JuristSkybreaker

Long time lurker, first time poster. I think I figured out Lirin's role and how Kal will get past his 4th Ideal problem. Lirin's big thing is that he wants to protect Kaladin from what he perceives is Kaladin making the 'wrong' decision for himself. Kaladin's big thing is that he wants to protect every person he encounters from what he perceives is their making the 'wrong' decision for themselves. Lirin and Kaladin will interact, maybe work together for a bit. Lirin will basically give him the "do as I say, its for your own good" speech and Kaladin will continue his objection that he's more useful as a warrior and that he doesn't have everything it takes to be a surgeon because he can't bring himself to triage directly. They'll argue a bit and it will come out: I"M TRYING TO PROTECT YOU YOU IDIOT! YOU"RE GOING TO GET KILLED IN WAR JUST LIKE YOUR BROTHER DID! And bingo: Kal will understand that just as the path of the surgeon isn't really his because he cannot be clinical with his desire to protect and he needs to be free to choose the spear and make his own choice for good or ill as a free person, he needs to likewise understand that people will put themselves in danger JUST LIKE HE DOES in order to try to protect others or defend an ideal or destroy an evil etc. That if HE is free to do so, even compelled to do so by some internal drive, then OTHERS must be as well, including his enemies. And just as he finds it terribly unjust and off-putting, even hurtful, that his father does not understand and accept his choice he will realize that he is causing problems by doing the same thing to his soldiers and enemies. He abrogates their value as persons and turns them into objects unless he respects their right to choose their path. Turning people into objects is not protecting them, its the opposite. So while he should strive to protect others, even his enemies in some respects, he must accept that their choices are their own and there will be times when protecting those he can protect means he has to destroy those he wishes he could protect but who have made other choices.