According to Butcher, all three of those are violations of the First Law. The reason for 3 being, essentially, "You were playing with fire, you accepted the responsibility to use it safely".

 

All three. The Laws punish reckless action as much as they do premeditated murder. Well, they punish both, at least. Severity is something we don't have much evidence for.

 

1) Definite execution, likely on-the-spot. No chance of trial.

2) Depends on the mood of the one passing sentence, possible execution, possible Doom of Damocles, if there is a trial, which is likely.

3) Depends on the mood of the one passing sentence, possible execution, possible Doom of Damocles, but leaning towards execution, due to the likely number of victims being more than one. Trial unlikely.

I think 2) is the only scenario where a trial is likely at all. The Doom, as I understand it from its two canon appearances, is only an option if there is a trial and someone steps up to take responsibility for the perpetrator, otherwise, Queen of Hearts.

 

My question also goes to the cirruption black magic causes.

Can you be corrupted by black magic, even if you kill someone with out knowing it? Like someone dying in a fire and you didn't even know it.

 

EDIT: Or not, sudden new page and responses, I hate it when that happens.

 

Yeah, that sounds familiar. I think it was either Ulshavaras (the oracle spirit thingy he summoned in Death Masks to figure out what was going on) or Nicodemus when he had Harry under running water in Death Masks

 

Magic isn't self-aware, so I'm going to have to disagree that it is the magic in itself that fucks the user of black magic over.

It is a big statement about who you are, though. It requires a lot of concentration, focus.

You have to want to kill somebody, you have to want to use your full concentration to make the magic real and to make that happen.

Murder changes you. If you change, your magic changes. I'd say it differs if it's mind-magic, since you're literally inside somebody elses mind.

It might just be the nature of that focus. Ascher, for example, used magic to kill in self-defense on several occasions, both directly and indirectly. Her use of magic was irresponsible but never really evil.

 

That logic falls short because if it wasn't magic itself (or a third party like the White God) that imposed the stain of Black Magic, then the stain would be applied subjectively. Some people would see absolutely nothing wrong with raising the dead, for instance, but that doesn't change the fact that it is corruptive and just plain wrong to do so.

The Laws are, as far as every character and Word of Jim has told us, objective in their punishment so it must be attributed to an outside party rather than as an internal change.

EDIT: Molly saw absolutely nothing wrong with enthralling her friends to fear heroin, too, but that didn't change the stain she acquired doing so.

 

I'm not talking about the stain but the damage done to the person in question. That said, you've got a point.

 

I don't see a difference between the 'stain' and the 'damage' you're talking about. As far as I can tell from your post, they're one and the same.

 

Probably, but it can't be said for sure. I'll give it some thought and to do that, I'll need coffee. Excuse me. ^^

 

Then again, we've seen that it is possible to resist the corruptive influence of stuff as dark as necromancy.

 

I don't recall the Law mentioning the unwilling dead at all, so I think the wiki may be wrong on this one. As I recall, Harry got by on the technicality that only human reanimation breaks the Council's Law. No mention of whether that breaks the cosmic Laws at all, though.

 

It's a weird situation. Iirc its a technicality because no one considers it worth their time to raise animals. Not enough bang for their buck. But Council Law should derive from Cosmic Law and thus Sue should be illegal despite how much she was needed. The only thing I can think of is that messing with a human soul with regards to Necromancy is what makes it black. Just like killing a ghoul or a bunny is a-ok as far as the Laws are concerned.

 

The laws exist to protect humanity not animals

 

If animals did create the issue, then imagine the bad karma for all the bugs you'd kill with fire spells and shit. xD


*Fistbump*


I miss seeing you in IRC, Ched!