A UN amendment which “unequivocally reject[ed] and condemn[ed] the terrorist attacks by Hamas that took place in Israel starting on 7 October 2023 and the taking of hostages” failed to reach the required two-thirds majority.
Every country that rejected or abstained from it have just told the world that they are ok with antisemitic terrorism.
This is utterly shameful.
A UN amendment which “unequivocally reject[ed] and condemn[ed] the terrorist attacks by Hamas that took place in Israel starting on 7 October 2023 and the taking of hostages” failed to reach the required two-thirds majority.
Co by znamenalo pro společnost porušení novinářské etiky, kdy veřejní nebo státní novináři, televize nebo noviny relativizují terorismus tím, že odmítají označit teroristy za teroristy a brání se v používání tohoto termínu kvůli údajné nejasnosti, co je příčinou a co následkem, často s argumentem, že teroristé bojují za své ideály, například islámské.
Tato situace by mohla mít několik negativních důsledků pro společnost:
Normalizace terorismu: Relativizace terorismu a odmítání jasně označit teroristy by mohlo přispět k normalizaci násilí a teroristických činů. To by mohlo vést k tomu, že lidé začnou považovat teroristické aktivity za akceptovatelné nebo oprávněné.
Manipulace veřejnosti: Média hrají klíčovou roli při formování veřejného mínění. Když média relativizují terorismus, mohou manipulovat veřejnost a vést ji k přijímání násilí jako legitimního prostředku dosažení cílů.
Oslabení boje proti terorismu: Když terorismus není jasně pojmenován a označen za to, co je, může to oslabit snahy bojovat proti terorismu, protože se nezabýváme jeho podstatou.
Ztráta důvěry veřejnosti v média: Když média ztratí objektivitu a nezabývají se terorismem v souladu s etickými normami, může to vést k ztrátě důvěry veřejnosti v média jako důvěryhodný informační zdroj.
Oslabení demokratických principů: Média hrají důležitou roli v demokracii tím, že umožňují veřejnou kontrolu a informované rozhodování. Relativizace terorismu může oslabit demokratické principy a demokratický proces.
Je důležité, aby média dodržovala novinářské etické normy a poskytovala objektivní a vyvážené informace. Akceptace relativizace terorismu v médiích by mohla mít negativní důsledky pro společnost, svobodu tisku a demokratické hodnoty.
Jaký potenciální dopad by mohlo mít omlouvání, relativizace nebo dokonce obhajování terorismu
z různých důvodů, včetně práva na odplatu, práva na sebeurčení, odtržení území, prosazování ideologií nebo zničení etnika,
pokud by politici, novináři a média nepostupovali v souladu s politickou nebo novinářskou etikou a neodsuzovali nebo dokonce stranili terorismu.
S tím, že by dotyčné politiky a novináře část společnosti nebo některé země podporovali.
Omlouvání, relativizace nebo obhajování terorismu z různých důvodů, pokud by politici, novináři a média nepostupovali v souladu s politickou nebo novinářskou etikou a neodsuzovali nebo dokonce stranili terorismu, by mohlo mít závažné důsledky pro společnost a mezinárodní společenství:
Růst terorismu: Pokud by terorismus nebyl důrazně odsuzován a dokonce obhajován, mohlo by to vést k růstu teroristických aktivit, protože teroristé by získali větší odvahu k provádění svých akcí.
Normalizace násilí: Omlouvání nebo relativizace terorismu by mohlo přispět k normalizaci násilí a teroristických činů. To by mohlo změnit vnímání veřejnosti a mladých lidí ohledně terorismu.
Růst extremismu: Normalizace terorismu by mohla vést k radikalizaci a růstu extremismu v různých částech společnosti. Lidé by mohli být ovlivněni k podpoře násilí a terorismu.
Zvýšené konflikty a nestabilita: Podpora terorismu by mohla zvýšit konflikty v různých regionech světa a destabilizovat politické a bezpečnostní situace.
Oslabení boje proti terorismu: Nedostatečné odsouzení terorismu a podpora teroristů by mohly oslabit snahy bojovat proti terorismu na mezinárodní i národní úrovni.
Ztráta důvěry veřejnosti v politiky a média: Pokud politici a média podporují terorismus, mohla by se ztratit důvěra veřejnosti v politické instituce a média jako objektivní a spolehlivé zdroje informací.
Mezinárodní izolace: Země, které by podporovaly terorismus, by se mohly dostat do mezinárodní izolace a čelit politickým a ekonomickým sankcím.
Porušování lidských práv: Teroristické skupiny často porušují základní lidská práva. Podpora terorismu by mohla znamenat porušování těchto práv a násilí vůči civilistům.
Změna geopolitického prostředí: Podpora terorismu by mohla změnit geopolitické prostředí a vztahy mezi zeměmi a regiony.
Je důležité, aby politici, novináři a média dodržovali politickou a novinářskou etiku a odsuzovali terorismus. Akceptace omlouvání a relativizace terorismu by mohla mít závažné a hluboké důsledky pro stabilitu, bezpečnost a mír ve světě.
Nebo ještě jinak:
Potenciální dopad omlouvání nebo obhajování terorismu z různých důvodů, včetně práva na sebeurčení, odtržení území, prosazování ideologií nebo zničení etnika, pokud by politici, novináři a média nepostupovali v souladu s politickou nebo novinářskou etikou a neodsuzovali nebo dokonce stranili terorismu.
Toto by mohlo mít několik důsledků:
Normalizace terorismu: Omlouvání nebo obhajování terorismu by mohlo přispět k normalizaci násilí a teroristických činů. Společnost by mohla ztratit schopnost rozlišit mezi legitimními politickými cíli a teroristickými činy.
Růst extremismu: Tato normalizace by mohla vést k radikalizaci a růstu extremismu, protože by se teroristické aktivity mohly stát společensky akceptovatelnými.
Změna veřejného mínění: Média a politici mají vliv na veřejné mínění. Pokud by média a politici neodsuzovali terorismus, veřejnost by mohla začít mít k němu pozitivnější postoj, což by mohlo změnit politický a společenský diskurz.
Oslabení boje proti terorismu: Nedostatečné odsouzení terorismu by mohlo oslabit snahy bojovat proti terorismu, což by mohlo ohrozit bezpečnost společnosti.
Ztráta důvěry veřejnosti v média a politiky: Pokud média a politici neplní svou roli v odsuzování terorismu, mohla by se ztratit důvěra veřejnosti v tato média a politické instituce.
Riziko násilí a konfliktů: Relativizace terorismu by mohla přispět k růstu násilí a konfliktů ve společnosti, protože by mohla podněcovat nenávist a radikalizaci.
Je důležité, aby politici, novináři a média dodržovali politickou a novinářskou etiku a odsuzovali terorismus, neboť akceptace relativizace terorismu by mohla mít negativní důsledky pro společnost, bezpečnost a demokracii.
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Dál jiné verze NEČTĚTE! Je to cca to samé!
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Nebo trochu jinak:
Akceptace porušení novinářské etiky ve smyslu, kdy veřejní nebo státní novináři, televize nebo noviny straní terorismu, by mohla mít značné a závažné důsledky pro společnost. Zde je několik možných důsledků:
Ztráta důvěry veřejnosti: Když veřejní nebo státní novináři podporují terorismus nebo zaujímají stranický postoj, může to vést k ztrátě důvěry veřejnosti v média. Důvěryhodnost médií jako zdroje nezávislých a objektivních informací může být vážně narušena.
Manipulace veřejnosti: Média hrají klíčovou roli při informování veřejnosti a formování názorů. Když média podporují terorismus, mohou manipulovat s veřejným míněním a vést lidi k víře v násilí nebo extrémní ideologie.
Růst násilí a konfliktů: Podpora terorismu ve veřejných médiích by mohla přispět k růstu násilí a konfliktů ve společnosti, protože by mohla podněcovat nenávist a radikalizaci.
Oslabení demokratických principů: Médiím náleží důležitá role v demokratické společnosti, protože umožňují veřejnou kontrolu vlády a poskytují informace pro informované rozhodování. Když média podporují terorismus, mohou oslabit demokratické principy a ohrozit demokracii.
Porušení novinářských standardů: Média mají povinnost dodržovat novinářské standardy, které zahrnují objektivitu, vyváženost a etické normy. Když tato pravidla porušují, ohrožují novinářskou integritu a profesionalitu.
Ztráta mezinárodní důvěryhodnosti: Pokud veřejní nebo státní novináři podporují terorismus, může to ovlivnit mezinárodní vztahy a důvěryhodnost státu na mezinárodní scéně.
Je důležité zdůraznit, že médiím náleží zvláštní odpovědnost vůči veřejnosti a demokracii. Akceptace porušení novinářské etiky ve prospěch terorismu by mohla mít negativní a hluboké důsledky pro společnost, svobodu tisku a demokratické hodnoty. Proto je důležité, aby byla veřejnost kritická a náročná ve vztahu k médiím a aby tato média byla zodpovědná a transparentní ve svém zpravodajství.
Ztráta důvěry v média: Pokud by společnost akceptovala takové porušení etiky, mohla by vést ke ztrátě důvěry veřejnosti v média jako zdroj spolehlivých a objektivních informací.
Růst extremismu: Podpora terorismu nebo jiných násilných ideologií médii by mohla vést k radikalizaci a růstu extremismu v společnosti. Lidé by mohli být ovlivněni tímto druhem propagandy a mohlo by to vést k více násilí.
Zvýšení společenského napětí: Akceptace takového porušení etiky by mohla zvýšit společenské napětí a konflikty, protože by média podněcovala nenávist a násilí.
Oslabení demokratických principů: Média jsou důležitou součástí demokracie, protože poskytují informace a umožňují veřejnou kontrolu moci. Pokud by média podporovala terorismus, mohlo by to oslabit demokratické principy a systém.
Zásadní porušení etických norem: Akceptace tohoto porušení etiky by mohla vytvořit precedens pro další neetické chování v médiích, což by mohlo ohrozit novinářskou integritu.
Je důležité, aby společnost zůstala kritická a náročná na médiích a aby se držela standardů novinářské etiky. Novináři a média mají zodpovědnost za poskytování objektivních a vyvážených informací a za respektování etických norem, které jsou základem důvěry veřejnosti v média jako instituci. Akceptace porušení těchto etických norem by mohla mít škodlivé důsledky pro demokracii a společnost jako celek.
Porušení novinářské etiky ve smyslu, kdy novinář či noviny straní terorismu, je závažný problém, který zpochybňuje důvěryhodnost a spolehlivost médií. Zde je, jak by se dalo o tomto porušení etiky promluvit:
Nekompetentnost nebo zaujatost: Můžeme zdůraznit, že novináři by měli být nezávislí a kompetentní ve svém práci. Stranění terorismu nebo jiným extrémním ideologiím zpochybňuje jejich schopnost poskytovat vyváženou a objektivní zpravodajství.
Podkopávání důvěry: Uveďte, že důvěra ve zpravodajství a novináře je založena na předpokladu, že budou objektivní a nepodporují násilí. Když média podporují terorismus, poškozují svou vlastní důvěryhodnost a důvěryhodnost novinařiny obecně.
Rozvracení společenského míru: Diskutujte o tom, jak podpora terorismu v médiích může přispět k rozvrácení společenského míru. Teroristické aktivity často vedou k násilí a nestabilitě, a média by měla hrát roli v prevenci a zmírňování konfliktů.
Nebezpečí pro veřejnost: Připomeňte, že terorismus představuje závažné bezpečnostní riziko pro veřejnost. Když média podporují terorismus, může to přispět k radikalizaci a rekrutaci nových teroristů.
Výrazné narušení novinářských pravidel: Podtrhněte, že novináři mají určitá etická pravidla a normy, která by měli dodržovat. Stranění terorismu je v rozporu s těmito pravidly a normami.
Volná diskuse a debata: Nastolte otázku o důležitosti svobodné diskuse a debaty v demokratické společnosti. Novináři by měli poskytovat informace a prostor pro různé názory, ale neměli by podporovat násilí a terorismus.
Výzva k transparentnosti: Zvýrazněte potřebu transparentnosti v médiích a volném přístupu k informacím. Média by měla být otevřená ohledně své redakční politiky a způsobu, jakým zpracovávají zpravodajství.
Když novináři nebo média podporují terorismus, jedná se o závažné etické porušení, které by mělo být kriticky zkoumáno a diskutováno. Tato diskuse je důležitá pro zachování svobody tisku a důvěryhodnosti médií.
BBC woke ? BBC Hamas News ? progressive international
Dvě třetiny disponibilního času tráví Češi s médii.[1] Z doby, kdy nespí, věnují médiím třetinu času. U starší generace to je více televize, u mládeže mají silnější pozici nové technologie - osobní počítač a internet. Tento stav je důsledkem vývoje posledních desetiletí.
Multimediální pomůcka z audiovizuální kultury pro potřeby vyučujících a studentů MU
I am sincerely happy to be here on the occasion of the 327th commencement of this old and most prestigious university. My congratulations and very best wishes to all of today's graduates.
Harvard's motto is "VERITAS." Many of you have already found out, and others will find out in the course of their lives, that truth eludes us if we do not concentrate our attention totally on it's pursuit. But even while it eludes us, the illusion of knowing it still lingers and leads to many misunderstandings. Also, truth seldom is pleasant; it is almost invariably bitter. There is some bitterness in my today's speech too, but I want to stress that it comes not from an adversary, but from a friend.
Three years ago in the United States I said certain things which at that time appeared unacceptable. Today, however, many people agree with what I then said.
The split in today's world is perceptible even to a hasty glance. Any of our contemporaries readily identifies two world powers, each of them already capable of entirely destroying the other. However, understanding of the split often is limited to this political conception: that danger may be abolished through successful diplomatic negotiations or by achieving a balance of armed forces. The truth is that the split is a much [more] profound [one] and a more alienating one, that the rifts are more than one can see at first glance. This deep manifold split bears the danger of manifold disaster for all of us, in accordance with the ancient truth that a kingdom -- in this case, our Earth -- divided against itself cannot stand.
There is the concept of "Third World": thus, we already have three worlds. Undoubtedly, however, the number is even greater; we are just too far away to see. Any ancient and deeply rooted, autonomous culture, especially if it is spread on a wide part of the earth's surface, constitutes an autonomous world, full of riddles and surprises to Western thinking. As a minimum, we must include in this category China, India, the Muslim world, and Africa, if indeed we accept the approximation of viewing the latter two as compact units.
For one thousand years Russia belonged to such a category, although Western thinking systematically committed the mistake of denying its autonomous character and therefore never understood it, just as today the West does not understand Russia in Communist captivity. It may be that in past years Japan has increasingly become a distant part of the West. I am no judge here. But as to Israel, for instance, it seems to me that it's been the part from the western world, in that its state system is fundamentally linked to religion.
How short a time ago, relatively, the small, new European world was easily seizing colonies everywhere, not only without anticipating any real resistance, but also usually despising any possible values in the conquered people's approach to life. On the face of it, it was an overwhelming success. There were no geographic frontiers [limits] to it. Western society expanded in a triumph of human independence and power. And all of a sudden in the 20th century came the discovery of its fragility and friability.
We now see that the conquests proved to be short lived and precarious -- and this, in turn, points to defects in the Western view of the world which led to these conquests. Relations with the former colonial world now have turned into their opposite and the Western world often goes to extremes of subservience, but it is difficult yet to estimate the total size of the bill which former colonial countries will present to the West and it is difficult to predict whether the surrender not only of its last colonies, but of everything it owns, will be sufficient for the West to foot the bill.
But the blindness of superiority continues in spite of all and upholds the belief that the vast regions everywhere on our planet should develop and mature to the level of present day Western systems, which in theory are the best and in practice the most attractive. There is this belief that all those other worlds are only being temporarily prevented (by wicked governments or by heavy crises or by their own barbarity and incomprehension) from taking the way of Western pluralistic democracy and from adopting the Western way of life. Countries are judged on the merit of their progress in this direction.
However, it is a conception which develops out of Western incomprehension of the essence of other worlds, out of the mistake of measuring them all with a Western yardstick. The real picture of our planet's development is quite different and which about our divided world gave birth to the theory of convergence between leading Western countries and the Soviet Union. It is a soothing theory which overlooks the fact that these worlds are not at all developing into similarity. Neither one can be transformed into the other without the use of violence. Besides, convergence inevitably means acceptance of the other side's defects, too, and this is hardly desirable.
If I were today addressing an audience in my country, examining the overall pattern of the world's rifts, I would have concentrated on the East's calamities. But since my forced exile in the West has now lasted four years and since my audience is a Western one, I think it may be of greater interest to concentrate on certain aspects of the West, in our days, such as I see them.
A decline in courage may be the most striking feature which an outside observer notices in the West in our days. The Western world has lost its civil courage, both as a whole and separately, in each country, each government, each political party, and, of course, in the United Nations. Such a decline in courage is particularly noticeable among the ruling groups and the intellectual elite, causing an impression of loss of courage by the entire society. Of course, there are many courageous individuals, but they have no determining influence on public life.
Political and intellectual bureaucrats show depression, passivity, and perplexity in their actions and in their statements, and even more so in theoretical reflections to explain how realistic, reasonable, as well as intellectually and even morally worn it is to base state policies on weakness and cowardice. And decline in courage is ironically emphasized by occasional explosions of anger and inflexibility on the part of the same bureaucrats when dealing with weak governments and with countries not supported by anyone, or with currents which cannot offer any resistance. But they get tongue-tied and paralyzed when they deal with powerful governments and threatening forces, with aggressors and international terrorists.
Should one point out that from ancient times declining courage has been considered the beginning of the end?
When the modern Western states were created, the principle was proclaimed that governments are meant to serve man and man lives to be free and to pursue happiness. See, for example, the American Declaration of Independence. Now, at last, during past decades technical and social progress has permitted the realization of such aspirations: the welfare state.
Every citizen has been granted the desired freedom and material goods in such quantity and of such quality as to guarantee in theory the achievement of happiness -- in the morally inferior sense of the word which has come into being during those same decades. In the process, however, one psychological detail has been overlooked: the constant desire to have still more things and a still better life and the struggle to attain them imprint many Western faces with worry and even depression, though it is customary to conceal such feelings. Active and tense competition fills all human thoughts without opening a way to free spiritual development.
The individual's independence from many types of state pressure has been guaranteed. The majority of people have been granted well-being to an extent their fathers and grandfathers could not even dream about. It has become possible to raise young people according to these ideals, leaving them to physical splendor, happiness, possession of material goods, money, and leisure, to an almost unlimited freedom of enjoyment. So who should now renounce all this? Why? And for what should one risk one's precious life in defense of common values and particularly in such nebulous cases when the security of one's nation must be defended in a distant country? Even biology knows that habitual, extreme safety and well-being are not advantageous for a living organism. Today, well-being in the life of Western society has begun to reveal its pernicious mask.
Western society has given itself the organization best suited to its purposes based, I would say, one the letter of the law. The limits of human rights and righteousness are determined by a system of laws; such limits are very broad. People in the West have acquired considerable skill in interpreting and manipulating law. Any conflict is solved according to the letter of the law and this is considered to be the supreme solution. If one is right from a legal point of view, nothing more is required. Nobody will mention that one could still not be entirely right, and urge self-restraint, a willingness to renounce such legal rights, sacrifice and selfless risk. It would sound simply absurd. One almost never sees voluntary self-restraint. Everybody operates at the extreme limit of those legal frames.
I have spent all my life under a Communist regime and I will tell you that a society without any objective legal scale is a terrible one indeed. But a society with no other scale than the legal one is not quite worthy of man either. A society which is based on the letter of the law and never reaches any higher is taking very scarce advantage of the high level of human possibilities. The letter of the law is too cold and formal to have a beneficial influence on society. Whenever the tissue of life is woven of legalistic relations, there is an atmosphere of moral mediocrity, paralyzing man's noblest impulses. And it will be simply impossible to stand through the trials of this threatening century with only the support of a legalistic structure.
In today's Western society the inequality has been revealed [in] freedom for good deeds and freedom for evil deeds. A statesman who wants to achieve something important and highly constructive for his country has to move cautiously and even timidly. There are thousands of hasty and irresponsible critics around him; parliament and the press keep rebuffing him. As he moves ahead, he has to prove that each single step of his is well-founded and absolutely flawless. Actually, an outstanding and particularly gifted person who has unusual and unexpected initiatives in mind hardly gets a chance to assert himself. From the very beginning, dozens of traps will be set out for him. Thus, mediocrity triumphs with the excuse of restrictions imposed by democracy.
It is feasible and easy everywhere to undermine administrative power and in fact it has been drastically weakened in all Western countries. The defense of individual rights has reached such extremes as to make society as a whole defenseless against certain individuals. It's time, in the West -- It is time, in the West, to defend not so much human rights as human obligations.
Destructive and irresponsible freedom has been granted boundless space. Society appears to have little defense against the abyss of human decadence, such as, for example, misuse of liberty for moral violence against young people, such as motion pictures full of pornography, crime, and horror. It is considered to be part of freedom and theoretically counterbalanced by the young people's right not to look or not to accept. Life organized legalistically has thus shown its inability to defend itself against the corrosion of evil.
And what shall we say criminality as such? Legal frames, especially in the United States, are broad enough to encourage not only individual freedom but also certain individual crimes. The culprit can go unpunished or obtain undeserved leniency with the support of thousands of public defenders. When a government starts an earnest fight against terrorism, public opinion immediately accuses it of violating the terrorist's civil rights. There are many such cases.
Such a tilt of freedom in the direction of evil has come about gradually, but it was evidently born primarily out of a humanistic and benevolent concept according to which there is no evil inherent to human nature. The world belongs to mankind and all the defects of life are caused by wrong social systems, which must be corrected. Strangely enough, though the best social conditions have been achieved in the West, there still is criminality and there even is considerably more of it than in the pauper and lawless Soviet society.
The press too, of course, enjoys the widest freedom. (I shall be using the word press to include all media.) But what sort of use does it make of this freedom?
Here again, the main concern is not to infringe the letter of the law. There is no true moral responsibility for deformation or disproportion. What sort of responsibility does a journalist or a newspaper have to his readers, or to his history -- or to history? If they have misled public opinion or the government by inaccurate information or wrong conclusions, do we know of any cases of public recognition and rectification of such mistakes by the same journalist or the same newspaper? It hardly ever happens because it would damage sales. A nation may be the victim of such a mistake, but the journalist usually always gets away with it. One may -- One may safely assume that he will start writing the opposite with renewed self-assurance.
Because instant and credible information has to be given, it becomes necessary to resort to guesswork, rumors, and suppositions to fill in the voids, and none -- and none of them will ever be rectified; they will stay on in the readers' memories. How many hasty, immature, superficial, and misleading judgments are expressed every day, confusing readers, without any verification. The press -- The press can both simulate public opinion and miseducate it. Thus, we may see terrorists described as heroes, or secret matters pertaining to one's nation's defense publicly revealed, or we may witness shameless intrusion on the privacy of well-known people under the slogan: "Everyone is entitled to know everything." But this is a false slogan, characteristic of a false era. People also have the right not to know and it's a much more valuable one. The right not to have their divine souls [stuffed with gossip, nonsense, vain talk.] A person who works and leads a meaningful life does not need this excessive burdening flow of information.
Hastiness and superficiality are the psychic disease of the 20th century and more than anywhere else this disease is reflected in the press. Such as it is, however, the press has become the greatest power within the Western countries, more powerful than the legislative power, the executive, and the judiciary. And one would then like to ask: By what law has it been elected and to whom is it responsible? In the communist East a journalist is frankly appointed as a state official. But who has granted Western journalists their power, for how long a time, and with what prerogatives?
There is yet another surprise for someone coming from the East, where the press is rigorously unified. One gradually discovers a common trend of preferences within the Western press as a whole. It is a fashion; there are generally accepted patterns of judgment; there may be common corporate interests, the sum effect being not competition but unification. Enormous freedom exists for the press, but not for the readership because newspaper[s] mostly develop stress and emphasis to those opinions which do not too openly contradict their own and the general trend.
Without any censorship, in the West fashionable trends of thought and ideas are carefully separated from those which are not fashionable; nothing is forbidden, but what is not fashionable will hardly ever find its way into periodicals or books or be heard in colleges. Legally your researchers are free, but they are conditioned by the fashion of the day. There is no open violence such as in the East; however, a selection dictated by fashion and the need to match mass standards frequently prevent independent-minded people giving their contribution to public life. There is a dangerous tendency to flock together and shut off successful development. I have received letters in America from highly intelligent persons, maybe a teacher in a faraway small college who could do much for the renewal and salvation of his country, but his country cannot hear him because the media are not interested in him. This gives birth to strong mass prejudices, to blindness, which is most dangerous in our dynamic era. There is, for instance, a self-deluding interpretation of the contemporary world situation. It works as a sort of a petrified armor around people's minds. Human voices from 17 countries of Eastern Europe and Eastern Asia cannot pierce it. It will only be broken by the pitiless crowbar of events.
I have mentioned a few traits of Western life which surprise and shock a new arrival to this world. The purpose and scope of this speech will not allow me to continue such a review, to look into the influence of these Western characteristics on important aspects of a nation's life, such as elementary education, advanced education in the humanities and art.
It is almost universally recognized that the West shows all the world a way to successful economic development, even though in the past years it has been strongly disturbed by chaotic inflation. However, many people living in the West are dissatisfied with their own society. They despise it or accuse it of not being up to the level of maturity attained by mankind. A number of such critics turn to socialism, which is a false and dangerous current.
I hope that no one present will suspect me of offering my personal criticism of the Western system to present socialism as an alternative. Having experienced -- Having experienced applied socialism in a country where the alternative has been realized, I certainly will not speak for it. The well-known Soviet mathematician Shafarevich, a member of the Soviet Academy of Science, has written a brilliant book under the title Socialism; it is a profound analysis showing that socialism of any type and shade leads to a total destruction of the human spirit and to a leveling of mankind into death. Shafarevich's book was published in France -- Shafarevich's book was published in France almost two years ago and so far no one has been found to refute it. It will shortly be published in the United States.
But should someone ask me whether I would indicate the West such as it is today as a model to my country, frankly I would have to answer negatively. No, I could not recommend your society in its present state as an ideal for the transformation of ours. Through intense suffering our country has now achieved a spiritual development of such intensity that the Western system in its present state of spiritual exhaustion does not look attractive. Even those characteristics of your life which I have just mentioned are extremely saddening.
A fact which cannot be disputed is the weakening of human beings in the West while in the East they are becoming firmer and stronger -- 60 years for our people and 30 years for the people of Eastern Europe. During that time we have been through a spiritual training far in advance of Western experience. Life's complexity and mortal weight have produced stronger, deeper, and more interesting characters than those generally [produced] by standardized Western well-being.
Therefore, if our society were to be transformed into yours, it would mean an improvement in certain aspects, but also a change for the worse on some particularly significant scores. It is true, no doubt, that a society cannot remain in an abyss of lawlessness, as is the case in our country. But it is also demeaning for it to elect such mechanical legalistic smoothness as you have. After the suffering of many years of violence and oppression, the human soul longs for things higher, warmer, and purer than those offered by today's mass living habits, introduced by the revolting invasion of publicity, by TV stupor, and by intolerable music.
There are meaningful warnings which history gives a threatened or perishing society. Such are, for instance, the decadence of art, or a lack of great statesmen. There are open and evident warnings, too. The center of your democracy and of your culture is left without electric power for a few hours only, and all of a sudden crowds of American citizens start looting and creating havoc. The smooth surface film must be very thin, then, the social system quite unstable and unhealthy.
But the fight for our planet, physical and spiritual, a fight of cosmic proportions, is not a vague matter of the future; it has already started. The forces of Evil have begun their offensive; you can feel their pressure, and yet your screens and publications are full of prescribed smiles and raised glasses. What is the joy about?
Very well known representatives of your society, such as George Kennan, say: We cannot apply moral criteria to politics. Thus, we mix good and evil, right and wrong, and make space for the absolute triumph of absolute Evil in the world. On the contrary, only moral criteria can help the West against communism's well planned world strategy. There are no other criteria. Practical or occasional considerations of any kind will inevitably be swept away by strategy. After a certain level of the problem has been reached, legalistic thinking induces paralysis; it prevents one from seeing the size and meaning of events.
In spite of the abundance of information, or maybe because of it, the West has difficulties in understanding reality such as it is. There have been naive predictions by some American experts who believed that Angola would become the Soviet Union's Vietnam or that Cuban expeditions in Africa would best be stopped by special U.S. courtesy to Cuba. Kennan's advice to his own country -- to begin unilateral disarmament -- belongs to the same category. If you only knew how the youngest of the Kremlin officials laugh at your political wizards. As to Fidel Castro, he frankly scorns the United States, sending his troops to distant adventures from his country right next to yours.
However, the most cruel mistake occurred with the failure to understand the Vietnam war. Some people sincerely wanted all wars to stop just as soon as possible; others believed that there should be room for national, or communist, self-determination in Vietnam, or in Cambodia, as we see today with particular clarity. But members of the U.S. anti-war movement wound up being involved in the betrayal of Far Eastern nations, in a genocide and in the suffering today imposed on 30 million people there. Do those convinced pacifists hear the moans coming from there? Do they understand their responsibility today? Or do they prefer not to hear?
The American Intelligentsia lost its nerve and as a consequence thereof danger has come much closer to the United States. But there is no awareness of this. Your shortsighted politicians who signed the hasty Vietnam capitulation seemingly gave America a carefree breathing pause; however, a hundredfold Vietnam now looms over you. That small Vietnam had been a warning and an occasion to mobilize the nation's courage. But if a full-fledged America suffered a real defeat from a small communist half-country, how can the West hope to stand firm in the future?
I have had occasion already to say that in the 20th century Western democracy has not won any major war without help and protection from a powerful continental ally whose philosophy and ideology it did not question. In World War II against Hitler, instead of winning that war with its own forces, which would certainly have been sufficient, Western democracy grew and cultivated another enemy who would prove worse, as Hitler never had so many resources and so many people, nor did he offer any attractive ideas, or have a large number of supporters in the West as the Soviet Union. At present, some Western voices already have spoken of obtaining protection from a third power against aggression in the next world conflict, if there is one. In this case the shield would be China. But I would not wish such an outcome to any country in the world. First of all, it is again a doomed alliance with Evil; also, it would grant the United States a respite, but when at a later date China with its billion people would turn around armed with American weapons, America itself would fall prey to a genocide similar to the in Cambodia in our days.
And yet -- no weapons, no matter how powerful, can help the West until it overcomes its loss of willpower. In a state of psychological weakness, weapons become a burden for the capitulating side. To defend oneself, one must also be ready to die; there is little such readiness in a society raised in the cult of material well-being. Nothing is left, then, but concessions, attempts to gain time, and betrayal. Thus at the shameful Belgrade conference free Western diplomats in their weakness surrendered the line where enslaved members of Helsinki Watchgroups are sacrificing their lives.
Western thinking has become conservative: the world situation should stay as it is at any cost; there should be no changes. This debilitating dream of a status quo is the symptom of a society which has come to the end of its development. But one must be blind in order not to see that oceans no longer belong to the West, while land under its domination keeps shrinking. The two so-called world wars (they were by far not on a world scale, not yet) have meant internal self-destruction of the small, progressive West which has thus prepared its own end. The next war (which does not have to be an atomic one and I do not believe it will) may well bury Western civilization forever.
Facing such a danger, with such splendid historical values in your past, at such a high level of realization of freedom and of devotion to freedom, how is it possible to lose to such an extent the will to defend oneself?
How has this unfavorable relation of forces come about? How did the West decline from its triumphal march to its present sickness? Have there been fatal turns and losses of direction in its development? It does not seem so. The West kept advancing socially in accordance with its proclaimed intentions, with the help of brilliant technological progress. And all of a sudden it found itself in its present state of weakness.
This means that the mistake must be at the root, at the very basis of human thinking in the past centuries. I refer to the prevailing Western view of the world which was first born during the Renaissance and found its political expression from the period of the Enlightenment. It became the basis for government and social science and could be defined as rationalistic humanism or humanistic autonomy: the proclaimed and enforced autonomy of man from any higher force above him. It could also be called anthropocentricity, with man seen as the center of everything that exists.
The turn introduced by the Renaissance evidently was inevitable historically. The Middle Ages had come to a natural end by exhaustion, becoming an intolerable despotic repression of man's physical nature in favor of the spiritual one. Then, however, we turned our backs upon the Spirit and embraced all that is material with excessive and unwarranted zeal. This new way of thinking, which had imposed on us its guidance, did not admit the existence of intrinsic evil in man nor did it see any higher task than the attainment of happiness on earth. It based modern Western civilization on the dangerous trend to worship man and his material needs. Everything beyond physical well-being and accumulation of material goods, all other human requirements and characteristics of a subtler and higher nature, were left outside the area of attention of state and social systems, as if human life did not have any superior sense. That provided access for evil, of which in our days there is a free and constant flow. Merely freedom does not in the least solve all the problems of human life and it even adds a number of new ones.
However, in early democracies, as in the American democracy at the time of its birth, all individual human rights were granted because man is God's creature. That is, freedom was given to the individual conditionally, in the assumption of his constant religious responsibility. Such was the heritage of the preceding thousand years. Two hundred or even fifty years ago, it would have seemed quite impossible, in America, that an individual could be granted boundless freedom simply for the satisfaction of his instincts or whims. Subsequently, however, all such limitations were discarded everywhere in the West; a total liberation occurred from the moral heritage of Christian centuries with their great reserves of mercy and sacrifice. State systems were -- State systems were becoming increasingly and totally materialistic. The West ended up by truly enforcing human rights, sometimes even excessively, but man's sense of responsibility to God and society grew dimmer and dimmer. In the past decades, the legalistically selfish aspect of Western approach and thinking has reached its final dimension and the world wound up in a harsh spiritual crisis and a political impasse. All the glorified technological achievements of Progress, including the conquest of outer space, do not redeem the 20th century's moral poverty which no one could imagine even as late as in the 19th Century.
As humanism in its development became more and more materialistic, it made itself increasingly accessible to speculation and manipulation by socialism and then by communism. So that Karl Marx was able to say that "communism is naturalized humanism."
This statement turned out not to be entirely senseless. One does see the same stones in the foundations of a despiritualized humanism and of any type of socialism: endless materialism; freedom from religion and religious responsibility, which under communist regimes reach the stage of anti-religious dictatorships; concentration on social structures with a seemingly scientific approach. This is typical of the Enlightenment in the 18th Century and of Marxism. Not by coincidence all of communism's meaningless pledges and oaths are about Man, with a capital M, and his earthly happiness. At first glance it seems an ugly parallel: common traits in the thinking and way of life of today's West and today's East? But such is the logic of materialistic development.
The interrelationship is such, too, that the current of materialism which is most to the left always ends up by being stronger, more attractive, and victorious, because it is more consistent. Humanism without its Christian heritage cannot resist such competition. We watch this process in the past centuries and especially in the past decades, on a world scale as the situation becomes increasingly dramatic. Liberalism was inevitably displaced by radicalism; radicalism had to surrender to socialism; and socialism could never resist communism. The communist regime in the East could stand and grow due to the enthusiastic support from an enormous number of Western intellectuals who felt a kinship and refused to see communism's crimes. And when they no longer could do so, they tried to justify them. In our Eastern countries, communism has suffered a complete ideological defeat; it is zero and less than zero. But Western intellectuals still look at it with interest and with empathy, and this is precisely what makes it so immensely difficult for the West to withstand the East.
I am not examining here the case of a world war disaster and the changes which it would produce in society. As long as we wake up every morning under a peaceful sun, we have to lead an everyday life. There is a disaster, however, which has already been under way for quite some time. I am referring to the calamity of a despiritualized and irreligious humanistic consciousness.
To such consciousness, man is the touchstone in judging everything on earth -- imperfect man, who is never free of pride, self-interest, envy, vanity, and dozens of other defects. We are now experiencing the consequences of mistakes which had not been noticed at the beginning of the journey. On the way from the Renaissance to our days we have enriched our experience, but we have lost the concept of a Supreme Complete Entity which used to restrain our passions and our irresponsibility. We have placed too much hope in political and social reforms, only to find out that we were being deprived of our most precious possession: our spiritual life. In the East, it is destroyed by the dealings and machinations of the ruling party. In the West, commercial interests suffocate it. This is the real crisis. The split in the world is less terrible -- The split in the world is less terrible than the similarity of the disease plaguing its main sections.
If humanism were right in declaring that man is born only to be happy, he would not be born to die. Since his body is doomed to die, his task on earth evidently must be of a more spiritual nature. It cannot be unrestrained enjoyment of everyday life. It cannot be the search for the best ways to obtain material goods and then cheerfully get the most of them. It has to be the fulfillment of a permanent, earnest duty so that one's life journey may become an experience of moral growth, so that one may leave life a better human being than one started it. It is imperative to review the table of widespread human values. Its present incorrectness is astounding. It is not possible that assessment of the President's performance be reduced to the question how much money one makes or of unlimited availability of gasoline. Only voluntary, inspired self-restraint can raise man above the world stream of materialism.
It would be retrogression to attach oneself today to the ossified formulas of the Enlightenment. Social dogmatism leaves us completely helpless in front of the trials of our times. Even if we are spared destruction by war, our lives will have to change if we want to save life from self-destruction. We cannot avoid revising the fundamental definitions of human life and human society. Is it true that man is above everything? Is there no Superior Spirit above him? Is it right that man's life and society's activities have to be determined by material expansion in the first place? Is it permissible to promote such expansion to the detriment of our spiritual integrity?
If the world has not come to its end, it has approached a major turn in history, equal in importance to the turn from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance. It will exact from us a spiritual upsurge: We shall have to rise to a new height of vision, to a new level of life where our physical nature will not be cursed as in the Middle Ages, but, even more importantly, our spiritual being will not be trampled upon as in the Modern era.
This ascension will be similar to climbing onto the next anthropologic stage. No one on earth has any other way left but -- upward.
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's conversations on diverse topics, broadcast every two weeks on Russia's Channel 1, from April to September 1995.
{Russian audio with English subtitles.}
Words of Warning to the Western World, Aleksandr I.Solzhenitsyn. 1975
"Men Have Forgotten God": Warnings From The Past
America Cannot Defend Itself Against Evil
Ignacio Ramonet
Má blízko k sociálnědemokratickému politickému proudu a keynesiánství
La tyrannie de la transparence
La tyrannie de la commenication - The Tyranny of Communication
... Mohla za to v té
době zejména všeobecná devalvace informací, kterou způsobilo rozšíření internetu a snadno
dostupných informací. Pouhá zpráva kvůli už neopominutelnému zpoždění za televizí a
internetem, který navíc dokázal tištěné noviny částečně nahradit i ve struktuře a formátu
zpravodajství, ztratila hodnotu. Změna celospolečenského vývoje navíc odklonila zájem o
politická témata: v devadesátých letech se studenou válkou zmizela nutnost pro vlastní
bezpečí a orientaci sledovat politickou scénu.
Seriózní deníky ztratily zájemce o
„formátotvorné“ téma politické analýzy. Namísto toho se v etablovaných demokraciích
přesunul zájem na celebrity jako představitele nových společenských elit...
Creative Camp tentokrát otevíráme pro druháky a třeťáky z MKPR a neslibujeme nic menšího než nejlepší praktické setkání s komerčním marketingem při studiu a inspirativní atmosféru.
níže je vložený google překlad 8. kapitoly - Storyforming:
8 ½ Character Archetypes You Should Be Writing
1. Protagonist / Hlavní postava
Ten nepotřebuje tolik vysvětlení. Váš Protagonist je nejdůležitější osobou ve vašem příběhu. Příběh mu patří. Ona je:
Hlavním hercem / aktérem
Osoba nejvíce závisí podstatně na antagonisty.
Osoba, jejíž reakce a akce řídit většinu zápletky / děje.
Osoba, se kterou čtenáři budou identifikovat nejsilněji.
Osoba, jejíž vnitřní cesta, jak ovlivněna vnějším konfliktem, bude nejzřejmější projev téma vašeho příběhu.
Příklady
Ebenezer Scrooge v A Christmas Carol, Blesk McQueen v autech, Bruce Wayne Batman začíná, Mattie Ross True Grit
2. antagonista / rival / protivník /
Ten je také docela jasný.
Antagonista bude pravděpodobně postava v jeho vlastní pravý, nebo může být antagonistický síly (např počasí). Smyslem jeho existence, v jakékoli projevy, je, že je:
Hlavní překážkou vaší postavy dosažení svého hlavního cíle zápletky.
Přímo na rozdíl od vašeho protagonisty (spíše než mimochodem).
Osoba, která sdílí důležité podobnosti, ať už dobré nebo špatné, s protagonistou, s cílem vyzdvihnout a prosadit? oblasti růstu protagonisty.
Příklady
Joker v The Dark Knight, prezident Sníh v The Hunger Games, Tai Lung v Kung-Fu Panda, starý muž v Potter Je to báječný život
3. Sidekick / vedlejší role/"kopie"
Sidekicks (nebo, jak je Hauge nazývá, "odrazy") přijít v mnoha různých formách, vše od nejlepšího přítele nebo spolupachatel zaměstnance nebo člena rodiny. Co je důležité, je to, že Sidekick je:
Věrni a podporuje protagonisty.
V souladu s cíli protagonisty.
Někdo, kdo se liší od protagonisty v důležitých ohledech, ať už dobré nebo špatné, aby upozornil na oblasti růstu protagonisty.
Příklady
Mater v autech, Barney Fife The Andy Griffith Show, Burt COP Je to báječný život, Nadine Groot v Red River
4. Skeptic
Tady je místo, kde Dramatica je párování postav začíná být zajímavé. Podle tohoto modelu, každá postava má svůj opak, který umožňuje autorovi čerpat důležité kontrasty a sondovat hloubku jeho tématu. Stejně jako antagonista je opakem hlavního hrdiny, skeptik je opakem Sidekick. On je:
Skeptický (ne, opravdu).
Někdo, kdo pochybuje, všechno, zvláště volby protagonisty.
Někdo, kdo je většinou na protagonistově "straně", ale kdo je pesimistický o volbách protagonisty, spíše než optimistický.
Hlas opatrnosti (někdy protagonisty výhodou), s větší pravděpodobností poskytnout důvody, proč se něco nebude fungovat, než proč to bude fungovat.
Příklady
Sarge v autech, LaBoeuf True Grit, Estella v Great Expectations Hub McCann v Secondhand Lions
5. Guardian
Také populárně známý jako Mentor, Guardian (ochránce/opatrovník) je klasický archetyp (myslím, Obi-Wan, Morpheus, a tři duchové v A Christmas Carol). On je často zobrazil jako šedá-vousatý starý muž, ale může mít mnoho podob, vše, co od dítěte (Piggy v Pán much) na zvíře (myslím Pooka v animovaném filmu Anastasia) na zdánlivou blázna (Clarence v Je to báječný život). On je:
Učitel nebo pomocník.
Někdo, kdo střeží protagonisty během svého pátrání.
Někdo, kdo vede (nebo někdy jen pokusí vést) protagonista po správné cestě.
Morální standard, proti kterému Protagonista (a antagonista), se měří.
Někdo, kdo střídavě podporuje nebo oponuje protagonistovi myšlenky, v závislosti na protagonisty posunu ve sbližování s morálním standardem příběhu.
Příklady
Alfred Pennyworth Batman začíná, Shifu v Kung Fu Panda, Garth McCann v Secondhand Lions, Col. Ramsey v The Great Escape
6. Contagonist
To je termín jedinečné Dramatica je seznam archetypů. Podle definice Melanie Phillipsová a Chris Huntley, na Contagonist "brání a klame protagonista, lákavé to [sic], aby se špatný kurz nebo přístup." The Contagonist je:
Kontrastoval s Guardian, protože on, vědomě či nevědomě, snaží se nakonec bránit, spíše než pomáhat protagonista.
Odlišné od antagonisty, protože není přímo v rozporu s cíli zápletky protagonisty.
Někdo, kdo může být na straně hlavního hrdiny při celkovém konfliktu, ale kdo se dostane do protagonista do cesty a způsobuje ho, aby zvážila odstoupení od boje proti antagonisty nebo při špatnou cestu k dosažení svého konečného cíle.
Příklady
Doc Hudson v autech, Col. Phillips v Captain America: První Avenger, Blanche Ingram v Jane Eyre, Jack Favell v Rebecca
7. Důvod
Stejně jako jeho název napovídá, důvodem znak je přítomen v příběhu poskytnout hlas logiky. On je:
Někdo, kdo je zásadně logické.
Někdo, kdo dělá rozhodnutí na základě logiky, ne emoce.
Někdo, kdo jedná v logických způsoby nezávislé na protagonisty.
Někdo, jehož logika ovlivňuje volbu protagonisty, pro lepší nebo horší.
Příklady
C-3PO ve Star Wars, Hamm v Toy Story, Inspector Gordon v Batman začíná, Herodes v Claudius Boha
8. Emotion
Pokud jste uhodl, že Emotion postava je do značné míry opakem toho důvodu, charakter, pak je to zlatá hvězda pro vás. Emoce znak:
Někdo, kdo je zásadně emocionální.
Někdo, kdo dělá rozhodnutí na základě emocí, ne logika.
Někdo, kdo může být negativně emocionální (např, rozzlobený) nebo pozitivně emocionální (např soucitný) -or obojí.
Někdo, kdo jedná v citových způsoby nezávislé na protagonisty.
Někdo, jehož emoce ovlivňuje volbu protagonisty, pro lepší nebo horší.
Příklady
Pan Ping v Kung Fu Panda, Cathy v Wuthering Heights, Amelia Sedley v Vanity Fair, Melanie v Uplynulý s větrem
8 ½. Milostný zájem
Nakonec jsme dospěli k archetypální sešití není výslovně uvedeno v prezentaci Dramatica je. Milostný zájem bude nalezen v převážné většině příběhů a není uveden v seznamu Dramatica je prostě proto, že to bude téměř vždy vejde do jedné z ostatních archetypů stejně. Nicméně zájem lásky stojí za zmínku, nezávisle na ostatních archetypů oba protože jeho výtečnosti v beletrii a kvůli několika důležitých rozdílů unikátních do role. Tento znak je:
Někdo s kým Protagonist zamiluje, a kteří pravděpodobně zamiluje zpět.
Často katalyzátor buď protagonista je vnitřní nebo vnější cesta-nebo obojí.
Někdo, kdo střídavě podporuje protagonista a odolává ho, podle toho, které je nutné podniknout kroky, aby se zasadila protagonista dopředu ve svém osobním růstu.
Příklady
Slečna Sally v autech, Rachel Dawes v Batman začíná, Rhett Butler v Uplynulý s Wind, pan Rochester v Jane Eyre
Míchání a odpovídající znakové archetypy
Takže tady to máte! Osm důležité charakterové archetypy, které může pohánět svůj příběh, a pomůže vytvořit nejvíce naplňující spiknutí a téma je to možné.
Ale počkat! Je toho víc!
Udělejme celý tento nápad ještě jednodušší. Jako Christopher Vogler vloží jej do spisovatele cesty:
... Jiný způsob pohledu na archetypů [je] je vidět ne jako rigidní charakterové role, ale jako funkce dočasně prováděné charaktery dosáhnout určité účinky v příběhu.
Jinými slovy, zatímco můžete skončit s osmi unikátními znaky, můžete také rozhodnout, můžete kombinovat své archetypy. Your Love Zájem může být také skeptik. Váš Contagonist může být vaše Důvod postava. Váš Sidekick může být také váš Emotion postava. Důležité je, není, že každý příběh představuje jedinečný charakter pro každého z těchto archetypů. Spíše je důležité je, že váš příběh zahrnuje jak mnoho z těchto postav aspektů, jako je to možné, takže si můžete přinést plnohodnotné hloubku a rezonanci k oběma váš plot a vaše téma.
Řekněte mi svůj názor: Můžete určit všechny z těchto postav archetypů ve vaší práci-v-pokrok?
Here’s the thing about character archetypes: everybody’s got his own take. Do you run with Joseph Campbell’s gazillion and one Jungian archetypes? How about Dramatica’s double quad of eight archetypes? Or maybe screenwriter Michael Hauge’s simple offering of four main players?
Nothing wrong with running with all of them. The fact that archetypes are both universally applicable and yet endlessly varying provides authors with both structure and flexibility. Character archetypes present important guidelines for creating a well-rounded cast that can provide optimum help for advancing your hero’s journey. But, depending on which approach you take, they can also be either frustratingly vague or claustrophobically limiting.
Today, we’re going to explore my take, which is primarily based on Dramatica’s eight characters. I like this approach because of its logic and comprehensiveness and also because it offers structure without boxing me in.
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1. Protagonist
This one doesn’t need much explanation. Your Protagonist is the most important person in your story. The story belongs to him. He is:
The main actor.
The person most greatly affected by the Antagonist.
The person whose reactions and actions drive the majority of the plot.
The person with whom the readers will identify most strongly.
The person whose inner journey, as influenced by the outer conflict, will be the most obvious manifestation of your story’s theme.
Examples
Ebenezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol, Lightning McQueen in Cars, Bruce Wayne in Batman Begins, Mattie Ross in True Grit
2. Antagonist
This one’s also pretty clear. The Antagonist will probably be a character in his own right, or may be an antagonistic force (e.g., weather). The point of his existence, in whatever manifestation, is that he is:
The main obstacle to your character’s achievement of his main plot goal.
Directly opposed to your Protagonist (rather than incidentally).
The person who shares important similarities, whether or good bad, with your Protagonist, in order to highlight and advance areas of Protagonist growth.
Examples
The Joker in The Dark Knight, President Snow in The Hunger Games, Tai Lung in Kung-Fu Panda, Old Man Potter in It’s a Wonderful Life
3. Sidekick
Sidekicks (or, as Hauge calls them, “reflections”) come in many different forms, everything from a best friend or accomplice to an employee or family member. What’s important is that the Sidekick is:
Loyal to and supportive of the Protagonist.
Aligned with the Protagonist’s goals.
Someone who differs from the Protagonist in important ways, whether good or bad, in order to highlight areas of Protagonist growth.
Examples
Mater in Cars, Barney Fife in The Andy Griffith Show, Burt the Cop in It’s a Wonderful Life, Nadine Groot in Red River
4. Skeptic
Here’s where Dramatica’s pairing of characters gets interesting. According to this model, every character has his opposite, which allows the author to draw important contrasts and plumb the depths of his theme. Just like the Antagonist is the opposite of the Protagonist, the Skeptic is the opposite of the Sidekick. He is:
Skeptical (no, really).
Someone who doubts everything, particularly the Protagonist’s choices.
Someone who is mostly on the Protagonist’s “side,” but who is pessimistic about the Protagonist’s choices, rather than optimistic.
A voice of caution (sometimes to the Protagonist’s advantage), more likely to provide reasons why something won’t work than why it will.
Examples
Sarge in Cars, LaBoeuf in True Grit, Estella in Great Expectations, Hub McCann in Secondhand Lions
5. Guardian
Also popularly known as the Mentor, the Guardian is a classic archetype (think Obi-Wan, Morpheus, and the three ghosts in A Christmas Carol). He is often visualized as a grey-bearded old man, but he can take many forms, everything from a child (Piggy in Lord of the Flies) to an animal (think Pooka in the animated film Anastasia) to a seeming fool (Clarence in It’s a Wonderful Life). He is:
A teacher or helper.
Someone who guards the Protagonist during his quest.
Someone who guides (or sometimes just attempts to guide) the Protagonist down the right path.
A moral standard against which the Protagonist (and the Antagonist) will be measured.
Someone who alternately supports or opposes the Protagonist’s ideas, depending upon the Protagonist’s shifting alignment with the story’s moral standard.
Examples
Alfred Pennyworth in Batman Begins, Shifu in Kung Fu Panda, Garth McCann in Secondhand Lions, Col. Ramsey in The Great Escape
6. Contagonist
This is a term unique to Dramatica’s list of archetypes. As defined by Melanie Anne Phillips and Chris Huntley, the Contagonist “hinders and deludes the Protagonist, tempting it [sic] to take the wrong course or approach.” The Contagonist is:
Contrasted with the Guardian because he, wittingly or unwittingly, seeks to ultimately hinder rather than help the Protagonist.
Different from the Antagonist because he is not directly opposed to the Protagonist’s plot goal.
Someone who may be on the Protagonist’s side in the overall conflict, but who gets in the Protagonist’s way and causes him to consider backing out of the battle against the Antagonist or taking the wrong path to reach his end goal.
Examples
Doc Hudson in Cars, Col. Phillips in Captain America: The First Avenger, Blanche Ingram in Jane Eyre, Jack Favell in Rebecca
7. Reason
Just as his title suggests, the Reason character is present in the story to provide a voice of logic. He is:
Someone who is fundamentally logical.
Someone who makes decisions based on logic, not emotions.
Someone who acts in logical ways independent of the Protagonist.
Someone whose logic influences the Protagonist’s choices, for better or worse.
Examples
C-3PO in Star Wars, Hamm in Toy Story, Inspector Gordon in Batman Begins, Herod in Claudius the God
8. Emotion
If you’ve guessed that the Emotion character is pretty much the opposite of the Reason character, then it’s a gold star for you. The Emotion character is:
Someone who is fundamentally emotional.
Someone who makes decisions based on emotions, not logic.
Someone who may be negatively emotional (e.g., angry) or positively emotional (e.g., compassionate)—or both.
Someone who acts in emotional ways independent of the Protagonist.
Someone whose emotion influences the Protagonist’s choices, for better or worse.
Examples
Mr. Ping in Kung Fu Panda, Cathy in Wuthering Heights, Amelia Sedley in Vanity Fair, Melanie in Gone With the Wind
8 ½. Love Interest
Finally, we come to an archetypal staple not explicit in Dramatica’s presentation. The Love Interest will be found in the vast majority of stories and is not mentioned in Dramatica’s list simply because it will almost always fit into one of the other archetypes as well. However, the Love Interest is worth mentioning independently of the other archetypes both because of its prominence in fiction and because of several important distinctions unique to the role. This character is:
Someone with whom the Protagonist falls in love—and who probably falls in love back.
Often a catalyst in either the Protagonist’s inner or outer journey—or both.
Someone who alternately supports the Protagonist and resists him, depending on which action is necessary to push the Protagonist forward in his personal growth.
Examples
Miss Sally in Cars, Rachel Dawes in Batman Begins, Rhett Butler in Gone With the Wind, Mr. Rochester in Jane Eyre
Mixing and Matching Character Archetypes
So there you have it! Eight important character archetypes that can power your story and help you create the most fulfilling plot and theme possible.
But wait! There’s more!
Let’s make this whole idea even simpler. As Christopher Vogler puts it in The Writer’s Journey:
…another way of looking at the archetypes [is to see them] not as rigid character roles but as functions performed temporarily by characters to achieve certain effects in a story.
In other words, while you may end up with eight unique characters, you may also decide you can combine your archetypes. Your Love Interest may also be a Skeptic. Your Contagonist may be your Reason character. Your Sidekick may also be your Emotion character. The important thing isn’t that every story presents a unique character for every one of these archetypes. Rather, the important thing is that your story incorporates as many of these character aspects as possible, so you can bring full-fledged depth and resonance to both your plot and your theme.
Tell me your opinion: Can you identify all of these character archetypes in your work-in-progress?
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