OK, so here's something that's been bothering me for a while.
Back in the Middle Ages and the Reneissance, some people were put to death for heresy. In the Protestant world, some other people were also put to death for spellcraft. There was a general tendency to burn those convicted.
Now - historical accuracy of modern portrayals of those events aside - we have it hardwired into our brains that whenever there is a "burn the witch" situation in fiction, it is pretty much always an innocent female being put to death by a fanatical, bloodthirsty mob. And don't the creators LOVE to use that preconception! Any protagonist, being faced with such a situation, will give it no thought and jump into the flames to rescue the damsel in distress, possibly maiming a few members of the mob. As far as storytelling goes, this is quite lazy - the author doesn't even have to give the hero any actual reason to save the convicted, the moment we hear the words "burn the witch", we have an immediate black-and-white conflict.
Of course, in the real world, punishing anyone in any way for "practicing witchcraft" is morally wrong - for the simple reason that we don't have working magic here. And while it seems that some of the witch-burnings of the past were for things like poisoning (the effects of which could often be qualified as magic being afoot), in general we can all agree that from the point of view of a modern audience, putting someone to death for casting spells - or being a bit off the rocker and believing to be able to cast spells - is just plain wrong.
However, we aren't talking about the real world here. We are talking about fictional settings, many of which have at least one working form of magic. Now what annoys me here is that surprisingly often in those settings, you could argue that the fanatical priest who wants to put the witch to death is in fact doing a sensible thing. And yet, the creators still use the lazy excuse of "it's a witch-burning, OF COURSE she is innocent!" and don't bother to create a genuine sense of conflict there.
A few examples spring to mind. To me, the worst offender is The Witcher, where
Then we have Dragon Age: Origins and the Warhammer universe, where all magic users present a danger to people by drawing their power from the world of demons (yes, I know it's not strictly the "world of demons", but let's simplify it for the sake of argument). While in WH the witch hunters and templars of Sigmar aren't portrayed as evil, they are still bloodthirsty fanatics. In DA:O, while the game goes to some lengths to show that not all Templars are trigger-happy mage-haters, their profession of hunting down rogue mages and keeping the legal ones in check is portrayed as morally wrong.
I might have lost you with all that textwalling, so let me reiterate my point: the "burn the witch" set-up, which is often used by creators of fiction to present a clear black-and-white moral conflict, has no place in fictional universes where magic is real and dangerous. If you're presenting the protagonist with a situation where a magic-user is about to be executed, give him/her an actual solid reason to defend the witch/wizard in question.
Erm... Discuss?
PS I know this topic is verging on off-top, but since I only put examples from games here (there are some from non-game works of fiction, but I guess three is enough)...
Back in the Middle Ages and the Reneissance, some people were put to death for heresy. In the Protestant world, some other people were also put to death for spellcraft. There was a general tendency to burn those convicted.
Now - historical accuracy of modern portrayals of those events aside - we have it hardwired into our brains that whenever there is a "burn the witch" situation in fiction, it is pretty much always an innocent female being put to death by a fanatical, bloodthirsty mob. And don't the creators LOVE to use that preconception! Any protagonist, being faced with such a situation, will give it no thought and jump into the flames to rescue the damsel in distress, possibly maiming a few members of the mob. As far as storytelling goes, this is quite lazy - the author doesn't even have to give the hero any actual reason to save the convicted, the moment we hear the words "burn the witch", we have an immediate black-and-white conflict.
Of course, in the real world, punishing anyone in any way for "practicing witchcraft" is morally wrong - for the simple reason that we don't have working magic here. And while it seems that some of the witch-burnings of the past were for things like poisoning (the effects of which could often be qualified as magic being afoot), in general we can all agree that from the point of view of a modern audience, putting someone to death for casting spells - or being a bit off the rocker and believing to be able to cast spells - is just plain wrong.
However, we aren't talking about the real world here. We are talking about fictional settings, many of which have at least one working form of magic. Now what annoys me here is that surprisingly often in those settings, you could argue that the fanatical priest who wants to put the witch to death is in fact doing a sensible thing. And yet, the creators still use the lazy excuse of "it's a witch-burning, OF COURSE she is innocent!" and don't bother to create a genuine sense of conflict there.
A few examples spring to mind. To me, the worst offender is The Witcher, where
a convincing argument can be put forward that Abigail actually deserves her punishment, yet the game arbitrarily declares rescuing her - and massacring an entire village - to be "good", and letting her die to be "evil", after a chapter full of run-of-the-mill sterotypes which set up a clear "burn the witch."
Then we have Dragon Age: Origins and the Warhammer universe, where all magic users present a danger to people by drawing their power from the world of demons (yes, I know it's not strictly the "world of demons", but let's simplify it for the sake of argument). While in WH the witch hunters and templars of Sigmar aren't portrayed as evil, they are still bloodthirsty fanatics. In DA:O, while the game goes to some lengths to show that not all Templars are trigger-happy mage-haters, their profession of hunting down rogue mages and keeping the legal ones in check is portrayed as morally wrong.
I might have lost you with all that textwalling, so let me reiterate my point: the "burn the witch" set-up, which is often used by creators of fiction to present a clear black-and-white moral conflict, has no place in fictional universes where magic is real and dangerous. If you're presenting the protagonist with a situation where a magic-user is about to be executed, give him/her an actual solid reason to defend the witch/wizard in question.
Erm... Discuss?
PS I know this topic is verging on off-top, but since I only put examples from games here (there are some from non-game works of fiction, but I guess three is enough)...
