People talk about the "morally gray" characters in Star Wars Andor. However, I don't think a person who has to do an evil thing morally gray if he understands that what he did was evil without rationalizing it as good.
For instance, the character Luthen says, "I'm damned for what I do." That indicates a person of conventional morality, not different from the average soldier of the Allies during WWII. On a personal note, and why this is an issue of importance to me, all of my elder relatives were ground combat veterans. Toward the ends of their lives--good lives, well-lived lives--they were all still tortured by things they'd done in combat. None of them felt his actions had been justified even though their actions had been forced upon them by circumstances they did not create.
Luthen's acknowledgment--"I'm condemned to use the methods of my enemy to defeat him....I'm damned for what I do"--is not morally gray in the classical sense. It reflects a man with a strong moral compass who knowingly violates it for a cause he believes just. That’s very different from someone who redefines wrong as right, which is often what the term “morally gray” suggests.
Luthen does morally reprehensible things: manipulating people, sacrificing allies, orchestrating civilian deaths, but he never excuses them as good. He doesn’t relativize morality; he believes in it. He just accepts damnation as the cost of victory.
That places him closer to the moral framework of Allied soldiers in WWII: “I’m doing something I believe is necessary, but I still know it’s morally wrong.”
IMO, a "morally gray" character is one who doesn’t operate on a fixed moral code or shifts between ethical systems situationally. A morally gray character denies the evil they do is actually evil, or they deny that good and evil actually exist.
Luthen believes in absolute morality, but he chooses to sin against it consciously and accepts a tragic ending that he considers a just ending for what he has done.
For instance, the character Luthen says, "I'm damned for what I do." That indicates a person of conventional morality, not different from the average soldier of the Allies during WWII. On a personal note, and why this is an issue of importance to me, all of my elder relatives were ground combat veterans. Toward the ends of their lives--good lives, well-lived lives--they were all still tortured by things they'd done in combat. None of them felt his actions had been justified even though their actions had been forced upon them by circumstances they did not create.
Luthen's acknowledgment--"I'm condemned to use the methods of my enemy to defeat him....I'm damned for what I do"--is not morally gray in the classical sense. It reflects a man with a strong moral compass who knowingly violates it for a cause he believes just. That’s very different from someone who redefines wrong as right, which is often what the term “morally gray” suggests.
Luthen does morally reprehensible things: manipulating people, sacrificing allies, orchestrating civilian deaths, but he never excuses them as good. He doesn’t relativize morality; he believes in it. He just accepts damnation as the cost of victory.
That places him closer to the moral framework of Allied soldiers in WWII: “I’m doing something I believe is necessary, but I still know it’s morally wrong.”
IMO, a "morally gray" character is one who doesn’t operate on a fixed moral code or shifts between ethical systems situationally. A morally gray character denies the evil they do is actually evil, or they deny that good and evil actually exist.
Luthen believes in absolute morality, but he chooses to sin against it consciously and accepts a tragic ending that he considers a just ending for what he has done.
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