If all the rules were removed . . . . part 2
Does might make right, in the case of someone having power over others? 98% of the time, I'd say absolutely not. But if rules are removed, if they no longer apply to you (or if you feel they don't), your sense of what's right and wrong can become awfully skewed.
I think the strongest example of this in my life is a novel I'm writing. It is an erotic novel, so, sensitive kidlets, shield your ears. The world itself changes. Magical abilities are given to a few people, maybe 5% of the population, in order to heal the wounds, spiritual, social, and environmental, that have ravaged the planet. The people with Magical Gifts soon become the ruling class, banding together in Houses of people who have similar abilites. I named each House for a Stone or Gem. There are 13 Houses in all.
The first person is forcibly taken by one of the ruling class. Who is not important. What is important to know was that the captured person was famous, a celebrity, one of the "beautiful people". (I'm writing this currently as a massive, multi-fandome RPS [real person story], but it's soon to become an actual work that can be published.) In order to keep the ruling class from using their powers to take what they want from the average population, all people with any measure of fame are declared slaves, and the Houses agree to the system. Thus 13 Houses of Earth become cartels of greed and power, catching and training slaves instead of working at their appointed tasks. Even the Houses that keep no slaves condone the system a s a necessary appeasement.
It beggars the question, would a normal person go a little nuts, or perhaps completely insane, if given the power to do whatever they wanted? If you were given the very object of your desire to do with as you pleased without boundaries, and that person didn't behave as you thought he or she would, would you be angry? I would really like to say I wouldn't. I'd really like to say that I have boundaries that I wouldn't cross, but, to be honest, I don't know how I'd react. If I went from being no one in particular to one of the most powerful people on Earth virtually overnight, I don't know what I'd do.
I had a few villians in this story, based on some people I know, at least in part. (I was angry with them and felt pretty hurt at the time. The whole story was partially cathartic. It was never really supposed to see the light of day.) Some of the atrocities said villains committed included beating someone nearly to death with a spiked club, using whips tipped in sharp metal barbs that would catch the skin and tear it, leaving someone clamped to a chair in a bent over position for the better part of a day and smacking the bejeezus out of him with a wooden paddle, and having someone's eyes removed and replaced because she didn't like the original color. One of the things that stopped me from thinking of my villians as the original people who inspired the characters was the fact that I stepped back and looked at them. "Sure, we've had lots and lost of fights, but would any of them really do this? Are any of them capable?" I answered, "No."
It was part of the reason that I reconciled with them again. I confessed to the writing, and all of them gave me an extrememly odd answer. "I couldn't tell you that I wouldn't go completely crazy given that type of power." The rules are removed. With nothing standing in your way, it could be incredibly easy to throw conscience out the door.
I mean, just look at me. Given a world (my writing) in which I have no boundaries, my villians, who are at least partially my own dark side, are capable of really horrible things. Most of the time, I tell myself I write this way because if horrible things didn't happen to the characters, there would be nothing to save them from. I like to think of myself as a decent person, but does the fact that the thought even entered my head mean I would be capable of it if there weren't any rules, if I had incredible power?
I hope that test never comes
I think the strongest example of this in my life is a novel I'm writing. It is an erotic novel, so, sensitive kidlets, shield your ears. The world itself changes. Magical abilities are given to a few people, maybe 5% of the population, in order to heal the wounds, spiritual, social, and environmental, that have ravaged the planet. The people with Magical Gifts soon become the ruling class, banding together in Houses of people who have similar abilites. I named each House for a Stone or Gem. There are 13 Houses in all.
The first person is forcibly taken by one of the ruling class. Who is not important. What is important to know was that the captured person was famous, a celebrity, one of the "beautiful people". (I'm writing this currently as a massive, multi-fandome RPS [real person story], but it's soon to become an actual work that can be published.) In order to keep the ruling class from using their powers to take what they want from the average population, all people with any measure of fame are declared slaves, and the Houses agree to the system. Thus 13 Houses of Earth become cartels of greed and power, catching and training slaves instead of working at their appointed tasks. Even the Houses that keep no slaves condone the system a s a necessary appeasement.
It beggars the question, would a normal person go a little nuts, or perhaps completely insane, if given the power to do whatever they wanted? If you were given the very object of your desire to do with as you pleased without boundaries, and that person didn't behave as you thought he or she would, would you be angry? I would really like to say I wouldn't. I'd really like to say that I have boundaries that I wouldn't cross, but, to be honest, I don't know how I'd react. If I went from being no one in particular to one of the most powerful people on Earth virtually overnight, I don't know what I'd do.
I had a few villians in this story, based on some people I know, at least in part. (I was angry with them and felt pretty hurt at the time. The whole story was partially cathartic. It was never really supposed to see the light of day.) Some of the atrocities said villains committed included beating someone nearly to death with a spiked club, using whips tipped in sharp metal barbs that would catch the skin and tear it, leaving someone clamped to a chair in a bent over position for the better part of a day and smacking the bejeezus out of him with a wooden paddle, and having someone's eyes removed and replaced because she didn't like the original color. One of the things that stopped me from thinking of my villians as the original people who inspired the characters was the fact that I stepped back and looked at them. "Sure, we've had lots and lost of fights, but would any of them really do this? Are any of them capable?" I answered, "No."
It was part of the reason that I reconciled with them again. I confessed to the writing, and all of them gave me an extrememly odd answer. "I couldn't tell you that I wouldn't go completely crazy given that type of power." The rules are removed. With nothing standing in your way, it could be incredibly easy to throw conscience out the door.
I mean, just look at me. Given a world (my writing) in which I have no boundaries, my villians, who are at least partially my own dark side, are capable of really horrible things. Most of the time, I tell myself I write this way because if horrible things didn't happen to the characters, there would be nothing to save them from. I like to think of myself as a decent person, but does the fact that the thought even entered my head mean I would be capable of it if there weren't any rules, if I had incredible power?
I hope that test never comes