Very much comparable because of the standard you set. I quote:

Both were OP users against non-OP users. And "disarmed" is meaningless when you can tie someone up with Air in a second, or build a wall of Air around you in a second that stops all weapons these men have.

And Rand wasn't physically close to the army, it was spread out all over, and he could tie them up from a far greater distance than they could attack him.

And very much in a position to make it impossible for them to kill his people. As you said, basic combat situations don't count with the OP.

Egwene was in a pitched battlefield! That the battlefield happened to be the corridors of a building doesn't change the rules of war. And no one, ever, would say that if you followed a disarming stroke with a killing stroke against an enemy combatant, you are violating the rules of war. In the midst of pitched battle, you are not required to pause between each shot to consider whether your enemies are armed and a current danger to you or temporarily rendered helpless. Especially when your enemies have attacked you on an enslavement raid with no provocation from you, their well being is not your responsibility.

You don't fling about generally destructive weaves in a closed corridor, especially when the person you're rescuing is right next to the person you're rescuing her from! Egwene used a precision strike because the situation called for it. The difference is not important to what we're discussing. Might as well discuss the color of Rand's and Egwene's clothes next. Those were different too!

To be potentially set free by another sul'dam so they can try capture another initiate of the Tower? Or complete with another damane and fling destruction about? Why the hell should Egwene allow that?

Dude... there were enemy channelers about who are perfectly capable of cutting bonds of Air!

So let me get this right... it is specifically death by burning and lightning you are objecting to? Are perfectly preserved Sul'dam bodies morally superior to burned up sul'dam bodies?



This is EXACTLY the point I'm making with Rand. He could have walled them off in Air. He could have made a trench with Earth. He could have raised a wall with Earth... all to keep the same Shaido he killed penned up and unable to threaten anyone.

Except she rightly sees damane as conscripts who had no choice. They had no agency, and therefore deserve greater consideration, insofar as it can be achieved without derailing the tactical goals of survival, and pushback of the Seanchan.

Yes.

Unless there's some special reasons weaves of Air work at a shorter distance than weaves of Fire...

And he had other options than just Air, and nor did he HAVE to be on that tower. He did later on ride around under strong guard. He could have done that earlier, and gone close enough in case there actually was some distance limitation to his weaves of Air.

Was he with the Seanchan in a battlefield, in that case? Also, what about Altara? There were several times Rand sent Asha'man inot battle where they were very close to the Seanchan they were killing. He could easily have asked them to tie up those men in Air, had them disarmed, and moved on. Insted, they caused explosions, including the kind the Asha'man do that just explodes single people entirely.

Similarly, there's an Illianer who shoots an arrow at Rand. Rand himself falls sick from channeling, but nothing in his PoV suggests that he wished his Asha'man had tied the man up in Air instead of throwing fireballs at him.

This WAS a pitched battlefield! Egwene didn't invite the sul'dam for tea and biscuits and decide to kill them.

Against the Seanchan, you mean? Because otherwise, she has shown heavy reluctance. When Rand asked her to use it against the Shaido, she was hesitant not eager.

I'm saying these are part of the exact same circumstance. Just because two of the people you killed happened to meet you in a corridor doesn't change the rules of war. I would question if the rest of the soldiers would have disengaged if Egwene had just tied up the sul'dam, for one thing. You can say the sul'dam were distinct from the rest of the soldiers all you want, but they were part of the unit.

You're saying it would be fine if Egwene threw a giant wall of fire at this group, and that she chose to kill the sul'dam is what makes her evil. I'm saying that makes no sense. She didn't choose to single out the sul'dam out of murderous intent. She couldn't fling generally destructive weaves inside a closed corridor. So she chose the targets who she could kill that would cause the quickest disengagement by the Seanchan, leaving her free to rescue Adelorna.

See... it is crap like this that frustrates. Elayne and Nynaeve joined in. Yes, Egwene started it, but they joined in right away, with no encouragement. It was a moment later, yet "only Egwene ever attacks the Children"?

To what? A perceived mega-weapon? That was "used" during an unprovoked attack by the Seanchan anyway. And I fail to see how the morality of this situation is altered one whit by whatever deranged fantasies the Seanchan had.

As for their misunderstanding being human nature... again, so? They're humans, and yes they make mistakes. Since when was that in any way germane to morality? All human behavior is human nature. If being "human nature" mitigated right or wrong, we would't be able to discuss morality at all. For instance, even if we accept Egwene murdered the sul'dam... THAT is human nature too.

Yet another straw man? You are on record that had this been a normal combat situation, you wouldn't have a problem. The only reason this counts is that Egwene can use the Power, and she is somehow uniquely burdened with new rules for this unlike other OP wielders we have seen.

Now... how does this translate to the sul'dam being "forever stripped of basic human decency? For one, Egwene didn't forever strip anyone of anything. Did she pass some order saying anyone who was part of the attack on the Tower should now be killed on sight? No.

And we have established this isn't "basic" human decency. This is a new standard you're asking for, selectively for this situation.

Except they are NOT a sham. The letter of the Oaths CANNOT be violated. We know from the Seanchan (both in the books and the Companion) have tried to use the Aes Sedai as they do Damane and they have failed. They just cannot, physically cannot, go on the offensive. Lay down your weapons, raise your hands, and tell and Aes Sedai you don't mean any harm and she cannot hurt you.

Namely? I don't see how tying them and leaving them is an option. They can be freed, then, and that is an unacceptable risk. You can say she can ask some Novices to take charge of them, but I don't see why she is obliged to waste precious resources on enemy combatants who haven't, and are extremely unlikely to, offer their surrender.

Then I'm going to have to ask for these comments.

Can I get some quotes? I did a search for "Oaths" in aCoS. Then, this was her position:

In tPoD, Elayne and Nynaeve don't once mention Oaths and Egwene. The only mention I can find is Elayne talking about taking oaths on the Lion Throne.

In WH, they have the conversation I quoted. And in the next chapter, Nynaeve thinks about how maybe Egwene was right about the advantages of the Oaths when she's faced by the Sea Folk. And Elayne later thinks “Egwene said they must try to live as if they had already sworn the Three Oaths, and here and now, Elayne felt the weight of it.” This was when she was meeting the Borderland rulers, and happens after their conversation in Tel'aran'rhiod, where Egwene explicitly says just that.

So no, before that conversation, Egwene made no such statement, and Elayne and Nynaeve mention no such thing. You imagined that, because you always imagine the worst of Egwene.

Nope. And they are asking her if the new info they gave her made an impact. There is no sense of continuing debate to it, and nothing from their thoughts, before and after, indicate otherwise. YOU imagined the rest.

And she WAS following them. Her killing sul'dam who were fighting against her does NOT violate the Oaths. Not just the letter, but the spirit. She was genuinely under attack, as was Adelorna, as were a bunch of Novices.

I don't find them contemptible, petty or dishonest. They reassure non-channelers of some very specific things, and those are beneficial to the Aes Sedai in that they can now be dealt with as a less threatening political entity. In the reality of the world the Aes Sedai inhabited post-Breaking, they made excellent sense. With the Seanchan invasion, I think they continue to make sense. They're not the ideal way for channelers to integrate into society, but they are definitely far from the worst.

To the contrary, she has stated an understanding that the First Oath doesn't enforce honesty. You can pin down an Aes Sedai and extract truth from them if you force them to make direct statements. There are situations where that is beneficial. But that doesn't make any Oath-sworn person honest. And never once has Egwene thought that someone Oath-sworn is more honest than someone who hasn't. In fact, the women she trusts the most: Siuan, Leane, Elayne, Nynaeve, Theodrin and Faolain are all uniquely the only women who are Aes Sedai and not bound by the First Oath for the majority of Egwene's time as Amyrlin.

I don't take this to mean she mistrusts all women who've taken the Oaths. Its just that she clearly doesn't equate honesty or trust with the First Oath.

There is no mutual exclusivity here. You can believe in the need to be honest and restrained in violence without being idiotic enough to think such behavior flows from enforced Oaths. And the Oaths are not a code of conduct so much as a voluntary set of strictures the Tower places on its members. There may be Aes Sedai who see them as some sort of moral code, but Egwene herself never does so. Her initial position is that they are anything but moral and need to be removed. She only changes her mind when their political benefits are shown to her, and after that, she only insists on them for those reasons. Never once does she equate swearing the Oaths to being a morally superior person. Even after her change of mind on the existence of the Oaths, she doesn't ever say women like the Wise Ones are morally compromised, or even try to get them to swear the Oaths. She was the first to notice that it is entirely possible to integrate channelers into society without Oaths. But the political realities of the Westlands don't allow it, at least not in the current climate, and she changes her tune on having Oaths for Aes Sedai. But she explicitly does not want it for all channelers, and accepts that she herself will lead half or more of her life unbound.

And what false reputation? Aes Sedai have no reputation for honesty. Their reputation is exactly what they deserve: only accept their direct statements as truth. Parse everything else they say more than you would for normal people. This is their universal reputation.

That's your view, and you have every right to it. I do see the Tower reformed by the end, and the changes she has wrought have set the stage for others to soon follow. The Tower won't be what it was, and that is just fine with me.

Sic their Warders to do what? Use the OP? No. The Warders can attack someone sure, but so far as I know no Aes Sedai has ever used that to kill someone outside of a battle situation, and even that happened at a time of incredible flux in Westlands society, when all sorts of customs and laws were being violated.

Heck, Artur Hawkwing led a 20 year siege against the Aes Sedai. He had more than half a brain, and didn't even trust Aes Sedai, yet even he knew they could besiege the city, starve it, and not have the Aes Sedai ride out and decimate his troops.

They do that, sure, but that is not all they do.

Yes, she defends their right to live that way. Does she ever preach it to anyone? Even Perrin comes to see the value in it, and sees it as something to be protected, while clearly knowing it isn't for him.

Helpless how? They were COMBATANTS! They did NOT lay down their arms, they were forcefully disarmed a moment before their death. You talk of them as if they are civilians who randomly wandered into a conflict. They were not that at all!

She explicitly says she does NOT!

This is just not true.

Which fight is this?

Such as?

It is perfectly workable. At least, RJ thought so in his notes, and several entries in the Companion take this to be a done deal, or near enough as makes no difference. If you think it is unworkable, explain why not, but it may also be worth noting that these objections work better against the author than the character. Neither Elayne nor Nynaeve think it is unworkable. Nynaeve's only objection is that Aes Sedai would be taking orders from women who couldn't be raised Accepted. Egwene has already shown her complete contempt for those OP strength standards, and she knows as well as anyone that not being strong enough to be raised Accepted doesn't make you any less competent a person. Nynaeve should know that too, after her extensive time around women like Alise, but she seems to have forgotten for that conversation.

They are not dishonest. The words of the Oaths are well known, as are their limitations. No Aes Sedai ever has said that her non-direct statements should be taken as truth, and I can't remember an instance where someone thought Aes Sedai were honest because of the Oaths, or fundamentally non-violent because of the Oaths.

I find it weird this was never raised up, too. But you will note that Egwene herself made the point that Siuan took advantage of the lack of Oaths to do something that she believes is right, even though it relies on a bald face lie. Egwene's position has NEVER been that the First Oath is an Oath to honesty. Pretty much every issue you have with the Oaths were raised by her in the series!

She sees the First Oath as a way to make sure Aes Sedai cannot directly lie. And she is well aware, as the quote I showed proves, that this actually makes most of their statements even more suspect. And she certainly never claimed taking the First Oath makes someone honest or trustworthy. What it does is allow Aes Sedai to make direct statements, and make sure everyone knows they're true. Ambiguity is removed in that case alone. Take Cadsuane's promises to Rand when he asked her to be his advisor. He can take those statements to be true, in a way he never could with someone who hadn't sworn the Oaths.

Your problem seems to stem from the belief that Aes Sedai are getting an unfair reputation for honesty. But they do not. They are not seen as honest by anyone. The only thing they get is that people trust their direct statements as not being lies. That is what they promise to do, and that is exactly what they are trusted for.

What impossible position?

She has never said taking the Oaths makes someone special or anything. She knows of and approves of other channeling societies integrating into their societies in other ways. She explicitly expects Aes Sedai to retire and do the same in the Westlands as well.

All her plan does is create a period where some channelers who so choose can take up a title and attendant restrictions that have both benefits and negatives.

I certainly don't think this is ideal, but what choice does she have? Announce to the world that Aes Sedai can now do all those things you're most afraid they will do? Won't that immediately have people questioning why this is so? Are people going to take this renunciation of the Oaths in the right spirit? Or use it as an excuse to run to the Seanchan and their truly despicable system?

What DO you think is the whole point of the Oaths? Because its pretty clear you think they're meant to be some holy moral code, whereas I see them as certain self-imposed checks the Tower instituted to deal with the mistrust of Aes Sedai that was the result of the Breaking. It was a political move to ensure Aes Sedai to function, not something that was meant to make Aes Sedai better than the normal populace.

Absolutely NO ONE is arguing this!

NO! She is not at all saying that the moral underpinnings of the situation would be changed by the Oaths! She just wants to be bound so the temptation to take the easier route of a direct lie is no longer present. Oaths or no Oaths, she wants to mislead Turese, and the presence or absence of the Oaths has nothing to do with he morality of Egwene's actions.

She very much wants the actual Oaths for convenience, here. She has to act like she has taken them, but without actually taking them, she CAN violate them. The distinction Egwene is making here isn't between dishonesty and honesty, it is between being unbound but behaving like you're bound, and being actually bound.

And no one, absolutely NO ONE, is arguing otherwise. This is yet another straw man you've created.

They do NOT change the moral axis. NO ONE says that Aes Sedai double speak is morally equivalent to honesty! Absolutely no one. Certainly, Egwene herself has said the OPPOSITE.

She did NOT! She says:

She is explicitly making an argument for convenience here, because having to act like you've taken the Oaths, without actually taking them, is hard. Elayne has made the same damned argument with different words. Nowhere does Egwene say that if she took the Oaths, everything she said would be honest! The very idea is laughable.

It has not! That is EXACTLY what she means in her statement to Theodrin and Faolain, and what she thinks of with Turese. Are you seriously saying that the quote I provided means that Egwene thinks that the very statements she made, all of which are explicitly deceitful and misleading, would somehow become truth if she had sworn the Oaths? Look at this quote from Towers of Midnight:

How does this comment even make sense if Egwene thinks there's some greater honesty to random statements made by women who have taken the Oath?

Change of tune now, eh? Well, I disagree. If the Oaths won't let you attack a temporarily disarmed combatant, they shouldn't let you place yourself in danger to be attacked. Nor should you be able to fling fire at the Aiel if you have them penned out with a wall of Air:

Only when Rand starts felling the Aes Sedai one by one do the Aiel actually breach to be among the Aes Sedai. Before that, they can't even shoot arrows at them, but it doesn't stop Erian, Katerine, Sarene, and a host of others from flinging fire and lightning at the Shaido.

The words of the Oaths only need the condition of personal danger to be met to allow you to respond with violence. They say nothing about using as little violence as possible to resolve the treat to your life, quite wisely since asking people defending their lives to pick the least destructive ways to survive is just going to get them all killed.

Stop trying to do this, Cannoli. There are two distinct issues at play here. 1) Was what Egwene did morally correct based on our understanding of the rules of war and how the OP might change them.
2) Was what she did a violation of the Oaths, which she wants to live by as if she has already taken them.

These are very different questions with no interplay, because the morality of the act has nothing to do with the Oaths, and the Oaths have got nothing to do with morality. Absolutely no one says acts permitted by the Oaths are morally correct!

AND NO ONE CLAIMED OTHERWISE! Can you show me one place where Egwene says the Oaths work this way? Where she says that an Oath Bound Sister must be implicitly trusted to be honest, and non-violent?

No, that is entirely your interpretation. She definitely aspires to honesty and non-abuse of the One Power, but this has absolutely nothing to do with the Oaths. Her views on this are never shown to change once she accepts she needs to let the Oaths remain.

I always read this as RJ showing how Egwene had transformed from an idealist to someone who understands reality. Abolishing the Oaths requires an ideal situation, something Egwene never got. And, apart from her genuine issues with the Oaths, she was also against them for fear of the Seanchan. Siuan's spiel was to remind Egwene that there are political benefits to the Oaths, and unspoken is that they give a sure lie to the Seanchan idiocy about channelers.

They do no such thing. Falme and the immediate aftermath is PTSD, not some underlying love for violence. By the time she's with the Aiel, a lot of that has cooled down, and we really don't see any of that behavior from her after that. Be it the Shaido or going against a potential female Forsaken who might be helping Rahvin, or facing a male Forsaken who might be helping Moghedien to escape, or attacking the Tower... Egwene is cautious and not at all eager for violence.

Sanderson changed that in aMoL, but I have no idea what that was about. It was initially presented as some kind of link to the earth thing, but that was incredibly inconsistent. I found the scene where she asks Bryne to change his battle plans to include Aes Sedai as active combatants, then smiles in satisfaction when she sees the revised plans to be entirely out of character, and promptly contradicted a few scenes later anyway.

Frankly, I think that should have been addressed better. But I also don't think this fits that. Frankly, I would have liked it better if Egwene had a genuine opportunity to attack the Seanchan and destroy them, but had to make the (correct) choice to spare them sine Tarmon Gaidon is not the time to settle those scores.

Never seen it used the way you did.