curze’s sense of justice

[mc warhammer]

such as it was. where did it come from? was it innate? learned? taught?

[helterskelter]

We'll go with innate/self taught. He had no guiding figure to tell him the difference of things during his child hood on Nostramo, he saw bad things happen and he killed the bad guy.

Think batman with judge death's ability to sentence, and it worked largely.

The problem was he worked really well as a deterrent when he was more myth. But then he became the actual ruler, and that was the problem.

Once you put a face to something, and you know that something isn't there any more, it's not the best deterrent. Hence Nostramo devolving back into the scummy pit it was before his arrival.

[mc warhammer]

We'll go with innate/self taught. He had no guiding figure to tell him the difference of things during his child hood on Nostramo, he saw bad things happen and he killed the bad guy.

Think batman with judge death's ability to sentence, and it worked largely.

The problem was he worked really well as a deterrent when he was more myth. But then he became the actual ruler, and that was the problem.

Once you put a face to something, and you know that something isn't there any more, it's not the best deterrent. Hence Nostramo devolving back into the scummy pit it was before his arrival.

yeah, I know the ol’ batman reference but bruce wayne’s morality and the instigating incident that sets him on his path is well documented

 

curze teaching himself a sense of fairness and justice on a planet that seemed to seriously lacking in both ...seems a stretch. has there been any canonical exploration of this?

[bluntblade]

I always saw Curze as Batman with League of Shadows ideology, and the Raven Guard as the League operating (roughly) with Batman's ideology

[helterskelter]

yeah, I know the ol’ batman reference but bruce wayne’s morality and the instigating incident that sets him on his path is well documented

 

curze teaching himself a sense of fairness and justice on a planet that seemed to seriously lacking in both ...seems a stretch. has there been any canonical exploration of this?

That's why I included the judge Death Bit, he more or less killed everyone who was a sinner in his skewed view. I think Prince of Crows shows the most background about Curze on Nostramo so there's a good place to start.

[Xisor]

It's not unthinkable that Curze looked out and saw things that upset him, with some trial and error he found a way of stopping the things that upset him. It just so happened that his childish wish to reforge the world to his design coincided with moral values.

 

Think of his skill as 'optimisation and problem solving' for how to conduct social relations. Even with just gut/animal instinct for social behaviours, it's not unthinkable for a superhuman to devise a need for a 'social contract' (no killing unless they're baddies, no unhelpful picking on the weak) in a relatively quick space of time.

 

As such, it could be argued that he has innate problem solving skills, and his perhaps a bit more socially motivated/strongly-held-views on 'how things should be'.

 

That they vaguely coincide with 'justice' and 'morality' is perhaps... coincidence, rather than innate.

 

Innate conviction and self-belief alloyed to strong interpersonal judgement skills (coupled to no self control).

[mc warhammer]

It's not unthinkable that Curze looked out and saw things that upset him, with some trial and error he found a way of stopping the things that upset him. It just so happened that his childish wish to reforge the world to his design coincided with moral values.

 

Think of his skill as 'optimisation and problem solving' for how to conduct social relations. Even with just gut/animal instinct for social behaviours, it's not unthinkable for a superhuman to devise a need for a 'social contract' (no killing unless they're baddies, no unhelpful picking on the weak) in a relatively quick space of time.

 

As such, it could be argued that he has innate problem solving skills, and his perhaps a bit more socially motivated/strongly-held-views on 'how things should be'.

 

That they vaguely coincide with 'justice' and 'morality' is perhaps... coincidence, rather than innate.

 

Innate conviction and self-belief alloyed to strong interpersonal judgement skills (coupled to no self control).

 

 

i like this. that it was some sort of assessment of natural threat vs resources that curze's primarch instincts sort to put into order.

 

the creatures that looked like him (citizens of nostramo) provide a some degree of comfort, food and protection. in some primordial way they are a resource and therefore a "good" thing.

 

the murderers and rapists and gangs who prey on them, decrease the resources or take them for themselves. therefore they are evil and "bad".

 

as he ages he learns to understand, read and interpret what little there is about justice, morality and ethics in nostramo's culture. in his mind, these concepts align closely enough to his survival needs to form a curze "morality".

 

so his system stems from selfishness and survival.

 

nice thought xisor.

[drooling blood]

Who really knows. He managed climbed out of lava pits as a baby.

Perhaps he met a undocumented so far friend. Or baby Sev in the dark.

Perhaps he knew while still in his vat.

[mc warhammer]

Who really knows. He managed climbed out of lava pits as a baby.

Perhaps he met a undocumented so far friend. Or baby Sev in the dark.

Perhaps he knew while still in his vat.

have to admit, my mind did wander to forgotten friend but i don’t know if that’s trite or tragic

[drooling blood]

Tis BL so trite more like.

[OnboardG1]

It's not unthinkable that Curze looked out and saw things that upset him, with some trial and error he found a way of stopping the things that upset him. It just so happened that his childish wish to reforge the world to his design coincided with moral values.

 

Think of his skill as 'optimisation and problem solving' for how to conduct social relations. Even with just gut/animal instinct for social behaviours, it's not unthinkable for a superhuman to devise a need for a 'social contract' (no killing unless they're baddies, no unhelpful picking on the weak) in a relatively quick space of time.

 

As such, it could be argued that he has innate problem solving skills, and his perhaps a bit more socially motivated/strongly-held-views on 'how things should be'.

 

That they vaguely coincide with 'justice' and 'morality' is perhaps... coincidence, rather than innate.

 

Innate conviction and self-belief alloyed to strong interpersonal judgement skills (coupled to no self control).

 

He's also a fairly powerful but untrained seer, which might have a bearing on the brutality of his justice (he can see what happens without it in his dreams). 

 

Curze and his legion are a superb expression of what happens when instinctive justice based on vengeance, pure utility and moral absolutism is the order of the day and delivered through vigilantism (and my favourite deconstruction of Batman, who I am not a fan of). There's a reason I like the savage little swines.

[b1soul]

Growing up witnessing the wretchedness and depravity of Nostramo, it was easy for Curze to develop views of humanity akin to those of Machiavelli, Hobbes, Han Feizi.

 

Man is a base brute and the most effective method of governance is through fear and draconian punishment.

[grailkeeper]

I think that Kurze's morality is an innate trate installed in him prior to the primarchs beings scattered, and would have come out however he was raised. Nature versus nurture is a big debate in real life, but I think there's a lot to show that in Primarchs nature wins out.

 

The best example is Perturabo- his adoptive father spent plenty of time with him but never received any affection in return Sure some like Gulliman look like they are absolutely products of their environment- but perhaps Gulliman may have ended up just the same had he ended up on some kind of Hell World like Mortarion.

 

Angron is perhaps the only example of Nurture absolutely winning out, the butchers nails effectively ruined any chance of any underlying personality coming to the fore. If the only known way of changing a primarchs personality is cybernetic implants then there's a strong case to be made for their personalities being innate. I'd say that that case is made stronger by the theory that the Emperor had a particular role in mind for each primarch. There's a good chance that this was genetically engineered into them. We already know that the 40k universe is a place where things like this can happen- look at Orks or Jokero. Perhaps Kurze's sense of justice  is as much a part of him as any Mek-boy's knowledge of engineering.

Edited October 18, 2017 by grailkeeper