>Some voices have suggested that the Vadeli should be considered as amoral.
>The actions that they perform are natural to them and are not violations
>of any cultural taboos or prohibitions that the Vadeli recognize. I'll
>concede that one might be able to work from this premise but I find it
>disagrees with my entire concept of magic and ritual.
>If the killing and eating of a human infant is an action without any moral
>weight for a Vadeli, then it is an action without any psychic or magical
>weight as well.
Hunting and slaughtering animals has very little moral weight for most humans yet it is an act with great psychic and magical weight for many cultures including the Praxians, the Pentans, the Hsunchen etc. Lighting a fire has virtually no moral weight amongst humans yet it is used in many religious ceremonies (Cremate Dead via Lodril).
>Consider a troll eating a human, this generates no significant magical
>energy, because trolls regard it as normal to eat humans.
It is a central part in making a stone to kill chaos as per the Boztakang Runespell.
>If a human were to eat a troll, then that would be a magically significant
>act, because most humans are conditioned not to eat sentient beings.
But many of the Cannibal Cult have been in the cult since year zero and are conditioned to eat sentients *yet* their magic is still potent for them. The magic-is-potent-if-and-only-if-it-breaks-taboos concept is not supportable, I'm afraid.
>The Vadeli must still regard their bizarre coupling/spawning/cannibalism
>activities as immoral or they would not be able to draw magical energy
>from them.
Not proven and it runs up against what Mark Smylie pointed out earlier: that after doing it for a few decades, the [disgusting practice] will ceases to be seen as immoral and become traditional.
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