Fate/stay night Game discussion (Warning: Spoilers)

[Tenchi Hou Take]

Originally Posted by Altima of the Gates

Why didn't Rin detect when Sakura went out of the house? They had already confined her to her room. The shadow itself manifested on it's own and spread (you do know it can teleport through shadows right?) well Rin had no knowledge of that fact, and she was the most intelligent magus there. And Rin kept familiars on Sakura at all times. It is not that Sakura was free to go wherever she pleased. The Shadow could break through all of the wards and warnings they had, and Rin did use a few of them, if you read the scenes properly. Unfortunately, it was out of their hands.

Honestly, and what would most of the people arguing these points do? Throw the girl away and kill her. Playing right into the hands of one or both of the main villains, causing what could have been an even bigger catastrophe. Yeah, nice job heroes. You couldn't save a girl suffering (I'll not even consider 'mercy-killing' to be 'saving' here, since I stand by the alternatives I proposed. ) or the people who will be killed when the idiots get trolled.

Look the so-called 'righteous busybodies' here. If you want to say flat out, that letting her live while people were dying is wrong, then I say that refusing to see the obvious alternatives and instead go for the quickest route without knowing a damn thing of the situation is the stupidest, most short-sighted thing I've ever seen. What if the curse wasn't stopped with her death? What if all you did was kill her consciousness by trying, which succumbed to despair, and you just had full AM without Sakura's id to at least keep it in check? What if Zouken had gotten the body. And it would be all too late to say whoops or to apologize to Sakura after shit went wrong.

Seriously, for all the bluster in this conversation, there continues to be the same blind, fanatical, narrow viewpoint. That was the one thing that pissed me off greatly in HF; that intelligent people refused to think, or rather, too stubborn in their ways.



Careful, you are making a very general statement here.

Your missing the heart of the problem here. It's not that there was completely no other options. It's that even if there were none Shirou would never have given up even if it humanity was destroyed. If you can say this is okay then you pretty much have no morality. You might as well condone a mass murder killing thousands for a high or a dictator killing thousands of people because he believed they were scum that needed to be removed or rapist raping women because he wanted.They all commited horrendous crimes for personal reasons and Shirou is no better than any of them he even states this himself.

That's why people dislike Shirou's choice and the supposed theme of heavens feel. It's basically saying whatever the hell you want and don't worry about the consequences.

[Cherry_Lover]

Originally Posted by Flinch

As long as people are not tools, I don't care what form of government is in control.

And Gaius did more for Rome than MANY emperors could ever dream of, and seizing power for him also meant that for the good of Rome, because he wanted Rome to prosper more than anything else.

But the whole point of such an autocratic system is that it does use people as tools, "for the good of the country". After all, if you're thinking of people as statistics rather than as humans (as your ideal implies), then what's wrong with forcefully conscripting people into the army to benefit the country, or making them do any other kind of work you feel like making them do? The only way to avoid treating people as tools is to think of them as individual humans with human rights, and as soon as you do that it becomes much harder to justify killing one of them "just in case" (of course, killing in self-defense of in the defense of others is entirely different, but Shirou wasn't doing that, because Sakura was not in the process of harming people and nor was she certain to do so at a later date).

Originally Posted by Arbitres

In the whole game thread defense, it's Cherry-tan and Alty that keeps railing it back on HF.

No, it's not. The original discussion was about whether Shirou loved Sakura or Rin. Flinch dragged it onto HF, by saying that Shirou should have killed Sakura. I merely responded to his comment.

Please stop blaming us for stuff that we're not responsible for. It takes two sides to have an argument, after all, and you, Flinch and Tenchi are every bit as "guilty" as me and Altima are of dragging topics into HF arguments and making sure they continue.

Also, Julius wasn't a hero.

Yeah, this....

I'd personally would have gone with Batman.

What, you mean the guy who won't even kill the Joker, and who put saving the girl he loved before saving the guy who was essential to the well-being of Gotham City?

Yeah, good example....

It's ideological as well as a preference on handling things. Just like you and cherry-tan's being about saving Sakura.

Well, of course. However, to me, the idea of killing an innocent person as the first resort is both extremely foolish and very dangerous. You only have to look at Kiritsugu to see what that attitude results in (castigating himself for not killing a hotel full of people so that he could get a little closer to winning the Grail War). Once you accept that human lives are expendable and should be thrown away at the first sign that it might be the better option, it's very easy to fall into killing considerably more people than you strictly need to, and even into killing people for causes which do not actually outweigh the lives lost.

No human being can fairly judge the lives of others and work out who is and who isn't worth saving, and if they try, it is very difficult to avoid falling off the slippery slope and killing people for trivial reasons or to achieve more mundane goals (like Kiritsugu attempting to win the Grail and wish for "world peace", even though that is probably not a good thing to wish for, even on a non corrupted Grail).

My biggest quip is with Shirou though, not Sakura. So you two have no need to get defensive-aggressive.

Well, a) just because we like Sakura, that doesn't mean that we don't like Shirou and b) you're saying that Shirou should have murdered Sakura in the route where she gets her only happy ending....

Same goes with you and Cherry-tan.

What? Objecting to murdering an entirely innocent girl is "narrow minded"?

Originally Posted by Haak

They don't change. This is Shirou in HF already...

But, prior to making that decision, he's not "in HF already". There are two ways it could go (either into HF, or not into HF), and prior to that point Shirou has acted exactly the same in the two different routes, with no difference in his thought processes or motivations (which includes feelings for Sakura).

Does he suddenly retroactively change his feelings and intentions in those scenes depending on which option you pick?

Originally Posted by Haak

They don't change. This is Shirou in HF already...

But, prior to making that decision, he's not "in HF already". There are two ways it could go (either into HF, or not into HF), and prior to that point Shirou has acted exactly the same in the two different routes, with no difference in his thought processes or motivations (which includes feelings for Sakura).

Does he suddenly retroactively change his feelings and intentions in those scenes depending on which option you pick?

Originally Posted by Tenchi Hou Take

Your missing the heart of the problem here. It's not that there was completely no other options. It's that even if there were none Shirou would never have given up even if it humanity was destroyed. If you can say this is okay then you pretty much have no morality. You might as well condone a mass murder killing thousands for a high or a dictator killing thousands of people because he believed they were scum that needed to be removed or rapist raping women because he wanted.They all commited horrendous crimes for personal reasons and Shirou is no better than any of them he even states this himself.

That's why people dislike Shirou's choice and the supposed theme of heavens feel. It's basically saying whatever the hell you want and don't worry about the consequences.

Except that you have absolutely no evidence of this, because he was never in a position where there weren't any other options.

Shirou's intentions when refusing to kill Sakura the first time around (in MoS) was quite clear. If she went insane, he would kill her in order to prevent her killing others. Similarly, there's no indication that, had she genuinely been impossible to save in the final battle, he'd have just let her live and destroy the world. Indeed, he is quite willing to trace the weapon that Rin supposedly intends to use to kill her, with the obvious implication being that, were he indeed not able to save her, Rin would kill her instead.

It's quite clear to me that, as far as Shirou was concerned, he would far rather Sakura die than her to remain Dark and destroy the world (unlike Rider, who would prefer Sakura to live no matter what), for her own good as well as for that of the world. However, he was never actually forced to make this decision, because there was always hope, and just because he doesn't know of another option at that moment, that doesn't mean that he won't discover one later on.

[Arbitres]

No, it's not. The original discussion was about whether Shirou loved Sakura or Rin. Flinch dragged it onto HF, by saying that Shirou should have killed Sakura. I merely responded to his comment.

Please stop blaming us for stuff that we're not responsible for. It takes two sides to have an argument, after all, and you, Flinch and Tenchi are every bit as "guilty" as me and Altima are of dragging topics into HF arguments and making sure they continue.

Oh, really? Wellt hat is definitely something new. Sorry about that, since I figured it was a safe assumption you two were. I retract my original statement then, if that's the case.

What? Objecting to murdering an entirely innocent girl is "narrow minded"?

What? Objecting to mass murder is "Authoritarianism"?

No human being can fairly judge the lives of others and work out who is and who isn't worth saving, and if they try, it is very difficult to avoid falling off the slippery slope and killing people for trivial reasons or to achieve more mundane goals (like Kiritsugu attempting to win the Grail and wish for "world peace", even though that is probably not a good thing to wish for, even on a non corrupted Grail).

If you say so, I'm definitely leaving the argument to the ones that have something to say besides their opinions and "X is why X is Y".

I, however, do agree with the Kiritsugu bit. If he hadn't lost himself to that ideology he probably would have saved more people, but not all cases are the same. But whatever, someone else can pick this up.

[Haak]

Originally Posted by Cherry_Lover

But, prior to making that decision, he's not "in HF already". There are two ways it could go (either into HF, or not into HF), and prior to that point Shirou has acted exactly the same in the two different routes, with no difference in his thought processes or motivations (which includes feelings for Sakura).

Does he suddenly retroactively change his feelings and intentions in those scenes depending on which option you pick?

No it doesn't. Choosing the Sakura choice at the start doesn't change him. The choice doesn't change him. The choice simply reflects who he already is. If you make the last Sakura decision, then Shirou doesn't change. It simply shows Shirou was Sakura-centric all along. If you don't, then it turns out that Shirou wasn't Sakura-centric all along.

Originally Posted by Altima of the Gates

Honestly, and what would most of the people arguing these points do? Throw the girl away and kill her. Playing right into the hands of one or both of the main villains, causing what could have been an even bigger catastrophe. Yeah, nice job heroes. You couldn't save a girl suffering (I'll not even consider 'mercy-killing' to be 'saving' here, since I stand by the alternatives I proposed. ) or the people who will be killed when the idiots get trolled.

Look the so-called 'righteous busybodies' here. If you want to say flat out, that letting her live while people were dying is wrong, then I say that refusing to see the obvious alternatives and instead go for the quickest route without knowing a damn thing of the situation is the stupidest, most short-sighted thing I've ever seen. What if the curse wasn't stopped with her death? What if all you did was kill her consciousness by trying, which succumbed to despair, and you just had full AM without Sakura's id to at least keep it in check? What if Zouken had gotten the body. And it would be all too late to say whoops or to apologize to Sakura after shit went wrong.

We're talking about Shirou here, not the player. Shirou doesn't know that killing her would be playing right into their hands.

Ultimately all you can do is make a decision based on what you know, and if you don't feel you know enough, you try and find out as much as you can. Shirou didn't choose not to kill Sakura because he felt he didn't have all the information yet. He chose not to kill her simply because he loved her and didn't want to kill her, regardless of the consequences.

I don't think Shirou not killing her the first time was a bad move because Shirou said right afterwards to Tohsaka that they were acting too quickly. He did feel that he didn't have all the information at that time. But the second time he decided that he would not kill Sakura even if it did endanger the lives of others, and he genuinely didn't believe that there was any other way. I'm not going to say that's wrong but I do think that's morally ambiguous.

You said acting too quickly can be stupid but being indecisive can be equally stupid and that's exactly what Shirou did. When murders were talking place and Shirou was hearing about them, he knew of the connection to Sakura but didn't want to admit to it. He simply didn't want to confront it. Even if there was nothing he could do, he didn't know that there was nothing he can do (and we all know that there being nothing he can do has never stopped him from trying before). I'd say that's morally ambiguous aswell.

[Tenchi Hou Take]

Originally Posted by Cherry_Lover

But the whole point of such an autocratic system is that it does use people as tools, "for the good of the country". After all, if you're thinking of people as statistics rather than as humans (as your ideal implies), then what's wrong with forcefully conscripting people into the army to benefit the country, or making them do any other kind of work you feel like making them do? The only way to avoid treating people as tools is to think of them as individual humans with human rights, and as soon as you do that it becomes much harder to justify killing one of them "just in case" (of course, killing in self-defense of in the defense of others is entirely different, but Shirou wasn't doing that, because Sakura was not in the process of harming people and nor was she certain to do so at a later date).



No, it's not. The original discussion was about whether Shirou loved Sakura or Rin. Flinch dragged it onto HF, by saying that Shirou should have killed Sakura. I merely responded to his comment.

Please stop blaming us for stuff that we're not responsible for. It takes two sides to have an argument, after all, and you, Flinch and Tenchi are every bit as "guilty" as me and Altima are of dragging topics into HF arguments and making sure they continue.



Yeah, this....



What, you mean the guy who won't even kill the Joker, and who put saving the girl he loved before saving the guy who was essential to the well-being of Gotham City?

Yeah, good example....



Well, of course. However, to me, the idea of killing an innocent person as the first resort is both extremely foolish and very dangerous. You only have to look at Kiritsugu to see what that attitude results in (castigating himself for not killing a hotel full of people so that he could get a little closer to winning the Grail War). Once you accept that human lives are expendable and should be thrown away at the first sign that it might be the better option, it's very easy to fall into killing considerably more people than you strictly need to, and even into killing people for causes which do not actually outweigh the lives lost.

No human being can fairly judge the lives of others and work out who is and who isn't worth saving, and if they try, it is very difficult to avoid falling off the slippery slope and killing people for trivial reasons or to achieve more mundane goals (like Kiritsugu attempting to win the Grail and wish for "world peace", even though that is probably not a good thing to wish for, even on a non corrupted Grail).



Well, a) just because we like Sakura, that doesn't mean that we don't like Shirou and b) you're saying that Shirou should have murdered Sakura in the route where she gets her only happy ending....



What? Objecting to murdering an entirely innocent girl is "narrow minded"?



But, prior to making that decision, he's not "in HF already". There are two ways it could go (either into HF, or not into HF), and prior to that point Shirou has acted exactly the same in the two different routes, with no difference in his thought processes or motivations (which includes feelings for Sakura).

Does he suddenly retroactively change his feelings and intentions in those scenes depending on which option you pick?

But, prior to making that decision, he's not "in HF already". There are two ways it could go (either into HF, or not into HF), and prior to that point Shirou has acted exactly the same in the two different routes, with no difference in his thought processes or motivations (which includes feelings for Sakura).

Does he suddenly retroactively change his feelings and intentions in those scenes depending on which option you pick?



Except that you have absolutely no evidence of this, because he was never in a position where there weren't any other options.

Shirou's intentions when refusing to kill Sakura the first time around (in MoS) was quite clear. If she went insane, he would kill her in order to prevent her killing others. Similarly, there's no indication that, had she genuinely been impossible to save in the final battle, he'd have just let her live and destroy the world. Indeed, he is quite willing to trace the weapon that Rin supposedly intends to use to kill her, with the obvious implication being that, were he indeed not able to save her, Rin would kill her instead.

It's quite clear to me that, as far as Shirou was concerned, he would far rather Sakura die than her to remain Dark and destroy the world (unlike Rider, who would prefer Sakura to live no matter what), for her own good as well as for that of the world. However, he was never actually forced to make this decision, because there was always hope, and just because he doesn't know of another option at that moment, that doesn't mean that he won't discover one later on.

Umm how about the the fact that he said he would NEVER give up on Sakura. Don't you understand the implacations of said word in rergards to Shirou. Shirou's the type of person that would chase after the impossible knowing full well that it was impossible. It's a driving theme of Shirou's character.

Did you completely ignore the parts of the story where Rin asks Shirou several times what he would do if Sakura couldn't be saved. He replies every time that he would keep on chasing. The story couldn't have made it blatant enough that Shirou would never ever give up on Sakura.

[Cherry_Lover]

Originally Posted by Arbitres

Oh, really? Wellt hat is definitely something new. Sorry about that, since I figured it was a safe assumption you two were. I retract my original statement then, if that's the case.

Well, don't make such assumptions in the future.

Like I said, an argument always requires there to be two sides.

What? Objecting to mass murder is "Authoritarianism"?

No, but no-one here is condoning "mass murder"....

If you say so, I'm definitely leaving the argument to the ones that have something to say besides their opinions and "X is why X is Y".

I, however, do agree with the Kiritsugu bit. If he hadn't lost himself to that ideology he probably would have saved more people, but not all cases are the same. But whatever, someone else can pick this up.

Well, that's the point.

Shirou may have saved more people in MoS than in HF (but, even that's not certain, because in the process of discarding Sakura he made it substantially more difficult for himself to win, because he also alienated all of his potential allies), but in general taking that attitude won't. HF Shirou's attitude (by which I mean "the attitude he took after the MoS decision") is a far more sensible one, in most cases. It just so happens that things were a lot worse than he had any reason to suspect (because there's no way he could have known that the shadow was caused by Sakura at that point), and thus killing her may well have saved more people (in the short-term, at least).

Originally Posted by Haak

No it doesn't. Choosing the Sakura choice at the start doesn't change him. The choice doesn't change him. The choice simply reflects who he already is. If you make the last Sakura decision, then Shirou doesn't change. It simply shows Shirou was Sakura-centric all along. If you don't, then it turns out that Shirou wasn't Sakura-centric all along.

But his thought processes are exactly the same in both routes prior to that decision. It makes no sense for that to be the case if he is less Sakura-centric in one route than the other.

We're talking about Shirou here, not the player. Shirou doesn't know that killing her would be playing right into their hands.

Perhaps, but he should have.

Ultimately all you can do is make a decision based on what you know, and if you don't feel you know enough, you try and find out as much as you can. Shirou didn't choose not to kill Sakura because he felt he didn't have all the information yet. He chose not to kill her simply because he loved her and didn't want to kill her, regardless of the consequences.

Maybe, but given that he didn't have all the information, choosing to kill her would be a rash decision. She was not a direct danger, and he openly accepted that if she were to go insane, he would have to kill her before she could hurt anyone else.

I don't think Shirou not killing her the first time was a bad move because Shirou said right afterwards to Tohsaka that they were acting too quickly. He did feel that he didn't have all the information at that time. But the second time he decided that he would not kill Sakura even if it did endanger the lives of others, and he genuinely didn't believe that there was any other way. I'm not going to say that's wrong but I do think that's morally ambiguous.

Well, no, he didn't. He made the decision to kill her but, when he tried, simply couldn't go through with it. That's an understandable reaction to killing an entirely innocent girl who you dearly love....

You said acting too quickly can be stupid but being indecisive can be equally stupid and that's exactly what Shirou did. When murders were talking place and Shirou was hearing about them, he knew of the connection to Sakura but didn't want to admit to it. He simply didn't want to confront it. Even if there was nothing he could do, he didn't know that there was nothing he can do (and we all know that there being nothing he can do has never stopped him from trying before). I'd say that's morally ambiguous aswell.

That's called human nature. He didn't want to admit that she was "responsible" for the shadow, just like he didn't want to admit to himself that he had feelings for her, and just like he and Rin didn't want to see how awful her life really was.

Originally Posted by Tenchi Hou Take

Umm how about the the fact that he said he would NEVER give up on Sakura. Don't you understand the implacations of said word in rergards to Shirou. Shirou's the type of person that would chase after the impossible knowing full well that it was impossible. It's a driving theme of Shirou's character.

Possibly, but that's no more true in HF than in other routes. It's not that Shirou is willing to let Sakura kill innocents, it's that Shirou is simply not ever going give up thinking that she can be saved.

Did you completely ignore the parts of the story where Rin asks Shirou several times what he would do if Sakura couldn't be saved. He replies every time that he would keep on chasing. The story couldn't have made it blatant enough that Shirou would never ever give up on Sakura.

Yeah, but if she were actually harming people at that point, he would stop her, even if it meant killing her. He would not allow her to destroy the world.

There is a difference between "knowing" Sakura can't be saved (like Rin does in the church...) and actually knowing that she can't be saved. There is no way that a human being can ever truly make that decision, but nevertheless it's clear from his actions in HF that, were Shirou forced to make the choice between killing Sakura and allowing her to destroy the world, he would have killed her.

[Haak]

Originally Posted by Cherry_Lover

But his thought processes are exactly the same in both routes prior to that decision. It makes no sense for that to be the case if he is less Sakura-centric in one route than the other.

I don't see why not. Prior to that decision we can't really tell either way. We don't know. This choice confirms it one way or the other.

Perhaps, but he should have.

Hard to say.

Maybe, but given that he didn't have all the information, choosing to kill her would be a rash decision. She was not a direct danger, and he openly accepted that if she were to go insane, he would have to kill her before she could hurt anyone else.

It wouldn't have been a rash decision just because he didn't have all the information. If he found out all the information he could but there was still information that he couldn't have possibly come across that would've changed everything, would he have still made a rash decision even if he spent ages on what he did know? I don't think so.

Well, no, he didn't. He made the decision to kill her but, when he tried, simply couldn't go through with it. That's an understandable reaction to killing an entirely innocent girl who you dearly love...

And then he justifies it. That still makes it morally ambiguous.

That's called human nature. He didn't want to admit that she was "responsible" for the shadow, just like he didn't want to admit to himself that he had feelings for her, and just like he and Rin didn't want to see how awful her life really was.

And? You can't justify these things by just saying it's understandable. You can justfiy anything like that. That's only an explanation. Not an excuse.

[Altima of the Gates]

You said acting too quickly can be stupid but being indecisive can be equally stupid and that's exactly what Shirou did. When murders were talking place and Shirou was hearing about them, he knew of the connection to Sakura but didn't want to admit to it. He simply didn't want to confront it. Even if there was nothing he could do, he didn't know that there was nothing he can do (and we all know that there being nothing he can do has never stopped him from trying before). I'd say that's morally ambiguous as well.

However, my issue here is that even during these times, there were actual solutions staring him in the face, as well for the other characters, but they hardly sat down and counseled here. I am perfectly aware that there are moral ambiguities here, but that is not my point. I sincerely loathe when people claim to be on the side of "justice" but don't use their brains and frantically go for the "it can't be helped" mindset. Since this situation could be helped, and there are no apologies that can be given for rash decisions, nor can you turn back the clock. If it was entirely hopeless, I would most likely agree with you, Sakura would agree with you. No matter if her fate after being an experiment was to be put to the abyss, she would reluctantly take it. But then, where is her "justice"? How is she compensated? How is Shirou and Rin compensated? Especially when it could be avoided.

There is already moral ambiguity in the world of magi. Look, the 4th War killed many children and innocents and yet there was no magi who stood up and said, "This isn't worth it." Even Rin didn't oppose it, and Saber who saw such atrocities, still saw fit to seek the Grail, but for some reason, Shirou is seen like a bad person to not give up on someone who should have been saved long ago. Sorry, but like DragoZERO said, moral ambiguity doesn't matter at this point. Magi, the Grail War, everything has already ruined a good deal of lives in Fuyuki, and by even condoning this contest for even one second, all people involved have blood on their hands. In that vein, Shirou and Sakura, who cared little for this war, who never wished for it in the first place, are the least liable and yet they are ironically judged the harshest.

The best way to stop innocents from potentially dying? Destroy the Great Grail. But the best people for that job, were entirely set on fighting this pointless battle that in the end, had no benefit at all.

Like I said, I loathe when the weak are crushed when it could entirely be avoided. I think I have that right. If it was truly hopeless, I would most likely bitterly agree. That's all I have to say on this. Since I pretty much won't ever agree to this bout of unfounded "pragmatism".

Oh, really? Wellt hat is definitely something new. Sorry about that, since I figured it was a safe assumption you two were. I retract my original statement then, if that's the case.

Yeah I'm surprised no one saw that Tenchi and Flinch kinda rekindled this neverending topic. I'll just be sure to pass on any attempt to get this started should it raise it's ugly head again.

[Cherry_Lover]

Originally Posted by Haak

I don't see why not. Prior to that decision we can't really tell either way. We don't know. This choice confirms it one way or the other.

Well, no, it doesn't.

A better example, actually, is choosing between Fate and UBW. The difference there has nothing to do with Shirou's feelings for Rin (he saves her in both cases), it's just a matter of whether he reflexively uses a command spell, or simply doesn't notice in time.

The final choice to get on HF is, perhaps, a little more directly linked to his feelings for Sakura (IIRC), but at the same time it's nothing that he wouldn't do for a close friend, and there's no doubt that even outside HF Sakura is a close friend of his. Plus, in order to get that choice, you have to make a decision which has nothing whatsoever to do with his feelings for Sakura (making another side-dish), and thus it's quite possible that a Shirou who loves Sakura dearly could end up on Fate or UBW because he chose not to do that....

Hard to say.

Oh, come on, are you seriously saying that trusting Zouken when he told Shirou to kill off his "experiment" to save the town was a good idea? Since when did Zouken ever care about the people of the town?

It wouldn't have been a rash decision just because he didn't have all the information. If he found out all the information he could but there was still information that he couldn't have possibly come across that would've changed everything, would he have still made a rash decision even if he spent ages on what he did know? I don't think so.

Yes, but given the information he had, there was no reason to kill Sakura. Like Altima says, killing her is an irreversible decision, so you should only do it if you are damn sure that it's the right thing to do. Shirou was not, and thus quite rightly refrained from doing so.

And then he justifies it. That still makes it morally ambiguous.

Sorry, but refusing to commit cold-blooded murder is not "morally ambiguous".

And? You can't justify these things by just saying it's understandable. You can justfiy anything like that. That's only an explanation. Not an excuse.

I'm just pointing out that Shirou is not perfect. He is human, and he has human feelings. If he tries to deny those, then you get Archer, ultimately.

[Haak]

Spoiler for Altima:

Originally Posted by Altima of the Gates

However, my issue here is that even during these times, there were actual solutions staring him in the face, as well for the other characters, but they hardly sat down and counseled here. I am perfectly aware that there are moral ambiguities here, but that is not my point. I sincerely loathe when people claim to be on the side of "justice" but don't use their brains and frantically go for the "it can't be helped" mindset. Since this situation could be helped, and there are no apologies that can be given for rash decisions, nor can you turn back the clock. If it was entirely hopeless, I would most likely agree with you, Sakura would agree with you. No matter if her fate after being an experiment was to be put to the abyss, she would reluctantly take it. But then, where is her "justice"? How is she compensated? How is Shirou and Rin compensated? Especially when it could be avoided.

I have no idea what you're talking about anymore. I'm perfectly aware it wasn't hopeless. I'm perfectly aware solutions could've been formed had they talked about it. But Shirou didn't. And he made the decision regardless.

There is already moral ambiguity in the world of magi. Look, the 4th War killed many children and innocents and yet there was no magi who stood up and said, "This isn't worth it." Even Rin didn't oppose it, and Saber who saw such atrocities, still saw fit to seek the Grail, but for some reason, Shirou is seen like a bad person to not give up on someone who should have been saved long ago. Sorry, but like DragoZERO said, moral ambiguity doesn't matter at this point. Magi, the Grail War, everything has already ruined a good deal of lives in Fuyuki, and by even condoning this contest for even one second, all people involved have blood on their hands. In that vein, Shirou and Sakura, who cared little for this war, who never wished for it in the first place, are the least liable and yet they are ironically judged the harshest.

What? Other people acting wrongly shouldn't justfiy someone else acting wrongly. Yes there are worse people but that doesn't justify anything. I'm talking about Shirou here. But it seems you're talking about people judging Shirou hypocritically, despite the fact that has nothing to do with whether or not Shirou was actually morally ambiguous.

What you're talking about is an entirely different point altogther. And just so you know, I never even judged Shirou and Sakura (especially not Sakura)

The best way to stop innocents from potentially dying? Destroy the Great Grail. But the best people for that job, were entirely set on fighting this pointless battle that in the end, had no benefit at all.

Hardly the best argument, since that's exactly what Shirou and Saber did in the end of Fate and would've done even if it wasn't tainted.

Spoiler for Cherry Lover:

Originally Posted by Cherry_Lover

Well, no, it doesn't.

A better example, actually, is choosing between Fate and UBW. The difference there has nothing to do with Shirou's feelings for Rin (he saves her in both cases), it's just a matter of whether he reflexively uses a command spell, or simply doesn't notice in time.

The final choice to get on HF is, perhaps, a little more directly linked to his feelings for Sakura (IIRC), but at the same time it's nothing that he wouldn't do for a close friend, and there's no doubt that even outside HF Sakura is a close friend of his. Plus, in order to get that choice, you have to make a decision which has nothing whatsoever to do with his feelings for Sakura (making another side-dish), and thus it's quite possible that a Shirou who loves Sakura dearly could end up on Fate or UBW because he chose not to do that...

That's why I admitted that it can all be seen as random chance if you looked at it all individually rather than collectively. Like I said, i don't see it that way.

Oh, come on, are you seriously saying that trusting Zouken when he told Shirou to kill off his "experiment" to save the town was a good idea? Since when did Zouken ever care about the people of the town?

Oh I thought you were talking about the first time. No, I agree he should've thought to find out more. I even said so myself. But the fact remains is that he didn't.

Yes, but given the information he had, there was no reason to kill Sakura. Like Altima says, killing her is an irreversible decision, so you should only do it if you are damn sure that it's the right thing to do. Shirou was not, and thus quite rightly refrained from doing so.

If we're talking about the second time (which I was), then he did have reason to kill Sakura. And like I said, he didn't refrain because he felt he didn't have all the information. That was the first time, not the second time. And you said it yourself, Shirou was going to do it, but just couldn't bring himself to do so. It wasn't a moral decision. He just didn't want to kill Sakura.

Sorry, but refusing to commit cold-blooded murder is not "morally ambiguous".

No but justifying risking the lives of hundreds is.

I'm just pointing out that Shirou is not perfect. He is human, and he has human feelings. If he tries to deny those, then you get Archer, ultimately.

Bullshit. He doesn't have to deny his feelings to face up to the fact that Sakura is inadvertedly killing people.

[Flinch]

If killing someone saves lives, is it really cold-blooded?

Hypothetical Scenario: I have a 40MT nuke in the center of LA. The blast will destroy a large portion of the city, and the fallout will likely kill everyone else. I intend to use it. Is it wrong to kill me?

[Cherry_Lover]

Originally Posted by Haak

What? Other people acting wrongly shouldn't justfiy someone else acting wrongly. Yes there are worse people but that doesn't justify anything. I'm talking about Shirou here.

Perhaps, but I don't see our resident Ilya fans accepting that, in fact, of all the people in the Grail War, she is the most responsible for what happened in HF (the Ilya Bad End you get if her affection points for you are too low shows conclusively that she both knows the identity of the shadow from the very beginning and possesses the means to stop it). Or, accepting that Rin was aware that a potentially dangerous war was to be fought on her land and made no effort to stop it. And, for that matter, that Rin was aware of Zouken's existence (and, presumably, how old he was), and made no effort to investigate it.

Hardly the best argument, since that's exactly what Shirou and Saber did in the end of Fate and would've done even if it wasn't tainted.

No, they didn't. They destroyed the summoned Grail. The Great Grail was still intact.

Originally Posted by Flinch

If killing someone saves lives, is it really cold-blooded?

But killing Sakura at that point wouldn't have saved lives (well, except for Shinji, Kotomine and Zouken, whose lives I would quite gladly trade for Sakura's), even if Shirou could have succeeded.

Hypothetical Scenario: I have a 40MT nuke in the center of LA. The blast will destroy a large portion of the city, and the fallout will likely kill everyone else. I intend to use it. Is it wrong to kill me?

No, it's not, but in that instance you are a direct and immediate danger to others (including, presumably, the person who will kill you...), and you are being so intentionally. That is not in any way the same as Sakura's situation in HF. Killing someone in self-defense or in the defense of others is not "cold-blooded murder". Stabbing someone in the neck when they're lying in bed totally helpless is.

[Haak]

Originally Posted by Cherry_Lover

Perhaps, but I don't see our resident Ilya fans accepting that, in fact, of all the people in the Grail War, she is the most responsible for what happened in HF (the Ilya Bad End you get if her affection points for you are too low shows conclusively that she both knows the identity of the shadow from the very beginning and possesses the means to stop it). Or, accepting that Rin was aware that a potentially dangerous war was to be fought on her land and made no effort to stop it. And, for that matter, that Rin was aware of Zouken's existence (and, presumably, how old he was), and made no effort to investigate it.

Again. This has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not Shirou was being morally ambiguous or not. Don't change the subject and don't resort to personal attacks.

No, they didn't. They destroyed the summoned Grail. The Great Grail was still intact.

Yeah but they still tried.

[Flinch]

There's so much bullshit flying through this thread that I seem to have forgotten what the point that I was trying to make was. Ah, oh well.

[LostHanyou]

Originally Posted by Flinch

There's so much bullshit flying through this thread that I seem to have forgotten what the point that I was trying to make was. Ah, oh well.

Going away for a few hours and checking this thread again = walls of text everywhere

I just can't keep up.

[Cherry_Lover]

Originally Posted by Haak

Yeah but they still tried.

Well, Shirou did, yes. However, Shirou did that in the other routes, too, including HF (where he gave up the possibility of a life with Sakura (or even a few hours with her) to destroy it.

[Haak]

Well you could argue he wouldn't have come to a decision to destroy the Holy grail even if it wasn't tainted, in the other routes, but yeah, even Ilya tried to destroy it. So my point stands.

[DragoZERO]

Originally Posted by mAc Chaos

lol I love how no matter when I come back to this forum this debate is always raging.

To be fair, before we were debating Rin's feelings toward Shirou. It was actually pretty good, lol.

Originally Posted by careph

Concise and to the point. Thank you so much for this comment, good Sir.

You are quite welcome. It's philosphy... a never ending debate.

Originally Posted by LostHanyou

Going away for a few hours and checking this thread again = walls of text everywhere

I just can't keep up.

I hear ya. And there isn't anything I can say that hasn't been said, so yeah.



Here is a question, I have been meaning to ask. What did Avalon do to Gil's Enuma Elish (Ea's attack). Did it send it back to him, deflect, or something else? I was meaning to go to that scene myself, but holidays are more demanding than I had thought they'd be. [/topicchange]

[Cherry_Lover]

Originally Posted by Haak

Well you could argue he wouldn't have come to a decision to destroy the Holy grail even if it wasn't tainted, in the other routes, but yeah, even Ilya tried to destroy it. So my point stands.

No, she didn't. Ilya made no effort to destroy it, except in HF where she did so to protect Shirou.

Originally Posted by DragoZERO

Here is a question, I have been meaning to ask. What did Avalon do to Gil's Enuma Elish (Ea's attack). Did it send it back to him, deflect, or something else? I was meaning to go to that scene myself, but holidays are more demanding than I had thought they'd be. [/topicchange]

Well, it should just act to keep Saber well out of the way of it, by removing her from that plane of existance. I believe that, in the game at least, Saber killed Gil by cutting him with Excalibur whilst he was still recovering from using Ea.

[Altima of the Gates]

[QUOTE]

Originally Posted by Haak

Spoiler for Altima:

I have no idea what you're talking about anymore. I'm perfectly aware it wasn't hopeless. I'm perfectly aware solutions could've been formed had they talked about it. But Shirou didn't. And he made the decision regardless.



What? Other people acting wrongly shouldn't justfiy someone else acting wrongly. Yes there are worse people but that doesn't justify anything. I'm talking about Shirou here. But it seems you're talking about people judging Shirou hypocritically, despite the fact that has nothing to do with whether or not Shirou was actually morally ambiguous.

What you're talking about is an entirely different point altogther. And just so you know, I never even judged Shirou and Sakura (especially not Sakura)



Hardly the best argument, since that's exactly what Shirou and Saber did in the end of Fate and would've done even if it wasn't tainted.

Spoiler for Summary:

I have no idea what you're talking about anymore. I'm perfectly aware it wasn't hopeless. I'm perfectly aware solutions could've been formed had they talked about it. But Shirou didn't. And he made the decision regardless.

What are you even talking about? Shirou had less than a tenth of the info to actually make the correct decisions (or even ambiguously good decisions)and there were conspiring elements all over. He did what he could with what he had, period. There was hardly any info forthcoming from his "allies" and he was a free magus with no info about the mechanics of the ritual. That is like saying a amateur diffusing a bomb set to go off in thirty seconds strapped on a girl, but two experts are in the room and sitting on their hands. And he did ask many times, for information or sought it out himself. It was his partners that kept their traps shut. Not at all a good place to make rash decisions, don't you think?

What? Other people acting wrongly shouldn't justfiy someone else acting wrongly. Yes there are worse people but that doesn't justify anything. I'm talking about Shirou here. But it seems you're talking about people judging Shirou hypocritically, despite the fact that has nothing to do with whether or not Shirou was actually morally ambiguous.

What you're talking about is an entirely different point altogther. And just so you know, I never even judged Shirou and Sakura (especially not Sakura)

Whether you are focusing on Shirou or not, you are not being hardly fair here, and yes, if you say that he is wrong for something, you are judging him, not just his actions. The point here, and DragoZERO said it best, that moral ambiguity does not matter. Had he the information, the first place they would have went is to the cavern and destroyed the Great Grail, which would have ended it. Period. Listening to Kotomine was incredibly dubious, listening to Zouken later on was dubious.

My big point here is that everyone else was thinking in a straight line and missing important points, and ironically Shirou was the only one to say, "hold up a second" to making rash decisions. Do you even get what I am saying here? Critical mistakes can be made when you don't think. And thought I hate it, the term, "the road to hell is paved with good intentions" is all over this story.

But fine, since you so badly want me to say it, yes, his decisions were morally ambiguous, but he was the only one putting thought to his actions, or at least, attempting to. Yes, they were thoughts layered with emotion, but I'll forgive him for that.

Hardly the best argument, since that's exactly what Shirou and Saber did in the end of Fate and would've done even if it wasn't tainted.

Saber, as it has been proven saw at the end of the 4th, knew that this war took the lives of innocents and still participated. Even going so far as to cut the head off the boy who rejected such a thing, because they couldn't agree on a set of viewpoints. Now before you think I hate Saber all of a sudden, check my sig. But the point is, more experienced better people for the job were perfectly okay with the system. Rin even says when Ilya explains everything about the ritual, she knew she was being used, but she went along with the Einzbern's plan. Let's face it, the only people who were adverse to fighting the war out were Shirou and Sakura, sure, if everyone knew it was tainted, they would destroy it, but for such an incredibly stupid ritual that has FOUR times in a row killed citizens of Fuyuki, people still seemed eager to participate to get the prestige, or to get what they wanted.

You can say that eventually they came to the decision to destroy it, but who was the one who rejected it from the beginning? Shirou, without needing to be told that this whole setup was crazy.

But anyway, this discussion has gone on long enough, and I don't think we should continue to go along with Flinch's and Tenchi's Sakura hating pace. Because all this will do is turn this thread into another knockdown drag out fight, but if you feel the need to keep going, fine with me.