Honor's Paradox

[rolanni]

If you honorably serve a dishonored master, is your personal honor unsullied?

Discuss, with examples.


ETA: Lotsa people ducking the question here. Interesting.

Comments

[oberon.livejournal.com]

It comes down to a simple definition. Either honor is an internal condition you either have or do not have through your own actions, or it's a state of being that depends on how your actions are perceived by those around you.

If it's an internal condition, behaving in a manner YOU believe to be honorable means that you are an honorable person, no matter whom you serve. It is interesting to note that if this is true, and your personal definition of honor aligns with that society generally considers 'good', honorable service to a master whose own actions are considered 'bad' may mean that you take actions that are not what that master might otherwise desire. Let's take the example of a samurai who serves a master who has become corrupt, greedy, and no longer follows the path of true belief that the samurai still does. Honorable service might demand that he offer the master an honorable death. Not what the master might wish, yet still honorable service. Honor might demand that he continue to serve, above his ethical questions. It would depend on the samurai's internal definition of honorable behavior.

[greylady.livejournal.com]

Yes.

This of course presumes that your service is within the bonds an honourable master would request. Dishonour can be earned for many reasons, including reasons for which an honourable vassal cannot turn away.

For example: A man may promise his child's hand in marriage to another, but the child may not keep that promise and choose another. The man is dishonoured by his inability to keep his promise, but in no way is he a less worthy man. His public honour is impacted, but his personal honour is intact.

In fact, one can argue that a vassal who has promised service is not able to withdraw that service until given permission from their liege (or their liege's liege). Ironically, only an honourable liege would properly release their vassals from service in the event that their honour was sullied.

Honor's Paradox

[patti ludwig (from livejournal.com)]

Just watched "The Karate Kid: Part II", wherein the nephew of the "chief bad guy" considers himself to be dishonored by "Daniel-san".
Daniel did what he saw as honorable, and within his comfort zone for personal safety, i.e. saved both Sato (Chief bad guy) and a small child who was (for reasons that escape me) up a power pole, while the nephew was too frightened to help either, and was forced to say so in front of virtually everyone he knew.
He may or may not have actually been brave in some other fashion, in some previous situation, but the physical dangers of the hurricane that caused the endangerment of the other characters was outside his comfort zone.
Now, Daniel did not do anything to him directly, but it was still Daniel he blamed for 'dishonoring' him. If his cronies in bullying the village had stayed by him, would they have shared his dishonor?
Frankly, I found he did all the dishonoring himself, including taking the love interest hostage to force Daniel into a "to the death" karate match in the climax of the movie.

Here's a twist on the question; Sato, chief bad guy & uncle, felt himself dishonored from before the story opened. The nephew was raised more or less by him, to serve him, and trained to bully people. When push came to shove, that led to his failing his "lord", his uncle. Does his dishonor, therefore, reflect on Sato? Sato repudiated him as soon as he saw in the hurricane how little physical courage the young man had, and started making some amends for his own previous bullying behavior, but we don't know how much he feels dishonored by the previous bullying by his nephew; how much dishonor does he accrue from that? How can he atone for it? Can he atone?

Okay, that's not probably the definition of 'dishonor' you're looking for, but I think that to a large degree, that's the kind of stuff that messes people up!

I think we have to go to Shakespeare here; "to thine own self be true." Each individual has to take Aral's definition of "Honor is what you know about yourself, reputation is what other people believe about you" and apply it to our own actions and intentions. You can do dishonorable things, in your own service or that of others, for the sake of honor, and feel only mildly sullied if you feel that what you did was right by your own morals or ethics. If you insist on following the letter of an oath in the face of what's pretty blatantly morally or ethically wrong, are you being true to yourself? You may weasel out of legal or "reputation" definition of wrongdoing, but will you be able to live with yourself?
That's if you KNOW about the wrong/dishonor of your lord.

What if you don't know about the dishonor? If you are serving an apparently honorable person doing overtly honorable things, but dishonor is going on 'under the rose', even without your input, and it comes crashing down on them, does it splash you too? Reputation vs. internal knowledge again. You may be branded as dishonored, but feel well in yourself. Or, if you have been brought up in (or considered and decided for yourself upon) a tradition that says you've essentially become a limb of your 'lord' ("the sinews of the empire" on Barrayar...) then you may still feel yourself dishonored regardless of whether you did or did not follow the letter and/or spirit of your oath.

I also considered "Honor's Paradox" from the Kencyr novels by Hodgsell... because of where/how I was brought up, and the opinions I've formed through exposure to such writings, and Liaden notions of honor... I have to say I'm still in the Shakespeare camp; do what's right for your internal equilibrium and let reputation fall where it will. This does mean weighing your oath's worth against the honor/dishonor that your lord is demanding from you.
Whew! Quite a diatribe.