Intergalactic Summit

I have some fond memories of the Centre for Advanced Studies. The first few weeks, when I adjusted to life outside the gilded cage of my father's sprawling estate. Making new friends, who couldn't pronounce my birth name, and so with the best of intentions gave me a new one that I've kept to this day. Disabling the safeties on a high-tech firearm as my end-of-term project and spending three days in the brig for it (totally worth it). My tutors and friends rallying around me when my father disowned me and cut off my tuition. The day of my graduation, when I gained not only my engineering certifications but the right to become a capsuleer as well. These are all memories I will cherish until the day I die, but it seems that things have changed for the worse in the seven-and-a-half years since I graduated.

This is not acceptable. The struggle through which Ms. Odenjorn has been put should never have happened in the first place and I condemn both the Minority Affairs Office and the Centre as a whole for allowing things to come to such a head. I'm suspending use of my engineering degree and all endorsement of the school until such time as the it sees fit to repair its attitude towards the Minmatar who represent our closest and dearest allies in this cluster. I encourage all other capsuleers who graduated from the Centre to do the same - after all, you're capsuleers. It's not like most of our prospective employers demand to see engineering degrees, nor do we generally need them to make a living.

I would certainly have liked to see a different outcome to this unfortunate affair. I cannot, however, support an initiative to condemn the finest institution for higher learning in the Federation.

It is perfectly possible to express disappointment without disrespect, and usually preferable, too. I will continue to think and speak highly of the Center for Advanced Studies, and I encourage other alumni to do so, too.

I will, however, urge the school administration to reassess its policies in light of Ms. Odenjorn's complaint. They should view it not as an attack, but as a challenge to improve. On that same note, dismissing her complaint as a "persecution fantasy" is unworthy of such an exalted institution. When the CAS (or any other institution for higher learning, without mentioning names) recommends that a student, any student, study humaniora instead of engineering or any other vocationally useful field of study, that is simply not good enough. It is in the institution's (and the Federation's) own best interest to acknowledge such.

In closing, I would again encourage Mlle Odenjorn not to give up her dreams. And if I, my corporation or even my family's agribusiness company can help her in any way, whether through offers of employment, letters of recommendation or anything else, she is welcome to contact us, and I am sure we can work something out. There are far too many idle hands in the Federation as it stands - denying those who actually do want to pull their weight the opportunity to do so is simply unacceptable.

Incidents? No.

Rare? Probably not.

However, they would be isolated and often committed by individuals or small groups. It is rare for a major university, corporation or political entity to engage in racism because it will gain negative publicity and is a violation of Federal tenets.

What the hell are you on about now, you old fool? Don't you have some puppies to kick?

It can, however, be defined as discrimination regardless, which the Federation should be made aware of and actively work to discourage. Which, I believe, was the point of the entire case to begin with and the reason for this thread.

For example, it's not racist to call a member of a different race a lolligagging simpleton if they are indeed a lolligagging simpleton.

It is indeed biased, Captain, and for good reason, I believe. It is my honest opinion that the Federation already has far too many students of the humanities, especially given the way in which the humanities are commonly taught today. It would benefit us all if funding was significantly shifted in favor of the sciences, and of professional studies such as engineering and medicine.

In this case, we have a student who was originally advised to drop her plans of studying engineering in favor of a "career" within the humanities. It should have been the other way around! People may be equal in the Federation, but fields and disciplines of study certainly should not be.


I will have to disagree with you there, Captain. The job of Federal authorities is to keep peace between neighbors and to protect the whole of the Union from threats abroad. It is not to march into people's homes and rearrange their furniture. However benevolent the intentions may be, such action treads perilously close to tyranny.

This seems an inevitable outcome in Gallente thinking. Tolerating outsiders, so long as they conform to the culture they wish to live in, produces no problems. However the Gallente seem to need to accept every aspect of the outsiders they play host to. Did they think Minmatar would only keep the parts of their thinking the Gallente agreed with?

How the Federation does not see this problem far more publicly and frequently, I could never guess.

This is a combination of two problems.

The first being that the Federation's census officials have decided to lump Minmatar regardless of tribe into a single group, probably in the name of efficiency. Not that it's really all that inefficient to take someone's tribal affiliation(s) into account. (Now, if we were talking clans and such, then it might become too much overhead. But we're not.) It's less racism and more bureaucratic bullshit.

It's equivalent to a census being taken in the Empire, and only taking which of the Heir families people work down the chain from into account rather than the specific Holder they are associated with, or identifying State citizens by their parent megacorporation but not by the subsidiary that they may actually work directly for.

The other problem, as Gabriel stated, is that it is also less racism and more internal Matari politicking. From my own conversations with a number of people from the Republic, it is my understanding that this is actually a normal - and often accepted - occurrence there, and one of the reasons it has resulted in a lot of noise in the Federation is that it is not normally acceptable.

As for why it isn't something seen more frequently, that is likely due to the escalation of the problem. I would wager that most similar cases in the Federation, when they happen, do not find themselves escalated all the way to the Supreme Court for whatever reason, be it a settlement between parties or a ruling from a lower judge.

We're only hearing about this case because it was escalated to the point where it became a high-profile story. If it hadn't made it to the Supreme Court, it is quite likely none of us would have even heard about it.

So on one hand it is okay for the Federation to regulate educational policy to encourage, if not force, individuals into specific fields for the "good of the Federation" but on the other hand the Federation encouraging, if not forcing, equal treatment of individuals for employment and educational purposes by businesses and educational institutions is perilously close to tyranny?