[ianferrel]

>A child kills several other children barehanded. >Then goes on to stamp out an entire intelligent life form

Yes. But the murders are not described in great detail or at great length, and all are in self-defence. A relatively small portion of the book deals with overtly violent acts, Ender feels great remorse, and the tone is not one of glorifying violence.

I think it's still reasonable to say the book is "a tiny bit violent".

[koof]

What about the whole "Ender commits mass genocide" part?

The book's apologetic tone about his violence doesn't make it any better - I would even argue that it makes it worse, as it waters down to "extreme violence is okay if you don't feel good about it".

[ianferrel]

> What about the whole "Ender commits mass genocide" part?

I claim there's a difference between a violent act, and a violent work of literature about that act.

The book spends only a paragraph or two on the actual genocide. No graphic descriptions are portrayed.

If I write, "Hitler and the Nazis killed millions of people in WWII", does that make this post violent? I'd argue that it does not. It's a fairly dry and matter-of-fact description of very violent acts. The post is not violent.

On the other hand, I could write a particularly violent description of a minor fight that left both people alive, but would be far more gruesome and objectionable. There's not a direct relationship between a body count and the violence of a literary work about it.

[nooneelse]

Self-defense ends when the immediate threat is incapacitated. Ender fights on past that point. The umbrella of "self-defence" does not cover all that he does.

[JoeAltmaier]

That's kind of the point in the book - they chose Ender because he would finish every fight definitively, conclusively and not waffle. Its actually one of the themes.

For a weak, picked-on child it was Ender's only defense in a violent world (from a child's point of view). He could not survive a truce that was then violated by the opponent. It would only give them the opportunity to surprise him later. He had to win on the 1st encounter.

The interstellar conflict was similar - the enemy attacked first, had a superior war machine and with time could overwhelm humanity.

Anyway, the point of books like this is to explore themes like that. They don't dictate a viewpoint to the reader, they provoke discussion and enable insights,if properly introduced to the juvenile reader.