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Gul Dukat is a good guy

Romo Lampkin said:
It's just a TV show.
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Yes, and? That TV show describes explicitly villainous actions. You're applauding those actions. Either you mean what you say, which calls your ethics into question — or you don't mean it, which means you're just ... tolling... the goats.

In either case, it says a great deal about you.

Which is it?
 
Maurice said:
^^^ This rather crosses the line on the "post not poster" commandment of the board, no?
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I am honestly unsure. The thread is controversial by nature. Is it out of line to speculate whether the poster believes what he says or is just trying to rile people up? Maybe it is. I won't pursue it any further.
 
I think there's an argument for applying different morality to television shows than to real life. For example, in The Sopranos you root for Tony even though he's just as evil a man as his enemies. This argument doesn't apply to DS9 though because this show is morally centered on characters who value life and freedom.
 
Dukat at the end of that episode flows forth and admits he's a tyrant or something. Which is not something I liked, whether Dukat is mad or not, the thing is with villains is that they never admit they are villains, they always have some kind of justification going or qualification to trot out. That's the thing about many real villains, they are perplexing and often don't fit as easily into the category of good and evil that we would wish them to fit in. I felt the writers start to approach this angle of a challenging villain but ultimately shied away from it.

Dukat going mad or becoming a cult leader are not twists I liked either. It's like the Dukat character was dragged along to perform one pedestrian villainous stereotype after another after they finished with his strong stroyline. It echoes what was later done with Baltar on NuBSG. He became a cult leader too after his big trail. The character loses all substance and just drifts when they don't think ahead.
 
I really don't know how well latter seasons Dukat flowed from earlier seasons Dukat. I think his betrayal in In Purgatory's Shadow pre - Sacrifice Of Angels meltdown tells you all you need to know about his character.

He was a patriot, to be sure. But, he knew going that particular route was going to cost the AQ millions of lives. He wouldn't have been that naive to think everyone in the AQ was going to wave The Dominion flag as they poured through the wormhole. An alliance with The Dominion was not the only choice he had to get The Klingons and Maqui off of Cardassia's back, but it was the one choice that would elevate him to a position of authority again.

Charming psychopath or not, he's accountable for his actions, not the propaganda he espoused. Like every great villain though, he feels justified in his actions. He thinks he's the good guy, making the right decisions for the good of everyone. People who commit the worst atrocities are not the ones who think they're committing evil.
 
Tosk said:
Not every "always" needs to be taken literally. Pretend I said "often" instead.
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Villains typically don't admit their villany. My original point stands. Your point about actors or whatever you're babblin' on about escapes me.
 
StarMan said:
I really don't know how well latter seasons Dukat flowed from earlier seasons Dukat. I think his betrayal in In Purgatory's Shadow pre - Sacrifice Of Angels meltdown tells you all you need to know about his character.

He was a patriot, to be sure. But, he knew going that particular route was going to cost the AQ millions of lives. He wouldn't have been that naive to think everyone in the AQ was going to wave The Dominion flag as they poured through the wormhole. An alliance with The Dominion was not the only choice he had to get The Klingons and Maqui off of Cardassia's back, but it was the one choice that would elevate him to a position of authority again.

Charming psychopath or not, he's accountable for his actions, not the propaganda he espoused. Like every great villain though, he feels justified in his actions. He thinks he's the good guy, making the right decisions for the good of everyone. People who commit the worst atrocities are not the ones who think they're committing evil.
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Indeed. If anything, they often appear clothed in righteousness and liberty.
 
I thought I'd read somewhere (probably Memory Alpha) that the whole point of the episode was to put an end to any ambiguity over whether Dukat was good or bad, because the writers had been horrified to hear fans actually defend Dukat's war crimes. Apparently it didn't work.
 
Hippocrates Noah said:
I thought I'd read somewhere (probably Memory Alpha) that the whole point of the episode was to put an end to any ambiguity over whether Dukat was good or bad, because the writers had been horrified to hear fans actually defend Dukat's war crimes. Apparently it didn't work.
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Well, there were critics who needed to be reminded that despite showing that he was nice to his secretaries, Der Untergang did not make Hitler more human.

I remember that I was myself surprised by Dukat's betrayal in BIL. I had become accustomed to seeing him as someone who had reformed and was an ally of those on the station. Looking back, it's easier to see that the new Dukat was merely someone who gained some perspective on the decline of influence both he and Cardassia exerted, and that he had simply developed a rapport with the crew of DS9. He was more humble, but not necessarily more moral, and he was still primarily concerned with preserving and regaining his power.
 
I watched a episode yesterday, the one where he and Sisko were trapped on a planet after a ship was destroyed (one where Dukat was delusional) and quite honestly Dukat (despite having mental issues) BELIEVED that he was the good guy in series, however it was also shown that he was very egotistical (Damar illusion telling him that he was the ONLY leader who could take them to victory).

Yeah he was quite clearly not a good guy but he did think that he was despite the evidence.
 
Paradise City said:
Dukat going mad or becoming a cult leader are not twists I liked either. It's like the Dukat character was dragged along to perform one pedestrian villainous stereotype after another after they finished with his strong stroyline. It echoes what was later done with Baltar on NuBSG. He became a cult leader too after his big trail. The character loses all substance and just drifts when they don't think ahead.
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You can't compare Dukat's cult to Baltar's cult. Dukat's cult was a marriage of his newfound Pagh Wraith faith, his megalomania, and his desire to be superior to Bajorans. Baltar's cult started without his involvement and to him was only a layer of protection against potential lynchings and a source of sex. Baltar's not like Dukat. Baltar had the same size ego, but his main motivator was self protection at the expense of all else.

In Dukat's mind, he was the good guy. That's not the measure of whether you are a good guy though, there are some great people out there who think they're terrible. Thinking you're great but ignoring or justifying the terrible things you do to others is the definition of narcissism.
 
Yeah, I just don't like either character being steered into being 'cult leader' following their grand storyline. Dukat's tenure ended predictably with him ducking out of his suicide pact whilst being busted in the attempt by his irate followers. That's just the whole cult meme redone for the millionth time. Baltar's cult just faded. I'd have much preferred if Baltar reinvented himself as some sort of social justice firebrand type which the writers seemed to be doing for a time but decided against it in favour of this cult of his. Overall, I want more demanding characters and villains who can be the stuff of debate rather than characters that are clear cut. Dukat going "ahahahaha...i wish i killed every single bajoran twice over....bwahahaha" seemed a pretty lame direction to take a character that was quite substantial in many respects.
 
JirinPanthosa said:
You can't compare Dukat's cult to Baltar's cult. Dukat's cult was a marriage of his newfound Pagh Wraith faith, his megalomania, and his desire to be superior to Bajorans. Baltar's cult started without his involvement and to him was only a layer of protection against potential lynchings and a source of sex. Baltar's not like Dukat. Baltar had the same size ego, but his main motivator was self protection at the expense of all else.

In Dukat's mind, he was the good guy. That's not the measure of whether you are a good guy though, there are some great people out there who think they're terrible. Thinking you're great but ignoring or justifying the terrible things you do to others is the definition of narcissism.
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Baltar had some substance to his cult. He had this third party "Six" angel talking to him too, giving him insight procured miraculously and so on. There's both craven cynicism and substance to both men's cult.
 
I had two problems with Dukat's cult. The first being that it was just too predictably evil. In a show that prides itself on a shades of grey morality and which previously had a nuanced villain, it just seemed to destroy the character. The second issue was one of plausibility. There's no way he should have been able to pull it off. I mean think about it. After the space holocaust, space Hitler shows up in space Israel and convinces the space Jews that they should follow him worship space Satan, because the fact that he rose to power means that the space god(s) obviously hate them. I get that there are crazy people in the world and presumably on Bajor, but there's no way he should have been able to amass any following let alone one as big as he did.
 
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