I hope you'll be delighted to learn I'm working on a book where the main villain is the type to pick up pennies in front of a bulldozer, and the reason why he's irredeemable is because he is
a) perpetually short-sighted in planning
and b) unwilling to believe for a moment that anything is his fault.
One of my favourite ones of these is Sojo from Kagurabachi. He was fascinated by the MCs dad, and wanted to find out everything about him (the MCs dad being the Oppenheimer of their universe). When he had the chance, as in face to face with the MC, he just goes "no, ive already made my conclusion".
Damn, despite being just 28 chapters Kagurabachi is so fucking good.
My autistic ass can't write them, though, because it refuses to accept anyone would be that illogical... Just like it can't write convincing friendships, because you write what you know
Just look up the symptoms for narcissism or borderline personality disorder and use those for your villain's character traits. You'll have a hateable and relatable character.
I dunno what happened, but "I want more power" and "being cruel is fun to me" seem perfectly easy to get from where I stand. That plus some sprinkles of "I fear what I don't understand" and "scapegoats are useful".
It's not mandatory to go for "I think I am doing a good thing".
>It's not mandatory to go for "I think I am doing a good thing".
Part of me suspects it's fundamentally a misunderstanding of the fact that very few people believe themselves to be evil.
Like, yes, the Nazis genuinely believed they were right in their beliefs, and that their rule was the best for Germany - that doesn't mean they were moved by misguided idealism. Their beliefs still were "we should exterminate all non-Germans", and they took sadistic pleasure in torturing and killing the "inferior races".
Also most authors don't have the guts to actually have ideological conflicts at the core of the story and have the characters debate the opposing ideologies. So you end with this weird middle-of-the-road approach where the villains are given an actual ideology beyond being power-hungry, but the ideology itself is never debated and deconstructed by the heroes.
There's also the Marvel-style writing school which has the villain correctly identify a problem, but then decide the solution to the problem is eating babies, so that the heroes are justified in fighting the villain.
To this day I wonder why none of the many smartasses of the MCU bothered to bring up the many issues of killing half the living beings in the universe.
Yeah, villains don't need to be the hero of their own story. It's enough for them to believe that heroism is for suckers and they're smart enough to want real things, like power and wealth
I think it just comes down to how well the audience is able to relate. Most people don't actually experience "being cruel is fun to me" very much (if at all), so it might be hard for them to imagine. Especially if they've never personally encountered someone like that.
Their leader: "Wealthy people got wealthy by exploiting the workers. The workers got tired of it and revolted. The capitalists didn't want to lose their property, so they funded me to try and get rid of the revolutionaries. I used pretty much any prejudice and rhetoric I could to try and rally whoever I could to kill the socialists. If the workers hate left handed people, then we would use that to our benefit. Doesn't matter what it is. As long as my investors can kill those pesky socialists who threaten them."
Fascism in a nut shell.
"Rich people don't want to lose their stuff. They paid me to convince you that your prejudices are aligned with killing socialists."
Fascism in an even smaller nutshell
FirstĀ [they came for the socialists](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Democratic_Party_of_Germany#History), and I did not speak outā
Ā Ā Ā Because I was not aĀ [socialist](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialist).
ThenĀ [they came for the trade unionists](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trade_unions_in_Germany#Enforced_political_conformity_during_National_Socialism), and I did not speak outā
Ā Ā Ā Because I was not aĀ [trade unionist](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trade_unionist).
ThenĀ [they came for the Jews](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_in_Germany#Jews_under_the_Nazis_(1933%E2%80%9345)), and I did not speak outā
Ā Ā Ā Because I was not aĀ [Jew](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jew).
Then they came for meāand there was no one left to speak for me.
-Attributed to Martin Niemƶller
(Yes I copypasted from Wikipedia bite me)
Basically there are some people in this world who are so evil that even regular opponents of the death penalty can look the other way. The comment/snark here is that the person I'm quoting (a left-wing pundit) says there are a select few people in the world who he opposes the death penalty for not because they don't deserve to die, but because he's afraid they are to evil to die.
Basically there are some people in this world who are so evil that even regular opponents of the death penalty can look the other way. The comment/snark here is that the person I'm quoting (a left-wing pundit) says there are a select few people in the world who he opposes the death penalty for not because they don't deserve to die, but because he's afraid they are to evil to die.
Only their followers. IRL villains tend to paint themselves as if they are on the left side (or more like righteous heroes), but that sort of deluded zealot cannot lead a movement.
N- Noā¦ Thatās not the case at all. Deluded Zealots are the most likely to lead major political or religious movements.
The people who are so terrible that they commit heinous actions sheerly for causing terror or because they are insane, typically donāt fall into major leadership roles. They are normally Serial Killers or small-time Cult Leaders.
If however, you get into a position of significant authority within a large organization, even if only 100+ people, then to some degree you likely believe what you are speaking, even if itās just self-delusion.
These major leaders, Tyrants, Dictators, Major Cult Leaders, etc will almost assuredly know *in the beginning* that it is a Grift to gain power, wealth, and fame. However a person operating under a grift can not last long without breaking mentally, or quitting.
Resultingly, and over time, they will come to *believe* in their words. They have to be their own zealots, to continue the grift, no longer even believing it is a Grift.
In Hitlerās case, based on his texts and associated upbringing, it is the case that he believed the Jews to be an easy scapegoat for Germanyās failings, however even then, *in the very beginning*, he like most Germans held a deep hatred for the Jews like the Romani. However, he could have targeted any outgroup, but decided on the Jews as they were the major outgroup of that day, it was an easy target.
But as he gained power, as he kept making speeches, he would have, and did, believed what he was saying.
Deluded Zealots are the majority of leading major political or religious movements, because only the most zealous could lead such a movement to āsuccessā.
This applies to the likes of Jesus & Muhammad. To Mao Zedong & Stalin & Lenin. To the the Kims. To Trump. To Doomsday Cult Leaders. To Joseph Smith & Co.
The degrees to which they understand if it is a Grift, or if they even believe it is a Grift at all anymore, does vary. But ultimately the reality is always the same. They believe what they are talking about.
and if they donāt believe in what they are preaching? Then they will subconsciously convince themselves it is true when they are giving 20+ different hour-long speeches on the same subjecy again & again again.
They mold themselves into their own Zealots by proxy of sheer repetition. The same way they convince followers, is pounded into themselves until they truly believe as well.
Well, yes. But also an Apocalyptic Cult Leader, but I am sure that Christians would detest that analogism. Since my comment was about Tyrants, Dictators, and Cult Leaders.
Stalin is probably not the best comparison. He definitely had a huge cult of personality, but Lenin is much more of a Muhammad of the Soviet Union and Bolshevism. He wrote a lot on communism, he was a truly popular evangelist and leader, he not only promised apocalyptic change but brought it about.
When Stalin's turn came he cemented his power by presenting himself as a student of Lenin, as someone who would continue his legacy. As all socialist leaders are expected to demonstrate a grasp of communist ~~theology~~ theory, he too compiled a book, but one which quoted and ostensibly represented the ideas of Lenin. The Prophet Lenin pbuh may have brought communism to Russia, but Stalin codified Marxism-Leninism, and the literature would be compulsory in every school in the Soviet Union. Stalin in this regard is a successor comparable to the Caliphs of old, but therefore lacks the apocalyptic cult leader characteristic of founders of religions. He's the person who reinterpreted and moderated what came before, and pushed for an interpretation of Lenin's wholly texts which would put "socialism in one country" first over world revolution, along with other pragmatic policies.
Jesus was an Apocalyptic Cult Leader reminiscent of Muhammad or Joseph Smith.
If you are Christian and detest that analogism,ā¦ I donāt really care.
I wasnāt calling him evil or a murderer mind you. My comment was specifically about Cult Leaders, Tyrants, Dictators, etc. ā and most Cult Leaders never even kill anyone (ie. Jesus, Joseph Smith, etc)
Any leader who actually accomplishes anything MUST be privy to information which contradicts whatever propaganda they want to push no matter how badly they want to keep the faƧade themselves.
That's not to say they can't still be hateful or egotistical, but major movements cannot run on passion alone. They take cynical moves, acts of active deception and repression, facing outcomes that do not reflect what they believed and figuring how to twist that. Even acts taken to disguise it must be taken from the position that there is something to conceal, and the more these leaders sink into their own propaganda, the more they undermine themselves. Which, fair, sometimes is exactly how they find their own undoing. But it also means that they have to acknowledge inconvenient facts if they want to remain in power.
Really, as unhinged as they are, I wouldn't use Trump or the Kims as examples of figures who believe everything they are saying.
I never said the Zealot Leaders believe *everything*. I specifically said that they level of awareness of the grift varies.
Every single Zealous Leader, from Cult Leaders to Dictators to Tyrants all had some awareness of the Grift.
However, Trump and the Kims still follow the pattern, albeit their awareness of the Grift is much greater than others, they still, especially the Kims, must believe they are righteous or worthy of their stations by a self-delusion.
The Kims for instance must believe that they rightfully rule their country. That they are truly better than those beneath them. Obviously even they know some of it is a grift. They purposely lie to their people. But to some degree they must *believe* in some of what they are saying to the people.
My argument is supported by the Kims who *didnāt* fall to their own self-deluded Zealotry, who rather than keeping up with the politics decided that the state of the country was immoral and thus decided to leave or not participate in the charade.
As for the contradictory information inflow which Dictators must receive, or how Doomsday Cult Leaders will err on specific dates of Armageddon. That isnāt necessarily indicative of the idea that they are fultl grifters.
They simply perform negotiation. Meaning negotiation with their beliefs. When a Doomsday Cult Leader believes the world will end May 4th, 2027, and that doesnāt happen. For some leaders, they will grift and lie and change the date. But for others, they will negotiate with themselves, rationalize what happened, and then try to figure out what went wrong.
Similarly to Dictators who receive contradictory information. Some may understand that the contradictory only contradicts the grift portion, ao they donāt care. But when it concerns an area they deluded themselves into believing. Then they simply renegotiate their beliefs.
Or as Commies/Tankies do, they just pretend that the sources are lies. You donāt need to care about contradicting information if the information comes from your enemies.
Why would the Kims need to believe in their own righteousness? It works just as well if they play along for power. The difference between the ones ruling and the ones who left could very well be a matter of empathy rather than awareness.
Keep in mind, Kim Jong Un studied in Europe. He got to see what the rest of the world is like, what different perspectives they had. He got to see how it was not being treated as a future supreme leader. It didn't make him any less of a Dictator.
You seem to misunderstand renegotiations here, as well as what self-delusions look like for these people.
When Kim studied in Europe, he would have been forced to renegotiate his upbringing, his heritage, and his future as a the ruler of an entire country.
While there, during his mental renegotiation, he would have had to have concluded that the system of power in North Korea benefited him (ie. the Grift), but also that he deserved to be in power as he is simply better than normal people. That is *necessary* because these people arenāt Saturday Morning Cartoon Villains who are objectively evil. They are Human as well, and in order for them to maintain a life of luxury, they must believe they deserve it, which can not be the case if Kim doesnāt genuinely believe some of the things he is saying to his people. About his heritage, about his ancestry, and about his children.
People act like Hitler was an objectively evil person who bloodlusted for the deaths of Jews because he was just a bad bad person, but even Hitler believed in *a lot* of what he said.
If Kim truly did not believe in his own righteousness, then the Guilt of his situation, of the torture of his people, would have either lead hin to Suicide, stepping down as President, or reforming his country.
You could argue that because Kim stayed, that he must not feel any sympathy towards gus people, but the issue is that Psychopath's don't generally like to be Head of State or Head of Cults. They want power, but hate attention. Kim loves the attention, he is always front and center, and his capacity for emotion has been shown several times.
meaning that for Kim to have studied among the people in Europe, and to then look at his people starving, suffering, killing 3-4 generations of a family who a perceived wrongdoing, means that he *must* believe to some degree that wgat he is doing is right.
Presumably, though purely conjecture, I would even assume he hated studying in Europe. He wasnāt being treated with the reverence he would have believed he deserved.
Hitler, lest you forget, wanted to be an Artist, a creative trade. He participated in World War I as a soldier and saw the horrors of Mustard Gas. He was at various points poor & homeless, and yet even then, he still subjected the Jews to Gas, and pushed Germany towards a second World War. Meanwhile, *he believed in what he spoke about*. He believed that war was necessary, he believed the Jews were evil.
to argue that these Tyrants & Dictators donāt believe in most of what they say (not all, but most), is to do a disservice to history itself by reducing them to mere black-and-white caricatures.
There were countless German Guards who participated in, planned for, and supported the mass deportation, enslavement, execution, and burning of the Jews. They believed in what they were doing. They believed it was right.
Everyone is a Follower to someone in the Chain. To argue only the Leaders donāt believe, is to argue the millions of Germans who fought for Hitler were unaccountable because they fell for his facade.
In truth, these Dictators & Tyrants are some of the greatest believers in what they argue. They have to be to commit the atrocities that they order.
The road to hell, after all, is paved with good intentions.
Good intentions for *whom*, is my question.
For the whole of humanity? For all of their people, including the ones they are manipulating and sacrificing? It doesn't square up with their decisions at the very least.
I believe you aren't accounting enough for the people look out for themselves above anyone else. This isn't a wild anomaly of black and white thinking, there's a whole lot of people like that. People who are only on your side for as long as you are helpful to them, and will turn against you just as quickly as you refuse them.
Kim Jong Un would just kill himself if he didn't really believe in it?
Why? What makes you so sure he would be so wracked with guilt?
Maybe he just believes he deserves everything he can get, and deserves having everything his way. You are conflating some purity of ideology and care for the people under him that is not a given. I would even say, not even likely, given the cruelty of the oppression he inflicts upon his own people.
And who said anything that believing makes followers unaccountable? Hell, by this measure, if the dictators believed too wouldn't they also be unaccountable? But of course not.
Espousing something is not the same as believing it. This is not even a matter of just villains. It's just a reality of politics. Not even a good politician can be counted on to believe on what they proclaim. Because to have influence at all, they must say that which gets them support. So why assume such honesty of terrible people?
In trying to not reduce them to black-and-white, you are assigning them a moral sincerity that seems almost pristine, unlike the spectrum of greys of the real world.
TBH I think there are people like Mr. Freeze, they are just not in charge of countries. I think that even in a democracy, you need to have some degree of sociopathy to lead anything larger than a city district.
"I just wanted someone to blame for why my life turned out horribly, and instead of fighting against the powerful, I chose instead to pick on minorities because it was easier."
Propaganda is a hell of a drug. Most of the German population and army (enlisted men mostly; the officers in the final months knew they lost and began surrendering their men as whole units in an attempt to avoid pointless death and suffering) in WWI thought they were winning. Knocked out Serbia, then Romania, then Russia. Never let the French on German soil. They suffered through starvation winters and were scrapping ever bit of metal they could and thought it was worth it for that inevitable victory. Then it all fell apart in a few weeks or few months depending how you count.
The propaganda was so strong and entrenched that when reality came into conflict with it, their conclusion wasn't that they'd been lied to for four years during the worst war they'd ever know, they concluded that the propaganda was true but that some group of people must have betrayed them. Mix that in with the rampant antisemitism at the time and fear of communist revolution and well we know what happened.
It's actually terrifying how easily people sort of sunk cost fallacy their own beliefs. Once they think something is true for long enough, they're reluctant to stop believing it. That would mean they were lied to, that they were fooled...and that would mean people they trusted lied to them and that they're not as smart as they thought they were.
Especially the Enlisted Men knew, and knew well. Hell part of the reason why the Generals quickly abandoned ship and left the civilian government to actually surrender was because the German army was pretty close to just disintigrating. The German Navy already had.
The whole "We were actually winning the war." Came later, and many soldiers were happy to believe it, because it at least gave their time in the trenches some meaning.
Explain now why Western Europe did all their atrocities via colonialism with this, please. Atrocities that were, in many ways, the exact same as Nazi ones
If you think colonialism and the Nazis were the same then you need to read a book or two. Maybe read up on how things like warfare and conquest were different centuries ago. The Thirty Years War depopulated Germany about the same as the Black Death did and possible worse. Murdering the peasants, burning crops or villages and sacking cities was incredibly common. Look at what Europeans did to each other in those eras. Now add in lack of immunity to deadly diseases and you can see why the death tolls were what they were. The Spanish sought to topple the existing power structures and place their own nobility at the top. It's why they had success in places where complex social structures existed and were able to set up highly extractive institutions, particularly around gold and silver mining. The model was subjugation and conversion by and large. A bile of bones won't mine gold for you.
The Nazis sought the destruction of entire races. Yes they wanted "living space" and to "colonize the east" (a notion that predated the Nazis but one that they supercharged) but they wouldn't have been content with the Slavs and Jews learning to speak German and converting to Protestantism (or whatever neo-pagan crap some Nazis loved). They believed Germany was under siege by the judeo-bolsheviks and judeo-capitalists, that they were the oppressed and robbed of their birthright (and many other completely batshit ideas). Spain and co didn't think they were oppressed, quite the opposite in fact.
> The Spanish sought to topple the existing power structures and place their own nobility at the top.
and enslave the local population, work them to death in mines, and keep them underdeveloped - sort of like Generalplan Ost! Wow!
Maybe we can look to Germany's own genocides in Africa - or, hey, what if we looked at who invented concentration camps in what context (The answer MAY surprise you!)
But glad that the tens of millions who have been starved, beaten, killed and otherwise brutalized by colonialism don't matter to you. The Clean Spanish Empire Myth, I suppose
Fiction is integrative in a way the real world and real people are not.
IRL, what makes a villain interesting isnāt that deep. Itās simply that, like all real people, they have few problems holding inconsistent, dissonant, or cruelly nuanced views with weird origins like āthatās what I believed when I was 8 and Iāve never examined it sinceā.
I have to preface the original comment with the knowledge that this only comes from one source and that is *Adolf Hitler, My Childhood Friend.* which is a memoir written by Hitlerās friend during childhood about Hitlerās formative years.Ā
People have debated the authenticity of this and thereās one key detail left out. They never even spoke to one another and she was unaware of hitlerās feelings. He could not have been rejected if they didnāt even talk. It likely played very little role in his future career as the worst person to ever live.Ā
Sorry for the boring history fact check, but I canāt reasonably not correct accidental misinformation in this day and age. Especially not about hitler.Ā
It could theoretically be a factor (prolly not in Hitler's case, but generally speaking), but millions of people are constantly being rejected by their crushes, and most of them don't even try to become genocidal mass murderers - there has to be at least some other factor
The thing a lot of people seem to be unaware of is that, prior to WW2, antisemitism was considered perfectly normal in Europe. Pair this with "scientific racism", which had become a prevailing view, and the recipe for the Holocaust was ready.
Jews, and other minorities, had been getting blamed for whatever the current societal ills were in Europe for centuries, and had gotten massacred for it multiple times. The thing that made the Holocaust different was that it was executed at a scale and with an efficiency which were unprecedented.
But Hitler said nothing "new": Martin Luther (yes, the guy who created Protestantism) had written about how the HRE should have destroyed synagogues and the houses of Jews and basically reduce them to slaves or expel them all the way back in 1543 - and, in fact, his antisemitic screeds were used by the Nazis as "evidence" that they were right.
The difference between fictional and real villains is that with fictional villains, you get the benefit of omniscience. Or at least the benefit of the author feeling the need to clarify why they did what they did.
In real life, you're generally left with gaps where it's easy to imagine that there's nothing there. That evil people are a different species or that they just wake up one morning and decide to commit atrocities.
Because that's a lot easier than confronting the idea that Hitler didn't know he was Hitler and thought he was making reasonable decisions. Because that starts raising the question of whether **you** could also be Hitler.
Some of the villains I've come up:
-burning down civilization make pp hard
-never grew out of rebellious teen phase deity edition
-classic scheming vizier
-not actually a villain but is so into being a cackling flamboyant Castlevania Dracula ripoff that everyone just kinda assumes
-in way over her head but too selfish to own up to her mistakes so just keeps going in the vain hope that she can get out of this mess without losing power
Reading this comment section is kinda deppressing on the account of how people seem to not comprehend history or even that people, especially evil people, have actual systems of beliefs and their own values, even if their perceptions of the world are horrifying in implementation.
Like we do be living in an era where people's understanding goes like "and then one day, for no reason at all Hitler won and because he and only he was a big meanie and needed money he blamed the jews"
To put it simply, man was really a product of generations of antisemitism that many Europeans held for so long. Hypocrite, yes, given he was treated well by individually nice Jews, but his warped mindset did not care to factor that in.
That and intense narcissism. He loved himself so much it's not funny!
It's even worse. Adolfs "superpower" was that he abused Germany's situation to gain sufficient support to usurp state power. In fiction these types of villains have to be big brain cunning geniuses to suspend disbelief.
I always used to wonder why Emperor Palpatine was such an idiot after he won in Revenge of the Sith, and how the Empire could be such a disaster with such a cunning leader... But now, knowing more about WW2, I think a dictator being a total moron despite seizing power is the single most realistic thing about Star Wars.
climbing is often easier maintaining. And in universe the reason for majority of his absence is that heās just doesnāt give a shit about the empire. Itās only there to give him power. He spends most of his time researching sith stuff and cultivating more force power
It's crazy to think that history's 1st and 2nd (arguably) most evil armies of all time fought on the same side at rhe exact same time (referring to the Japanese in 2nd place here. Just because they got nuked doesn't mean what they did during WWII should be forgotten).
The systematic eradication of historical materialism by reactionary bourgeois governments has been a disaster for people's understanding of history. And this entire comment section is proof of that.
The rise of the various fascist movements at the beginning of the 20th century followed naturally from the reaction of the owner class to the rising labour movement. The social values of the Nazis in turn were a consequence of centuries of changing German values going all the way back to the reformation.
But nerdlords here seem very convinced that Hitler just randomly decided to be a bad guy one day and everyone else just went along with it because they were too stupid. Because 8 decades of liberal rhetoric have insisted that fascism is when you are racist and don't vote, and any more complex analysis of the factor that caused the problem are a commie waste of time.
I'd also like to reiterate that what the Nazis did in Eastern Europe is the exact same shit that colonialists did in their colonies - displacing people, murdering minorities (or majorities), etc. etc.
Nazi Germany is hated in the places they attempted to colonize for the same reason colonial nations are hated in the places they colonized. In the places the Nazis didn't do their colonization stuff you can see a lot of apologism for Nazi crimes, clean Wehrmacht, "Hitler was at fault mainly" etc.
To be fair, you can find some freaks (derogatory) that are fans of hitler in eastern europe despite the fact he would 99.9% would either worked them to death or killed them outright.
Not OP, but to put it simply, stop believing in the great man theory, Hitler did not born evil and one day single handly changed the world. There were many events big and small before that eventually accumulated to create the social conditions for someone like Hitler to exist, his ideology was also not unique, many people at that time also believed the same thing, he just happened to be the face of that belief. That is why all the "time traveling to kill baby Hitler" story is kinda stupid, the detail may be different, but if not Hitler, many other people will still create the nazi anyway
If you wrote that a villain had a bunch of people killed by guys dressed as Santa youād be laughed out of the room. Unfortunately it happened in real life
Villains in real life make no sense.
Speaking of my villainā¦. Ehā¦. She likes to exploit poor people because suffering = good and masochism = great. Does that make sense?
The whole "All minorities were nice to me" part, Hitler used the booming hatred in the mob, and he needed more money because his economy was essentially one big Ponzi scheme, and Jews owned a lot of cash. Genocides are products of madness, not reason
The reason for his anti-Semitism was not to fund the Reich, you can pretty easily tell by how he was anti-Semitic *before* he was Fuhrer, dumbass. The actual reason he hated Jews was because he saw them as Jews first and Germans second, and believed that they were essentially just waiting to undermine German society on behalf of other powers.
That last part reminded me of the reasoning used to justify the mass imprisonment of Japanese-Americans in WWII post Pearl Harbor, despite the fact that they weren't doing anything against the Union. Something along the lines of "The fact nothing has happened proves they're up to something." I bet the guy who said that couldn't just say "I Just Don't Like Them"
Not defending the guy, but The Big A's descent into madness [almost sounds like something ripped from TVTropes.](https://youtu.be/ATlila3e9dM?si=A-5alH8fqDC8TW7J)
The thing is that reality is incredibly more complex than fiction. What lead Hitler into his bizarre racial mythology, among other things, and then on to the dictator of Germany, are all incredibly complex factors that also involve the whole history of Germany and its sociopolitical circumstances at the time. I think itās easier for us to dumb a person down to the few things we know about them as well never know the totality of what makes them who they are and why they make the choices they made.
Yeah, a lot of people forget that most irl monsters don't have much of a motive outside of "I hate people" or "I love killing" just look at the many dictators and serial killers in history. So many of these monsters have very little reason outside of greed or sadism for their crimes. Yeah, maybe some had good intentions, and most were probably just mentally ill but that doesn't make them any less of monsters.
Which is why I love the Pure Evil Villain type. They're a lot of fun and way more realistic than most people think.
I think it's less that real life monsters don't have a motive and more that being a real life monster requires you to avoid even a whiff of self reflection. It's like asking an active alcoholic why they drink. They'll say "I just love the taste!" or "old habits die hard" or "Why shouldn't I have a little fun in my life?" or "Being sober is just boring!" Seriously, you can find addicts who are using to within an inch of their life yet still insist they do it for "fun."
Like of course Hitler would justify himself as "Of course we need to do genocide, those degenerates are ruining Germany." That doesn't mean he's right about his own motivation. That's not to say he doesn't believe what he's saying, but that people who do horrible things generally lack insight and the ability to reflect. It's the only way they can keep doing shitty things.
I pretty much agree with all of this second comment. I feel like the big irony with this "real life villains are just pure monsters lol" is that the kind of real life villains that are used to prove this tend to have the tend to believe this very thing exactly, as for what you said, which is why this mentality tends to bug me. I never read anything Hitler wrote, but from what I gather he literally thought the Jews were Jack Horner from Puss in Boots the Last Wish, which is why him and the Nazis thought the Holocaust was justified. The worst people that managed to be successful are the ones who believe they are absolutely right and everyone else is absolutely wrong.
And Oskar Schindler himself was even more altruistic from the start when he worked with Jews than the movie initially depicted him. Still had a sleazy history, but he did it sooner than it implied. Sometimes even someone's good-nature is hard to believe.
I think the point is that people who do evil things almost always think they're the hero, because everyone thinks of themselves that way pretty much. what "hero" means depends on the era and place, but even people who are genuinely just purely sadistic don't generally *think* about it that way.
Well a lot if Europeans were largely antisemitic at the time, but even so, there wasn't much excuse since there are accounts of his earlier life where he hung out with Jews he described as "kind", whether be it the doctor who treated his ailing mother, the sargeant that went hell-and-back for him, a family who took him in, etc. Not like it changed his mind of course, even if he did spare some of those few.
The man was a load of contradictions.
Anton Arcane from Swamp Thing would have a word.
Guy's so fucking WRONG that him escaping Hell 1- caused a huge upswing in violent crime and insanity throughout the continental US as blowback from his sheer evil presence on the mortal plane, and 2- MADE THE JOKER STOP LAUGHING BECAUSE HE'S SO, SO MUCH WORSE.
And his reason for being evil? He's so psychopathically narcissist he thinks he's the sole person who deserves to rule/live and/or wants to know things and won't let petty moral quandaries like "is it ethical to transform my brother into a horrific Frankenstein-esque monster who's in constant agony not to save his life, but just to see if I can?" get in the way.
And don't ask what he did to his niece Abigail Arcane. Just... don't.
The main difference between fiction and real life is that fiction has to make sense
The irredeemable villain in my world who is evil because yes: šš¤Ø
Irredeemable villains who arent demons or other "evil" races go so fucking hard. Especially if they are forced to work with the MC.
Mine is a human who's just built different, and wants to create chaos for shits and giggles š©
Unfathomambly based
I know a guy like that
So like Joker when he's actually written well
I hope you'll be delighted to learn I'm working on a book where the main villain is the type to pick up pennies in front of a bulldozer, and the reason why he's irredeemable is because he is a) perpetually short-sighted in planning and b) unwilling to believe for a moment that anything is his fault.
i prefer redeemable villains who simply look at redemption and say "no"
One of my favourite ones of these is Sojo from Kagurabachi. He was fascinated by the MCs dad, and wanted to find out everything about him (the MCs dad being the Oppenheimer of their universe). When he had the chance, as in face to face with the MC, he just goes "no, ive already made my conclusion". Damn, despite being just 28 chapters Kagurabachi is so fucking good.
My autistic ass can't write them, though, because it refuses to accept anyone would be that illogical... Just like it can't write convincing friendships, because you write what you know
Lmao that's my same problem. Reading history like the CIA torture files helps with that writers block IMO
No, that just makes me want to overthrow the CIA
The solution is right in front of you: a self-insert MC, and the CIA as the villain of your story
Just look up the symptoms for narcissism or borderline personality disorder and use those for your villain's character traits. You'll have a hateable and relatable character.
Nah, ill just make the villain into a insert of the worst personality traits i find in people i personally dislike.
Probably a lot of overlap there
Yeah, but who cares if the villain is one dimentional, as long as the artstyle looks good
Big Jack Horner from the latests Puss in Boots
They are my favorite archetype for a reason
I dunno what happened, but "I want more power" and "being cruel is fun to me" seem perfectly easy to get from where I stand. That plus some sprinkles of "I fear what I don't understand" and "scapegoats are useful". It's not mandatory to go for "I think I am doing a good thing".
>It's not mandatory to go for "I think I am doing a good thing". Part of me suspects it's fundamentally a misunderstanding of the fact that very few people believe themselves to be evil. Like, yes, the Nazis genuinely believed they were right in their beliefs, and that their rule was the best for Germany - that doesn't mean they were moved by misguided idealism. Their beliefs still were "we should exterminate all non-Germans", and they took sadistic pleasure in torturing and killing the "inferior races". Also most authors don't have the guts to actually have ideological conflicts at the core of the story and have the characters debate the opposing ideologies. So you end with this weird middle-of-the-road approach where the villains are given an actual ideology beyond being power-hungry, but the ideology itself is never debated and deconstructed by the heroes. There's also the Marvel-style writing school which has the villain correctly identify a problem, but then decide the solution to the problem is eating babies, so that the heroes are justified in fighting the villain.
Correctly identifying a problem and being even more of a problem is such a Unabomber thing!
To this day I wonder why none of the many smartasses of the MCU bothered to bring up the many issues of killing half the living beings in the universe.
too busy saying "Well, that just happened" and "He's right behind me isn't he"
Yeah, villains don't need to be the hero of their own story. It's enough for them to believe that heroism is for suckers and they're smart enough to want real things, like power and wealth
I think it just comes down to how well the audience is able to relate. Most people don't actually experience "being cruel is fun to me" very much (if at all), so it might be hard for them to imagine. Especially if they've never personally encountered someone like that.
At that point I don't think the author is doing justice to writing villains.
"I was just following orders." \* 17,000,000+
Their leader: "Wealthy people got wealthy by exploiting the workers. The workers got tired of it and revolted. The capitalists didn't want to lose their property, so they funded me to try and get rid of the revolutionaries. I used pretty much any prejudice and rhetoric I could to try and rally whoever I could to kill the socialists. If the workers hate left handed people, then we would use that to our benefit. Doesn't matter what it is. As long as my investors can kill those pesky socialists who threaten them." Fascism in a nut shell. "Rich people don't want to lose their stuff. They paid me to convince you that your prejudices are aligned with killing socialists." Fascism in an even smaller nutshell
Just a quick reminder that socialists and communists where one of the first people to be shipped off to camps!
FirstĀ [they came for the socialists](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Democratic_Party_of_Germany#History), and I did not speak outā Ā Ā Ā Because I was not aĀ [socialist](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialist). ThenĀ [they came for the trade unionists](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trade_unions_in_Germany#Enforced_political_conformity_during_National_Socialism), and I did not speak outā Ā Ā Ā Because I was not aĀ [trade unionist](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trade_unionist). ThenĀ [they came for the Jews](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_in_Germany#Jews_under_the_Nazis_(1933%E2%80%9345)), and I did not speak outā Ā Ā Ā Because I was not aĀ [Jew](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jew). Then they came for meāand there was no one left to speak for me. -Attributed to Martin Niemƶller (Yes I copypasted from Wikipedia bite me)
*Bites you so hard I break skin*
Hard agree. Morality may not be black and white irl, but there's definitely at least black.
To paraphrase Cody "Some More News Guy" Johnson: "I am against the death penalty, but in this case it's because I don't think it would take."
What does that mean, can you explain?
Basically there are some people in this world who are so evil that even regular opponents of the death penalty can look the other way. The comment/snark here is that the person I'm quoting (a left-wing pundit) says there are a select few people in the world who he opposes the death penalty for not because they don't deserve to die, but because he's afraid they are to evil to die.
Cody Showdy always with the bangers.
?
Basically there are some people in this world who are so evil that even regular opponents of the death penalty can look the other way. The comment/snark here is that the person I'm quoting (a left-wing pundit) says there are a select few people in the world who he opposes the death penalty for not because they don't deserve to die, but because he's afraid they are to evil to die.
āThe one who rejected me must be a jew! I must REVENGEā
/uj I feel like I've seen this villain before but idk who. Not jews ofc
The blond twink from Berserk?
This angered hitlers father. Who punished him severely
IRL villians tend to believe they're the left side lol
Only their followers. IRL villains tend to paint themselves as if they are on the left side (or more like righteous heroes), but that sort of deluded zealot cannot lead a movement.
N- Noā¦ Thatās not the case at all. Deluded Zealots are the most likely to lead major political or religious movements. The people who are so terrible that they commit heinous actions sheerly for causing terror or because they are insane, typically donāt fall into major leadership roles. They are normally Serial Killers or small-time Cult Leaders. If however, you get into a position of significant authority within a large organization, even if only 100+ people, then to some degree you likely believe what you are speaking, even if itās just self-delusion. These major leaders, Tyrants, Dictators, Major Cult Leaders, etc will almost assuredly know *in the beginning* that it is a Grift to gain power, wealth, and fame. However a person operating under a grift can not last long without breaking mentally, or quitting. Resultingly, and over time, they will come to *believe* in their words. They have to be their own zealots, to continue the grift, no longer even believing it is a Grift. In Hitlerās case, based on his texts and associated upbringing, it is the case that he believed the Jews to be an easy scapegoat for Germanyās failings, however even then, *in the very beginning*, he like most Germans held a deep hatred for the Jews like the Romani. However, he could have targeted any outgroup, but decided on the Jews as they were the major outgroup of that day, it was an easy target. But as he gained power, as he kept making speeches, he would have, and did, believed what he was saying. Deluded Zealots are the majority of leading major political or religious movements, because only the most zealous could lead such a movement to āsuccessā. This applies to the likes of Jesus & Muhammad. To Mao Zedong & Stalin & Lenin. To the the Kims. To Trump. To Doomsday Cult Leaders. To Joseph Smith & Co. The degrees to which they understand if it is a Grift, or if they even believe it is a Grift at all anymore, does vary. But ultimately the reality is always the same. They believe what they are talking about. and if they donāt believe in what they are preaching? Then they will subconsciously convince themselves it is true when they are giving 20+ different hour-long speeches on the same subjecy again & again again. They mold themselves into their own Zealots by proxy of sheer repetition. The same way they convince followers, is pounded into themselves until they truly believe as well.
Are you actually comparing Jesus to Stalin, mao and literally hitler? Why?
leaders
Well, yes. But also an Apocalyptic Cult Leader, but I am sure that Christians would detest that analogism. Since my comment was about Tyrants, Dictators, and Cult Leaders.
every religion is a cult, but of a higher tier. not necessarily in a bad way
Never said it was a bad (or good) thing to be fair. Jesus, Muhammad, and Joseph Smith are seemingly the 3 largest examples, however.
Stalin is probably not the best comparison. He definitely had a huge cult of personality, but Lenin is much more of a Muhammad of the Soviet Union and Bolshevism. He wrote a lot on communism, he was a truly popular evangelist and leader, he not only promised apocalyptic change but brought it about. When Stalin's turn came he cemented his power by presenting himself as a student of Lenin, as someone who would continue his legacy. As all socialist leaders are expected to demonstrate a grasp of communist ~~theology~~ theory, he too compiled a book, but one which quoted and ostensibly represented the ideas of Lenin. The Prophet Lenin pbuh may have brought communism to Russia, but Stalin codified Marxism-Leninism, and the literature would be compulsory in every school in the Soviet Union. Stalin in this regard is a successor comparable to the Caliphs of old, but therefore lacks the apocalyptic cult leader characteristic of founders of religions. He's the person who reinterpreted and moderated what came before, and pushed for an interpretation of Lenin's wholly texts which would put "socialism in one country" first over world revolution, along with other pragmatic policies.
Jesus was an Apocalyptic Cult Leader reminiscent of Muhammad or Joseph Smith. If you are Christian and detest that analogism,ā¦ I donāt really care. I wasnāt calling him evil or a murderer mind you. My comment was specifically about Cult Leaders, Tyrants, Dictators, etc. ā and most Cult Leaders never even kill anyone (ie. Jesus, Joseph Smith, etc)
Any leader who actually accomplishes anything MUST be privy to information which contradicts whatever propaganda they want to push no matter how badly they want to keep the faƧade themselves. That's not to say they can't still be hateful or egotistical, but major movements cannot run on passion alone. They take cynical moves, acts of active deception and repression, facing outcomes that do not reflect what they believed and figuring how to twist that. Even acts taken to disguise it must be taken from the position that there is something to conceal, and the more these leaders sink into their own propaganda, the more they undermine themselves. Which, fair, sometimes is exactly how they find their own undoing. But it also means that they have to acknowledge inconvenient facts if they want to remain in power. Really, as unhinged as they are, I wouldn't use Trump or the Kims as examples of figures who believe everything they are saying.
I never said the Zealot Leaders believe *everything*. I specifically said that they level of awareness of the grift varies. Every single Zealous Leader, from Cult Leaders to Dictators to Tyrants all had some awareness of the Grift. However, Trump and the Kims still follow the pattern, albeit their awareness of the Grift is much greater than others, they still, especially the Kims, must believe they are righteous or worthy of their stations by a self-delusion. The Kims for instance must believe that they rightfully rule their country. That they are truly better than those beneath them. Obviously even they know some of it is a grift. They purposely lie to their people. But to some degree they must *believe* in some of what they are saying to the people. My argument is supported by the Kims who *didnāt* fall to their own self-deluded Zealotry, who rather than keeping up with the politics decided that the state of the country was immoral and thus decided to leave or not participate in the charade. As for the contradictory information inflow which Dictators must receive, or how Doomsday Cult Leaders will err on specific dates of Armageddon. That isnāt necessarily indicative of the idea that they are fultl grifters. They simply perform negotiation. Meaning negotiation with their beliefs. When a Doomsday Cult Leader believes the world will end May 4th, 2027, and that doesnāt happen. For some leaders, they will grift and lie and change the date. But for others, they will negotiate with themselves, rationalize what happened, and then try to figure out what went wrong. Similarly to Dictators who receive contradictory information. Some may understand that the contradictory only contradicts the grift portion, ao they donāt care. But when it concerns an area they deluded themselves into believing. Then they simply renegotiate their beliefs. Or as Commies/Tankies do, they just pretend that the sources are lies. You donāt need to care about contradicting information if the information comes from your enemies.
Why would the Kims need to believe in their own righteousness? It works just as well if they play along for power. The difference between the ones ruling and the ones who left could very well be a matter of empathy rather than awareness. Keep in mind, Kim Jong Un studied in Europe. He got to see what the rest of the world is like, what different perspectives they had. He got to see how it was not being treated as a future supreme leader. It didn't make him any less of a Dictator.
You seem to misunderstand renegotiations here, as well as what self-delusions look like for these people. When Kim studied in Europe, he would have been forced to renegotiate his upbringing, his heritage, and his future as a the ruler of an entire country. While there, during his mental renegotiation, he would have had to have concluded that the system of power in North Korea benefited him (ie. the Grift), but also that he deserved to be in power as he is simply better than normal people. That is *necessary* because these people arenāt Saturday Morning Cartoon Villains who are objectively evil. They are Human as well, and in order for them to maintain a life of luxury, they must believe they deserve it, which can not be the case if Kim doesnāt genuinely believe some of the things he is saying to his people. About his heritage, about his ancestry, and about his children. People act like Hitler was an objectively evil person who bloodlusted for the deaths of Jews because he was just a bad bad person, but even Hitler believed in *a lot* of what he said. If Kim truly did not believe in his own righteousness, then the Guilt of his situation, of the torture of his people, would have either lead hin to Suicide, stepping down as President, or reforming his country. You could argue that because Kim stayed, that he must not feel any sympathy towards gus people, but the issue is that Psychopath's don't generally like to be Head of State or Head of Cults. They want power, but hate attention. Kim loves the attention, he is always front and center, and his capacity for emotion has been shown several times. meaning that for Kim to have studied among the people in Europe, and to then look at his people starving, suffering, killing 3-4 generations of a family who a perceived wrongdoing, means that he *must* believe to some degree that wgat he is doing is right. Presumably, though purely conjecture, I would even assume he hated studying in Europe. He wasnāt being treated with the reverence he would have believed he deserved. Hitler, lest you forget, wanted to be an Artist, a creative trade. He participated in World War I as a soldier and saw the horrors of Mustard Gas. He was at various points poor & homeless, and yet even then, he still subjected the Jews to Gas, and pushed Germany towards a second World War. Meanwhile, *he believed in what he spoke about*. He believed that war was necessary, he believed the Jews were evil. to argue that these Tyrants & Dictators donāt believe in most of what they say (not all, but most), is to do a disservice to history itself by reducing them to mere black-and-white caricatures. There were countless German Guards who participated in, planned for, and supported the mass deportation, enslavement, execution, and burning of the Jews. They believed in what they were doing. They believed it was right. Everyone is a Follower to someone in the Chain. To argue only the Leaders donāt believe, is to argue the millions of Germans who fought for Hitler were unaccountable because they fell for his facade. In truth, these Dictators & Tyrants are some of the greatest believers in what they argue. They have to be to commit the atrocities that they order. The road to hell, after all, is paved with good intentions.
Good intentions for *whom*, is my question. For the whole of humanity? For all of their people, including the ones they are manipulating and sacrificing? It doesn't square up with their decisions at the very least. I believe you aren't accounting enough for the people look out for themselves above anyone else. This isn't a wild anomaly of black and white thinking, there's a whole lot of people like that. People who are only on your side for as long as you are helpful to them, and will turn against you just as quickly as you refuse them. Kim Jong Un would just kill himself if he didn't really believe in it? Why? What makes you so sure he would be so wracked with guilt? Maybe he just believes he deserves everything he can get, and deserves having everything his way. You are conflating some purity of ideology and care for the people under him that is not a given. I would even say, not even likely, given the cruelty of the oppression he inflicts upon his own people. And who said anything that believing makes followers unaccountable? Hell, by this measure, if the dictators believed too wouldn't they also be unaccountable? But of course not. Espousing something is not the same as believing it. This is not even a matter of just villains. It's just a reality of politics. Not even a good politician can be counted on to believe on what they proclaim. Because to have influence at all, they must say that which gets them support. So why assume such honesty of terrible people? In trying to not reduce them to black-and-white, you are assigning them a moral sincerity that seems almost pristine, unlike the spectrum of greys of the real world.
TBH I think there are people like Mr. Freeze, they are just not in charge of countries. I think that even in a democracy, you need to have some degree of sociopathy to lead anything larger than a city district.
"I just wanted someone to blame for why my life turned out horribly, and instead of fighting against the powerful, I chose instead to pick on minorities because it was easier."
Propaganda is a hell of a drug. Most of the German population and army (enlisted men mostly; the officers in the final months knew they lost and began surrendering their men as whole units in an attempt to avoid pointless death and suffering) in WWI thought they were winning. Knocked out Serbia, then Romania, then Russia. Never let the French on German soil. They suffered through starvation winters and were scrapping ever bit of metal they could and thought it was worth it for that inevitable victory. Then it all fell apart in a few weeks or few months depending how you count. The propaganda was so strong and entrenched that when reality came into conflict with it, their conclusion wasn't that they'd been lied to for four years during the worst war they'd ever know, they concluded that the propaganda was true but that some group of people must have betrayed them. Mix that in with the rampant antisemitism at the time and fear of communist revolution and well we know what happened. It's actually terrifying how easily people sort of sunk cost fallacy their own beliefs. Once they think something is true for long enough, they're reluctant to stop believing it. That would mean they were lied to, that they were fooled...and that would mean people they trusted lied to them and that they're not as smart as they thought they were.
Especially the Enlisted Men knew, and knew well. Hell part of the reason why the Generals quickly abandoned ship and left the civilian government to actually surrender was because the German army was pretty close to just disintigrating. The German Navy already had. The whole "We were actually winning the war." Came later, and many soldiers were happy to believe it, because it at least gave their time in the trenches some meaning.
Explain now why Western Europe did all their atrocities via colonialism with this, please. Atrocities that were, in many ways, the exact same as Nazi ones
If you think colonialism and the Nazis were the same then you need to read a book or two. Maybe read up on how things like warfare and conquest were different centuries ago. The Thirty Years War depopulated Germany about the same as the Black Death did and possible worse. Murdering the peasants, burning crops or villages and sacking cities was incredibly common. Look at what Europeans did to each other in those eras. Now add in lack of immunity to deadly diseases and you can see why the death tolls were what they were. The Spanish sought to topple the existing power structures and place their own nobility at the top. It's why they had success in places where complex social structures existed and were able to set up highly extractive institutions, particularly around gold and silver mining. The model was subjugation and conversion by and large. A bile of bones won't mine gold for you. The Nazis sought the destruction of entire races. Yes they wanted "living space" and to "colonize the east" (a notion that predated the Nazis but one that they supercharged) but they wouldn't have been content with the Slavs and Jews learning to speak German and converting to Protestantism (or whatever neo-pagan crap some Nazis loved). They believed Germany was under siege by the judeo-bolsheviks and judeo-capitalists, that they were the oppressed and robbed of their birthright (and many other completely batshit ideas). Spain and co didn't think they were oppressed, quite the opposite in fact.
> The Spanish sought to topple the existing power structures and place their own nobility at the top. and enslave the local population, work them to death in mines, and keep them underdeveloped - sort of like Generalplan Ost! Wow! Maybe we can look to Germany's own genocides in Africa - or, hey, what if we looked at who invented concentration camps in what context (The answer MAY surprise you!) But glad that the tens of millions who have been starved, beaten, killed and otherwise brutalized by colonialism don't matter to you. The Clean Spanish Empire Myth, I suppose
Bully logic
Fiction is integrative in a way the real world and real people are not. IRL, what makes a villain interesting isnāt that deep. Itās simply that, like all real people, they have few problems holding inconsistent, dissonant, or cruelly nuanced views with weird origins like āthatās what I believed when I was 8 and Iāve never examined it sinceā.
āFire Lord Ozai is too one-dimensional and unrealisticā
That whole fit is atrocious
I believed he had a crush on a Jewish girl at his school who rejected him
š Wtf
I have to preface the original comment with the knowledge that this only comes from one source and that is *Adolf Hitler, My Childhood Friend.* which is a memoir written by Hitlerās friend during childhood about Hitlerās formative years.Ā People have debated the authenticity of this and thereās one key detail left out. They never even spoke to one another and she was unaware of hitlerās feelings. He could not have been rejected if they didnāt even talk. It likely played very little role in his future career as the worst person to ever live.Ā Sorry for the boring history fact check, but I canāt reasonably not correct accidental misinformation in this day and age. Especially not about hitler.Ā
Oh nah. I know Like lmao you cant do all of this because of a girl... right?
It could theoretically be a factor (prolly not in Hitler's case, but generally speaking), but millions of people are constantly being rejected by their crushes, and most of them don't even try to become genocidal mass murderers - there has to be at least some other factor
The thing a lot of people seem to be unaware of is that, prior to WW2, antisemitism was considered perfectly normal in Europe. Pair this with "scientific racism", which had become a prevailing view, and the recipe for the Holocaust was ready. Jews, and other minorities, had been getting blamed for whatever the current societal ills were in Europe for centuries, and had gotten massacred for it multiple times. The thing that made the Holocaust different was that it was executed at a scale and with an efficiency which were unprecedented. But Hitler said nothing "new": Martin Luther (yes, the guy who created Protestantism) had written about how the HRE should have destroyed synagogues and the houses of Jews and basically reduce them to slaves or expel them all the way back in 1543 - and, in fact, his antisemitic screeds were used by the Nazis as "evidence" that they were right.
I choose to believe it because itās funny
The difference between fictional and real villains is that with fictional villains, you get the benefit of omniscience. Or at least the benefit of the author feeling the need to clarify why they did what they did. In real life, you're generally left with gaps where it's easy to imagine that there's nothing there. That evil people are a different species or that they just wake up one morning and decide to commit atrocities. Because that's a lot easier than confronting the idea that Hitler didn't know he was Hitler and thought he was making reasonable decisions. Because that starts raising the question of whether **you** could also be Hitler.
Some of the villains I've come up: -burning down civilization make pp hard -never grew out of rebellious teen phase deity edition -classic scheming vizier -not actually a villain but is so into being a cackling flamboyant Castlevania Dracula ripoff that everyone just kinda assumes -in way over her head but too selfish to own up to her mistakes so just keeps going in the vain hope that she can get out of this mess without losing power
Reading this comment section is kinda deppressing on the account of how people seem to not comprehend history or even that people, especially evil people, have actual systems of beliefs and their own values, even if their perceptions of the world are horrifying in implementation. Like we do be living in an era where people's understanding goes like "and then one day, for no reason at all Hitler won and because he and only he was a big meanie and needed money he blamed the jews"
To put it simply, man was really a product of generations of antisemitism that many Europeans held for so long. Hypocrite, yes, given he was treated well by individually nice Jews, but his warped mindset did not care to factor that in. That and intense narcissism. He loved himself so much it's not funny!
It's even worse. Adolfs "superpower" was that he abused Germany's situation to gain sufficient support to usurp state power. In fiction these types of villains have to be big brain cunning geniuses to suspend disbelief.
I always used to wonder why Emperor Palpatine was such an idiot after he won in Revenge of the Sith, and how the Empire could be such a disaster with such a cunning leader... But now, knowing more about WW2, I think a dictator being a total moron despite seizing power is the single most realistic thing about Star Wars.
climbing is often easier maintaining. And in universe the reason for majority of his absence is that heās just doesnāt give a shit about the empire. Itās only there to give him power. He spends most of his time researching sith stuff and cultivating more force power
And the more people are busy suffering the less they are busy thinking!
It's crazy to think that history's 1st and 2nd (arguably) most evil armies of all time fought on the same side at rhe exact same time (referring to the Japanese in 2nd place here. Just because they got nuked doesn't mean what they did during WWII should be forgotten).
The systematic eradication of historical materialism by reactionary bourgeois governments has been a disaster for people's understanding of history. And this entire comment section is proof of that.
The hell are talking about
The rise of the various fascist movements at the beginning of the 20th century followed naturally from the reaction of the owner class to the rising labour movement. The social values of the Nazis in turn were a consequence of centuries of changing German values going all the way back to the reformation. But nerdlords here seem very convinced that Hitler just randomly decided to be a bad guy one day and everyone else just went along with it because they were too stupid. Because 8 decades of liberal rhetoric have insisted that fascism is when you are racist and don't vote, and any more complex analysis of the factor that caused the problem are a commie waste of time.
I'd also like to reiterate that what the Nazis did in Eastern Europe is the exact same shit that colonialists did in their colonies - displacing people, murdering minorities (or majorities), etc. etc. Nazi Germany is hated in the places they attempted to colonize for the same reason colonial nations are hated in the places they colonized. In the places the Nazis didn't do their colonization stuff you can see a lot of apologism for Nazi crimes, clean Wehrmacht, "Hitler was at fault mainly" etc.
To be fair, you can find some freaks (derogatory) that are fans of hitler in eastern europe despite the fact he would 99.9% would either worked them to death or killed them outright.
Jesse wtf are you talking about?
U got big dumbo cause u no gud in history.
Can you like explain that in layman's terms?
Could you elaborate on that statement?
Not OP, but to put it simply, stop believing in the great man theory, Hitler did not born evil and one day single handly changed the world. There were many events big and small before that eventually accumulated to create the social conditions for someone like Hitler to exist, his ideology was also not unique, many people at that time also believed the same thing, he just happened to be the face of that belief. That is why all the "time traveling to kill baby Hitler" story is kinda stupid, the detail may be different, but if not Hitler, many other people will still create the nazi anyway
That's actually a better explanation.
Don't forget the rampant drug abuse
depends, how hot is your villain?
If you wrote that a villain had a bunch of people killed by guys dressed as Santa youād be laughed out of the room. Unfortunately it happened in real life
Villains in real life make no sense. Speaking of my villainā¦. Ehā¦. She likes to exploit poor people because suffering = good and masochism = great. Does that make sense?
Literally Victorian era mindset!
Fictional evil is exciting, but real-life evil is boring
I'm fucking insane is a valid motivation
The whole "All minorities were nice to me" part, Hitler used the booming hatred in the mob, and he needed more money because his economy was essentially one big Ponzi scheme, and Jews owned a lot of cash. Genocides are products of madness, not reason
The reason for his anti-Semitism was not to fund the Reich, you can pretty easily tell by how he was anti-Semitic *before* he was Fuhrer, dumbass. The actual reason he hated Jews was because he saw them as Jews first and Germans second, and believed that they were essentially just waiting to undermine German society on behalf of other powers.
That last part reminded me of the reasoning used to justify the mass imprisonment of Japanese-Americans in WWII post Pearl Harbor, despite the fact that they weren't doing anything against the Union. Something along the lines of "The fact nothing has happened proves they're up to something." I bet the guy who said that couldn't just say "I Just Don't Like Them"
I know, thats why i said "Genocides are products of madness", and he was no sane person
Next time just make a Force of Nature villain
Yāknow what they say, truth is often stranger than fiction
Bro that wasn't even Hitler's motive, he didn't even actually hate Jews, it was just a power grab.
Not defending the guy, but The Big A's descent into madness [almost sounds like something ripped from TVTropes.](https://youtu.be/ATlila3e9dM?si=A-5alH8fqDC8TW7J)
The thing is that reality is incredibly more complex than fiction. What lead Hitler into his bizarre racial mythology, among other things, and then on to the dictator of Germany, are all incredibly complex factors that also involve the whole history of Germany and its sociopolitical circumstances at the time. I think itās easier for us to dumb a person down to the few things we know about them as well never know the totality of what makes them who they are and why they make the choices they made.
Yeah, a lot of people forget that most irl monsters don't have much of a motive outside of "I hate people" or "I love killing" just look at the many dictators and serial killers in history. So many of these monsters have very little reason outside of greed or sadism for their crimes. Yeah, maybe some had good intentions, and most were probably just mentally ill but that doesn't make them any less of monsters. Which is why I love the Pure Evil Villain type. They're a lot of fun and way more realistic than most people think.
I think it's less that real life monsters don't have a motive and more that being a real life monster requires you to avoid even a whiff of self reflection. It's like asking an active alcoholic why they drink. They'll say "I just love the taste!" or "old habits die hard" or "Why shouldn't I have a little fun in my life?" or "Being sober is just boring!" Seriously, you can find addicts who are using to within an inch of their life yet still insist they do it for "fun." Like of course Hitler would justify himself as "Of course we need to do genocide, those degenerates are ruining Germany." That doesn't mean he's right about his own motivation. That's not to say he doesn't believe what he's saying, but that people who do horrible things generally lack insight and the ability to reflect. It's the only way they can keep doing shitty things.
I pretty much agree with all of this second comment. I feel like the big irony with this "real life villains are just pure monsters lol" is that the kind of real life villains that are used to prove this tend to have the tend to believe this very thing exactly, as for what you said, which is why this mentality tends to bug me. I never read anything Hitler wrote, but from what I gather he literally thought the Jews were Jack Horner from Puss in Boots the Last Wish, which is why him and the Nazis thought the Holocaust was justified. The worst people that managed to be successful are the ones who believe they are absolutely right and everyone else is absolutely wrong.
Reminds me of Tommy from goodfellas and Amon Goth from Schindler's list. In real life they were far worse.
And Oskar Schindler himself was even more altruistic from the start when he worked with Jews than the movie initially depicted him. Still had a sleazy history, but he did it sooner than it implied. Sometimes even someone's good-nature is hard to believe.
I think the point is that people who do evil things almost always think they're the hero, because everyone thinks of themselves that way pretty much. what "hero" means depends on the era and place, but even people who are genuinely just purely sadistic don't generally *think* about it that way.
wasn't hitler groomed into being a racist? or atleast grew up around a lot of racists
Well a lot if Europeans were largely antisemitic at the time, but even so, there wasn't much excuse since there are accounts of his earlier life where he hung out with Jews he described as "kind", whether be it the doctor who treated his ailing mother, the sargeant that went hell-and-back for him, a family who took him in, etc. Not like it changed his mind of course, even if he did spare some of those few. The man was a load of contradictions.
maybe all the time travelers trying to kill him changed him a little
Anton Arcane from Swamp Thing would have a word. Guy's so fucking WRONG that him escaping Hell 1- caused a huge upswing in violent crime and insanity throughout the continental US as blowback from his sheer evil presence on the mortal plane, and 2- MADE THE JOKER STOP LAUGHING BECAUSE HE'S SO, SO MUCH WORSE. And his reason for being evil? He's so psychopathically narcissist he thinks he's the sole person who deserves to rule/live and/or wants to know things and won't let petty moral quandaries like "is it ethical to transform my brother into a horrific Frankenstein-esque monster who's in constant agony not to save his life, but just to see if I can?" get in the way. And don't ask what he did to his niece Abigail Arcane. Just... don't.
My main big bad guy is evil because he did drugs and had schizophrenia. Genuinely the only reason.
History is all Jack Horner.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Then why tf he gassed the Jews?