Protects criminals

But is it really user? Sometimes police officers go undercover as criminals to take down criminal organisations.

That is not ends justify the means, ends justify the means would be planting evidence, intimidating witnesses and coercion in order to secure a conviction on somebody you personally know is guilty.

Going undercover is subterfuge, dangerous only to the one undercover.

Going undercover will sometimes end up having you doing acts of questionable legality though. That in itself is ends justifying the means. There's just varying scales of it, what you describe is just one extreme end of it.

No, it increases the chances of you leaning towards doing so, but it itself is not ignoble nor illegal and evil.

One cannot do evil to do good

But if a cop has to, say, sell drugs to a addict during undercover work, he is suddenly evil even though doing so helped further the operation to bust 100s of other dealers who would do more damage?

The ends DO justify the means, people like to bitch about the Greater Good but what alternative is there? To work for the lesser good?

Yes, that is true. But that is a different issue, the means of going undercover is not 'ends justify the means' mentality. It does increase it as I said before, but it can be as simple as wearing a wire and sitting through a dinner or standing as a guard during a speakeasy.

The ends sometimes do and sometimes don't justify the means. I don't care if a drug user is given an overdose thanks to the cop selling him dirty heroin while undercover with the mob.

It only matters when you yourself become the object of the means. At which point people have a problem.

I am addressing your point that undercover cops aren't necessarily going to do evil, so I gave an example of him doing something rather concretely evil.

But before I continue, do you mind expanding on what you mean by "yourself become the object of the means", because from vaguely guessing what that means it sounds more like people becoming corrupted by personal gain rather then doing lesser evils to achieve greater goods or prevent greater evils.

The Harper's and the Moonstars (their more extreme offshoot under Khelben "Blackbag" Arundsen) are basically fantasy CIA. Their goals are good but their methods tend to be somewhat circumspect. As has been stated, they get their jobs done with subterfuge, trickery, and when necessary assassination. Most of the more extreme elements of the Harper's were composed of Arundsen and his proponents, and when he left to form the Moonstars they departed the Harper's with him.

National sovereignty is a spook.

People tend not to have a problem with 'ends justify the means' thinking until they or somebody they know are the target.

>First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
>Because I was not a Socialist.
>Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
>Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
>Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
>Because I was not a Jew.
>Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

The ends justifying the means is essentially a pass for all the horrors committed by Communism.

Part of the reason Harper's exist is to try to get around the traditional limitations "Good" has placed on itself in fantasy settings. They're decidedly Chaotic Good in Outlook

I think the issue here isn't that people are disagreeing with their idea that their specific Ends justify their means, rather then any possible End justifying whatever means.

As an American I love the CIA fucking with other countries to further US goals, but I'm not going to call that morally good, I'm going to call it what it is, Self Interest, and I can understand other people having an issue with the CIA.

Well that's a matter of personal good vs society good, if hurting those people legitimately makes things more better for others then it the hurt cast onto others, it is moral to hurt those in the name of the superior good, sucks for those people but hey, it's legit making things better despite personal lose.

Now the issue with things like Communism is how legitimate those ends are, but then we just get to standard moral differences.

The biggest problem with ends justify the means is that it becomes really easy to justify anything you do on the chance that it might have a good outcome.

>Now the issue with things like is how legitimate those ends are

Now you have just shot down your own argument.

>One cannot do evil to do good
Absolutely not true.
You can say that a person can not call themselves good if they resort to evil means, but there are legit circumstances where the only option that will bring about a good result is the one that would be called evil.

Well I've always felt this way about the Harpers since like 2005...
>I feel the exact same way about the Pathfinder Society.

Adventurer Guilds are basically another word for Murder-Traitors-Thieves. And you laugh because it sounds like a Veeky Forums-joke. Then you realize. No- they really fucking are and it's not as funny anymore, it's just bad writing.

Well yes, anything can spiral out and become something bad, that doesn't mean the original is bad.

Can you honestly say that there is no greater cause no matter how good it is that you would never commit any minor evil, no matter how tiny? To go for a extreme example, would you not pinch a man without consent if it could somehow end all human suffering forever?

For more realistic examples, keeping a fat friend from eating to keep him on his diet even though he really wants to have this cake?

A police officer shooting a criminal and killing him so his hostages won't die under his hands?

Punching out a man brutally beating his wife?

People like to think Ends Justify the Means is some sort of thing only like, the top 2% of amoral people do where they have a family murdered so they can further their career or whatever non-sense you'll see on TV, but it's really such a broad concept that it covers a significant portion of moral decisions.

Well no, different people thinking what is moral being different doesn't change that if those people legitimately think something is so good it is actually worth causing this amount of harm, then it is moral for them to cause that harm in the name of that good, just as it would be moral for someone to view that harm they cause as being too great a evil for the minor good, or even evil, that the 1st persons End is would be to then fight that person.

>it's really such a broad concept that it covers a significant portion of moral decisions.

Yes, but on a grand level it comes down using a new rule of law to withhold the very protection from those you are now legally allowed to hate/abuse/punish/rob. The end justify the means is mob rule.

How are any of my examples, which are clear examples of committing a lesser harm to achieve a superior outcome and thus Ends Justify the Means, Mob Rule when they are all done via individuals?

It has nothing to do with "New rule of law" or Mobs, it does not require changing your Code of Ethics nor having a majority backing, and can be done via holding on to your current Rules and against common belief, I would in fact say most pop-culture instances of Ends Justify the Means involve going against Society.

I can't forgive them for murdering Xzar.

To be fair, they weren't exactly the only ones trying-they just happened to get him first.

More like I did, since I was played by Harpers. Next time I'm taking that Bird and dropping it off in the nine hells

On a grand scale, when applied to a population, individual actions mean nothing in the long run. But when a new power lays down an edict saying that X is holding back the country and it is because of them that we the country is backwards.

As I said, on a grand scale I did not mention your small examples. Please stop purposefully misrepresenting my argument, it serves no greater good.

How come I can't name off the top of my head any lawful good household names in the realms that were murdered by the Harpers, because the realm was getting too lawful or good?

Neutral my ass. More like Mystra pawns and shills, amirite

I was not misrepresenting your argument, merely reading it wrongly, thinking "Grand Scale" meant in the more conceptual manner rather then physically grand as in about large groups.

But to be more on your point, should a country cause no harm then? Is there no just reason for them to go to war? No crime bad enough for them to punish?

I think Correllon likes the Harpers too

Well, you can't expect the Harpers to play fair. If they did, they might not have successfully retarded societal progress to the staggering degree that they have.

When the crime is fabricated as an ends to a means, yes, it is a gross overreach of all manner of morality, trust and decency.

Let us not forget what we are arguing, there is nothing wrong with punishment for a crime.

We are talking about the purposeful breaking of the law by a group in power to further an agenda which they believe is good.

Nah, they are a Chaotic Evil organization.
As in they will do whatever it takes to achieve their organization and personal goals regardless of consequences.
Truly evil people will also think that their goals are horrible personally and believe those who think they are horrible are the ones being truly evil themselves, which is Harpers outlook.
They also have no problem involving unrelated people aka innocent people into their mess, sometimes to their deaths.
The writers didn't realize it themselves what they wrote the Harpers to be. Especially when you compare them to real world terrorist organizations.

Well then there is the issue of what is "fabricated" and what is merely another interpretation of a event. Most political decisions I can think up are based of things most people would agree happened, mutual agreement in justification not happening not due to disbelief in the root cause, but mere interpretation of it differently resulting in different answers being thought up, rather then full on denial of said events existence.

You can disagree with them and think their reading of said event is crazy, but truly following one's belief and being a lunatic are not mutually exclusive, I would in fact say they often correlate.

And as stimulating as this debate is, I'm not going to let it ruin my sleeping schedule so I shall bid you adu, probably forever unless this thread somehow manages to survive the hours I'm asleep.

>Alignment thread
The best way to deal with alignment is to not play D&D.
The second best way is to not use alignment altogether.

>b-but muh alignment spells
Them too.
>b-but-
Then don't play D&D.

This instance isn't a flaw of DnD, it's a flaw of the forgotten realms being written poorly.

Alignments in general are very much flaw of D&D.

Harpers are actually a pretty interesting organization, they're basically Black Ops of fantasy, doing things nobody likes so the world doesn't blow up. Calling them Good is a stretch tho.