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No. 114042
>>114035
>>114035
I would argue there is a difference between desperation and determination and you've completely mischaracterized both. The definition for determination is "firmness of purpose; resoluteness." In literature, causes of this character trait are having a "strong focus and ability to make decisions; having a set goal, objective or desire that is personal and important; being highly committed to an idea or belief." Amon is determined. Korra is determined. They both have clear goals and work through adversity and set backs to reach this goal. That's all that's needed. You argue Korra doesn't have a "choice" and that her actions are acts of "desperation". This logic falls apart because there are multiple points in the series where Korra gets beaten, and she's given a chance to leave Republic City and go where it's safe, and she refuses because she feels it is her responsibility to bring balance to the city by defeating Amon. "Desperation" isn't a character trait anyways. Many determined characters feel desperation at times. Heck, let's look at One Piece with one character no one can argue doesn't have an abundance of determination, Luffy D. Monkey. During the Maineford arc, Luffy feels desperation to save Ace from execution. His actions to push forward through the horde of Marines and attempt to rescue him are a result of his determined personality. The same is for Korra. She sees her boyfriend Mako is about to have his bending taken away from him, she feels desperation, and its her determined personality that drives her forward to attack Amon.
As for the Bravery issue, I did read your post, perhaps closer than you expected me to. While you did begrudgingly agree that Korra is brave, your context around that admission downplayed the trait and suggested it was the result of "stupidity." That's what I took issue with.
Finally, you claim she was unnecessarily showboating, but where? How? Let's look at the scene again. Korra Vs Triple Threat Triad -…
The actions consisted of shooting the water bullet back at the water bender and freezing it, tossing the earth bender up into the air, and then dispersing the firebender's burst and tossing him through a window. That's pretty dang tame for super-heroics. Then the gangsters attempt to get away, so Korra uses earth bending to destabilize the vehicle which causes it to spin out of control and crash into a building. Nothing here was "showboating," they were all perfectly logical ways to deal with an enemy. Yes there is some collateral damage and she does get reprimanded by Lin for that, but these actions don't show an inherent selfishness. The fact that she saw benders using their abilities to prey on the helpless citizenry and set out to bring them to justice should not be twisted into evidence of some negative character trait. Plenty of heroes have caused collateral damages in their fights, it's the nature of action.
You state that Korra's decision to go with Unalaq was selfish because she wants to know how to beat the spirits and that's it, but if you actually watched the episode, her concern is peaked when she first learns that spirits are attacking ships. That's when she expresses an interest in learning from Unalaq and "fighting spirits." She's interested in protecting others. She puts the welfare and safety of others before herself. That's selfless. The inverse, a selfish person, wouldn't give two craps about the welfare of others.
Honesty IS an inherently good character trait. "Honesty is the best policy" (-Benjamin Franklin), "Honesty is the first chapter in the book of wisdom" (-Thomas Jefferson), "No legacy is so rich as honesty" (-William Shakespeare), heck even wikipedia defines honesty as a positive and virtuous facet of moral character. Honesty is defined as being forthright, truthful, and candid. In literature, the causes of this trait are growing up with a strong moral center or in an environment where truthfulness is placed in high regard; a desire to help; having strong ethics; a religious background/upbringing where lies are viewed as sin. Now you can easily argue Korra kissing Mako or aggressively pursuing him romantically was a shitty thing to do, I'm not interested in that fight. But you can't argue honesty isn't a virtuous, positive character trait. There are ways to negatively implement ANY character trait, including Determination, Bravery, and Selflessness, as well as Affection, Caution, Charismatic, Clever, Diplomatic, and hell even FRIENDLY (I'm looking at you, Pinkie Pie). If you're going to argue Honesty is not a "positive" character trait because there was once a negative result from it, then you're going to have to set out some kind of test that a characteristic or quality needs to meet, because you're working off a definition that is different from what is generally accepted by western society and literature.
Yeesh, I've spent too long on this argument already. I actually went to rewatch video of the series to support my points, I think that's a signal that it's time to take a break from the Internet.
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