I think when she says "Don't flinch when that happens," she means, "Don't flinch when that happens."

Does she have some particular horrible thing that she expects Kara to have to do in mind, though? I mean, it's kind of a nonsensical piece of advice to give two days after meeting someone unless you're trying to rev them up for something, and it's not like Kara has a problem with blowing up Cylons, so it would have to be something else.

I guess it just didn't work for me as something the character would say at that point if not for the writers wanting there to be Ironic Subtext. YISMV.

Either you commit an atrocity or you let people die -- why is this a universal either-or statement, when there might be many other potential outcomes? The answer: crappy/underhanded rhetoric.

Not if one assumes she's not talking about every decision (if I part my hair on the right, hundreds will die) but about the moments in which you have to perform atrocities to save lives, in which there are no other choices for survival.

Which contrasts with Adama's decision to be worthy of survival, rather than survive at any cost in those same moments.

eta:

I guess it just didn't work for me as something the character would say at that point if not for the writers wanting there to be Ironic Subtext.

It worked for me as Cain grooming Kara. Every lesson doesn't have to be about the next ten minutes.

Can't you all see it? The woman is screaming "I need to be killed! Kill me now, before we are consumed entirely by the slashy subtext!"

t pouts

now I have to rewatch to see if I think Cain wants to die

Not if one assumes she's not talking about every decision (if I part my hair on the right, hundreds will die) but about the moments in which you have to perform atrocities to save lives, in which there are no other choices for survival.

But she does the conflation herself, between "sometimes" and "inevitably" - I'll repost below:

Sometimes terrible things have to be done. Inevitably, each and every o­ne of us will have to face a moment where we have to commit that horrible sin.

If it's "sometimes" that she's talking about, then it's legitimate to claim under certain limited circumstances that only two (or a small number) choices exist. But when you get to "inevitably each and every one of us," then you're playing fast-and-loose with who gets what choices when, and it's fair to call fallacy.

[There's also a school of thought that the job of leadership is the job of avoiding situations in which there are no good choices, but the point here is that claiming that a bad-choice situation (now with big scary death and atrocity!) is "inevitable" for every person is a big fat lie.]

If it's "sometimes" that she's talking about, then it's legitimate to claim under certain limited circumstances that only two (or a small number) choices exist. But when you get to "inevitably each and every one of us," then you're playing fast-and-loose with who gets what choices when, and it's fair to call fallacy.

I don't get it--with "sometimes" she narrows her pool, and within that pool, some things are inevitable. I don't see why you insist that these things are inevitable outside the pool. I do think the language could have been streamlined, but that it's much easier for me to assume she's being a little sloppy about talking about binary Gordian Knots rather than characterising every important decision.

horrible sin

I think these words migh actually back up the idea that cain wants to , or thinks she deserves to die. Describeing a choice as a horrible sin sounds like someone looking for punishment.

I'm still not sure about those SG-1 spoilers.

I mean Season 9 is barely half through. Anything could happen between now and when the eps are shot.

Seems weird and fanficcy.

Since the "each and every one of us" she's talking about is people in positions of military authority during the current war against the Cylons who have already killed 99% of all humanity, I don't think it's so far-fetched to assume that they will all, at some point, come face to face with an impossible situation.

What she doesn't realize is that Adama, who has a first and a last name, and is in the opening credits, will nearly always be given a third choice. She, being a character with no first name and destined to die after only three episodes, has far more limited options.

I've had to watch a lot of kids be put into body bags. They're covered with flags and they float out that airlock.

Anyone else find it a little weird that Galactica and Pegasus have left a trail of dead, frozen bodies floating in space?

But I think Moore is just following naval tradition here.