: Re: Promoting controversial opinions in a work of fiction I'm writing a first person novel and main character has highly controversial views, many of which the majority of people would probably consider

@Kaufman555

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Would the reader have done different?

In a book I am reading, the main character just committed mass murder on a gigantic scale. They sunk two innocent ships — a merchant vessel and its escort — to protect their family.

From the perspective of everyone else, this was a hideous crime... dozens of families losing their loved ones to an act of needless brutality. There is no question at all that from the other perspective, the protagonist is a villain of the worst order.

But as a reader, we are never treated to that perspective, we are only give the protagonists's view. And given how they ended up in that situation, a combination of — by no other label — piracy, and a big oopsie during the heat of battle... the protagonist is not left with any other choice, unless they expect to get mercilessly hunted down and have their whole community — and their family — eradicated.

So the way to bring this to the reader is to go up the path that leads the protagonist to their decisions, step by step, in such a way that the reader feels that they would not have done any different, lest they put themselves or people they love at great risk.

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