Is Gollum/Smeagol evil??

[Cheeseumpuffs]

So Lord of the Rings was on and my mother and I had a conversation that sparked a thought and I wondered what you all thought. According to my mother, Gollum is pure, irredeemable evil. I however, feel that he isn't evil and that it was the Ring working through him.

This conversation began when, during The Fellowship, Bilbo doesn't want to give up the Ring and she made some comment about how Bilbo was "evil" for this.

But yeah. What do you guys think?

 

[xbox]

The ring corrupted him, his only purpose was to do anything and everything to get the ring back. They showed a flashback where he was a normal friendly guy before.

 

[ProxyAmenRa]

He is just misunderstood.

 

[Hadoblado]

It's terrible what happened to him, but true evil (if it exists) would not argue with itself over whether what it was doing was right.

 

[EyeSeeCold]

Free DesertSmeagle

 

[Jesse]

During that flashback he also killed a guy. He was never a good person, as the books show and the ring just corrupted him more.

 

[Hadoblado]

The ring was what caused him to kill his friend. He made (presumably) his first kill within seconds of seeing the ring, I don't think this a coincidence.

 

[The Gopher]

Free DesertSmeagle

+1

 

[Cheeseumpuffs]

@Jesse, that was my mom's argument, too.

But yeah I agree with Hadoblado. He and his friend had no intention of killing each other until he found the ring. But as soon as he had it, they both tried to kill each other for it.

 

[nanook]

does this have to be a yes no question? could there be something different, some possibly unconscious reasoning, behind opinions that state the one or other option? could it be about perspectives? there are two ways of experiencing the life, that is named gollum. one from the inside, one from the outside. there is a third perspective, that of theoretical/analytical construct, which depends on so many factors, you could argue about. the inside experience of gollum is one of total innocence, because gollum can't control himself. he is nothing but a witness to his nature. this is how i experience him emphatically. he always seems to be surprised about his own sneakiness, and the unpredictability of when he is afraid and when he gets courageous. while he plays 'trustworthy' he experiences himself as 'trustworthy'. the outside experience of gollumn is, that there is no coherent someone in gollum, who can be trusted or predicted in any way. just corruption. this is the meaning he holds to the world. to the world he is evil. so we have two perspectives, which are arguably true, although opposed in content. and we have not even begun to discuss the theoretical third-person perspective, the conclusion of which will depend on our scientific interpretation of psychology, possibly neurology and ringology. the third perspective, no matter what it's conclusion will be, won't change or remove the first two perspectives. it may only distract from them, but it doesn't have to. so they are all true.

 

[Hadoblado]

I suddenly fell out INTPed...

 

[Jesse]

It all comes down to whether Smeagle had a choice in his actions and I would argue he did, no matter how powerful the ring is supposed to be there is an element of user action otherwise Frodo's whole arc is useless.

 

[Hadoblado]

Does weak willpower equate to evil? Frodo may not have been turned into a murderer, but he still wanted to keep the ring for himself despite all the evil that would be ended with it's destruction.

 

[Cheeseumpuffs]

does this have to be a yes no question? could there be something different, some possibly unconscious reasoning, behind opinions that state the one or other option? could it be about perspectives? there are two ways of experiencing the life, that is named gollum. one from the inside, one from the outside. there is a third perspective, that of theoretical/analytical construct, which depends on so many factors, you could argue about. the inside experience of gollum is one of total innocence, because gollum can't control himself. he is nothing but a witness to his nature. this is how i experience him emphatically. he always seems to be surprised about his own sneakiness, and the unpredictability of when he is afraid and when he gets courageous. while he plays 'trustworthy' he experiences himself as 'trustworthy'. the outside experience of gollumn is, that there is no coherent someone in gollum, who can be trusted or predicted in any way. just corruption. this is the meaning he holds to the world. to the world he is evil. so we have two perspectives, which are arguably true, although opposed in content. and we have not even begun to discuss the theoretical third-person perspective, the conclusion of which will depend on our scientific interpretation of psychology, possibly neurology and ringology. the third perspective, no matter what it's conclusion will be, won't change or remove the first two perspectives. it may only distract from them, but it doesn't have to. so they are all true.

Haha yeah, I considered putting more points of view on the poll but the original conversation was kept in a evil/good conversation and left little room for ambiguity so I decided to leave it. I personally agree with what you said, or something along those lines.

 

[Jennywocky]

I don't know if I could exonerate Gollum from his own choices.

Bilbo, for example, was faced with similar choices and yet chose to let the Ring go... although he needed help from Gandalf. But ultimately he decided to relinquish his ownership. He also did not take the Ring via an evil deed (despite lying about it when he found it), whereas Gollum murdered his best friend in order to get it even before he truly had the Ring in his possession.

IRL, we might not be faced with magic rings, but we are daily faced with potent temptations that we must either deny or succumb to. Some of these choices are even addictive in nature, where there's a level of compulsion from the item we desire that we can't well resist, yet there is some component of choice where we at least choose to distance ourselves and/or ask for help to resist.

Bilbo made choices to let the Ring go, Gollum made choices to take the ring for himself and even try to reacquire it when it would have been easier logistically to let it go. If there is any culpability at all in the world, Bilbo would be seen as less selfish and Gollum as moreso.

(Interestingly, in the book, Frodo did an amazing job at resisting the lure of the Ring, but when the Ring was close to its end, at the forge where it was created, in the heart of Mordor, not even Frodo could resist that temptation to claim it.)

 

[dark]

Gollum is Lawful Good.

 

[scorpiomover]

The Ring corrupts everyone it comes into contact with. Even Gandalf and Galadriel become extreme tyrants, and start saying the most tyrannical things, when Frodo offers them the chance to have the ring. About the only people who don't seem to be affected, are Tom Bombadil in the books, and Samwise Gamgee, also in the books. In the films, everyone is affected.

Gollum is just a normal person, who gets corrupted by the ring, just like most people do.

Of course, that brings up the question of if good people can be corrupted easily. Abraham Lincoln said that if you want to see someone's character, give them a little power. We also know that "absolute power, corrupts absolutely", because when you give people a LOT of power, nearly all become corrupt. This shows that, although most people are good, it's usually when they are powerless to do otherwise, and that when they have a LOT of power, that goes out the window.

Of course, a lot of people don't like that idea, because that means that they cannot live wearing rose-tinted glasses, and because it also means they might be prone to corruption. No-one likes to think of themselves as evil, even if they are.