a moral vampire ed

8/7/2019 A Moral Vampire ed

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Aliaa Ismail

Professor Christopher Faulk

RHET 201

30 November 2010

A Moral Vampire? The Moral Messages Sent Through Vampire Dairies, Seen Through The

Actions Of The Salvatore Brothers.

Through all the myth and stories of the past vampires have been portrayed as evil

demons, just because of the vampire characteristic; sucking human blood but in the past 50 years

the world was adopting a foreign concept about vampires. People started looking more at the

vampires as characters with different personalities rather than analyzing them as heartless

creatures, classifying them into good and bad. The new television series, The Vampire dairies

which was released in 2010 portrays different mythical creatures like witches and werewolves

but focuses on Vampires; highlighting two Vampires in particular; the Salvatore brothers. One of

the brothers is an example of morality and the other is viewed by other characters in the show as

the total opposite. Through these two characters the show has discussed many moral issues; by

deliberately showing them as human characters with humane traits, whom one could meet

through their daily life course. By making the vampires actual characters it becomes a lot easier


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for the audience to associate and sympathize with them. The show presents some vampires as

moral creatures, making the audience accept them as part of the human society and adding new

meaning to morality.

In The Vampire Dairies the primary focus of morality is on diet of vampires. The

vampires who are associated with drinking human blood are considered immoral and the ones

who drink animal blood are the moral ones. The diet issue has been addressed through different

shows, like Buffy the Vampire Slayer series and The Twilight Saga. The show also indicates

that a good vampire must fight and kill the ones dangerous to humanity. The controversial issue

here is that to fight human blood sucking vampires the moral vampires has to be stronger. This is

problematic as for the moral vampires to be stronger they have to maintain a stable vampire diet

of human blood. The show starts off with an idea about morality of vampires and as the show

progresses this idea changes and what remains is that the means are insignificant so long as the

aim is to protect humanity. For example Stephen Salvatore has showed weakness to other

threatening vampires due to his diet, when his human girlfriend offered her own blood that was

found acceptable.

Throughout the different episodes vampires are classified into two categories, moral and

immoral. But is there really a moral Vampire; one with ethics and rules? And how do we

differentiate between a good and a bad vampire, or even judge the Salvatore brothers when it is

their nature to cause death and end human lives. Most of the time human behavior is justified if

history clears it, and a crime is never defined unless the whole scene is clear. Therefore while

judging the Salvatore brothers their historical background and how they were converted must be

assessed especially those of Damon Salvatore. Regardless to what he does, Damon Salvatore is

justified; firstly it is part of his vampire nature to cause death and in accordance to his past he has


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every motive to inflect pain on others. Also by tracking down Damons actions it is obvious that

they do not differ much from those of Stephens, except that Damon likes to hide his emotions

and pretend to be cold therefore if Damon and Stephan

are the same that makes both neutral as both have

done moral and immoral deeds. The morality

represented through the Salvatore brothers is driven

by love and regret.

Stephen Is Moral?

Although Stephan Salvatore does not drink human blood and tries his best to protect his

human friends from vampires his past was not very attractive. In the first episodes of the series

the audiences are introduced to Stefan Salvatore mentioning that his past is not something he is

proud of and then he moves to Mystic Falls where he was brought up in 1864. Stephen moves to

where his uncle Zach lives; he claims that he will not attack any humans and that his main aim

now is to live a peaceful life. Stephens main reason to move in is later discovered to be having

strong feelings for a human girl called Elena. At first one thinks that Stephens intentions are

noble but later realizes that Elena is a dead ringer for Katarina Petrova; ex-girlfriend to both

Salvatore brothers and the one who has changed them.

Through the course of his actions we know that Elenas appearance is what attracted him

then as he knew her and realized that she is nothing like Katarina he loved her more. Stephen

Salvatores acts are mostly moral as we see him protecting Elenas younger Brothers girlfriend

from a painful fate yet when she attacks his human girlfriend he kills her. Here we learn that he

has priorities and also killing some people maybe is a protection from what they could become.

Some people might judge Stephen harshly for killing that girl (Vikki) yet when looking closely

Ste hen


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she was a vampire changed by Damon and she has been having

problems adjusting since then. She was becoming a cruel character

herself and her cruelty was due to her lack of self control.

Therefore Stephens action was to protect her from the demon she

could become. Later in the series he protects Bonnie, Elenas

friend from his older brother Damon who was about to kill her. He

also protects Damon once from an attack even though he was risking his

own life while doing so. Throughout the series the audiences are invited to see the protective

character of Stephen Salvatore and his peacefulness.

Stephen Changes All That Was Good In Damon

While Stephen is being presented in a very decent manner his brother Damon is

introduced in the series as a very destructive character, allowing the

audience to see him as the "bad-boy vampire without the guilt" (Stasi

2009). It was him who caused the first death seen on the first Episode,

as he attacked two innocent people in their car just to satisfy his

appetite. Later in the same episode he is shown interfering with his

younger brothers life, reminding him the main reason of his existence was to

make his life as miserable as he could (Damon Salvatore Episode one; minute: 31) . At first

one would think that Damon Salvatore is a truly evil and immoral Character yet in the Season 1

Episode 20 the audiences find out that there is a strong reason behind Damons action. The truth

was that when Damon found out that he was a vampire he felt damned and he did not want to

make the choice that would make his transaction complete as found that choice totally immoral

and ruthless. In order for a vampire to complete transaction he must feed on human blood, but

Ste hen

Ste hen and Vikki


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Damon was not convinced of this miserable act so he tried to starve himself to death especially

when the reason why he would do this was not valid anymore. To be with Katarina Petrova for

an eternity was not an option as she has been killed in the church or at least he thought so. When

Stephen saw that he was the only one who has transferred he could not bear to be alone forever

or the only damned one so he kept trying to persuade his brother. Stephen went as far as bringing

Damon a girl to prey on. Being put in a situation as such Damon could not resist his own desire

for her blood. So he dramatically changed vowing to make his younger brothers life a misery

here after. Damon might not appeal much to other characters in the show or the audiences but if

the audiences have heart in themselves to forgive Stephen for all he has done to his older brother

then they should also accept Damons considered immoral behavior. Not forgetting a vampires

nature it would be hard to judge Damon, it is not like he is a serial killer; his actions imply basic

survival instincts.

Love And Trust Damon is a complex character who does not show his emotions to other people as he has

learned the hard way about trust. While Damon was still human his brother and he were in love

with Katarina Petrova; they were sharing her and she was all they cared about. At the same time

the town was creating a counsel to fight vampires, the founders counsel,

this counsels main duty was to locate vampires and hunt them down.

The Salvatore brothers father; Giuseppe Salvatore; was the founder

of this counsel and as a result of Damons love for Katarina Petrova

made Stephen vow not to mention anything to their father. Damon is

the older brother and probably wiser there for it would have been

more logical that Stephen listens to him. But Stephen thought he

The Salvatore Brothers


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could trust his father and he was wrong because as soon as his father found out that his sympathy

with vampires he guessed it was all about Katarina and therefore hunted her down. What

happened to Katarina devastated Damon from inside as he has had romantic love for her.

Romantic love is an emotion that requires a singular object that is, there can be only one at a

time (Milavec & Kaye, 168) which is the reason why he could not bear losing her. His brothers

involvement in such scene made him lose trust in the closest people to him; in this case it was

Stephen. The situation here is cruel on both brothers as they both loved Katarina, but with

Damon it was his brother breaking the promise that hurt him most. As Damon loved Stephen

more than anyone else the back stab was stronger and therefore would take much longer to heal

from. After all Stephen has done to Damon the characters of the show and audience are still

capable of forgiving him, but it was Damon who was hurt therefore he cannot be judged for

trying to make his brothers life an eternity of misery.

Love And Regret

Not only does Stephen engage in the full transaction of Damon and the hunting down of

their true love but later the audiences find out that he is also the one to kill his father. In order to

continue his transaction Stephen preys on his own father, he might have

regretted this later on but the fact that he actually did it shows absolute

ruthlessness. Now after all Stephen has done in the past he comes

back and he is a changed man, he does not suck human blood but

maintains a healthy diet of animal blood, he does not harm humans

but rather protect them he also cares enough about his older brother

Damon. Caring about Damon is how he should act but the fact that

Damon was absolutely indecent since he has come to Mystic Falls makes

Katarina Petrova


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Stephen a truly changed man. Regardless to Stephens past the bond between him and his brother

is very strong even though Damon hides how he feels; it is pretty clear that he cares about

Stephen. The relationship between the brothers is sensed in the scene where Stephen is sitting in

a bar drinking and Damon sneaks up on him and they keep pretending to be each other. This

scene might pass like a meaningless one but if the audiences look deeper at it they can see that it

reflects true brotherhood something they would be doing with their brothers and sisters, done out

of pure love.

Love plays a major role in the relationship between the brothers; it is the essence that

keeps changing the way they act love can function as a reason (Bransen 15). The strongest

love in the series the brotherhood love between the Salvatore brothers and the romantic love they

share for Katarina Petrova and later Elena Gilbert. For Stephens case it was the regret he had

after killing his father and persuading his brother to be become a vampire that stopped him from

preying on innocent human lives and resolving to animal blood for a substitute. Later it was his

great love for Elena that guided him to continue his moral pass, he did have some problems on

the way but Elenas faith in him helped him get back on the

track. On the other hand Damons love for Katarina is the

major reason for the birth of his cruelty. His love for

her was the climax emotion he experienced at a

certain period of his life and the fact that she

disappeared suddenly hurt him so much that it took

all his innocence away and left him bitter.

Consequently morality is driven by love, the ultimate

love. As a mode of caring love is not a primarily

Elena and the

Salvatore Brothers


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matter of feeling, nor of desiring, believing, or judging, but ofwilling (Bransen 9). Willing to

change for someone to satisfy them and make them proud when someone loves another so much

that he/she favors their partner's benefit more than their own.

Morality And Selflessness...

As witnessed through the episodes Stephen maintaining a decent behavior. Mostly this is

due to his love for Elena, because he has great love for her he wants her to have the best and

therefore does tremendous efforts to be the best. Calling a vampire moral can be bizarre but if

Stephen gets out of his own way, interests and happiness just to please Elena. And "The moral

point of view can be characterized in a number of ways, but on almost any account it involves

giving up the priority of self-interested considerations" (Bransen 4) which is exactly what

Stephen does. For example he chose not to suck human blood, when it would make him stronger

and more powerful just to protect and satisfy Elena.

"And it may be true that most people who are happy have projects or interests or

involvements that give their lives meaning" just like Stephen has Elena. (Wolf 303) But poor

Damon has no one to fight for him or love him. For Damon life is a misery; it is extremely

difficult for him to exist when he cannot find someone to love him for who he is. He is usually

trying to hurt others and inflect the pain that he feels on them as revenge on life. He lives every

day like the other until he goes to Mystic Falls and meets Elena his brother's girlfriend, who he

also falls in love with. At first he is competing with his brother but he realizes that Elena loves

his brother more. From Elena's behavior it is clear that she also loves Damon, but when Damon

digs in his heart and discovers that the only reason that he is back in Mystic Falls is that he truly

loves his younger brother and wishes happiness for him. His behavior changes and he becomes a

noble man. He starts to care for his brother and Elena protecting them from other evils and not


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harming them in any way. In the end of Episode 8 Season 2 "Rose" Damon goes to Elena's house

to return her necklace, "a necklace filled with vervain [given to her by Stephen] to keep Damon

out of her mind" (Lemmon) which she had lost while being kidnapped. Before handing over her

necklace Damon decides to let Elena know how he feels about her, so he confesses his love to

her, telling her that he loves Stephen too and that Stephen is a good guy that's why he will stop

chasing her. Damon confesses his feelings without giving Elena the necklace because he knows

that his actions will cause so much unwanted drama and therefore he compels her to forget

directly afterwards. Here Damon gets over his selfishness and does the thing that will satisfy the

people he love rather than satisfying his own self. The positive change in Damon's behavior is

very clear and shows what love can do to a hurt, sad regretful person like Damon.

Good Vs Evil

Furthermore Damon is shown trying to save others in many scenes, but while Stephen

and Damon are being shown good, are all vampires good? Certainly if all vampires are good then

all the issue of morality will not exist. For the good to exit the bad must. The strong example of

evil in the show was portrayed by Katarina Petrova the first love of the Salvatore brothers. She is

cruel and has totally shut out all her senses for her blood lust. Katarina Petrova might have had a

rough past but she unlike Damon shows no regret for her actions. She just feels satisfaction while

harming others and toying with them just like she previously toyed with the Salvatore brothers in

1864 before they turned. Making them both love her and playing with their emotions when she

loved neither but herself.

Katarina Petrova was selfish and self-centered; she could not sacrifice her happiness for

anything. It is something that she had since she was human and was carried on with her as a

vampire. As she was wanted by one of the original vampires when she was young and she used a


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young vampire to save her own life because he loved her; soon as she was able to help herself

she abandoned him to suffer the punishment for helping her. Her act was cruel and she changed

herself to a vampire on her own out of her choice, this is a curse that she wanted. Her cruelness

increased much more as she changes to a vampire. She is a major reason why the Salvatore

brothers appear very decent.

Conclusion

If everything Stephen and Damon do is based on pure love, regret and trust does that

allow them to be considered moral? If Stephen is considered moral by all the characters in the

show as well as audiences and he is almost the same as Damon if we

put all their actions on the balance. Then that should mean that

either both are moral or immoral. It is extremely important

not to differentiate between their morality levels when their

deeds are the same. The Salvatore brothers express that

vampires are not cold ruthless creatures; but they actually

have a soul and genuine human feelings. It is these

emotions that help them control their vampire nature and

make moral decisions regarding human life.

Elena Gilbert / Katarina Petrova ???

and the Salvatore Brothers


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Bio:

Aliaa Ismail, an Architectural Engineering and

Egyptology student in the American University in Cairo, has

been living in South Africa and moved to Egypt 3 years ago.

She enjoys reading books that relate to mythology; more

specifically to do with the dark myth of vampires, also loves

watching vampire movies and TV shows. Her love for the myth

of vampires and obsession about it drove her to write about it in

her 201 research paper. Therefore she picked a topic that has

interested her and she had not had enough time to spend on it in

the past. The purpose of this paper is to breakdown the moral

messages conducted through one of the vampire TV shows The

Vampire Dairies. This is important as the vampire based shows

are increasing and majority of teenagers are watching them and

getting influenced through their moral messages.


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Work Cited Page

Bransen, Jan. " Selfless Self Love" Ethical Theory and Moral Practice, Vol. 9, No. 1 (Feb.,

2006), pp. 3-25. JSTOR.

In Jan Bransens article Selfless Self Love" she discusses how morality comes

from selfless self love, where selfless self love is to love someone else and do whats for

their benefit disregarding ones self. It challenges that there is an opposition between self

love and morality. This article starts focusing on the idea of a moral point of view, later it

discusses Harry Frankfurts work on love and introduces the new concept, that love

provides one with self-grounding and self-regarding reasons. This article was important

as it proves that morality come from self love, and it is love that allows morality to flow

in one's life.Greene, R. & Yuen, W. (2003) Morality on Television: The Case of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. In

J. B. South & W. Irwin (Eds.) Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Philosophy: Fear and

Trembling in Sunnydale (pp. 271-281). United states of America.

In this article Greene, R. & Yuen, W. relate the show Buffy the Vampire Slayer to

Morality and talks about each of the characters and their relations. It is trying to prove

that the relations between characters and the importance of human life are the key factors

that define morality in shows like Buffy the Vampire Slayer. This source is a critical one

as it acted as a guide through my paper, the way that Greene, R. & Yuen have looked at

the characters in the show helped me see the minor details and overall situation in The

Vampire Dairies show.


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Lemmon, Amber. Is the Vampire Diaries' use of vervain accurate?

http://www.examiner.com/vampire-diaries-in-national/is-the-vampire-diaries-use-of-

vervain-accurate 5th October 2009 3:42 pm

Here Lemmon has done a small analysis to one of the episodes of vampire dairies.

She analysis's the one of the earlier episodes showing that Stephen lacks trust in Damon,

and the ways in which he tries to protect his human girlfriend from his older brother.

Milavec, M. & Kaye, S. (2003) Buffy In The Buff: A Slayer's solution to Aristotle's love

paradox. In J. B. South & W. Irwin (Eds.) Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Philosophy:

Fear and Trembling in Sunnydale (pp. 160 - 185). United states of America.

Milavec, M. & Kaye, S. have linked the characters in Buffy the Vampire Slayer

using their love relationships. they classified different types of love and gave examples

about them, mostly emphasizing Romantic love. The love of a singular object, and how it

reflects on human behavior. It was important to see how love can affect actions of people

affecting their own morality.

"Rose". The Vampire Dairies Season 2 episode 8, 5th November. 2010. On line streaming:

http://www.cucirca.com/2010/11/05/the-vampire-diaries-season-2-episode-8-rose/

At the beginning of this episode Elena is Kidnapped by other vampires as she

resembles Katarina Petrova, but the Salvatore brothers unite to save her. This episode is

important as it shows that even love can make Damon do moral acts like saving a human

life and helping his own brother.

Stasi, linda. (2009) "Love at first bite: Vampire Diaries' has serious **** teeth"

http://www.nypost.com/p/entertainment/tv/love_at_first_bite_gGWSIohvtxF9h3aSTkLH

nK, 11:54 AM, September 10, 2009
http://www.nypost.com/p/entertainment/tv/item_gGWSIohvtxF9h3aSTkLHnKhttp://www.nypost.com/p/entertainment/tv/item_gGWSIohvtxF9h3aSTkLHnKhttp://www.nypost.com/p/entertainment/tv/item_gGWSIohvtxF9h3aSTkLHnKhttp://www.nypost.com/p/entertainment/tv/item_gGWSIohvtxF9h3aSTkLHnKhttp://www.nypost.com/p/entertainment/tv/item_gGWSIohvtxF9h3aSTkLHnKhttp://www.nypost.com/p/entertainment/tv/item_gGWSIohvtxF9h3aSTkLHnKhttp://www.nypost.com/p/entertainment/tv/item_gGWSIohvtxF9h3aSTkLHnK


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This is a critic about the primary episodes, introducing the characters and

breaking down their personalities. Here Linda Stasi talks about the nature of the brothers

and how one presents morality and the other pure evil. It mainly discusses the way in

which Damon appears in, but if more episodes are evaluated and if Linda Stasi looks

more closely at the actions of Damon she will be able to discover how sensitive and

caring he is.

The Vampire Dairies Seasons 1 & 2 episode, 2010. On line streaming:

http://www.cucirca.com/2009/09/23/watch-the-vampire-diaries-online/

This is my primary source therefore the most important one, it is the actual series.

This is mainly the life of the Salvatore brothers, two vampires, changed by their first

love, Katarina Petrova, after they have been alive since 1964. they meet a girl Elena

Gilbert, who is the dead ringer for their first love; they both fall in love with her but she

starts dating Stephen as he is the one she falls in love with. The whole series is basic

romance with some vampire adventures as the two brothers compete over Elena and try

to defend her from other vampire attacks.

Wolf, Susan. "Meaning and Morality"Proceedings of the Aristotelian SocietyNew Series, Vol.

97, (1997), pp. 299-315. JSTOR.

Susan Wolf 's article addresses the relation between meaning and morality. she

addresses their impact on one's life. she discusses how one cannot abandon the things that

add meaning to his/her life to reach morality, for if they leave all that adds meaning to

their life then their life becomes meaningless and there is not more reason to care about

moral issues. She argues successfully by refereeing to Utilitarianism For & Against
http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublication?journalCode=procarissocihttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublication?journalCode=procarissocihttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublication?journalCode=procarissocihttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublication?journalCode=procarissoci


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(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983) a work by J. J. C. Smart and Bernard

Williams.

a moral vampire ed

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