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I’m kind of confused - what do you even want? Really, to save people who have not been indoctrinated by now means all we could save are infants and possibly small children? Everyone else must be left to rot, lest they infest and erode the culture of the Tribes with the Amarr religion. After all, that religion is the most nefarious tool of the enemy.
Or do you then dream of somehow reprogramming these former slaves from their religion? If so, how are you any better than those you fight against? Or are you perhaps hoping, that when shown the Tribal way, they simply abandon their former faith? Some perhaps will. Some most certainly will not. What about them? Are they to be slaughtered for the greater good perhaps?
Could you explain your reasoning behind this need to free all the minmatar as quickly and forcefully as possible, yet not thinking ahead at all that quite possibly, not just some, but most of our brethren are already lost to us, at least if we want them to be “proper, true minmatar unsullied by the filth of the Amarr dogma” - whatever that means - as some seem to want them to be?
Do forgive me if I’ve read you wrong. You seem to defy all my knowledge of rational beings in this cluster, repeatedly.
If you don’t see an argument being made, it’s largely a poor idea to invent one. It’s called a strawman. Feel free to tilt against such and windmills if you wish, but it’s not particularly effective in terms of argument. There is a significant difference between mere faith and the ideology of ‘Superior Amarr’, ‘Reclaim under them’ and so on.
The religion, while abhorrent to me, is not the problem. It’s the attached ideology. See above.
Again you’re inventing arguments that haven’t been made. If you wanted actual discussion on the subject, perhaps stick to the subject instead of inventing extremist standpoints for other people. It’s rather dishonest and disingenuous.
Already done, repeatedly, over a very long time. That you still aren’t paying attention shouldn’t be surprising I suppose. Do you know why the Empire enslaves over generations? It’s in order to break and eradicate every last smidgeon of what the people once were. The blood may remain Minmatar, but every generation, every year, every day that passes there’s spirits and minds broken until the point where they may not be recovered. It’s no different from murder, eradicating what a person is and replacing it with their own preferred ideas. While less blatantly obvious than Sansha’s technology shortcut, it’s no different in the end result. An atrocity beyond description.
And every moment there is no action taken, another mind crumbles and breaks. The sheer scale of it, across countless worlds against countless enslaved, is by far the most horrifying act undertaken by humans in all of our known history. There hasn’t been a single horror out there, be it by Sansha, Blooder or whoever else’s hands that is even remotely close to rivaling this madness… but no, we should wait. It’d be inconvenient to take action.
Cowards often decide it’s irrational to stand for something.
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That ideology is in the very core of the religion. Amarr are God’s Chosen people, suffering is good for the soul, anyone who doesn’t believe will not ascend to the Heavens, and so forth. It is rather disingenious and dishonest to say it isn’t. By this reasoning, anyone who is already deeply rooted in Amarr spirituality is already a “lost cause.”
Granted, perhaps my first take was too sensationalistic - people can and do abandon religions all the time. Despite that, even if some can be converted from the ideology and religion of the Amarr, there will still be countless billions that are already lost forever. What is your solution to this problem?
“She didn’t ‘release’ Matari, she launched an invasion force of countless indoctrinated and unprepared zealots upon the Tribes in what is to this day one of the most brilliant acts of combined public relations ploy and resource sapping attack in known history. The broken and spiritless. For this, you praise them?”
Your words, not mine.
I believe it is because generational slavery is considered to be a way of cleansing the soul, each generation is purer in spirit than the last. Functionally, of course, it is just like you describe - the longer it goes on and the better they can eradicate any traces of their slaves identities as an independent people, the better they can shatter their spirits and resistance of the ideology crumbles until it becomes acceptance.
But it IS inconvenient to take action. Earlier you lambasted the emancipation declaration by late Empress Jamyl as " most brilliant acts of combined public relations ploy and resource sapping attack in known history." Now, lets imagine that poof, we just liberated trillions of slaves. Let’s say that about half of them are as you say, broken and spiritless, a weapon against our culture. Another half is not yet broken and very much interested in rediscovering and practicing their ancient heritage and cultures.
Now, without even thinking about reconciling these two halves in to the same society, how do you propose all these people will be taken care of, when a far smaller number strained the Republic to its limit? I don’t recall you ever actually explaining how something this monumental would and could be undertaken without massive preparations? Even more massive than the Elder Fleet? But then again, maybe you have - I can’t be aware of each and every time you’ve opened your mouth.
Classy. Didn’t you say something about strawmen earlier?
That ideology is not as interlocked with the religion as you think. The amount of faithful who do not believe in Amarr Superiority is significant. If you think it is, you need to spend more time with those of the faith. The religion is not the problem. It’s the ideology.
What problem? Lost or not, it’s their choice. Once they have been given the freedom to make that choice, it’s up to them.
One of these is not like the other. Maybe spend less time rewriting someone’s words until they fit your appeasement agenda.
It is inconvenient indeed. That doesn’t mean it’s not worth doing, and it’d frankly be a simple matter of giving them the choice. We can take in as many as we’d have to. The ones that’d choose to come to us knowing that it’ll be a significant change in their lives have all that it takes to contribute and pull their own weight. If there ever was a people who know how to work for a living, it’s a slave. It’d simply be a matter of scaling up the very same operations we’ve been running for ages, and in the recent decade doing it with capsuleer assistance.
Under Tribe guidance, capsuleers could set up a staggering number of Fortizars and even Keepstars as waystations for processing and treatment, travel and organizational purposes and you can build damn near entire cities from prefabs almost overnight these days. Ushra’Khan already has several in orbit over Matar, I have a few scattered along the Network, and that’s just what’s already there.
An organized effort spending some real ISK on infrastructure? I could scatter a dozen Fortizars by myself and I’m barely registering on the scales of the wealthy capsuleers. The Tribes were never strained to their limits. There were the exact kinds of troubles and growing pains as you expect during culture clashes and unexpected population growth and that was never going to be a painless process no matter what anyone did. It would however be worth the effort.
It’s a really piss-poor argument that always seems to rear it’s head that “oh clearly freeing our people means forcefully rooting them up from their homes and hearth and dumping them with no aid somewhere”. That has never been a thing.
That was no strawman, that was an insult answering another. Cowardice really is the only reason to abandon our kin to their fate. Our people have endured as it is and it can endure the troubles it’d be to welcome our kin home.
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Now you’re actually making some sense, after all.
It rears its head because the immense hurry you and others like to tout implies that an immediate and brute force is needed. A lot of our arguments could be avoided if you actually presented yourself in a way that didn’t come across so hostile. Yeahyeah spare the “afraid of harsh words” -lecture.
I’m afraid that’s a matter of your reading comprehension being sub-par. Yes, there’s a serious need for immediate and brute force. Every delay means we lose more of our kin. The pressure on the Empire to cease their practice of slavery must be immediate and sufficiently strong to achieve that, with the minimum amount of delay.
None of this implies kidnapping men, women and children.
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Congratulations to DutchGunner on her 14 years in space.
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As the only recent reference point of a large scale liberation of enslaved minmatar by free minmatar - the Elder Fleet didn’t ask the Starkmanir or anyone else if they wanted to leave. They either left or were killed by the Amarr or operatives of the Fleet. Reasons varied. I’m not naive enough to think that they would be given a “simple choice” on the matter second time around, either. Frankly I wouldn’t trust capsuleer efforts to be any more delicate than that, and despite your idealistic intentions in practice, yes it would mean kidnapping men, women and children or murdering them by our own hands or by the hands of the slavers.
There is not a single power in the universe that could pressure the Empire to cease their practice of slavery in any reasonable amount of time, if by brute force you mean threat of military force. Even if we broaden the meaning of brute force to include economic and political pressure, it still will not be enough. Only 100% sure option to do that is in the long run to subvert the whole Amarrian culture and leadership. You deem this unacceptable, because it has to happen right now. But as far as I can see, the only right now options will just result in staggering death tolls for all involved and not the least of those who were supposed to be saved.
You think I want to abandon our kin in the Empire? You couldn’t be more wrong. Just because I am not raging against the Empire every second of my existence does not mean I’ve given up. I am constantly looking for an option that will save the most people - this includes every possible thing in a physical and metaphysical arsenal from securing allies to devising ways to affect public opinion in the Empire itself - I cannot single handedly topple an empire, obviously, but that does not mean that I am not trying to find ways to.
I know saying the following will land me mountains of trouble with people I know and some I don’t even know yet but: If our people already survived over 700 years of slavery, they can survive a few years more. And for them it is different - at least the current slaves in the Empire know or at the very least have rumors that there are free Minmatar out there who are working day and night to liberate them - our ancestors had no such luxury and they persevered for centuries. The Elder Invasion was a highly visible event in many respects, surely it renewed and reignited flames of defiance in the hearts of slaves around the Empire.
And many of them are pretty much convinced that we’re damned to hell unless we submit to the collar and allow ourselves to be broken down and remade in the image of the Amarr ideal. That’s what they’re doing to those in chains. It needs to end. It needs to end now. And while Miz may accuse me of being a coward and an appeaser, I really would prefer it if we could conduct our military assault after covertly fomenting a civil war, but nobody seems willing to help with that critical ‘foment a civil war’ bit.
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Dont think I havent wracked my brain about this like you wouldn’t believe. Theres so many issues and variables that could fill several books and I can’t fit all of them in one measly post.
Dont think I wouldn’t want to also end it right now if I thought it possible. But I don’t see how it could be possible. Still, I prefer to spend my energy in at least doing something I believe to be useful, trying to help even those she would discard as indoctrinated, instead of expending energy on insulting other Minmatar and spitting on them by even implying they dont care and would abandon others to the Amarr just because its easier. Abandoning means doing nothing, not “not doing things how I want”.
If she disagrees, ■■■■ her.
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Miz is one of the voices I tend to give fuller weight on this issue than most others. Not because of the years she spent in the trenches, fighting to save anyone she could. Not because she’s given blood, sweat, and tears to the cause, and had her name driven through the mud for her dedication to it. Not even because she’s right about Sarum’s obvious motivations and the political expediency of dumping a one-time release of slaves on the Republic to blunt our momentum and political will.
I do it for the same reason I listen very carefully to certain others on this topic: she’s been one of those people you think she ‘would discard as indoctrinated’. I may not always agree with them, but then, they don’t agree, either.
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You can give her any weight you all you want. She is not special. There are thousands others just like her, millions even. And I know there are billions of people who think like her. But I think their zeal, while admirable and understandable, is also the worst possible reaction in a sea of bad choices.
She is not the highest authority on this issue just because she happens to be a capsuleer with the loudest mouth. Note, that I don’t claim myself to be that either, but at least I don’t try to push my view as the only right one, and throw under the train anyone who thinks differently.
I’m done. She is not worth my time.
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