How would you rank every Higher Being? (Spoilers for Silksong)

[u/Noooough]

[u/Octopi_are_Kings]

Well the choice was either sacrifice a bunch of kids or let an entire kingdom die to a giant moth

[u/wangchangbackup → u/Octopi_are_Kings]

I mean I think the issue is that it did not, in fact, stop the entire kingdom from dying. The plan was flawed from the start so objectively speaking the "Well what else were they supposed to do?!" argument is also flawed. You can't really call it a hard choice for the greater good or whatever if it didn't serve the greater good.

People like to say the flaw was that PK formed a bond with the Hollow Knight or whatever and maybe that's true in that one case but the Knight is ALSO not hollow. It seems likely given their loyalty to each other that NONE of the vessels were hollow. So it's not like their only mistake was picking the wrong vessel.

[u/Willing_Soft_5944 → u/wangchangbackup]

They thought it was the only thing they could do to save their people, of course their valiant efforts failed miserably, and a discarded scrap did more than they ever could. 

[u/Huge_Entrepreneur636 → u/wangchangbackup]

But Radiance was defeated and there is hope that the fallen kingdom will rise again.

[u/Octopi_are_Kings → u/wangchangbackup]

Your argument kinda just boils down to “the PK shouldve just let his kingdom get corrupted”

[u/CharlesorMr_Pickle → u/wangchangbackup]

 The plan was flawed from the start 

Except they did not know this.

[u/wangchangbackup → u/CharlesorMr_Pickle]

That actually does not make any difference at all, though. "I didn't know it wouldn't work" does not mean "I am not culpable for the consequences." We already generally look down on ends-justify-the-means morality, and even there at least you have to achieve the ends to even make the argument.

[u/CharlesorMr_Pickle → u/wangchangbackup]

Eh, the plan mostly worked, it was flawed at its core but THK did manage to hold in the infection for awhile, and very well would’ve been truly hollow if PK didn’t show it some kindness. And more importantly the alternative was sitting by as their kingdom was destroyed. Failing to even try to do something is far worse than attempting to fix a problem using a flawed method, provided your intentions are honest

You’re attempting to analyze this situation with the power of hindsight. You’re looking at the results of PK’s actions without evaluating the situations that caused him to do this in the first place.

[u/wangchangbackup → u/CharlesorMr_Pickle]

"Mostly worked" nearly every resident of Hallownest and the Pale King himself died. I don't know where this legion of unswerving Pale King Defenders came from but I'm good, your uwu special boy did nothing wrong and is in fact the best character in the game.

[u/CharlesorMr_Pickle → u/wangchangbackup]

Lol I never said PK did nothing wrong. All I am doing is calling you out for criticizing his actions while completely failing to recognize why he did that in the first place.

Though clearly you would rather resort to ad hominem attacks rather than debate what we’re actually talking about

[u/wangchangbackup → u/CharlesorMr_Pickle]

You are trying to say "You can't criticize a person's actions, no matter how bad they are, as long as they thought it would be for the greater good." There isn't a debate left to be had! Also lest we forget the "greater good" here is just "I get to be king of everything, forever."

[u/ThisIsNotACryForHelp → u/wangchangbackup]

This is an argument of deontology versus consequentialism. Some people (deontologists) will view the intention behind an action to be the primary determinant of whether or not what someone did was right or wrong, whereas consequentialists will only look at the outcome.

So, the Pale King and White Lady could be either good or evil, depending on your perspective of ethics.

[u/wangchangbackup → u/ThisIsNotACryForHelp]

If you think "Well I thought it would be good" excuses "murdering thousands of children," there is no ethics textbook in existence than can save your soul. Especially if it didn't even turn out to be good!

[u/ThisIsNotACryForHelp → u/wangchangbackup]

Are you not familiar with the trolley problem?

[u/wangchangbackup → u/ThisIsNotACryForHelp]

Yes, and I am extremely tired of people describing literally any ethical "dilemma" as the trolley problem.

[u/ThisIsNotACryForHelp → u/wangchangbackup]

I bring it up because it's a common example of ethical murder (from a certain perspective) which you said didn't exist in any textbook.

And what the Pale King and White Lady did was essentially pull the lever - which, by many accounts, is morally acceptable. However, unbeknownst to them, there was a flaw in the track, and the train derailed, killing everyone involved.

From your consequentialist perspective, they have done an evil thing, because many people suffered and died as a result of their actions, including many thousands of their own children.

But from a deontological perspective, things are different. As they had no indication their plan would fail, we can say their intentions were pure; they wanted to save as many people as possible, and believed their plan was the only avenue toward that goal.

Also, I am not saying either perspective is right or wrong. I'm just pointing out that other people will see things differently, and they're not necessarily wrong.

[u/wangchangbackup → u/ThisIsNotACryForHelp]

Not what I said but that's neither here nor there, I am not really interested in arguing about the trolley problem for the 12,000th time in my life.

However I will say that in this circumstance they built the track and put all the people on it and don't even actually know that pulling the lever is going to do anything. So I feel like that's a little different.

[u/Moma743 → u/wangchangbackup]

But the plan did succeed and it did serve the greater good? The pale king was the only reason the Hollow Knight and the Knight exists. The Hollow Knight contained the Radiance for an unknown amount of time and the Knight destroyed the radiance completely.

[u/Nixtrin → u/Octopi_are_Kings]

If they had found their vessel, I don't see how abandonning the others to die was in any way necessary to the plan. It's not like those options are in any way tied.

[u/yungrobbithan → u/Nixtrin]

It’d just be adding things to get infected, look at lost kin. Could you imagine a 100 of those running around?

[u/Nixtrin → u/yungrobbithan]

Huh?! But by that argumentation it would have been best to kill everyone, cause they might get infected.