Intergalactic Summit

A simple media observer would know that context is key.

The context, in this case, is a new and strikingly partisan entrant into an existing fray with zero provable combat record, baseliner or capsuleer, and no history of involvement in political discussion, whose verbal ticks and other patterns correspond to a party who's known to use proxies heavily.

We use context and reputation to assess the validity of a person's claims, and the bias they take into a discussion.

The complete lack of context and reputation is actually highly unusual, especially among people so partisan, unless they are proxies or somehow otherwise involved with established parties.

Six years with no apparent reputation is, well, beyond merely unusual. It's frankly aberrant.

That said, admittedly, talk of sock puppets and proxies is distasteful in these forums, because it presumes a lack of independence or freedom of action that goes against the grain with most capsuleers. At the same time, it's an essential part of understanding the mess that is the Intergalactic Summit, and the cheap rhetorical ploys used by some to try to score points.

Nah. Miz is just totally shocked to find out I'm arrogant. Totally. See? That's her shocked face. Or maybe it's her 'I'm gonna taser you' face. I mean, being tasered was pretty shocking.

Ohh! No, wait! That's her 'Red, get the hel off my galnet' face!

No tasers. You're getting plugged directly into the mains at this point.

... now get off my galnet.

Have you made your point yet? I think everyone who's reading this understood your accusation several pages ago.

My favorite thing about this is just another breeding ground for the same handful of people to come in and spew huge pages and pages and pages of rhetoric between one another instead of anyone who actually enjoys the content to speak and comment on it, lest they be buried beneath ten hours of reading and high-chin sarcasm.

I don't see how this is surprising, or new, or very upsetting at all.

Can we end this obnoxious habit of assuming that someone who thinks very differently than us simply doesn't think? It's pretty obvious by the way one carries themselves if they're well-read or not. Let's not pretend that because we don't like someone, these indicators aren't there. It's childish.

See, now you're talking more like I'd usually expect from the Amarr. Only, also, you're now likely trying to allay a suspicion.

In any case, respectfully, I'll pass on debating the Reclaiming, sir. That one really is kind of a thorny issue for me, and it's a bit removed from, well, this entire thread, really.

New, from The Federal Frontier: The Soul and the Capsuleer, by Saint Michael's Soul. An essay on the Jovian Disease and how it relates to the Capsuleers.

Well, it would be, although the concept of the soul it discusses is one that comes from neither of our traditions. Although, the question of whether souls reincarnate is a little less important than what the article's really saying, which is to suggest that we're damaging ourselves with repeated copying and driving ourselves into despair and eventual self-destruction. It's not a new idea, but I'd find it a lot more persuasive if I thought that it was really the cloning that is the problem.

The state of my mind, and soul, is kind of a major concern for me. In a very real way, it's why I'm in the Empire to begin with.

I clone pretty regularly. Not emergency medical cloning so much; that's only happened a couple times, but jump-cloning, which turns out to be more like emergency cloning than I thought (they don't actually preserve our old bodies; we get our brains burned out by the scan, per usual. It's just they salvage the implants). If the article's thesis is correct, I should be kind of on a downward spiral as long as this continues, or at the very least the cloning itself should be a corrosive influence interfering with any efforts I might be making to heal or grow as a person.

I don't ... actually think that's the heart of it, though. If I had to name a single factor that's been a kind of dark influence in my life, I think it's a more traditional soul-eroding problem: we tend to have a pretty casual familiarity with other people's deaths.

We're a warrior caste; those of us who don't kill supply those who do. Unlike more traditional warrior castes, of course, we don't die. The people around us do, though, and it happens pretty often. Sometimes it's because we kill them; sometimes it's because we get them killed. It's something nearly as inherent to us as the clone.

Even if you only live, and die, once, being responsible for a hundred thousand deaths would kind of eat at your spirit. That applies whether you believe in "spirits" or not. Call it your mental state; call it your soul; it doesn't really matter: mass murder is hard on atheists, too.

It's part of our job, to be weapons. It's hard to get away from it completely. We find different ways to cope. My friend Alizabeth approaches the whole thing in a very soldierly way: she gets to know her people, develops camaraderie and trust. Feels responsible for what becomes of them.

I think that would drive me insane. ... I'm not good at keeping everything professional, or just accepting responsibility if someone I considered a friend is gone from this world forever. I, instead, accept it as my role, but, I depersonalize it. I treat my crews like cells in my body: living, vital, with needs that play strongly into how they perform when I need them to, but ... not as friends or comrades. More as part of myself. Components in the ship I inhabit.

It's not a perfect solution. I approach it impersonally, but that doesn't make me any less a killer. And it's not like I have strong beliefs that I consider to justify the deaths I've caused-- but at the same time I do still accept my role as necessary.

If I let it, I think that's the dynamic that would kill my soul. That's the wound I'm kind of trying to heal, even if I know I'll probably never be quite okay.

So ... I think, it doesn't have to be the copying. Even without cloning, why would anyone expect an entire caste of mass killers to be spiritually and/or psychologically healthy people?