r/AvatarMemes • u/Western_Echo2522 • May 22 '25

When Aang Kills

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Not saying I don’t love Aang btw. I do, I’m just mentioning something I noticed on another rewatch. That Vulture-Wasp definitely fell in two different pieces. It kinda felt like Aang’s Mace Windu v. Jango Fett moment, and I think it makes him feel more human, because he was enraged for a justifiable reason, his oldest living friend having just been kidnapped and missing, and another friend was being taken too. It was the heat of the moment. I don’t think it takes away from his character at all, I actually think it adds to it a lot. I did, however, want to point it out, because I feel like it’s easy to miss

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1.4k

u/Gnos445 May 22 '25

He knocked dozens of men off a cliff with an avalanche back in season one.

70

u/mrdankhimself_ May 22 '25

Killing in battle is not the same as killing in the heat of passion.

106

u/Daxlm95 May 22 '25

"Why is it, that when a man's kills in war it's called heroic but when a man kills in the heat of passion its called murder?"

Sorry, your post made me think of that.

13

u/StrangeDise May 22 '25

What are you doing? Only Garth and I are allowed to talk to the camera.

17

u/mrdankhimself_ May 22 '25

Why do they come to me to die?

2

u/ValorousUnicorn May 23 '25

An asnine qoute, yet people think it invokes 'good morales'.

Murder is premeditated killing of another.

Manslaughter is the accidental OR non-planned killing of another "heat of passion" BS.

In actual war, killing isn't for fun and games, its to degrade your opposition's ability to fight back. Every naive person thinks that weapons/ammo against the law of war are 'most deadly', nope. Bullets that break up on impact with the human body, those made of plastic that cannot be detected via x-ray, and pretty much anything that would cause unnecessary suffering.

Soldiers don't shoot to wound, criminals enjoy hurting people, therein lies the difference.

23

u/danyboui May 22 '25

The air nomads would’ve seen no difference between the two acts as they are both kills.

36

u/catsanddiscgolf May 22 '25

Monk Gyatso casually peacefully convincing dozens of firebenders to give up their life force in their own volition

19

u/zbeezle May 22 '25

The first Kyoshi book has a character who used airbending to create a storm and sink a fleet of pirate ships, and was subsequently shunned by the rest of the nomads despite fighting pirates being a fairly moral act by most people's standards. They were pretty heavy on the "don't kill" thing.

7

u/danyboui May 22 '25

Thank you. People act like they couldn’t attack or kill but they could it would just be a “spiritual taint” that other Air Nomads wouldn’t accept unless it was from an Avatar and even then Yangchen still got banished when she endangered other nomads’ lives.

1

u/Beautiful-Ad3471 May 22 '25

Well, maybe that's why they all died.

8

u/zbeezle May 22 '25

To be fair, Gyatso was surrounded by fire nation corpses when aang found him, so maybe there was an exception for massive attacks on the temples.

4

u/Ok_Sink5046 May 23 '25

They are against killing on any grounds except their grounds. Cross that property sign and they'll cross you off the list.

2

u/Beautiful-Ad3471 May 22 '25

Oh, no, I was just joking

2

u/Artificial_Human_17 May 22 '25

Except that they clearly tried defending themselves and ended up killing a few Fire Nation soldiers

2

u/Beautiful-Ad3471 May 23 '25

It was a stupid joke reply.

5

u/HyenaFan May 22 '25

It is to Aang though, by his own admission.

12

u/TipResident4373 May 22 '25

It's possible Aang didn't learn that there are sometimes ethical nuances back when he was at the Air Temple. He had to learn that violence, even lethal violence, is sometimes necessary.

Remember those firebender skeletons at the Southern Air Temple? It's pretty clear Gyatso took more than a few of them down before they got him.

15

u/FindingOk7034 May 22 '25

FINALLY someone mentions that Aang DOESNT have the full scope and nuance of his culture. He’s 12!!! No matter what cultural background you come from, did you have the full scope and understanding of all the nuances of your culture? I highly doubt it.

Aang still had A LOT to learn from his teachers and the rest of his people, and he never will! More history to learn, more techniques, more cultural experiences, etc etc. That just ADDS to the tragedy of the Air Nomad genocide.

4

u/TipResident4373 May 23 '25

Apropos to this, in Legend of Korra, Zaheer does mention reading the work of an ancient Air Nomad poet, and I still can’t figure out how he was able to come across it?

6

u/FindingOk7034 May 23 '25

Yeah. Honestly, surprised the Air Acolytes were as established as they are. Basically everything started from a CHILD’S incomplete knowledge and perception of their culture.

3

u/Mazrodak May 23 '25

We know there are libraries in the Avatar world, so my guess would be that he found it there. IIRC Sokka knew what a library is before meeting Wan Shi Tong so that implies that there is more than one. Surely one of them has books on Air Nomads.

2

u/TipResident4373 May 24 '25

That makes sense.

3

u/DatBoi_BP May 23 '25

We all make mistakes in the heat of passion, Jimbo