Villians

[paradys]

It might be sort of an odd question, but if you think about it with any sort of real seriousness, does the world need a super-villain? Not the crap we have going on now or Dr. Evil or something like that, but I'm talking the Hitler/Mussolini/Dr Doom/Cobra Commander/Vader sort of villain

Comments

[rantmonkey]

I think we need more of Carl Sagan and Randy Pausch sorta people. We have enough bad guys who praise the corporate giants and the system that supports the richest 1% getting even richer and sneer at anything approaching the dreaded socialism. Buffett, for instance, added 10 billion to his sizable fortune last year. That makes me sick. In 1986, there were only 140 billionaires in the world. Now there are 1,125 of them. That is a sickeningly large amount of money. 4.4 trillion between the lot of them. 4,400,000,000,000. I call that evil. Especially when 12.1% of the US population is living in poverty

[paradys]

Evil needs a face or it hides as what we have. I agree on a logical level with you, but from a social science point of view, you're living in some land that just doesn't work out, sorry to say.

I'm too stoned to get too indepth, but lets just say, while not wrong, you give people too much credit. That's the best I can muster on Valium.

[rantmonkey]

Bottom line is - the only world you really have the power to influence is your own. So, I choose to live in one where I take in friends who need a place to crash land from a life that veered into suck-itude. Where I don't pretend the guy with bad teeth and the mental look in his eye is invisible when he asks for money.

I do tend to give people more credit than they have earned; and I know they don't, most of 'em, have the currency to pay me back, ever. But, me - I'd rather believe in someone and be proved wrong, than doubt them and be proved right. For a long time, I enjoyed the emotional distance of being a cynic. Now I'd rather be a completely unrealistic dreamer sort. It's more fun.

[princeps]

I think really the question is what third world nation could be easily taken over and bent to the whims of evil.

Something African maybe? A Balkan?

[paradys]

I will likely choose Africa. They'll still be fighting with magic belts and stones for the most part. Numbers-wise only a handful of folks ever support a warlord and a little cash/food/fear will even disperse that like nobodies business.

From a super science perspective, Africa also rocks.

From a UN perspective, nobody would likely even notice until it was all over and we were members anyway because of the way diplomacy works.

And really? I wouldn't be totally against living there. Raise the people up just a little and I'd bet it would be utterly beautiful.

Balkans and crap? Too complex and I have a pretty short attention span.

[veridian_knight]

Be careful, in recent years, companies like Blackwater have been using Africa as proving grounds, it may be quite the fight.

[veridian_knight]

I am loathe to increase the amount of suffering in the world.
But by giving Evil a name and a face, it makes it easier to fight.
The trick is simultaneously motivating people to take up arms, and keeping the other, real Evils, on display, so they fall before righteousness as well. The biggest problem with creating monolithic Evil is that lesser, more "reasonable" Evil will likely throw in and support the forces of righteousness, especially if they can pull a PR stunt, or get a pocket hero out of the deal.
We may be more cunning than the urbane Evils, but the average drone isn't.

[paradys]

Well, if the adage holds, I will have already destroyed the other evils. It's sort of what evil does.

[veridian_knight]

Then that will be good enough for me.
all that will be needed then is an environment that doesn't encourage, even reward, the growth of Evil.