"Good guys" committing perfidy (fake surrender) and it's treated as a clever heroic ploy instead of a war crime or something morally dubious

[u/AporiaParadox]

1. Star Wars: The Clone Wars. Anakin pretends to surrender to the enemy multiple times during the Clone Wars. And no, it's not used to indicate that Anakin is falling to the Dark Side, other characters like Obi-Wan do it too.
2. The Iliad. The Trojan Horse was a real dick move, a fake surrender compounded by a fake peace offering, followed by a massacre. I get that it was a different time, but still, most modern adaptations just treat it as a cool thing. One thing I'll give Nolan's The Odyssey credit for is that Odysseus recognizes that what his "clever plot" was wrong.

Perfidy is a serious war crime, because morality aside, in exchange for one victory, you're dooming all of your allies who might want to legitimately surrender in the future because now the enemy is just going to execute them, not to mention that now the enemy won't surrender to you and will just fight harder.

[u/Basic_Dingo6487]

I dont think Greeks or Troyans are good guys in the Iliad.

[u/Arctic_The_Hunter → u/Basic_Dingo6487]

And even if they were, Odysseus is very much meant to be morally ambiguous, to the point that the Odyssey ends with Athena (goddess of everything he’s good at basically) having to show up in-person to tell everybody he’s chill.

The Greek concept of a hero was basically just someone who did incredibly impressive deeds, usually with the Gods’ favor, not someone who was actually heroic by today’s standards.

[u/ember13140 → u/[deleted]]

Or his wife and kids

[u/AzzyDreemur3 → u/ember13140]

That one wasn't his fault

[u/Hungry-Detail9945 → u/AzzyDreemur3]

The music teacher?

[u/AzzyDreemur3 → u/Hungry-Detail9945]

The wife and kids, if I remember correctly Hera made him do that

And the second wife put a coat made of acid on him

[u/TheDikaste → u/AzzyDreemur3]

Yeah, Hera absolutely hated his guts and used her powers to make him go insane and murder his family with his bare hands.

[u/Hungry-Detail9945 → u/AzzyDreemur3]

Alright but why you say "that one" caused is implied that ot specify only one which the question above your comment while not including the other. (Sorry if this was'nt the definition cause english is not my first language)

[u/AzzyDreemur3 → u/Hungry-Detail9945]

I haven't heard about music teacher so can't say anything about that

[u/Zurulean → u/AzzyDreemur3]

Iirc, he constantly berates and hits his students for the slightest mistake. Herakles isn't that good at controlling his strength, so his lyre play is bad, so he is hit often. At some point he snaps and hits his teacher back, but because he is a frail old man and Herakles a Demigod, the teacher dies instantly.

[u/EscapedFromArea51 → u/Zurulean]

Maybe it's a didactic story on the consequences of corporal punishment.

[u/Freidhiem → u/EscapedFromArea51]

Yea, fuck that teacher

[u/klatnyelox → u/Hungry-Detail9945]

The phrase "that one" is referring to that one incident, not that one kill.

He killed his wife and kids as part of the same event, that whole event wasnt his fault.

[u/dinnerthief → u/Hungry-Detail9945]

That "one" can be rephrased in this case to "that particular incident". Doesnt necessarily mean a singular person

[u/Own_Trip_5986 → u/AzzyDreemur3]

Actually it was a coat with the blood of some centaur who wanted her for something idk

[u/InternalCapable5286 → u/Own_Trip_5986]

It was the blood of the Hydra he had killed iirc.

[u/Chaz-Natlo → u/InternalCapable5286]

A centaur tried to kidnap Herc's wife. Herc shot the Centaur with an arrow dipped in Hydra venom, poisoning the Centaur to death. The Centaur convinced the wife to make a coat from his now Hydra poisoned flesh, and to give the coat to Herc if she felt he was ever going to be unfaithful. She did and the poison on the coat was so intense it would have killed a normal man, but since Herc was a Demigod, it just made him suffer unceasingly.

[u/Own_Trip_5986 → u/InternalCapable5286]

Oh yes, that was it, haven’t thought about that myth in an age, I just remembered it was blood and a centaur who convinced her