Final Fantasy and Philosophy Essay 2

[strifehart]

Time for Essay 2 kiddos. I guess maybe chapter 2? Eh, no biggie.

Anyways, here's a quick synopsis of the second essay. The main topic is whether or not Kefka is insane. The definition and purpose of labeling someone as insane are explored as well as the history of the label. The resulting philosophical background is then applied to Kefka specifically with respect to his actions and responses to the heroes in the story. Here's a short list of some of the things Kefka did in FFVI. Whether or not they're are the works of a madman, or logical responses with respect to his point of view...that's for you guys to decide.

1. Poisoned water supply to Doma, murdering several innocents as well as the entire Doma Army.
2. Captured espers to drain their energy, then subsequently resolved to kill them to obtain their magicite.
3. Upon draining the energy of the 3 esper/god/statues, he became all-powerful, god-like individual. He then built a tower, and razed the land, killing innocents.
4. When our heroes made it up the tower, they confront him and try to convince him to show compassion. But he ignores them.
5. Sometime during his upbringing, he was experimented upon with magicite. Possibly an explanation for his SEEMINGLY irrational behavior? Perhaps not?

Anyways, what do you guys think? Insane? Sane? Unfairly labeled as a "bad" guy? Maybe he's a bad example? Maybe Sephiroth, Seifer, Ultimecia, Golbez, Kuja, Sin, Jecht, etc. are better examples of the mislabeled, misunderstood villain? Thoughts?

 

[TheMixedHerb]

Whether or not they're are the works of a madman, or logical responses with respect to his point of view...that's for you guys to decide.

This is the part that stood out to me.
Kefka, in his own mind was completely sane, everything he did had a purpose, a reason for doing it. To others these were seen as barbaric actions and the killing of innocents and such, in his eyes however. It was fine, it had to be done to achieve his goal.

The fact that he was experimented on at a young age probably had the knock on effect of him

Spoiler

experimenting on Terra

and then going on to do the things you mentioned in your post.

I think in his eyes it was nothing more than a task, but to anyone else he's considered as a madman.

 

[Rydrum2112]

I guess I am going to use 2 different posts to make my points, the first will be to address Strife and his question.

I think kefka is driven insane, first through the experimentation on him and then by his quest to become a god (and ability to actually do it). I also think that from a moral perspective he is definitely evil. So if you are like me and conclude that he is insane & evil, then yes I think he is a "bad" guy.

Strife- what is your conclusion?

 

[Rydrum2112]

Now for a bit more long winded post (sorry about that)-

I think the point of the chapter is a question slightly different form of the one that Strife asked (although his question is far more tangible to debate), was Kefka’s conclusion insane? And remove the fact that it is easy to dismiss his view from the ad hominem attack of- he is insane/evil/crazy so his conclusions are crazy.

Vanille says something particularly apt:

Kefka, in his own mind was completely sane, everything he did had a purpose, a reason for doing it. To others these were seen as barbaric actions and the killing of innocents and such, in his eyes however. It was fine, it had to be done to achieve his goal.

It is ironic that every act Kefka did was reasonable [rational] from his own perspective. (What is the best/quickes/most efficient way to end the siege of Doma?-poison the entrenched.) I think the author of the essay is partly correct- Kefka realized there was no singular point to life (no meaning to life), and thus through twisted logic & reasoning, decided if there was no point to life- there should be no life.

As the author says "When he achieves the height of all rational power available to both humans and gods, he suddenly finds no justification for life at all."

Kefka became a god, and didn't see a point in life. This is where his insanity kicks in- by becoming a god he should be able to come to the conclusion that life has meaning but he couldn't find any, and doesn't listen to the hero's trying to explain the meanining in their own lives. (I think the author even says by this time he is now arational).

I think this relates to current times, as more and more non-religious [atheists, agnostics etc.] become outspoken, people fear what this may mean for society as a whole. As the author states, there is a real fear in people that if there is no god (or a "Kefkan" type god) than life is meaningless and Kefka is a character who represents the epitome of this sentiment.

I personally take the side of our hero's in this tale (as when they argue with him before the final fight), life has meaning -independent of the question of whether there is a god or not.

I put the meaning into my own life.

To quote an excellent song writer, Ajren Lucassen- "The meaning of life is to give life meaning"



What are people's thoughts on this (in addition to what Strife was asking)?

 

[strifehart]

Awesome that everyone seems to have slightly different viewpoints on this issue. Here's my take.

First off, to be honest, I identified the least with Kefka out of every final fantasy villain I've ever come across (except, of course, in situations where they change the main villain for the final battle, like in FFIX). As I played through FFVI, whenever Kefka did something "horrible" I would immediately dismiss it as a purely evil act and focus on how to defeat Kefka. I think this attitude towards Kefka is hardwired into the script of the game. What I mean is, the game itself doesn't allow for much identification with Kefka, which is why many people find it so easy to label him insane.

As far as the book's discussion on the meaning of labeling someone insane etc., I found that part of the article to be somewhat meaningless. Well, it was interesting to read, but not very good discussion fodder.

Going back to identification with Kefka, I think it's a shame that the game doesn't explore this further. Kefka actually shares characteristics found in many people, and, to me, represents the line of logic associated with many, during the worst parts of their lives. When you have no family, no friends, no purpose, there isn't much to live for. I think this is exemplified with the reasons the main party provides to Kefka as their reasons to live. The interesting part of this, is that many people have felt this way during their lives (feel like they have no friends or no reason to live). I know some people who turned to drugs or alcohol (and even a few people who tried to commit suicide) after having these types of feelings. It seems that many people can justify the ending of their own lives when they can no longer find a reason to live. Kefka takes this to the extreme however...he doesn't find a lack of purpose in his own life...he (after attaining god status and supposedly becoming all-knowing) finds a lack of purpose in all life. This is the stretch that I have difficulty understanding. If anyone could explain that to me, it'd be much appreciated.

Of course, I agree with Ry's quote "I put the meaning into my own life". But it's easy to see why Kefka feels that without some higher purpose, without some sort of grand connection between us all or an overseeing force, then society and life in general can be looked upon as an non-necessity. Of course, what Kefka doesn't realize, is that it's the connections we make between us that give life meaning. But even those relationships aren't permanent, eternal or meaningful on a large scale.

If you look at things from a really detached perspective, society and life is just one big clusterfuck of chaotic fleeting relationships...none of them are really "important" on a grand scale...so why have them at all? I think Kefka chooses to view life in this way (what I think to be an exaggerated version of a valid perspective) and that's why he decides to eliminate life.

Other thoughts? Sorry for the long post. Just had a lot on my mind...and I tend to ramble sometimes.

 

[Rydrum2112]

Strife I think you nailed this:

"

If you look at things from a really detached perspective, society and life is just one big clusterfuck of chaotic fleeting relationships...none of them are really 'important' on a grand scale...so why have them at all? I think Kefka chooses to view life in this way (what I think to be an exaggerated version of a valid perspective) and that's why he decides to eliminate life.

"


i also think that another quote you made is interesting, about how you identified least with Kefka. I think that is in part true, until you are told he was experimented on and made deranged then you really have 0 sympathy for him getting his ass kicked.

 

[strifehart]

I think the turning point for me, when I decided that he had no hope of changing his tune, was when he poisoned Doma. I remember when that happened, I was like "OH shit. this guy is into some seriously evil shit." I suppose I took the "easy way out" by not acknowledging the fact that from a military perspective, it makes the most amount of sense. It kills the entire other side while minimizing your losses. It's funny, because other villains don't fit this bill like Kefka does (part of what makes him so unique). I don't think I dismissed any of the other main baddies as quickly as I did with Kefka. Golbez is one that comes to mind, for anyone that has played IV. He does some pretty awful shit, but in the end, he turns it all around. Plus, Square has a long history of mind control, etc. Like when Seifer was "bad" as the sorcerer's lapdog. But even then, I was certain that he was just a misunderstood rival. And sure enough, at the end, he's chilling at fisherman's horizon and NOT destroying the world. Kuja actually came pretty close to sitting with Kefka. After all the messed up shit he kept doing, i half expected that he was just gonna be baddie for the entire game. But then they brought up the whole "why does he also look like a monkey like zidane" and then I was like "ohhhhh, i bet they're like brothers or somethin and he'll turn around eventually". Anyways....enough rambling.

 

[Rydrum2112]

Strife, you make another good point about FF games in why do so many FF games have a pseudo-bad guy (almost all of them have 2 pseudo bad guys too)?

Spoiler alert below: (True bad guy is in para-ens)
vi-emporer gestahl (kefka)
vii- shinra & rufus (Sephiroth)
viii- edea & siefer (Ultimecia & Adel)
ix- brahne & kuja (necron)
x- seymour & maester's of yevon (Sin & Yu yevon)
x-2- Leblanc and the 3 guys (Shuyin)
xii- gabranth (Vayne)
xiii- pulse fal'Cie and pulsians (bartandalus)

 

[lostsummoner]

Kefka ... is to sanity, as to a madman thinking he's talked to God.

Kefka believes that he's doing what's best to achieve his goals. He doesn't see it in the way that we would see it. Take the poisoning of Doma. He saw it as a means to an end. It quickly brought the standstill to an end, but at the same time, those around him were horrified.

It kind of fits in with those who have been mistreated at a young age, as they grow older, their views of what's right and wrong are skewed to a point that they don't know what a 'normal' person would know. To them, getting hit upside the head when you've done something wrong is normal, where as, with anyone else, they could perceive it as wrong. The whole 'you don't pay back violence with violence' Anyone else would try to figure out a way to do so without having to kill innocent lives, where as Kefka, figured they're going to die anyway, might as well take the shortest route possible.

There have been studies of folks on medications for various things, and the medication doing something to their brain waves, and literally driven insane because of what they were on. Or, driven to insanity due to things that had happened to them in the past.

That being said, Kefka's insanity could be a case of "he was mistreated and they didn't know what they were doing" They, of course, being the scientists or whatnot that infused Kefka with the magicite.

With Kefka wanting more and more magic to become a God, there is also the possibility that he had become addicted to the magic that he had infused. He takes as much as he can and still wants more. Think of how an addict could be when they're in their ...'high' so to speak. I realize that other drugs have different names for that particular result, but most seem to understand where I am going with with the term 'high'. Your average stoner would think of things that they feel would be amazing, even though a sober person would wonder what was going through their minds at the time.

I know I've read articles somewhere about someone on a drug doing what they thought was right at the time. Shooting up a place, killing innocent bystanders and whatnot. Their drug addled brains think that they're doing is right all along. They're becoming they're own vigilantes, taking the law, or whatever they thought was wrong, into their own hands, and doing various extreme means to set it "right"

Using that mind frame, Kefka thinks what he's doing is perfectly normal, and gosh darn it, why don't you understand it? He wants to do what he thinks is right for the situation, even though no one else feels the same. The gathering of magicite and infusions would give him such a ultimate high that his brain, previously altered by the initial experimentation by the government, just couldn't handle it and he just ... snapped, for lack of a better term.

Sorry if this kinda bounces all over the place. It took me about a week to figure out what I wanted to say.

 

[A G Thing]

Hi this is my first post so anyways on to the psychoanalysis...

Kefka before godhood is a vastly complex personality.

Yes he was experimented on but that is just the cause of his mental breakdown. He is still an intelligent creature, so he can choose how he behaves and yet he chooses to behave as such. If this is due to his moral compass being damaged then rationality would make positives better for him and yet he relishes evil acts. He clearly sees good but he either does not fully comprehend it or does not accept it. This means that his entire value system is based on another quality. He chose to be experimented on to gain power, or he was forced to be the first. If he chose it he wanted the power to gain control, but if it was forced then he most likely reacts out of fear. It is possible that he has both such drives as he may have volunteered but then when it went wrong he felt betrayed.
It is true that he wants to achieve his goals and he is not afraid to simply use the quickest route to victory such as in poisoning Doma.
Of course this might not be out of a purely economic coldness but also in the sense that he has a sort of rivalry with Leo. Through out the game Leo is hailed as a great general, and is respected by his men. Kefka while not endearing himself to his subordinates does however expect such respect even though he does not value the lives of his own men. He poisoned Doma knowing that prisoners would be killed in the act by lying to get Leo out of the way. Doing so would perhaps also humiliate Leo who was being in his view praised for false reasons. Leo out ranks him but by lying he can control Leo in a sense and is free to gain control over the army.
He constantly scrapes to those above him bowing and appeasing them but any time he feels superior he suddenly displays force as if acting out. Such as his visit to Figaro where he burns the city after clearly mocking Edgar. He is a bully and it shows quite often doing what he does for the attention and the superior rush it gives him.
It is also of note that he betrays the Emperor only once he has access to power great enough to do so.
He is a coward through and through as evidenced by his running away throughout the game but the moment he is superior to anyone he crushes them in the most vicious, brutal way he can so as to extend the suffering. This change to sadism is a reflection of the fact that he believes himself superior to everyone else as he has the correct view or abilities he believes places him above others.
Kefka also desires control over situations and people as shown in both his views with enslaving Terra, manipulating Celes and his mass attack on Narshe.
His use of Terra is purely as a weapon and he gets obvious satisfaction watching her kill countless people as his weapon. It is the controller who commits the crime and Kefka parasitically gains pleasure from the evil he forces her to commit.
With Celes he shows obvious attraction if not affection in offering her mercies he does not to other characters. When at the Magitech Facility he tries to justify her actions and turn her back to the Empire but from all we know of him why does he not just try to kill her with the rest of the traitors? He must place some kind of value upon her but it may range from lust to want of a powerful tool in her abilities. Again on the floating continent Kefka and the Emperor try to influence her to join the Empire again, and Kefka seems up for it. Still once she stabs him Kefka lashes out and smacks her good but he does not kill her though it does seem he may from then. This seems to bring him to the conclusion that he cannot control her therefore he see's her as a disappointment and discards the idea.
When Kefka attacks Narshe he does so in such overwhelming force he believes that he can destroy anything that gets in his way even saying so directly. His forces are annihilated and he flees before he is defeated himself.

When Kefka becomes a god he becomes even more complex but is left vague in game.

Most notably of the changes is that his more nihilistic tendencies arise. What happens to someone whose entire outlook in life is that he must constantly torture others and have control now has ultimate power to do so. He first does as we all do when we get a new toy, he does not read the instructions and over indulges a bit, but in his case destroying much of the world in the process. It is an attempt to force the world to bow before him and thus gain control, and considering how much power he has even this is a baby step.
But then he sees how easy it has become.
The minor destruction of before cannot be done by him because he would simply view it as too easy. It becomes boring... But not only that... The small spark of humanity in him if it ever was there would make him sick to be proven right that life was meaningless so easy. He wants to overcome everything he views as wrong (Which is everything!), destroy it from within, and when he proves it all false he would most likely destroy himself if he is able because he is in a sense addicted to feeling. So he did not completely destroy the world most likely because he did not want to see the figurative game over. He wanted to continue crushing things and get that thrill back. He was cold and emotionless except when he was killing, or committing acts that caused suffering. Imagine if you could not feel anything unless you killed another or tortured someone etc.
But giving him that spark of humanity may be too much. If his soul, or conscience was truly devoid of humanity then to be truthful it would change little except that he would instead of being disgusted perhaps become bored. He would see everything as easy to destroy and he would lose interest until it attracted his personal attention or his mind wandered to it. In the end his emotional rush or at least excitement at killing and suffering would drive him to the same goal.
This is why I believe he let the characters and the world survive... He wanted something worth killing with the full extent of his power, and with his own hands.

Lastly as a God Kefka had few lines to describe his ultimate goals but there is evidence to note.
When the main cast all recite their reasons for living he dismisses them not completely just because he does not understand them but also because he believes he will understand them eventually, and by doing so he can destroy them. He claims to want to destroy hopes, dreams, love... Basically every ephemeral quality that he does not care about. But he becomes more angry and obstinate when saying such. He is clearly insane as he cannot accept that he is wrong because to him in his mind he is clearly right. He wants to have power over these things and thus control over them.
Kefka also builds a tower which is a personal symbol to many for self glorification. He is inflating his own ego trying to rationalize what makes him deserving of his stolen power and the rightness of his actions. This is a direct contrast to his Nihilistic tendencies, but plays to his controlling tenancies. He wants once again control and yet how do you control nothing, there is nothing to fear you, to obey you, to die... He even says that he will make a monument to non existence as if to try and claim he can eventually control the nothing it's self which is by it's self a contradiction of epic proportions.

In summation the main themes I have derived from Kefka are this...

He has an overwhelming need for control (Megalomania) of everything thus he must fear everything.

His outlandish and bully based sadism done solely to show his power to others thus causing fear that feeds back into control.

He tolerates things he can control but only so he might have more power to destroy things greater than he is.

This cycle of Sadism and Control can only be maintained while victims are alive however it becomes hollow as easy victims become unable to give the needed rush.

This leads to larger more grandiose evils and acts in order to recapture that satisfaction.

Nihilism is a defense mechanism adopted not only to provide reason to the existence of a world that he fears, but also reason as to justify his actions in overcoming it.

Finally with the achievement of great power, his megalomania evolves into a true god complex in which he acknowledges his existence thus making his nihilism comparative to the fact that he is all that truly matters therefor everything else means nothing.

WHEW!!!! Anyways what do you think??? Anything I am off about?