I really do not believe Klaus is lying or even rationalizing when he says that he acts out of amoral self-preservation.
You don't think Klaus is rationalising? It's what I would call rationalising, I think. Like, I certainly don't think he's lying. And I agree with you in so far as I think Elijah's assessment that Klaus behaviour is determined by 'ego', ego, is way out, waaaaaaaaaaay out. If anything, it's the fragility of Klaus' ego that's responsible. I don't think he's onto much with 'paranoia' either. As far as I can surmise, Mikael hunting Klaus constituted a very real, very genuine threat to Klaus' life. So I didn't think Klaus' evil plan to build a massive hybrid army so that Mikael wouldn't be able to touch him was necessarily a paranoid overreaction. I think he might be onto sibling with 'anger' though, I don't know.
The reason I that I think Klaus is rationalising though, is because you can't really objectively say that his actions are amoral. Like, he is a sadist, through and through. He is utterly gleeful when he inflicts pain on others. Gleeful. This is the reason why he was immediately in Stefan's thrall in 3.03; Stefan showed Klaus how to enact slow, painful torture the right way and Klaus legit giggled and fell in love. It's clear that Klaus actively enjoys moments like making Tyler beg for Caroline's life, when he knows he isn't going to grant that to Tyler/Caroline. Furthermore, he is also ridiculously sadistic vis a vis his own family, the people he is meant to love and care about the most. Klebekah is the obvious example, but he also smiles his widest smile when he tells Elijah that if he runs, it will be to chase Katherine. Not that he didn't enjoy torturing Katherine in her own right, because he was totes into that in Season 2. And his innate sadism doesn't square with his own idea of himself as reacting to his environment. It just doesn't. It's a delusion.
That's why I take issue with the idea that he is simply rationally applying the lessons that anyone in his shoes would learn.*** Firstly because I don't think that everyone who faces a certain set of circumstances, including circumstances of discrimination and adversity, reacts in the same way? There are examples of this on TVD, like. Damon, for example, never learns. He's incapable of taking the 'ways of the world' on board, no matter how harshly they are meted out to him. Secondly because Klaus ostensibly goes overboard; he enjoys being cruel. He loves and relishes in the thing. And so he is far more cruel and violent than he needs to be in order satisfy an m.o of pure survivalism. So the logic that he spouts about his actions being the result of trying to survive in a harsh world, well, I don't know how else to characterise that except rationalisation.
*** Having said that, I have complete sympathy when it comes to Klaus and how he reacts to his own family. He has a fucking compelling reason not to trust any of them ever again, especially Elijah. (Though I think this is less true of Rebekah? It's just a ~sense a I get, IDK.)
Elijah's assessment that Klaus behaviour is determined by 'ego', ego, is way out, waaaaaaaaaaay out.
lol, yeah, that is Elijah projecting.
I would argue, though, that what Klaus has learned is that showing his ability to be violent is the most reliable indicator of personal safety. I think that glee is about feeling some hit of relief in the world. Like, I don't get the idea he gets up and dressed at the beginning of his day in order to do mayhem; he doesn't "love to set things on fire" in the way Rebekah does. I don't think he's motivated by enjoyment of destruction, I think destruction is a means he readily associates with desirable ends.
I don't think that everyone who faces a certain set of circumstances, including circumstances of discrimination and adversity, reacts in the same way?
Discrimination and adversity generally, sure. But the specifics I think one would learn in his shoes, growing up being The Enemy both within and without your intimate group, would teach anyone who's relatively sane and paying sufficient attention that the world DOES work this way, that people ARE hateful bastards who are out to get you at every turn. Whether or not a person would be willing or able to act on it the way he does is where people vary.
*** Having said that, I have complete sympathy when it comes to Klaus and how he reacts to his own family. He has a fucking compelling reason not to trust any of them ever again, especially Elijah.
Oh, totally. And as someone outside the situation, I can easily say that he ought to know that not everyone in the world is his sibling. But that's not how people work. People take the lessons we learn with our families and extrapolate from that because that's how we learn to be people.
You don't think Klaus is rationalising? It's what I would call rationalising, I think. Like, I certainly don't think he's lying. And I agree with you in so far as I think Elijah's assessment that Klaus behaviour is determined by 'ego', ego, is way out, waaaaaaaaaaay out. If anything, it's the fragility of Klaus' ego that's responsible. I don't think he's onto much with 'paranoia' either. As far as I can surmise, Mikael hunting Klaus constituted a very real, very genuine threat to Klaus' life. So I didn't think Klaus' evil plan to build a massive hybrid army so that Mikael wouldn't be able to touch him was necessarily a paranoid overreaction. I think he might be onto sibling with 'anger' though, I don't know.
The reason I that I think Klaus is rationalising though, is because you can't really objectively say that his actions are amoral. Like, he is a sadist, through and through. He is utterly gleeful when he inflicts pain on others. Gleeful. This is the reason why he was immediately in Stefan's thrall in 3.03; Stefan showed Klaus how to enact slow, painful torture the right way and Klaus legit giggled and fell in love. It's clear that Klaus actively enjoys moments like making Tyler beg for Caroline's life, when he knows he isn't going to grant that to Tyler/Caroline. Furthermore, he is also ridiculously sadistic vis a vis his own family, the people he is meant to love and care about the most. Klebekah is the obvious example, but he also smiles his widest smile when he tells Elijah that if he runs, it will be to chase Katherine. Not that he didn't enjoy torturing Katherine in her own right, because he was totes into that in Season 2. And his innate sadism doesn't square with his own idea of himself as reacting to his environment. It just doesn't. It's a delusion.
That's why I take issue with the idea that he is simply rationally applying the lessons that anyone in his shoes would learn.*** Firstly because I don't think that everyone who faces a certain set of circumstances, including circumstances of discrimination and adversity, reacts in the same way? There are examples of this on TVD, like. Damon, for example, never learns. He's incapable of taking the 'ways of the world' on board, no matter how harshly they are meted out to him. Secondly because Klaus ostensibly goes overboard; he enjoys being cruel. He loves and relishes in the thing. And so he is far more cruel and violent than he needs to be in order satisfy an m.o of pure survivalism. So the logic that he spouts about his actions being the result of trying to survive in a harsh world, well, I don't know how else to characterise that except rationalisation.
*** Having said that, I have complete sympathy when it comes to Klaus and how he reacts to his own family. He has a fucking compelling reason not to trust any of them ever again, especially Elijah. (Though I think this is less true of Rebekah? It's just a ~sense a I get, IDK.)
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lol, yeah, that is Elijah projecting.
I would argue, though, that what Klaus has learned is that showing his ability to be violent is the most reliable indicator of personal safety. I think that glee is about feeling some hit of relief in the world. Like, I don't get the idea he gets up and dressed at the beginning of his day in order to do mayhem; he doesn't "love to set things on fire" in the way Rebekah does. I don't think he's motivated by enjoyment of destruction, I think destruction is a means he readily associates with desirable ends.
I don't think that everyone who faces a certain set of circumstances, including circumstances of discrimination and adversity, reacts in the same way?
Discrimination and adversity generally, sure. But the specifics I think one would learn in his shoes, growing up being The Enemy both within and without your intimate group, would teach anyone who's relatively sane and paying sufficient attention that the world DOES work this way, that people ARE hateful bastards who are out to get you at every turn. Whether or not a person would be willing or able to act on it the way he does is where people vary.
*** Having said that, I have complete sympathy when it comes to Klaus and how he reacts to his own family. He has a fucking compelling reason not to trust any of them ever again, especially Elijah.
Oh, totally. And as someone outside the situation, I can easily say that he ought to know that not everyone in the world is his sibling. But that's not how people work. People take the lessons we learn with our families and extrapolate from that because that's how we learn to be people.
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