December 17, 2024 • 23 mins
Is it moral to trick a willing participant in a deadly game?
'Ender's Game' by Orson Scott Card is a sci-fi war scenario between humanity and hive mind insect aliens. Humanity survived two space battles but must prepare for the all important third. They recruit gifted children & train them mercilessly to be strategic commanders in the International Fleet. Ender Wiggin is the most talented of the bunch and must do brutal things to save those he loves. It consists of 15 chapters mostly titled for an important person in the book.
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Timeline:
(00:00:00) Intro
(00:03:17) Themes/Questions
(00:16:18) Author & Extras
(00:17:18) Summary
(00:21:00) Value 4 Value
(00:22:15) Join Live!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Kyrin Down (00:00):
Is it moral to trick a willing participant in a deadly game?
Welcome, mere mortalites, to another episode of the mere mortals book reviews. I'm your host here, Kyrin. Live as always, 11 AM Australian Eastern Standard Time on a Wednesday.
(00:21):
On here, 18th
December
2024.
And as you might surmise, this is the book review podcast where I talk about how I was buggered as a kid.
Okay. No. No. That's that's really messed up actually. I probably probably shouldn't have said that. But there are buggers in this book and there are plenty of kids in this book that we have today. Enders game by Orson Scott Card, the award winning classic of war and survival.
(00:45):
Now this book is published was published in 1985
with a very slight revision in it. I don't, which was related to some cold war things that kinda happened in this book, but, yeah, whatever.
326 pages in length, but the writing is rather large. So I think I've read it in, I don't know, about 4 hours time or something. It didn't really take me that long to get through. This is a sci fi war scenario which takes place between humanity in the
(01:13):
I think it's set in the like the late or the late 90s or early 2000s.
But humanity is way more technologically advanced than we are right now.
And,
it's set in that time period more or less with a adversary. And this adversary are these hive like mind
insect aliens, which are extraterrestrial,
(01:34):
and they come from outside of our solar system. And they're kind of colonizers. They
initially came to,
some space battles with with humanity.
2 of them, the first invasion and the second invasion. And humanity is preparing for this third invasion.
And what humanity has
decided to do is that we need the kids, man. We need these kids to fight these aliens. So they're recruiting all of these kids to be these strategic battle commanders.
(02:01):
And basically, they're sending them up into space to these battle schools, and they're fighting against each other to to get them prepared to to fight these aliens
more in the strategic sense of,
space battles rather than hand to hand combat or anything like that.
This book is focused in particular on the titular character, Ender,
And his name is Ender Wiggin. He's 6 years old when we first meet him, and he's basically a genius.
(02:26):
What
they we see throughout this book is his progress
in becoming a better strategic commander. He goes off to these battle schools. But we also see there's a lot of manipulation going on.
A lot of,
rather bad things happen to him, and he has to do some pretty brutal things to save those that he loves. This book is split into 15 chapters in total
(02:48):
with,
I don't know how many pages per probably like 30 ish pages per per chapter, something like that.
And at the start of each chapter, it usually has a name. So we,
have here the giant string on page 6. Usually, the name is actually referring to a a a character in the book such as Valentine, who is his sister,
(03:09):
Peter, his brother,
or an event that's happening such as launch or drink or battle goon or whatever it is. So let's jump into
the themes and questions. And this is gonna be a rather hard talk book to talk about without giving away some spoilers. So preparation for that in the in incoming section.
The main theme I wanna concentrate on here is sacrifice and manipulation.
(03:33):
And this is very closely
cons, tied to the concept of the greater good, which we have talked about in previous book reviews in the past. I wanna try and stay in this
very similar adjacent lane, but not get into the greater good. And,
can you give consent to things that are unimaginable?
Is it possible to take back consent after the fact?
(03:54):
And if you agree to give up everything, do you have any rights? And these are fairly pertinent questions
that, we arrive at after seeing how Ender Wiggin is is treated in this in this book. So the setup for all of this, we have
the mill, military saying like, yep, we want these children, but they want them to be, volunteers rather than drafts. They want them to be, willing participants in this game. So we see right at the start that end,
(04:19):
whilst forced into some
from the very get go a very, unique and violent situation.
He eventually,
is talking to, I believe his name is Colonel Graff. And Graff is like, hey, look, you can come up to the battle school. We're not gonna force you to do it. We need you to be willing. But, you know, there there's very much
a tipping of the scales to get what they want out of these people. So we see it's it's already on shaky grounds. You know, 50% of the reason he goes is is because he wants to save his sister, Valentine and and humanity. And 50% is because he's scared shitless over his psychopathic brother, Peter, who is also a genius. And his sister is also rather, a genius. That's a whole whole family of geniuses.
(05:00):
And he basically agrees
in this decision to become a sacrifice for humanity. And so
it's not made explicit like, hey, we're going to do these things to you. But from the very get go, we see that
he he knows he's being manipulated. He knows he's being put in tough situations.
The the colonel, the
the graph and all of these, you know, commanders and stuff, they they make it very apparent like, hey, we're going to do and make this as hard for you as possible
(05:29):
because this is going to make you a better commander, a better leader.
So Enda kind of explicitly and implicitly
agrees to this. Okay. I'm gonna do this. What you need to know about him is,
he physically is a kid, but emotionally,
he is already an adult, but without any of the, you know, sexual stuff because he hasn't hit puberty. So those driving factors, those things that,
(05:53):
you know,
major decisions in in other humans,
adults, I should say,
aren't affecting him nor any of the other kids.
It's mostly about prestige
status,
and where they fit into the group rather than any sexual stuff like that. So
we see at the start of each chapter,
this,
(06:14):
in in emboldened or a different different font text
that,
the there's this kind of unknown discussion that's happening. And so I'll just read out a little bit here. Graff.
The sister is our weak link. He really loves her. I know. She can undo it all. From the start, he won't want to leave her. So what are you going to do? Persuade him that he wants to come with us more than he wants to stay with her. How will you do that? I'll lie to him. And if that doesn't work, then I'll tell the truth. We're allowed to do that in emergencies. We can't plan for everything. You know? So we already say, okay. Like, these people are manipulating him and and we get these insights into what they're doing to him right at the start. And whilst they care for Ender on a
(06:51):
kind of emotional level, they're not psychopaths these commanders. They know they're basically torturing a child.
They also have this kind of concept of the greater good and that, you know, he agreed to this. He's he's a sacrifice. We need to do this. So
the we we see these kind of moral quandaries,
went apart from him. And,
(07:12):
I found one interaction
particularly insightful. And this is when Graff tells Enda that they need someone who understands the buggers. He he makes them very clear, like, these bugger aliens, we need you to understand them.
We need you to empathise with them because that's probably the only way that's going to your really be able to understand them. Yet despite that,
(07:32):
we need you to kill them for humanity's sake and you must defeat them.
The interesting part of that interaction, I think, is he didn't press on the need of,
the why the why of all of this. And,
why would it be critical to defeat them? There is no moral claim made in this that humans are better than them.
(07:53):
Explicitly, perhaps implicitly, this is this is understood, but there's no false false statements that the buggers have an invalid point of view and that,
that everything that is happening is is just and and right.
It's not explained.
Yeah. And does and does a smart kid. And he he sees through the bullshit really quickly. He sees that, okay, these people are manipulating me. Okay. They're lying to me. Okay.
(08:19):
The
the purpose of the international fleet is to train killers and that humanity are actually the aggressors in this 3rd invasion. He he knows, like, hey, we're preemptively
going to to their home worlds, to their colonies, to their planets,
in this 3rd invasion. So,
you know, we are in some extent the the aggressors in this some extent we are the aggressors in this situation, although they started it, you know, and so there's plenty of justifications as to why this needs to happen. But
(08:49):
it's all kind of
very flimsy, I would say. And
he sees the tricks they pull. 1 is, Valentine's letter, which they,
send to him after censoring all of his communication with his parents and his his family,
which they
kept him to get past like a mental block that he is happening.
And then also her appearance at the lake when he's moving on to this next step in his his career, if you wanna call it that. And,
(09:16):
once again, drive home the need, like, hey, you're doing this for for someone that you love, but they're pulling the strengths of it. They're they're they're very much tilting the balance,
and
how they force him to have, hurt others for his own safety.
And one spoiler avoided is, the aftermath of these aggressive self defense,
situations that he's put in. So there are gonna be some spoilers from here, though. The manipulation continues as does the degradation of end. He physically starts falling apart,
(09:45):
as he's getting into the later part of this book and the training is undergoing
even more intense things. You know, he's not getting enough sleep. He's being put in situations where he has to make very tough decisions to win these games. He's pushing his little sub commanders, which he has under him to extreme lengths and pressure.
Some of them start to crack,
(10:06):
and he has to make decisions to,
swap them out to do different things. And,
spiritually, I think he's also wavering where he's like, what is the point of all this? Like, these there's just so many constant battles. This training just will not end.
And that this is all just in preparation for for the actual battles that will come the real things.
(10:28):
After the final battle, he realizes he actually has been tricked once again and that this whole process he was going through,
after the battle school and when he gets into the command school was,
actual battles. He was sending real human fighters into real battles even though he thought it was still all training in a game.
He was taking it seriously,
(10:49):
yet he didn't know, like he made some a whole bunch of sacrifices. He
threw away fleets of ships. He made poor decisions, which got real humans killed. And in the end, he he realizes, like, oh, no.
To win this whole battle, I had to do something,
which is actually a rather heinous atrocity. He killed a whole planets full of of these aliens.
(11:12):
And he realizes,
like, shit, I've I've just become I've essentially just committed genocide.
And to boot after all of this, right at the end of the book, he gets no rewards as a hero.
Only ostracization
and
power games and being manipulated as a tool.
He doesn't get to go back to Earth after all of this. And the kicker, the absolute kicker is
(11:37):
eventually he learns that it was all for naught as humanity wasn't even in danger. So
this sacrifice that he was this, everything that he did,
he realizes it was like it was pointless. I've
done terrible things
to people,
to
aliens to,
(11:58):
to myself.
And there was no point in it at all at the end. And,
you know, the only the only one I guess who can really decide
on these questions of
sacrifice, was it right or wrong of what they did to him,
is probably end of himself.
He, you know, he's the one who went through all of this.
(12:20):
One of the colonels, colonel Graff, at the end, he gets exonerated by a committee because of what happened to,
you know, the crimes essentially that he had to commit to train ender
to to become this this hero.
And he gets exonerated by
a military or a civilian trial. I'm not sure which one.
(12:41):
And so in to some extent, it's, it's viewed
the conclusion is that everything that was done to ender was in fact, moral.
Yet, I think that really only rests with ender.
He bears the ultimate burden for everything that he's done. And he was there was personal responsibility thrown into this. He did agree to
(13:03):
to all of these things,
to protect the the person that he loves, but also, you know, to to sacrifice,
to save his own life by being away from his his crazy brother.
And if it wasn't for just this little plot device thrown right at the end, which allows this to continue into a series of books rather than just a one off,
(13:24):
I imagine he would have felt used. I imagine he would have just gone,
okay. I did all of these things. I
everything, not only just a u used but abused.
He he was
put into situations where
if if these if this happened in like real life and then just a family home
and the international fleet with all its commanders was actually just, you know, a mom and dad did go, okay, this this kid was certainly abused. Probably the the closest analogy would be
(13:54):
a a family forcing their kid to become, you know, a soccer superstar
and training him mercilessly
day and night
to get to these, you know, levels where he'll become the best in the world or something like that. So
who gets to decide? Well, putting aside consent issues of a 6 year old being able to agree to anything, no matter how genius he is.
(14:16):
He knows nothing of the world and,
and
how to make
logical informed decisions.
I personally think it's okay to renegotiate.
If you want to put this in a in a bad sense, it would be to backpedal or to break your word
once more information becomes available. And so at that any point
(14:39):
of this cycle of him going through this battle school and realizing like, oh, they're just manipulating and tricking me. Oh, they're doing this to me now. Oh, they've lied to me in this extent. Oh, is this actually the reality of what's happening? Or is this,
is this just another trick or another game? I think at any point in that cycle, if he wanted to say, you know, I agree I agree to all of this,
(15:01):
but when new information comes up,
you can actually take away that consent,
mid process. I probably would say you're not allowed to,
because this could happen in sexual situations, for example, where a guy and girl have sex.
And then after the fact one of them regrets it,
(15:23):
you know,
I don't think that's permissible to then say a crime was committed,
if if consent was given at the start.
But certainly going forward,
you then have the moral right to say like, no, I don't want to participate in any of this. So
it was an unfair
situation. He was put in
one where it was essentially
(15:44):
you give us everything and we take everything.
And
it's it's honestly kind of a brutal book in that respect. So
willing sacrifices.
Yes. He was a willing sacrifice, but geez, he, he got tricked a lot. And
Yeah. Is it Yeah. Can you consent to things that are unimaginable?
(16:05):
I'm not so sure. I I don't think
I think a tentative yes to that. Yeah. You can say, like, oh, I'll I'll agree to this right at the start, but if things change, you're you're certainly allowed to change your opinion.
Alright. Let's jump on to the author some extra details. Not too much to talk about. Awesome. Scott Card,
born in 1951. He's a university professor,
(16:27):
written some plays as well as books.
This this book in particular won the Hugo Award, Nebula Award. Never heard of them,
but,
was made into a movie as well. It's a very popular book, so it's it's not kind of unknown.
The only extra detail to add to this is that this is a rare book where I had actually seen the movie first.
(16:49):
I don't know how long ago. I'm going to say at least a decade. But,
the twist ending of this really stuck with me. And so even when I was reading the book, I knew I knew what was coming from the very get go. So,
you know, even though I gave away some spoilers here, it was also somewhat spoiled for me. So the tragedy of abuse of book review spoilers
(17:13):
is continuing along down through the generations now. So, well,
let's jump into the summary. Similar books recommendations.
On the surface, it's a rather fun book about sci fi kids aliens war. You'd maybe be think like, oh, okay. This is it's kinda interesting. Right? Child geniuses as well.
But once you dig into it, man, the whole thing is just morally reprehensible.
(17:37):
There is unjustified violence, emotional manipulation,
manslaughter,
political bullshit, constant lying, and to top it all off, a nice little genocide right at the end.
That being said, it's very compelling reading, and I did quite enjoy the story. I I found it,
very interesting.
Yeah. Worthwhile worthwhile going through and and reading. So overall, I'm gonna give Ender's Game by Austin Scott Card, probably a 7 out of 10.
(18:03):
I reckon I would have given this higher 7 and a half, maybe even an 8 if I didn't know what was coming. Because I do like those twist endings where a book can really make you feel something can go like, oh, shit. So I would have given it higher, I believe if I if I didn't already know what was coming. So there's a whole bunch of sequels to this, as this is the first in a series.
(18:24):
And as I mentioned, there's a there was a little plot twist or not a plot twist, a plot device right at the end, which then allows the continuation of Ender in his journey through space and his interaction with buggers and things like this.
I actually personally think it would have been an even more impactful book if they didn't have that. And it just ended off as like
(18:45):
a brutal
realization by end of that. He'd just been tricked and manipulated
and that essentially his his life was worthless.
I think that would have been
that would have really set this book apart, I I feel.
But, you know, it's a kid's book. You don't know. Kids probably don't really wanna
have that sort of brutality rider thrust upon them.
(19:07):
Don't expect me to cover the sequels in the future. One thing I've realized about myself is,
I'm not actually that really interested in in reading
series of books where they tie up with one another,
as
evidenced by my self reading Dune and then having no real desire to read the rest in the series.
The only series I've read I was more of a series person when I was a kid,
(19:30):
reading del Toro Quest
and the Alex Rider series, Artemis Fowl, things like that.
Nowadays,
yeah, just it's it's not so interesting to me to have a continuing character,
going on, which I think partly explains why I don't really read
fantasy
sci fi as much.
Or if I did read sci fi, I'd probably be more along the lines of Isaac Asimov because those are usually just one off little books that he has or bigger books
(20:00):
rather than,
an extended series of Game of Thrones, for example, or things like that. So,
yeah.
The only other thing I'd maybe recommend reading from this is there is a very short story called, The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas
by Ursula K Le Guin.
And it has a very similar
(20:22):
interesting aspect about sacrifice,
this time,
not willingly, but
then kind of touching upon the greater good and and
what Moore as an outside observer would do after looking at these things. So, you know, imagine this book, but told from the out, the person,
point of view of perhaps Graf
who willing participates
(20:44):
in this or perhaps even one of Enda's
fellow school children,
cadets, battle school commanders,
and them realizing what's been done to him. I yeah. That that would be
a interesting book to have on on that, regard as well.
Okay. We're getting towards the end here. And
let's jump into the value for value section.
(21:05):
I really would love if you share this podcast.
If you're with someone who has a fellow a fellow desire to read to
explore into these books.
I do all of this upfront and it's available anytime anywhere for free for you. All I ask is that you just return some of that value back. A share, a like, comment on the YouTube channel is great.
(21:27):
Word-of-mouth in real life. I love to get some book recommendations. And the final way is via,
sending some monetary support. We did see that last week with a PayPal coming in from our friend, Vratislav.
And we've also got a boostagram this week, which is where you can do it, directly within the podcasting app. And this was, by d's laughs. He sent 123
(21:48):
satoshis sent using fountain, the fountain app. And he just says keep up the great work. And then a pointing a pointing hand at me. Oh, thank you, man. Very much appreciated d's laughs. And I certainly will keep up the great work. Perhaps that was addressed to 1 though. So who knows? Both of us will have to keep up the the great work.
So very much appreciated. If you wanna know more about how to do that and get a shout out, new models podcast.com/support.
(22:11):
And we've got a section there on how to do that.
Cute. And speaking of keeping up the great work,
we are live here on 11 AM Australian Eastern Standard Time on a Wednesday.
And I will be live this very same time next week. And oh, actually, will I? Might be Christmas. I'll probably still be live. Yeah. I'll I'll do Christmas stuff in the afternoon. And,
(22:33):
what I wanted to talk about is what's coming up. What are the next books? So
finally, it's gonna happen. I am almost almost finished reading
this one here.
I'm gonna do it. I think I've only got like 20 pages left to read.
I will get through that this week. I promise you that. I have almost finished Devil Take the Highmost
(22:58):
by,
oh, I've forgotten his name. I'll
remember that shortly.
And a little surprise unexpected book coming up is an autobiography,
which I didn't really plan on reading, but is
come to me for for one reason or another. But I'm gonna keep that as a surprise for those,
coming into the new year will be when I do that one. So
(23:21):
lots of stuff coming up, exciting things. Juan's also still doing his book reviews as usual. So we're gonna leave it there for today. Thank you, everyone, for joining in. Hope you're having a fantastic day wherever you are in the world. Hope you have a fantastic
Christmas,
coming up and a fantastic New Year. We're We're gonna be keeping on doing these book reviews
for the foreseeable future. So very much appreciated. Ciao for now. Kyren out.
Is it moral to trick a willing participant in a deadly game?
Welcome, mere mortalites, to another episode of the mere mortals book reviews. I'm your host here, Kyrin. Live as always, 11 AM Australian Eastern Standard Time on a Wednesday.
(00:21):
On here, 18th
December
2024.
And as you might surmise, this is the book review podcast where I talk about how I was buggered as a kid.
Okay. No. No. That's that's really messed up actually. I probably probably shouldn't have said that. But there are buggers in this book and there are plenty of kids in this book that we have today. Enders game by Orson Scott Card, the award winning classic of war and survival.
(00:45):
Now this book is published was published in 1985
with a very slight revision in it. I don't, which was related to some cold war things that kinda happened in this book, but, yeah, whatever.
326 pages in length, but the writing is rather large. So I think I've read it in, I don't know, about 4 hours time or something. It didn't really take me that long to get through. This is a sci fi war scenario which takes place between humanity in the
(01:13):
I think it's set in the like the late or the late 90s or early 2000s.
But humanity is way more technologically advanced than we are right now.
And,
it's set in that time period more or less with a adversary. And this adversary are these hive like mind
insect aliens, which are extraterrestrial,
(01:34):
and they come from outside of our solar system. And they're kind of colonizers. They
initially came to,
some space battles with with humanity.
2 of them, the first invasion and the second invasion. And humanity is preparing for this third invasion.
And what humanity has
decided to do is that we need the kids, man. We need these kids to fight these aliens. So they're recruiting all of these kids to be these strategic battle commanders.
(02:01):
And basically, they're sending them up into space to these battle schools, and they're fighting against each other to to get them prepared to to fight these aliens
more in the strategic sense of,
space battles rather than hand to hand combat or anything like that.
This book is focused in particular on the titular character, Ender,
And his name is Ender Wiggin. He's 6 years old when we first meet him, and he's basically a genius.
(02:26):
What
they we see throughout this book is his progress
in becoming a better strategic commander. He goes off to these battle schools. But we also see there's a lot of manipulation going on.
A lot of,
rather bad things happen to him, and he has to do some pretty brutal things to save those that he loves. This book is split into 15 chapters in total
(02:48):
with,
I don't know how many pages per probably like 30 ish pages per per chapter, something like that.
And at the start of each chapter, it usually has a name. So we,
have here the giant string on page 6. Usually, the name is actually referring to a a a character in the book such as Valentine, who is his sister,
(03:09):
Peter, his brother,
or an event that's happening such as launch or drink or battle goon or whatever it is. So let's jump into
the themes and questions. And this is gonna be a rather hard talk book to talk about without giving away some spoilers. So preparation for that in the in incoming section.
The main theme I wanna concentrate on here is sacrifice and manipulation.
(03:33):
And this is very closely
cons, tied to the concept of the greater good, which we have talked about in previous book reviews in the past. I wanna try and stay in this
very similar adjacent lane, but not get into the greater good. And,
can you give consent to things that are unimaginable?
Is it possible to take back consent after the fact?
(03:54):
And if you agree to give up everything, do you have any rights? And these are fairly pertinent questions
that, we arrive at after seeing how Ender Wiggin is is treated in this in this book. So the setup for all of this, we have
the mill, military saying like, yep, we want these children, but they want them to be, volunteers rather than drafts. They want them to be, willing participants in this game. So we see right at the start that end,
(04:19):
whilst forced into some
from the very get go a very, unique and violent situation.
He eventually,
is talking to, I believe his name is Colonel Graff. And Graff is like, hey, look, you can come up to the battle school. We're not gonna force you to do it. We need you to be willing. But, you know, there there's very much
a tipping of the scales to get what they want out of these people. So we see it's it's already on shaky grounds. You know, 50% of the reason he goes is is because he wants to save his sister, Valentine and and humanity. And 50% is because he's scared shitless over his psychopathic brother, Peter, who is also a genius. And his sister is also rather, a genius. That's a whole whole family of geniuses.
(05:00):
And he basically agrees
in this decision to become a sacrifice for humanity. And so
it's not made explicit like, hey, we're going to do these things to you. But from the very get go, we see that
he he knows he's being manipulated. He knows he's being put in tough situations.
The the colonel, the
the graph and all of these, you know, commanders and stuff, they they make it very apparent like, hey, we're going to do and make this as hard for you as possible
(05:29):
because this is going to make you a better commander, a better leader.
So Enda kind of explicitly and implicitly
agrees to this. Okay. I'm gonna do this. What you need to know about him is,
he physically is a kid, but emotionally,
he is already an adult, but without any of the, you know, sexual stuff because he hasn't hit puberty. So those driving factors, those things that,
(05:53):
you know,
major decisions in in other humans,
adults, I should say,
aren't affecting him nor any of the other kids.
It's mostly about prestige
status,
and where they fit into the group rather than any sexual stuff like that. So
we see at the start of each chapter,
this,
(06:14):
in in emboldened or a different different font text
that,
the there's this kind of unknown discussion that's happening. And so I'll just read out a little bit here. Graff.
The sister is our weak link. He really loves her. I know. She can undo it all. From the start, he won't want to leave her. So what are you going to do? Persuade him that he wants to come with us more than he wants to stay with her. How will you do that? I'll lie to him. And if that doesn't work, then I'll tell the truth. We're allowed to do that in emergencies. We can't plan for everything. You know? So we already say, okay. Like, these people are manipulating him and and we get these insights into what they're doing to him right at the start. And whilst they care for Ender on a
(06:51):
kind of emotional level, they're not psychopaths these commanders. They know they're basically torturing a child.
They also have this kind of concept of the greater good and that, you know, he agreed to this. He's he's a sacrifice. We need to do this. So
the we we see these kind of moral quandaries,
went apart from him. And,
(07:12):
I found one interaction
particularly insightful. And this is when Graff tells Enda that they need someone who understands the buggers. He he makes them very clear, like, these bugger aliens, we need you to understand them.
We need you to empathise with them because that's probably the only way that's going to your really be able to understand them. Yet despite that,
(07:32):
we need you to kill them for humanity's sake and you must defeat them.
The interesting part of that interaction, I think, is he didn't press on the need of,
the why the why of all of this. And,
why would it be critical to defeat them? There is no moral claim made in this that humans are better than them.
(07:53):
Explicitly, perhaps implicitly, this is this is understood, but there's no false false statements that the buggers have an invalid point of view and that,
that everything that is happening is is just and and right.
It's not explained.
Yeah. And does and does a smart kid. And he he sees through the bullshit really quickly. He sees that, okay, these people are manipulating me. Okay. They're lying to me. Okay.
(08:19):
The
the purpose of the international fleet is to train killers and that humanity are actually the aggressors in this 3rd invasion. He he knows, like, hey, we're preemptively
going to to their home worlds, to their colonies, to their planets,
in this 3rd invasion. So,
you know, we are in some extent the the aggressors in this some extent we are the aggressors in this situation, although they started it, you know, and so there's plenty of justifications as to why this needs to happen. But
(08:49):
it's all kind of
very flimsy, I would say. And
he sees the tricks they pull. 1 is, Valentine's letter, which they,
send to him after censoring all of his communication with his parents and his his family,
which they
kept him to get past like a mental block that he is happening.
And then also her appearance at the lake when he's moving on to this next step in his his career, if you wanna call it that. And,
(09:16):
once again, drive home the need, like, hey, you're doing this for for someone that you love, but they're pulling the strengths of it. They're they're they're very much tilting the balance,
and
how they force him to have, hurt others for his own safety.
And one spoiler avoided is, the aftermath of these aggressive self defense,
situations that he's put in. So there are gonna be some spoilers from here, though. The manipulation continues as does the degradation of end. He physically starts falling apart,
(09:45):
as he's getting into the later part of this book and the training is undergoing
even more intense things. You know, he's not getting enough sleep. He's being put in situations where he has to make very tough decisions to win these games. He's pushing his little sub commanders, which he has under him to extreme lengths and pressure.
Some of them start to crack,
(10:06):
and he has to make decisions to,
swap them out to do different things. And,
spiritually, I think he's also wavering where he's like, what is the point of all this? Like, these there's just so many constant battles. This training just will not end.
And that this is all just in preparation for for the actual battles that will come the real things.
(10:28):
After the final battle, he realizes he actually has been tricked once again and that this whole process he was going through,
after the battle school and when he gets into the command school was,
actual battles. He was sending real human fighters into real battles even though he thought it was still all training in a game.
He was taking it seriously,
(10:49):
yet he didn't know, like he made some a whole bunch of sacrifices. He
threw away fleets of ships. He made poor decisions, which got real humans killed. And in the end, he he realizes, like, oh, no.
To win this whole battle, I had to do something,
which is actually a rather heinous atrocity. He killed a whole planets full of of these aliens.
(11:12):
And he realizes,
like, shit, I've I've just become I've essentially just committed genocide.
And to boot after all of this, right at the end of the book, he gets no rewards as a hero.
Only ostracization
and
power games and being manipulated as a tool.
He doesn't get to go back to Earth after all of this. And the kicker, the absolute kicker is
(11:37):
eventually he learns that it was all for naught as humanity wasn't even in danger. So
this sacrifice that he was this, everything that he did,
he realizes it was like it was pointless. I've
done terrible things
to people,
to
aliens to,
(11:58):
to myself.
And there was no point in it at all at the end. And,
you know, the only the only one I guess who can really decide
on these questions of
sacrifice, was it right or wrong of what they did to him,
is probably end of himself.
He, you know, he's the one who went through all of this.
(12:20):
One of the colonels, colonel Graff, at the end, he gets exonerated by a committee because of what happened to,
you know, the crimes essentially that he had to commit to train ender
to to become this this hero.
And he gets exonerated by
a military or a civilian trial. I'm not sure which one.
(12:41):
And so in to some extent, it's, it's viewed
the conclusion is that everything that was done to ender was in fact, moral.
Yet, I think that really only rests with ender.
He bears the ultimate burden for everything that he's done. And he was there was personal responsibility thrown into this. He did agree to
(13:03):
to all of these things,
to protect the the person that he loves, but also, you know, to to sacrifice,
to save his own life by being away from his his crazy brother.
And if it wasn't for just this little plot device thrown right at the end, which allows this to continue into a series of books rather than just a one off,
(13:24):
I imagine he would have felt used. I imagine he would have just gone,
okay. I did all of these things. I
everything, not only just a u used but abused.
He he was
put into situations where
if if these if this happened in like real life and then just a family home
and the international fleet with all its commanders was actually just, you know, a mom and dad did go, okay, this this kid was certainly abused. Probably the the closest analogy would be
(13:54):
a a family forcing their kid to become, you know, a soccer superstar
and training him mercilessly
day and night
to get to these, you know, levels where he'll become the best in the world or something like that. So
who gets to decide? Well, putting aside consent issues of a 6 year old being able to agree to anything, no matter how genius he is.
(14:16):
He knows nothing of the world and,
and
how to make
logical informed decisions.
I personally think it's okay to renegotiate.
If you want to put this in a in a bad sense, it would be to backpedal or to break your word
once more information becomes available. And so at that any point
(14:39):
of this cycle of him going through this battle school and realizing like, oh, they're just manipulating and tricking me. Oh, they're doing this to me now. Oh, they've lied to me in this extent. Oh, is this actually the reality of what's happening? Or is this,
is this just another trick or another game? I think at any point in that cycle, if he wanted to say, you know, I agree I agree to all of this,
(15:01):
but when new information comes up,
you can actually take away that consent,
mid process. I probably would say you're not allowed to,
because this could happen in sexual situations, for example, where a guy and girl have sex.
And then after the fact one of them regrets it,
(15:23):
you know,
I don't think that's permissible to then say a crime was committed,
if if consent was given at the start.
But certainly going forward,
you then have the moral right to say like, no, I don't want to participate in any of this. So
it was an unfair
situation. He was put in
one where it was essentially
(15:44):
you give us everything and we take everything.
And
it's it's honestly kind of a brutal book in that respect. So
willing sacrifices.
Yes. He was a willing sacrifice, but geez, he, he got tricked a lot. And
Yeah. Is it Yeah. Can you consent to things that are unimaginable?
(16:05):
I'm not so sure. I I don't think
I think a tentative yes to that. Yeah. You can say, like, oh, I'll I'll agree to this right at the start, but if things change, you're you're certainly allowed to change your opinion.
Alright. Let's jump on to the author some extra details. Not too much to talk about. Awesome. Scott Card,
born in 1951. He's a university professor,
(16:27):
written some plays as well as books.
This this book in particular won the Hugo Award, Nebula Award. Never heard of them,
but,
was made into a movie as well. It's a very popular book, so it's it's not kind of unknown.
The only extra detail to add to this is that this is a rare book where I had actually seen the movie first.
(16:49):
I don't know how long ago. I'm going to say at least a decade. But,
the twist ending of this really stuck with me. And so even when I was reading the book, I knew I knew what was coming from the very get go. So,
you know, even though I gave away some spoilers here, it was also somewhat spoiled for me. So the tragedy of abuse of book review spoilers
(17:13):
is continuing along down through the generations now. So, well,
let's jump into the summary. Similar books recommendations.
On the surface, it's a rather fun book about sci fi kids aliens war. You'd maybe be think like, oh, okay. This is it's kinda interesting. Right? Child geniuses as well.
But once you dig into it, man, the whole thing is just morally reprehensible.
(17:37):
There is unjustified violence, emotional manipulation,
manslaughter,
political bullshit, constant lying, and to top it all off, a nice little genocide right at the end.
That being said, it's very compelling reading, and I did quite enjoy the story. I I found it,
very interesting.
Yeah. Worthwhile worthwhile going through and and reading. So overall, I'm gonna give Ender's Game by Austin Scott Card, probably a 7 out of 10.
(18:03):
I reckon I would have given this higher 7 and a half, maybe even an 8 if I didn't know what was coming. Because I do like those twist endings where a book can really make you feel something can go like, oh, shit. So I would have given it higher, I believe if I if I didn't already know what was coming. So there's a whole bunch of sequels to this, as this is the first in a series.
(18:24):
And as I mentioned, there's a there was a little plot twist or not a plot twist, a plot device right at the end, which then allows the continuation of Ender in his journey through space and his interaction with buggers and things like this.
I actually personally think it would have been an even more impactful book if they didn't have that. And it just ended off as like
(18:45):
a brutal
realization by end of that. He'd just been tricked and manipulated
and that essentially his his life was worthless.
I think that would have been
that would have really set this book apart, I I feel.
But, you know, it's a kid's book. You don't know. Kids probably don't really wanna
have that sort of brutality rider thrust upon them.
(19:07):
Don't expect me to cover the sequels in the future. One thing I've realized about myself is,
I'm not actually that really interested in in reading
series of books where they tie up with one another,
as
evidenced by my self reading Dune and then having no real desire to read the rest in the series.
The only series I've read I was more of a series person when I was a kid,
(19:30):
reading del Toro Quest
and the Alex Rider series, Artemis Fowl, things like that.
Nowadays,
yeah, just it's it's not so interesting to me to have a continuing character,
going on, which I think partly explains why I don't really read
fantasy
sci fi as much.
Or if I did read sci fi, I'd probably be more along the lines of Isaac Asimov because those are usually just one off little books that he has or bigger books
(20:00):
rather than,
an extended series of Game of Thrones, for example, or things like that. So,
yeah.
The only other thing I'd maybe recommend reading from this is there is a very short story called, The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas
by Ursula K Le Guin.
And it has a very similar
(20:22):
interesting aspect about sacrifice,
this time,
not willingly, but
then kind of touching upon the greater good and and
what Moore as an outside observer would do after looking at these things. So, you know, imagine this book, but told from the out, the person,
point of view of perhaps Graf
who willing participates
(20:44):
in this or perhaps even one of Enda's
fellow school children,
cadets, battle school commanders,
and them realizing what's been done to him. I yeah. That that would be
a interesting book to have on on that, regard as well.
Okay. We're getting towards the end here. And
let's jump into the value for value section.
(21:05):
I really would love if you share this podcast.
If you're with someone who has a fellow a fellow desire to read to
explore into these books.
I do all of this upfront and it's available anytime anywhere for free for you. All I ask is that you just return some of that value back. A share, a like, comment on the YouTube channel is great.
(21:27):
Word-of-mouth in real life. I love to get some book recommendations. And the final way is via,
sending some monetary support. We did see that last week with a PayPal coming in from our friend, Vratislav.
And we've also got a boostagram this week, which is where you can do it, directly within the podcasting app. And this was, by d's laughs. He sent 123
(21:48):
satoshis sent using fountain, the fountain app. And he just says keep up the great work. And then a pointing a pointing hand at me. Oh, thank you, man. Very much appreciated d's laughs. And I certainly will keep up the great work. Perhaps that was addressed to 1 though. So who knows? Both of us will have to keep up the the great work.
So very much appreciated. If you wanna know more about how to do that and get a shout out, new models podcast.com/support.
(22:11):
And we've got a section there on how to do that.
Cute. And speaking of keeping up the great work,
we are live here on 11 AM Australian Eastern Standard Time on a Wednesday.
And I will be live this very same time next week. And oh, actually, will I? Might be Christmas. I'll probably still be live. Yeah. I'll I'll do Christmas stuff in the afternoon. And,
(22:33):
what I wanted to talk about is what's coming up. What are the next books? So
finally, it's gonna happen. I am almost almost finished reading
this one here.
I'm gonna do it. I think I've only got like 20 pages left to read.
I will get through that this week. I promise you that. I have almost finished Devil Take the Highmost
(22:58):
by,
oh, I've forgotten his name. I'll
remember that shortly.
And a little surprise unexpected book coming up is an autobiography,
which I didn't really plan on reading, but is
come to me for for one reason or another. But I'm gonna keep that as a surprise for those,
coming into the new year will be when I do that one. So
(23:21):
lots of stuff coming up, exciting things. Juan's also still doing his book reviews as usual. So we're gonna leave it there for today. Thank you, everyone, for joining in. Hope you're having a fantastic day wherever you are in the world. Hope you have a fantastic
Christmas,
coming up and a fantastic New Year. We're We're gonna be keeping on doing these book reviews
for the foreseeable future. So very much appreciated. Ciao for now. Kyren out.
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