Board 8 > Can bad men be great men?

(+) Yeah! (+)

Shouldn't be hard to figure out what this means in light of the last couple weeks.

Like Ghengis Khan was an evil jerk. But it's kinda hard to deny he didn't do great things.

A good number already are

Look at Gandhi
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I mean Stalin was one of the main reasons Hitler lost WWII, and he was one of the worst people to exist in the last century

so yeah
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He Who Must Not Be Named did great things. Terrible. Oh yes. But great.
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Ghengis Khan is who I thought of from the topic title
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yes it's possible. khan is not one of them. the only thing he ever did was commit a bunch of genocide and conquer a bunch of stuff. seriously ask anyone what khan did that was so great. he never invented anything, never created anything, never advanced anything. all he did was "unite" aka conquer.
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Johnbobb posted...

I mean Stalin was one of the main reasons Hitler lost WWII, and he was one of the worst people to exist in the last century

so yeah

What about Hitler himself?

MariaTaylor posted...

yes it's possible. khan is not one of them. the only thing he ever did was commit a bunch of genocide and conquer a bunch of stuff. seriously ask anyone what khan did that was so great. he never invented anything, never created anything, never advanced anything. all he did was "unite" aka conquer.

Why are you of the opinion that conquering the known world was not a great incredible feat?

SSJBGenkiDama posted...

Why are you of the opinion that conquering the known world was not a great incredible feat?

it's incredibly douchy, I'll give him that
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hitler also committed a bunch of genocide and conquered a bunch of places. do you also think he was great?
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MariaTaylor posted...

hitler also committed a bunch of genocide and conquered a bunch of places. do you also think he was great?

No.

The topic was supposed to be something like can evil men do great works, or things, or accomplish greatness.

Hitler was obviously a terrible person, and the things he did were horrifying. But it's hard to argue they weren't amazing. He nearly conquered Europe. Napoleon was evil, Alexander the Great was evil, Xerxes was evil, but it's hard to say they didn't accomplish great things.

I mean, Hitler was an exceptionally gifted leader, there's no denying that, I think people are struggling with the term great and it being used to signify good. When it can signify large accomplishments equally. At least that's my take.

So the answer is yes of course, but that doesn't make them above reproach or mean their actions were justified.
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well that stuff technically falls under the definition of great

SSJBGenkiDama posted...

Johnbobb posted...

I mean Stalin was one of the main reasons Hitler lost WWII, and he was one of the worst people to exist in the last century

so yeah

What about Hitler himself?

well no

Hitler's biggest contribution to the well-being of the world was killing himself

which doesn't count imo
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Depends how you define being a "great" man

Basically like Menu said if you measure it more on accomplishments and feats / basically making a name for themselves (be it through conquering, inventing, etc) then yes bad men like Hitler and Khan can be considered "great men" in that regard.
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Pirateking2000 posted...

Depends how you define being a "great" man

Basically like Menu said if you measure it more on accomplishments and feats / basically making a name for themselves (be it through conquering, inventing, etc) then yes bad men like Hitler and Khan can be considered "great men" in that regard.

Well, yeah. That's what the debate in this topic was about.

Obviously you can't be evil men and still be great morally.... like I can't believe someone said that about Stalin here. Stalin had amazing accomplishments, but certainly in no way normally was he great, in any aspect.

I think most people got what you were going for, but some choose to ignore the broader definition of great.
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khan is a nobody as far as I'm concerned. just one of many in a long line of authoritarian assholes who tried to terrorize and enslave the common man when he should have pissed off and left us free to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

do I think it's great that he accomplished a ton of raping and enslaving and genociding others? uh, no. wish someone had hit him in the eye with a stray arrow at some point and ended that nonsense way before it ended. as far as I'm concerned the more stuff you conquer the bigger dipshit you are.
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Thought this topic would be more about "Can morally bad men have positive contributions to the world." Like Martin Luther King, Jr., for example. Not "Can morally bad men accomplish their goals," which is a fucking idiotic premise. Yes, bad men can succeed at evil. How fascinating!
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I mean your take on it is idiotically simplified seph, but thems the breaks.
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metaIslug posted...

Saddam Hussein? I dunno

He didn't actually accomplish anything though. There's a difference between using chemical weapons on helpless civilians and ruling with an iron fist, to actually conquering something or producing something of worth. Anyone is capable of ordering a chemical weapons strike versus a completely unguarded people, if they're already in a position of power... and acquisition of power does not necessarily make one great. See most royal families.
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if you define great as killing a lot of people and crushing your enemies, then the venn diagram between great men and bad men has massive, overlap

in fact i'd say that the majority of 'great' men are bad in that sense
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I kinda think of "great" as being more about magnitude than anything so sure
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SSJBGenkiDama posted...

Obviously you can't be evil men and still be great morally.... like I can't believe someone said that about Stalin here. Stalin had amazing accomplishments, but certainly in no way normally was he great, in any aspect.

I'm not saying Stalin was great morally. Obviously he's one of the worst people to ever really exist. He also stopped Hitler.

so I mean, I think it depends more on if you define great as "they did things people will remember" or "they did things important for the world"

If you're defining it the first way then what's the point of the topic, the answer is "yes, duh"
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Nelson_Mandela posted...

Thought this topic would be more about "Can morally bad men have positive contributions to the world." Like Martin Luther King, Jr., for example.

Edgy.
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LapisLazuli posted...

Nelson_Mandela posted...

Thought this topic would be more about "Can morally bad men have positive contributions to the world." Like Martin Luther King, Jr., for example.

Edgy.

It's pretty common knowledge that he was an adulterer, but the point is that it shouldn't detract from his overall message
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