Intergalactic Summit

Ya could at least try'ta be funny when ya drop a steaming butt sausage onto a thread.

Msr. Sarice.

Thank you for your reply.

As I am not the one making the assertion, it isn’t incumbent on me to prove or disprove anything. I simply asked for the data related to the above mentioned declaration.

I “suggest” that if the assertion is true and as apparent as you suggest, then proving it by presenting the data shouldn’t be difficult.

The rejection of human universals is what will keep us divided.

It's really sad people will continue to categorize humans by race and culture.

No, actually I was referring to "bonding contracts" - a more modern phrase for what we simply call indentured servants. That's the only "language barrier" here.

We're changing with the times. Part of that change is learning from our Caldari allies. Adapting the old to the new. Indentured servants have proven to have advantages over conventional slaves - at least for menial labor, and menial labor is the place where we're ditching slave labor the fastest. One, indent- sorry, "bonded workers" are more productive because they know that they're only in it for a set amount of time, so they've got more positive attitudes about their jobs. Two, the Republic whiners can't say diddly-squat about it because, oh yeah, they signed the contract of their own free will to get out of whatever hole that they dug themselves into.

Now I understand that many will protest that we include church attendance as part of the deal, but what do you expect? We are bound by our Faith to at least try to enlighten them. Still, if it doesn't work and they end their contracts still refusing God's love then frankly that's their own loss. I know a lot of people in the Theology Council don't appreciate that sentiment, but frankly they're not living on the borders and fighting with Blood Raiders on a daily basis. I've come to accept that there are some people you just can't reach - I'll mourn for their souls but other that that, oh well.

The Caldari are right - slaves aren't good for the economy. They cost too much to care for & maintain to really be worthwhile outside of high-end brainy jobs, and those slaves were the first ones freed by the decree of our Great Empress. Far more practical to just use plain old peon-wage workers for all the peon jobs. If my aunt's estate is any sign of the directions things are going then it's worth nothing that the entire family has fewer than a dozen slaves in the entire compound, and the only one involved in what you'd consider "menial labor" is a maid with a mental disability (read: she can't do more complicated stuff). Why keep them at all? Same reason a Caldari CEO/billionaire would keep their own butlers, chauffeurs, personal assistants etc: Status... and helping keep up with all the details of running a big estate. What is left of slave Holding, at least around here, is all just status symbols for bigwigs to show off with. Trained, intelligent staff who come just in under the mark for being the kind of "technical specialists" that were all freed by Her Majesty's decree not long ago.

Incidentally, that whole "Bushido" some of you Caldari are into has also helped smooth over a lot of wrinkles, too. Our household bodyguard was trained in that and when my Aunt offered to free him he flat out refused, saying that if his mistress ever disowned him it would be such a loss of honor that he'd have to kill himself. Nuts, right? I don't get it but hey, if he wants to stay working for us then we're sure as heck not going to refuse. I've been suggesting that we try this whole "Samurai" warrior-ethic thing with the rest of our Kameiras.

Except, the Caldari do not see it as fellow humans, only fellow Caldari, which alludes to the original post. That in itself is a great tragedy. They're not the only perpretrators of that, granted, but such a backwards mindset must be weeded out.

The same encyclopedia that was previously quoted above as stating the second highest absolute standard of living also mentions the State as being very high in emotional fulfillment, universal infrastructure, and cultural satisfaction. This rationally adds up to the highest overall standard of living.

But as my associate earlier stated: "We do not all share the same metric of living quality." So I will assume your disagreement with my assessment and the discussion can move on from here.

Inhonores is adept at embodying the very worst of the Federation, unfortunately for him.

Let's be clear on this - the reason different cultures exist in New Eden is because there is no such thing as a human universal. If our values truly were universal, we would long since have merged into one big peaceful stagnant monosociety.

We have not. Why? Because the Caldari mindset is not compatible with the Gallente mindset, because the Amarr mindset is not compatible with the anybody-else mindset, because the Sansha mindset largely boils down to attempting to violently override alternative mindsets.

This is not an artificial state of affairs brought on by petty-minded and small people, this is the way in which our species functions and the manner in which it has thrived. This is the way in which life functions and thrives - change brought on by competition brought on by difference.

Peace is not a scenario where two groups' values are identical, it is a scenario where two groups' values are not incompatible.

If you find the situation "sad" or think it "should be" somehow different, then the problem is not reality, the problem is your own vapid wishful thinking. If you think we should overlook how we are raised, how we think and what we believe in favour of the fact that, statistically, we are genetically indistinguishable, then you're putting more importance on a damn molecule than on the ideas and philosophies that have defined and sculpted nations.

It's especially insulting to be told that our philosophies are inferior. Our philosophy is different, and that is not in and of itself a bad thing. We're a competing product in the marketplace of ideas and ideals. That is how things are, and how they should be - competition leads to improvement. The more diverse and rich the marketplace, the more the competing products must refine and improve themselves to keep up with and outstrip their opposite numbers.

This "wouldn't it be nice if everybody hugged?" fedo gas is the refuge of a mind that can't deal with the fact that our minds, mentalities and memes are just as active an ecosystem as our bodies and genes. There is evolution through natural selection, and that has never been an aesthetically pleasant process. Without it, however, our kind would still be stuck on whatever ancestral homeworld we share, hooting at each other across a river and throwing rocks. Instead we have thriving interstellar civilisations that are picking apart the mysteries of the laws of physics and turning them to incredible ends, that have conquered death itself.

Given the choice between a productive dystopia with all of its associated headaches and headache cures, or a blissful eternity of sitting around the campfire singing songs and oblivious of the impending extinction event, I'd always choose the former and wouldn't trade it for a planet made of solid Technetium.

True. Yes. It seems that my above comment strayed a little too far towards one extreme, which I regret.

That said, I feel I have given an argument that justifies the "evolutionary selectionism" approach - namely that it demonstrably works and has done so for hundreds, thousands, most likely even millions and billions of years stretching back into the evolutionary history of our species.

Some measure of protecting the weak is of course necessary - otherwise we'd have abandoned our babies in the snow and expected them to keep pace. So I guess the word "weak" is slightly the wrong one to use.

Yes. There's the problem - Where Inhonores is describing the dropouts, drug addicts and so on of society as "weak" and in need of protection, the attitude in the State is that such persons are actually a strong influence in the wrong direction. In our model, "weak" would be the equivalent of zero, and the destitute who put themselves there through their own personal failures would in fact be a negative sum.

So let's concede that the weak should be protected and invested in, but that active burdens on society should not. "Weak" would be a child, or somebody whose circumstances are due to factors beyond their control. Weak people can and should be invested in and will generally reward the investment by joining (or rejoining) the ranks of the strong (I don't like this "weak and strong" terminology, by the way: it feels a bit too primitive, but I'm having trouble thinking of a more refined way of putting it.). A burden would be somebody who took bad debt to cover their gambling habit and Drop addiction, and who will just consume any investment without providing a return in due course.

My thanks, Pilot Mithra: my earlier thought was in need of some refining.

The homeless are not without choices, we are experiencing an economic boom the likes of which we have not had in generations. The factories need more hands, the war machine needs more bodies, and the offices need more brains. There is not a lack of work to go around.

What would supporting them do for the state anyhow? Other than spend money where it could be put to better purposes improving the state instead of giving comfort to those who refuse to seek out work.

If these were the days before the rise of Heth, before our victories, during those darker days... I would have perhaps agreed with you, but it is a new day and there is no longer an excuse.

You're most welcome, Cpt. Hakatain.

I greatly enjoyed reading your response to my post and while I feel that there are still some ideological differences between us, I'd agree with your analysis so far.

I'm a bit sad to see that I only reached the Caldari my post was addressed to and not also the Gallente.

Faithfully,
N. Mithra