[Anime-only] Naruto Shippuden Episode Discussion

[JustRob]

I'm not gonna do this quote war thing, you make a few good points. You can choose to believe Danzo was simply power hungry and selfish, I choose to believe he actually did want to make the world a better place. He just went about it the wrong way, and in doing so lead people to distrust him.

[Hunter]

A discussion about the definition of evil is by nature arguable but the fact that Danzo was a traitor is not.

He attempted to forge a secret alliance with Hanzo in order to overthrow Sarutobi which ended up with the creation of Pain and ultimately the destruction of Konoha. He kidnapped and murdered Konoha orphans to create his own personal secret police which among others thing created Kabuto. He gave up the secret identities of Konoha Anbu to his former accomplice Orochimaru in order to get Sai close to Sasuke against Tsunade order. He murdered the messenger from mount Myoboku to keep Naruto out of Konoha so that Tsunade would be killed while he and his troops stayed hidden because the slaughter of the population didn't matter as long as enough remained to fell under his rule. He attempted to take control of the other villages and immediately got caught which could have had dramatic ending for a weakened Konoha had he not been killed.
The Uchiha situation that you give him credit for was a debacle of such epic proportion that evil isn't enough to qualify it, the sheer incompetence it required is mind-blowing to say the least.
The coup is a perfect example of self-fulfilling prophecy, it only happened because Danzo and the Elders overruled Sarutobi in the first place when they ordered the segregation of the Uchiha at the outskirt of the village. It caused the destruction of one of Konoha's strongest clan and eventually led to the whole Sasuke issue which Naruto will have to resolve.

Everything Danzo did was for his own self-interest and then rationalized into claiming being in charge would help Konoha whereas in truth litterally every single action Danzo took have harmed the village deeply.
That's the interesting thing about this character, he saw himself as an utilitarianist who didn't care about the means as long as they reached favorable outcomes but the consequences of his actions were always terrible for the village and forced others to clean up his mess.
From his own perspective Danzo should have murdered himself for the sake of Konoha. If he hadn't been so blinded by his own deluded sense of importance that is.

[james0246]

^Isn't that kind of the point of Danzou though? He is the ultimate indictment of a system that works entirely on the basis of self-interest. All of Danzou's mistakes may have come back to bite him, but the very foundation of his attempts were based around the ideology of purposeful self-interest and extreme xenophobia and paranoia that is rooted in all the villages. All the Kages have pulled off similarly stupid incidents that really did nothing to help their own villages beyond seeking grounds for mutual self-destruction. Ei attempted to kidnap a clan heir for baffling reasons plus he sought to ever increase his armies for no specific reason; Oonoki taught his subordinates to always seek to betray the other villages and he used a terrorist organization to do something (I forget why he used Akatsuki); Sarutobi is/any Hokage are apparently (a) horrendous leader(s) in nearly every respect (too passive?); Gaara's dad sought war with Konoha for inherently flawed reasons; and while Mei hasn't really done anything one way or another, the past Mizukages have all been shown to have similar aforementioned tendencies. The fact that the world has survived as long as it has is almost baffling considering how often the leaders sought to kill themselves and everyone else for the stupidest reasons.

Danzou is simply Kishimoto's ultimate example of the failures of all the leaders under the current village system. He is blatant and obvious, but his design, especially his failures, is purposeful within the overall context of Kishimoto's story (and honestly, it is a fairly decent satirical understanding of the modern world).

[monir]

Originally Posted by JustRob

I've thought about it often, but it's difficult to truly pinpoint what would be evil. But if it were me, I guess I'd say that a person who does atrocious things, or inflicts pain upon others purely out of sheer enjoyment would be evil. I also kind of want to say that someone who moves only out of personal gain, and will commit the most horrible acts to achieve it, is evil.

And then most people say, "So you believe that not every murderer is evil?". No, I don't. People who murder because they like to see other people bleed are in my opinion, evil. But someone who murders another out of sheer desperation, revenge, or delicate reasons, I can't say that's evil. It's a crime, and it's wrong and it should be punished. But that's not what I believe evil means.

Thanks for your candid response!

I guess it's pretty easy to forget how messed up the Naruto universe is. The definition of evil is also highly subjective. Me, I consider taking another human life for whatever reason as evil. So for me, if the act is evil, the person who is knowingly partaking in the act is also evil (more or less). Some of the most heinous crimes in human history has been committed for the sake of "greater good." Religion anyone????

I find Itachi just as evil as Danzou, subjectively speaking. Danzou thought up the whole plan and Itachi was one of his tools to carry it out. Regardless how grand his loyalty was toward Konoha, he still killed a lot of people to show his patriotism. I'm sure those people didn't volunteer to die for the village.

[Hunter]

Originally Posted by james0246

^Isn't that kind of the point of Danzou though?

Yes?
I wasn't complaining, I liked Danzo as a character, if anything I think he was underused.

Originally Posted by monir

I find Itachi just as evil as Danzou, subjectively speaking. Danzou thought up the whole plan and Itachi was one of his tools to carry it out. Regardless how grand his loyalty was toward Konoha, he still killed a lot of people to show his patriotism. I'm sure those people didn't volunteer to die for the village.

Well yes but Itachi has a ponytail so he's fabulous and rules do not apply.

[monir]

Originally Posted by Hunter

Well yes but Itachi has a ponytail so he's fabulous and rules do not apply.

Oh my gosh, dat' ponytail. While Itachi is awesome, I also question is patriotism toward his village by not taking care of Sasuke-kun after taking care of the rest of Uchiha.

[Ero-Senn1n]

Originally Posted by JustRob

I'm not gonna do this quote war thing, you make a few good points. You can choose to believe Danzo was simply power hungry and selfish, I choose to believe he actually did want to make the world a better place. He just went about it the wrong way, and in doing so lead people to distrust him.

The reason i put Danzo to the 1st position as most evil is because i think that one who uses good people, entire organizations, corrupts the minds of good people, is more evil than a terrorist. This is of course matter of opinion. To give some examples:
- people who corrupted the original message of christianity (or any other religion) and did for example the spanish inquisition
- people who used the ideals/dreams of the socialist/communist states and then made of themselves absolute leaders and used terror on people every day (like Stalin, Mao, ....)
or small scale examples:
- a priest who raises your children, but in reality he is a pedophile
- a politician who serves democracy, but in reality he serves large corporations
- a policeman who defends citizens, but in reality he serves the criminals
- etc..
These people are an inner disease of a good system not just attacking it from the outside as an some criminal does, that's why i rate their crime to be more severe. They attack the very people who entrusted them to defend and help everyone.

You may be able to defend many deeds of Danzou, but you can't defend in any way Danzo's decision of letting Tsunade and other jounins like Kakashi die while hiding inside some bunker.

Kishimoto didn't invent this character from nowhere, these exist in the real world, the big difference is that in the real world their actions often succeed. Of course in the narutoverse evil fails sooner or later, so that's how all of Danzo's evil actions fail or later cause big problems. Same for the hokages when they do bad things. Unfortunately in the real world - at least in the short term - their evil shit often succeeds.

[itachi-san314]

all this danzo talk has me again wishing kishi took the story in a different direction than this current 'war'. if nagato lived and naruto let him escape, and if danzo didn't totally bungle the kage summit and lived longer, the story would have fallen into some seriously dark times and actually been quite awesome

[JustRob]

Originally Posted by Ero-Senn1n

The reason i put Danzo to the 1st position as most evil is because i think that one who uses good people, entire organizations, corrupts the minds of good people, is more evil than a terrorist. This is of course matter of opinion. To give some examples:
- people who corrupted the original message of christianity (or any other religion) and did for example the spanish inquisition
- people who used the ideals/dreams of the socialist/communist states and then made of themselves absolute leaders and used terror on people every day (like Stalin, Mao, ....)
or small scale examples:
- a priest who raises your children, but in reality he is a pedophile
- a politician who serves democracy, but in reality he serves large corporations
- a policeman who defends citizens, but in reality he serves the criminals
- etc..
These people are an inner disease of a good system not just attacking it from the outside as an some criminal does, that's why i rate their crime to be more severe. They attack the very people who entrusted them to defend and help everyone.

You may be able to defend many deeds of Danzou, but you can't defend in any way Danzo's decision of letting Tsunade and other jounins like Kakashi die while hiding inside some bunker.

Kishimoto didn't invent this character from nowhere, these exist in the real world, the big difference is that in the real world their actions often succeed. Of course in the narutoverse evil fails sooner or later, so that's how all of Danzo's evil actions fail or later cause big problems. Same for the hokages when they do bad things. Unfortunately in the real world - at least in the short term - their evil shit often succeeds.

And it's perfectly fine that you think that way, because you're right, their deeds are horrible and definitely criminal. The thing is, I look at the long term goal, not the means. And the long term goal for Danzo was peace, primarily for Konoha, but also for the rest of the world. Like he said himself, the world must become one. Taking the time to do it morally won't change anything, and eventually Akatsuki will destroy the world.

Or at least, that's what would helpen in reality, but in a fairytale manga like Naruto ofcourse it will be a happy ending, making Danzo's motives pretty void.

And people keep bringing up the Pain invasion, so let me ask you. What would it have accomplished if Danzo had sent his men out? Absolutely nothing. They would have been killed off, like everyone else. But you should realize too, not helping out a comrade is not betrayal. Betrayal is when you actively move against the comrade and attack them. Danzo didn't do any of that.

Yeah, he killed a frog to prevent Naruto from returning early. Why? Because Danzo knew as well as everyone else that Naruto had a dangerous power inside him, and the Akatsuki couldn't get their hands on it, no matter what. To be quite honest, the failure of the other villages to protect their Jinchuuriki is what led the Akatsuki to be so dangerous now. Hell, the Hidden Rock had two Jinchuuriki, and they managed to let both be taken.

[Ero-Senn1n]

Originally Posted by JustRob

The thing is, I look at the long term goal, not the means. And the long term goal for Danzo was peace,

This is the basis of our disagreement on Danzo, everything else is the consequence of this. His long term goal was to become hokage and then leader of the whole world, for that he used ideals like "world peace" and such. There's nothing wrong with ambition, all of the heroes have it too: to become hokage. But Danzo became obsessed with this ambition and this corrupted him, there was no "will of fire" in him any more.

In fact Kishimoto had made of Danzo a sort of "satan", so much that in fact i think he even exaggerated a bit on that theme by making him the main evil even in Kabuto's story, not only in case of Nagato and Itachi. It's very much like how Hitler is made some kind of supreme evil who stands out in the 20th century, but the reality is that many others were just as evil as him. I guess in a simple shonen manga like Naruto it's ok if evil within the system is simplified down to Danzo's character.

Defending Danzo by saying that he did evil "for the greater good" doesn't work, most of the evil guys say this. One of my points in the earlier post was that doing evil in the name of ideals/beliefs is the worst thing becuase it's destroying the very dream for which you do it. You can build peace by either killing your enemies or enslaving them (as Obito wants with I.T.) but that is not true peace, it's fake.

[JustRob]

Danzo doesn't back away from what needs to be done, even if it is ugly. To reference the Uchiha event one more time, he gave the Third some time to negotiate with the Uchiha, but it led nowhere as Danzo had predicted. Everyone knew there was only one way to save Konoha, even Itachi's parents finally resigned to their fate.

I still don't consider him similar to Hitler. Where Hitler moved purely out of petty revenge or ridiculous beliefs, Danzo moved for a noble goal. He was never bent on conquest like Hitler was. Yeah, he wanted to become Hokage. But not to lead Konoha in taking over the world, but so he could do more and have more influence in how the world was shaped.

[Hunter]

Originally Posted by JustRob

[...] But you should realize too, not helping out a comrade is not betrayal. Betrayal is when you actively move against the comrade and attack them. Danzo didn't do any of that.

I've already said enough on the subject and if you don't realize, among other things, that conspiring with a foreign force against your leader is treason then nothing will; but even so to say that Danzo never moved against a comrade just after the episode where we saw him betraying both Kabuto and his adopted mother when he decided they had outlived their usefulness is a little... Let's say perplexing.

[Ero-Senn1n]

Originally Posted by JustRob

To reference the Uchiha event one more time, he gave the Third some time to negotiate with the Uchiha,

You got that backwards, it's the hokage who can give time to his subordnates, it's not a subordinate who gives time to the hokage.

Originally Posted by JustRob

but it led nowhere as Danzo had predicted.

Of course you can predict something when you are one of the major causes for that to happen
We talk about a guy who cut out the eye of one of the most loyal ninja of Konoha, that is Shisui. And we see he gave that eye to himself, what a lucky guy to win the legendary eye with which he can manipulate his own comrades

Originally Posted by JustRob

Everyone knew there was only one way to save Konoha,

Every one of those 4 elders that knew what was the situation.
The same way Tobi/Madara is right, this world cannot be repaired, they need infinite tsukiyomi, really... there's only one way to save the world... that's I.T.

[JustRob]

Originally Posted by Hunter

I've already said enough on the subject and if you don't realize, among other things, that conspiring with a foreign force against your leader is treason then nothing will; but even so to say that Danzo never moved against a comrade just after the episode where we saw him betraying both Kabuto and his adopted mother when he decided they had outlived their usefulness is a little... Let's say perplexing.

I'm still not convinced he conspired with Hanzo against Konoha. The only one who ever told us that story was Nagato, and it's flakey at best, especially considering Danzo got bad blood with Hanzo later on.

And I'm sorry to say, but betraying Kabuto & Nonou is not the same thing as betraying the village. He didn't put the village in jeopardy by attempting to have them killed. They were simply becoming too dangerous and Danzo went with a pre-emptive strike. It's low, it's disgusting, and it's betrayal, but it's not betrayal of the village as a whole.

Originally Posted by Ero-Senn1n

You got that backwards, it's the hokage who can give time to his subordnates, it's not a subordinate who gives time to the hokage.


Of course you can predict something when you are one of the major causes for that to happen
We talk about a guy who cut out the eye of one of the most loyal ninja of Konoha, that is Shisui. And we see he gave that eye to himself, what a lucky guy to win the legendary eye with which he can manipulate his own comrades


Every one of those 4 elders that knew what was the situation.
The same way Tobi/Madara is right, this world cannot be repaired, they need infinite tsukiyomi, really... there's only one way to save the world... that's I.T.

And you are apparently under the impression that the Hokage is a dictator who makes every decision alone. If the Third makes a decision, Danzo doesn't have to agree with it, and can actively combat it, especially if the two other elders are also on his side.

Yeah, he took clever advantage of the massacre of the Uchiha. If the clan had to be wiped out anyways, might as well take their strongest weapons.

You keep saying this, but why don't you come up with a compromise? What would you have done in that situation? The discussion wasn't going anywhere, and the Uchiha were about ready to declare all open war on Konoha. So what do you do? Spare them because "it's such a horrible thing to do and morals restrict us"? Or decide that not every decision in life is easy, and that you can't always do things the moral way?

[itachi-san314]

Originally Posted by JustRob

I'm still not convinced he conspired with Hanzo against Konoha. The only one who ever told us that story was Nagato, and it's flakey at best, especially considering Danzo got bad blood with Hanzo later on.

And I'm sorry to say, but betraying Kabuto & Nonou is not the same thing as betraying the village. He didn't put the village in jeopardy by attempting to have them killed. They were simply becoming too dangerous and Danzo went with a pre-emptive strike. It's low, it's disgusting, and it's betrayal, but it's not betrayal of the village as a whole.

are you also not convinced that he gave top secret intel on all the anbu members loyal to tsunade over to orochimaru and kabuto? that's treason bro

[JustRob]

Originally Posted by itachi-san314

are you also not convinced that he gave top secret intel on all the anbu members loyal to tsunade over to orochimaru and kabuto? that's treason bro

A meager price to pay to sneak in a spy in order to assasinate Sasuke, and deprive Orochimaru of one of his greatest weapons. All that happened was the information was compiled into a Bingo Book. It's not like Orochimaru having that information posed immediate danger.

[itachi-san314]

Originally Posted by JustRob

A meager price to pay to sneak in a spy in order to assasinate Sasuke, and deprive Orochimaru of one of his greatest weapons. All that happened was the information was compiled into a Bingo Book. It's not like Orochimaru having that information posed immediate danger.

i'm not going to play the troll game with you also i totally disagree about the price to pay (as if there'd be no other chance to kill sasuke) but that's beside the troll point

[JustRob]

It's not actually a troll, I believe Danzo took the best course of action there.

What other chance to kill Sasuke would there possibly be? The original plan was that Orochimaru would take Sasuke's body after three or so years, not long after Sai infiltrated there. Orochimaru wanted the Sharingan for many reasons, one of them being so he could crush Konoha. Deprive him of the host he has been honing for the past three years, and you remove the threat.

A missing-nin that deserts the village, is hunted down and exterminated. This is how it always has been, and how it should be. Tsunade walked away from her responsibility here because Sasuke happened to be Naruto's buddy, and we all know Naruto is the Messiah. So, when it seemed like the opportunity was there to get close to Orochimaru, Danzo decided to sneak one of his own agents in. And it would have worked, if he hadn't picked a crappy agent that also wanted to follow Messiah Naruto after spending a few days with him.

[itachi-san314]

Originally Posted by JustRob

It's low, it's disgusting, and it's betrayal, but it's not betrayal of the village as a whole.

Originally Posted by itachi-san314

are you also not convinced that he gave top secret intel on all the anbu members loyal to tsunade over to orochimaru and kabuto? that's treason bro

Originally Posted by JustRob

A meager price to pay to sneak in a spy in order to assasinate Sasuke, and deprive Orochimaru of one of his greatest weapons.

Originally Posted by JustRob

It's not actually a troll, I believe Danzo took the best course of action there.

it is a troll. you are presented with evidence contrary to your point yet you stick to your guns for no reason other that to troll.

2+2=5. I don't care what evidence you supply to the contrary.

What other chance to kill Sasuke would there possibly be?

danzo was obviously aware that the heaven and earth bridge spy would be kabuto and would lead to orochimaru and that would lead to sasuke. so why not send more of his root anbu to track kabuto, find sasuke and give sai a better chance of beating sasuke. sai wasn't close to sasuke's power, but 3+ root anbu should have done the trick. there was no need to divulge info on tsunade's anbu agents. danzo purposely wanted to undermine her position and take her down. same thing with the nagato incident. his interest was not with the village, it was with taking tsunade down and becoming hokage himself. purely selfish and treasonous

[Hunter]

Originally Posted by JustRob

I'm still not convinced he conspired with Hanzo against Konoha. The only one who ever told us that story was Nagato, and it's flakey at best, especially considering Danzo got bad blood with Hanzo later on.

And I'm sorry to say, but betraying Kabuto & Nonou is not the same thing as betraying the village. He didn't put the village in jeopardy by attempting to have them killed. They were simply becoming too dangerous and Danzo went with a pre-emptive strike. It's low, it's disgusting, and it's betrayal, but it's not betrayal of the village as a whole.

Ha yes, the fact that Danzo tried to forge a secret alliance with Hanzo is now propaganda and lies and when you're given a direct example of Danzo betraying his men you move the goalpost and change it to betray the village.
Of course as I have previously listed there are also many examples of Danzo betraying the village but then you can simply redefine what the village means just as you have narrowly redefined evil to label no one but the criminally insane and traitor to mean, well nothing anymore really.
So what does the village mean? Not the legitimate leadership obviously. Danzo ignored their direct orders, schemed in their backs and planed for their death. Not the population that he abandoned to be slaughtered when it was convenient for the current Kage to be killed so he could take her place. Not the new generation, the children of his fallen comrades whom he abducted and coerced into murdering each others in order to create brainwashed drones under his absolute command.
No, the definition of treason, evil and village is apparently solely what Danzo says it is.

And this isn't trolling itachi-san314, merely dogmatism which if anything is rather fitting considering the subject of the conversation. This is exactly how you can convince people to perform monstrous acts and claim them righteous or look at a long list of dreadful schemes that ended in failures with terrible consequences and claim those were the best course of action regardless.