Nova's first Scratch Video and Relativistic Morality

Here is Nova's first Scratch Project.  She is very proud of it, and happy that it is finally done.  From beginning to end, the entire project was completed without any help from grown-ups.  She recruited her younger sisters to be voice actors and coached them through their lines.

If you watch it in full, you may be surprised at the end.  *Spoiler Alert* The monster wins.  Part of me wanted to strong-arm an ending I found more morally satisfying.  Shouldn't good win out?  What about the village?  Why did the good witch capitulation when captured?  Shouldn't she put up more of a fight?  Play the martyr?  When I made objections, Nova responded 'It is a happy ending for the monster.'  And that it is. When I questioned further, she explained that ravaging and pillaging was simply what monsters did, and it did not make them bad.

Replace 'monster' with 'cat' and 'ravage and pillage' with 'hunt', and you have an argument I've given many times.  I guess I shouldn't be surprised. For a minute I thought about how we would have to rearrange our lives to broadcast an 'all life is sacred' message.  A vegan household with a crazy cat sprang to mind.  

But on further examination, I do not believe such a lifestyle is necessary to promote compassion and kindness, and neither do I believe there is really anything wrong with the ending of Nova's video. Fiction and play are both safe ways to explore different ideas and different points of view.  Adults underestimate children in this regard quite often.  Playing the villain does not make a child bad.  It makes him curious, even compassionate.  They are imagining the world from a different point of view.  I trust that Nova would protect humankind from a monster if one appeared in real life.