional cartoon ghosts, but let's run with that, okay.)

Here is the thing: Nobody in-universe would actually be risking anything by working on a peaceful solution. At all. No risk.

As we've already established, there isn't any risk to the souls involved, because they are unageing and eternal, not suffering, and won't remember any of this. None of the souls involved are at risk here.

There also presumably isn't any serious risk to the balance of souls, since it was functioning just fine pre Winter War, where we can fairly assume that nearly zero Gillians, Adjuchas, and Vasto Lordes were being killed, since Rukia had only ever heard of one appearing from her textbooks, despite being close to two captains and a lieutenant.

Also, nobody would need to wait for a future scientist to join their ranks. Urahara, Mayuri, and Hikifune are all already there. We're not waiting for them to appear, they're there, and not on terrible terms with each other. You're probably also overestimating how long it would take, given that the technology to create a functional soul already exists, and Urahara has already been researching Hollows for over a century.

Also, if we're talking about how souls shouldn't be trapped together to form emergent personalities and should be freed immediately, then you also need to destroy all zanpakuto, since it's canon now that they're created almost exactly the same way as Menos are, just with less eating involved.

Actually, I would think that should be a higher priority than killing off arrancar, since zanpakuto take their personalities from their wielders anyway - they're not true, emergent people. #BreakAllZanpakuto2016.

Now who is brushing things under the carpet? The author already stated only shinigami can purify souls to absolve them of sins and send them to soul society, Quincy remnants were killed almost to the last for destroying souls, yes you heard it right, Destroyed, souls are not indestructible. Any other method of hollows dying from consumption and shinigami purification is resulting in the complete destruction of souls. Regular hollows are driven by hunger to consume in order to evolve, same with Gillians, those above can think without the all consuming hunger driving them, so for the most part they kill each other. Starrk's mere existence was killing any hollow below Vasto Lorde by sheer proximity hence eradicating their congregate souls, Barragan was acting tyrant in HM killing others on a whim. We're dealing with a net loss of souls. Im pretty sure destroying souls is considered a sin that is a one way ticket to hell when they die, not matter how unintentional the act is

If you insist on keeping bringing up cancer, great it was bad analogy, want to keep attacking it like Donald Trump? We're not pointing fingers at who is more morally correct but how to solve the greatest crisis in Bleach

[DMurphy]

Originally Posted by Polarpew

Now who is brushing things under the carpet? The author already stated only shinigami can purify souls to absolve them of sins and send them to soul society, Quincy remnants were killed almost to the last for destroying souls, yes you heard it right, Destroyed, souls are not indestructible. Any other method of hollows dying from consumption and shinigami purification is resulting in the complete destruction of souls. Regular hollows are driven by hunger to consume in order to evolve, same with Gillians, those above can think without the all consuming hunger driving them, so for the most part they kill each other. Starrk's mere existence was killing any hollow below Vasto Lorde by sheer proximity hence eradicating their congregate souls, Barragan was acting tyrant in HM killing others on a whim. We're dealing with a net loss of souls. Im pretty sure destroying souls is considered a sin that is a one way ticket to hell when they die, not matter how unintentional the act is

If you insist on keeping bringing up cancer, great it was bad analogy, want to keep attacking it like Donald Trump? We're not pointing fingers at who is more morally correct but how to solve the greatest crisis in Bleach

You're getting piqued again. It's not doing wonders for your coherence. Or your analogies, since I'm not sure a literal fascist is necessarily the strongest analogy for someone pointing out that you said something stupid. I'm also not going to let you forget that analogy, either, just so you're not surprised when I bring it up again.

(Although it's interesting that you should mention a fascist, since on an in-universe level, you're proposing genocide. Since that's what we call attempting to wipe out a large group of people who share a common trait. I want to be entirely clear that that's not meant to be a moral judgement on you, since it's fiction and this isn't a real group of people, but it would be an in-universe moral concern.)

The thing is, you're now rather abruptly hinging your argument on 'well, some Hollows kill each other! And it's permanent! So they all have to be purified, even though that would result in some sapient people dying!' but that's a separate issue. Some people kill each other, and that's permanent, but we don't respond by wiping out humankind, we respond by imprisoning murderers. With the exception of societies that have poor human rights records in general, we don't even kill convicted murderers themselves.

(Arguably, Soul Society is a society with a terrible human rights record already, but presumably under Kyoraku they're at least trying to be better.)

Also, you still haven't addressed the whole thing where zanpakuto are also made up of a multitude of souls - which we know can also end up killed permanently, since a zanpakuto destroyed in bankai can't regenerate. Captains are constantly putting hundreds or thousands of souls at risk.

Also, your basic grammar is slipping the more and more needlessly emotional you get about this. That's not a point against any of your arguments, it just makes them kind of difficult to parse.

[Polarpew]

I'm utterly confused why we keep bringing up the ethics behind all this topic of killing. Killing is killing, in order to preserve the souls of hollows, and given with what Shinigami is currently equipped with, hollows need to die. Is that genocide? Is it morally evil to commit such an act? Why yes, it is on both counts, still doesn't change that through inaction countless many more souls are being destroyed.

In your point about Zanpakuto endangering souls, they were made for the sole purpose of purifying a greater amount of hollows to cleanse souls and send them to SS, otherwise all shinigami would be doing it by using hand to hand or kido to purify hollows. So yes, I agree that the creation process of Zanpakuto is unseemly, but if there was a better way, I'm sure they would have done so. And maybe they should, but given what they have, they make do.

[DMurphy]

"I'm utterly confused why we keep bringing up the ethics behind killing," is a sentence that would sound absolutely psychotic if we weren't talking about fictional beings, just as a side note. Which when you consider that you seem to have forgotten a few times so far that we are talking about fictional beings, might be a touch concerning.

But if this was only about making sure souls aren't destroyed - and we're both well aware that that's not the crux of your argument, since you only brought it up after having every single one of your other points thoroughly rebutted - then there's a simple way around that: Establish a Hollow civilisation under the rule Las Noches.

Exterminating all Hollows is morally incorrect and, as others have said, practically impossible: Establishing a society under the rule of a benevolent Hollow government is not - in fact, we know it's not impossible, because Baraggan had reigned as king over Hueco Mundo for years, with a sizable court, it's just that he didn't care if people died. Aizen ruled over Hueco Mundo as well, with Hollows inside and outside the walls of Las Noches under his command, so clearly it is possible to govern it.

Establish a government, lay down laws against murder, imprison those who break those laws. Problem solved.

In which case, why is there even anything to discuss? It's heavily implied that Harribel is already doing that.

[Polarpew]

sure peaceful government would tremendously help in preventing deaths of hollows from other means. doesn't really help basic hollows to Adjuchas from killing each other since their nature forces them to commit murder. They need to eat souls, not out of nutritional needs but an overpowering instinct. So I guess the law should only be applied to Adjuchas and above, while finding a way to prevent Adjuchas from going insane without feeding on souls. What you mentioned before about preserving personalities would be nice, if they could make a faux body for the hollows, but then you need to be able to convince Harribel and the other hollows to willingly allow themselves to be killed so the souls get purified while they occupy new bodies, thus giving up their power in the process (gonna need someone to take over the government to enforce the laws on hollows by force)

[DMurphy]

Gosh, I need to sleep, but bit by bit:

1) No evidence at all that Adjuchas go insane if they can't eat other Hollows, you literally just made that up. We know for a fact the main motivation for Adjuchas eating others is so that they can become more powerful and survive people trying to eat them - it's a vicious cycle of 'I need to survive people trying to eat me so I have to eat others so they have to try to eat people to survive' that can be broken by a sufficiently powerful government choosing to protect them.

2) We know that that instinct isn't overpowering. Starrk and Harribel never show any interest in eating others, and it's implied that Nel doesn't either.

3) If there were new bodies for them to inhabit, I very much doubt people like Harribel and Starrk would care about the reduction in powers - which is assuming there even would be one.

4) By giving Menos an escape from being Menos, such as by formulating a way to preserve their personalities in new bodies, you would break the 'eat or be eaten' cycle anyway, so a reduction in powers wouldn't matter.

[schedmaster]

Close this thread already please. This is getting ridiculous.

[sayde]

Originally Posted by Saravis4

I still don't think you realize just how impossible of a task what your suggesting is. According to google, in the real world, over 6,000 people die every hour. If Bleach's world is anything like ours, then that means potentially 6,000 hollows every hour and thus potentially multiple gillians every hour. That is a possibility that the Shinigami would have to deal with for every hour of every day until the unforeseeable end of humanity. At that point, forget Soul Society, there would be no point in the Shinigami leaving Hueco Mundo.

As for storing the souls, even if that is possible, which I'd question, the problem with that is that the number of souls going in would be greater than the number of souls going out. The storage device would have an ever increasing number, resulting in the same imbalance problem.

Yeah. Setting aside all the other parts of this debate going on (from ethics and zanpakuto's) and focusing strictly on the direct issue of why it's not possible given the current rules established in the Bleach universe, this sums up everything I would've said far more concisely and succinctly then I ever could. (So thank you Saravis4.) Either way, while we could come up with some theoretical (and rather simple) solutions to solve the problem, anything truly worthwhile would probably involve introducing, changing, or bending established Bleach universe rules that none of us have the creative authority to claim as an absolute possibility.


For example, I could say, why can't the bright minds of this series create a spirit particle converter that converts the endless sands of HM into edible nourishment for hollows so they can be content and not have to eat each other to survive? That would solve the issue of more menos being created. And those normal hollows caught eating other hollows could then be sent to hell since the act of eating hollows at that point would be turned into a completely avoidable and voluntary choice. And then why not have the bright minds of soul society follow this up by creating a weapon that when used on a pre-existing menos class hollow, splits all those souls back into the normal hollows through which they came? But I don't have the creative authority to assume that's possible. lol

I agree with the TC in that this is a problem and it's indeed one of the aspects of Bleach's universe that sucks to no end. And it'd be nice to somehow reform the universe to bring guaranteed salvation to fallen souls trapped in HM in due time. But it's not the sort of elephant in the room-like easily solvable situation that any of us can simply say "wow! Why didn't we just do it this way all along! *duh*"

Maybe Aizen had a good plan to fix this. And maybe that's why he wanted to dethrone the soul king. Who knows? But as far as I see it, unless a convincing idea is proposed that stays within the known rules and boundaries set by Kubo, I see no point in debating this topic further. Reasons for why a storage system for excess souls wouldn't work has already been stated. First we'd have to take creative authority to assume it's possible to make. And then it'd be little more than a very brief bandaid that would not do anything to permanently fix the imbalance dilemma. Is there anything else we can come up with that sounds doable and plot-hole proof?

[Kafriel]

Remember in the non-canon bleach anime that time when Ichigo met that one guy in the menos forest who spent literally all of his life fighting hollows...and how it made no visible difference whatsoever?

Shinigami are very limited in number compared to plus souls and hollows. The ones who can cause serious mass destruction are captains and their lieutenants, who generally don't leave seireitei and command their divisions, or keep training. Way back in the first BLEACH arc, Byakuya had to make a move because Ichigo was an anomaly, and even then, he had to suppress his power manyfold before moving through realms.

So, assuming the Gotei13 really did want to exterminate all hollows, how would they move about it? Stark and Barragan had been around since before Aizen's gambit and they had enough power to pretty much destroy SS by themselves - sending captains to HM would leave SS vulnerable to surgical strikes, so it wouldn't be a viable option, but anything less would most definitely die horribly, as they almost did many times when fighting the Espada.

I, on the other hand, have a much more prominent question: does Ichigo's Zangetsu purify hollows? It is a quincy-powered sword, so it should have the same effect as Ishida's arrows, i.e. erase the hollow's souls from existence. When he purified Sora, he had used Rukia's borrowed power to do it, so that made sense...but what about everything he did after awakening from Urahara's deep shaft? What percentage of shinigami power is required to purify instead of kill, because arrancar also possess shinigami qualities. Are kido kills allowed, since they make no use of the sword? What's the minimum fee for soul disruption and how many years in jail are offenders due?

[amtro]

I am compelled to insult you all, but I'll refrain. Instead I'll ask, do any of you even read Bleach?
Hollows are an absolute necessity. They are part of the natural balance of souls. Upset the balance and the realms start bleeding into each other and collapsing. In simpler terms, if the balance collapses everything ends.

[sayde]

Originally Posted by amtro

I am compelled to insult you all, but I'll refrain. Instead I'll ask, do any of you even read Bleach?

Don't be an ass. If you actually read through the thread, you'd see your point has been brought up. Numerous times in fact.