Every great prophet, poet or Saint in the imperial history made waves! No one was asking her not to make waves as much as don’t attack the bloody system physical she wants to see reformed.
Good things take time. At the expensive of the short term, the alternate worst-case scenario charging headlong without thought will cause more harm than good.
Patients is a virtue which surprisingly in short supply for immortals.
Go back and re-read those discussions. You may be surprised at how much she was being told not to even level public accusations.
Then they were wrong not that anyone cares what I think.
I was disciplined and demoted in PIE for making waves. Other Amarr have been telling me the same thing for my entire life. When I defend them and the faith, all is great, but if I point out our own flaws, I’m told to mind my place, that I should never have been freed, that my tongue should be cut out. When I was a slave I was taught to always report anything improper among my peers, but should I spot something among my betters and report that, it would go ignored or even punished. In PIE, we reported blooder slave sacrifices to the Ministry of Internal Order, and were told by the Grand Inquisitor himself that they would do something about it, and they never did. We capsuleer loyalists petitioned Her Imperial Majesty herself to remove slave sell orders from the SCC markets, which is already a violation of Scripture, to stop people like Nauplius, fweddit, and others from purchasing slaves for murder. That petition was rejected.
I have been patient. I behaved, and kept my mouth shut. I went through the proper channels, as a good Imperial does. It fixed nothing. Instead, I’ve watched countless times as arrogant, lipserving Holders spit all over the purpose of Blessed Servitude. I’ve watched the greatest heretic and traitor alive today get pardoned by a Shathol’Syn-defying empress and be the first heir allowed to enter the Succession Trials twice, even after he approved a Sani Sabik as one of his champion-candidates, and everyone just went along with it. “We hear and obey,” the line always goes.
And you know what the funny thing is? If Khanid had won the succession trials, I wouldn’t be alone. There’d be many more loyalists rebelling alongside me. But no, he lost, so everyone got to pretend that everything was okay again. “Ah, we don’t have to do anything now, that line wasn’t crossed.” Nevermind all of the other lines that were broken to even get to that point.
Was it a step too far to engage in violent dissent? Possibly. But then, my family was attacked first. Millions of people on Kahah were butchered. And on Thebeka? Well, I do feel guilty for my role there. But the only way for an insurrection to win concessions is for it to last long enough and deal enough damage to convince the people in power to actually reconsider the status quo. Waves need weight if you want to actually tip the boat over.
What your empire needs is more people of thought, conscience and faith like Kernher, not fewer.
Quoted for truth.
Here in the State we measure the weight as merit.
There is a really different thing on how and what you do. I don’t really know what happened in PIE and what exact waves you were making, but I’ll allow myself to assume, and ask to forgive me if I’ll be wrong and correct me - but I got a feeling you were telling your superiors they were… wrong.
I am pretty sure superiors will be glad to hear you if you will start offering them suggestions, improvements. But once you start pointing them on mistakes? Nobody likes that. And, especially since everyone do mistakes. I do mistakes, you do mistakes, our superiors do mistakes, our leaders do mistakes - everyone do them.
But there is a significant difference between us, our superiors and our leaders. Our leaders have more merit than us. And it is assumed, that the higher your position is, the more merited they are. You were like a wagon which tried to run ahead of a “rail steam engine”.
Why, for example, Mr. Sobaseki has succeeded in creating the State and secceeding from the Federation? Because he was the “engine” and all people in the State were wagons, whom he was pulling - because he was most merited one, everyone followed him.
If you want your waves to have weight, you need to exalt yourself. Earn merit by the service, showing your qualities, improving your position, status, climbing the ladder, leading people. Because those superiors you disagree with, did all that. They EARNED their position, they EARNED their authority.
So, if you think you’re smarter or better then them, how comes it is they who rule you, and not you rule them?
That is incorrect. I did not speak ill of my superiors in PIE or the Empire, and in fact submitted immediately and without question to their orders to desist. The waves I was making was in speaking ill of members of the Kingdom and other groups, who for political reasons we are supposed to make nice with. To put it in other words for you… the things you say about Priano or Ishukone? Remarks like those are what I was punished for saying. It was the looseness of my tongue, not disobedience, that I was disciplined for. Because in the Empire, it is considered more civil to keep strong opinions private and pretend to like each other, even if you and your superiors hate the people you are dealing with. Indeed, there was some sentiment by my superiors that they agreed with my remarks. I just wasn’t allowed to say them aloud.
That is what I mean about being disciplined for making waves. Speaking honestly and truly about problems in our society is considered inappropriate.
The Empire is not the State, Kim. Stop speaking about it like it is. Merit is not a factor in leadership in the Empire. Our leaders are born into their position. They do not work to earn it. The most faithful, intelligent, and dutiful slave will remain a slave at the whim of the Holder, while the most incompetent, immature, and faithless Holder will remain a Holder as long as he doesn’t make someone with even more power than him angry. Even the Succession Trials, which were once about proving the fitness of the heir through personal challenges, are now determined through the actions of others, not the personal merits of the heir.
Part of what I am fighting for is to change that. Because the Empire actually needs to respect merit, to give power to those who prove they deserve it and that they are competent and responsible enough to wield it. A great many of our current problems are the result of favoring blood and ancestry over our actions.
Because I was born into slavery, and they were born into noble houses. That is how the Empire works, Kim. In PIE, I was placed into the Praetorian Auxiliary Force, a corporation which was created for the sole purpose of keeping the ‘lesser races’ out of the primary corporation. Our rank structure was explicitly limited: No matter the merit and deeds of a PAux member, no member of a ‘lesser race’ had the opportunity to ascend to the highest ranks in PIE. Just like there are only two Minmatar Holders in the entire Empire, and most free Minmatar in the Empire suffer very poor economic prospects and frequently fail to find work as they are passed over for less-merited True Amarr or Khanid workers.
The Empire is not the State.
For what it is worth, though, I have no desire to rule anything.
Well, then I was wrong. Please forgive me.
Well, this is a bit different. Priano is not a member of the State at all. And Ishukone is a rival corporation of my parent corporation. It is not a rival per se of a coporation I am now citizen of, so for me Ishukone can rot in Kyonoke pit for all I care.
That’s actually a good thing. Sometimes I think I should be punished as well for looseness of my tongue. I just talk to much and can’t stop. 
Honestly, since you brought Priano - I actually approached her back then with respect and civility despite she was respresenting Ishukone that I didn’t like (at least back then - she was a member of I-RED). And it was her who behaved in uncivil manner towards me, so, please, don’t direct these remarks at me, please. I am respectful to those, who behave civilized themselves.
Different cultures, I assume, I am sorry, I cannot offer here much.
Ehh… I am sorry about that as well. I know only what I know.
And for this, however, I’d like to comment. If you want to change something, you need to rule it. If you don’t want to rule it, you shall accept the status quo and let yourself be ruled by those who can do that.
If you will fight the power, you’ll do only worse. Because right now the system works. It’s not ideal, it has flaws, but it works. Once you start poking it with a stick without redesigning it properly from above, you’ll just start kicking gears out, damage lives, property, efficiency. By trying to “bring change” without authority to bring that change you’ll never bring the change itself as you plan, you will bring only suffering and destruction.
Trying to capsize the boat is what makes you a traitor, Samira. You might mean it as a metaphor for profound change, but, capsized boats tend to be hard to right again, and often soon sink. Effecting change without capsizing the boat … that’s perhaps a less satisfying path. But for those who want to keep the boat afloat, it’s the only way.
You still say “we” when talking about the Empire, but at this point that’s a reflection of hope more than truth. I don’t think you have a lot of friends here anymore. I’m not even of the Faith, and I probably am less an outsider than you, even so.
You cut yourself from those who stood by you, played into your enemy’s hands, and made yourself a liability to those who might have sympathized, so that now you are outcast by friend and foe alike. It’s understandable that you did-- so understandable that your enemy most likely correctly predicted what you would do, and so successfully played you. It doesn’t make you less a fool.
There’s a certain someone you hate, but whom you have come to resemble a little. You both claim to serve the best interests of the Empire. You both put your own judgment ahead of, well, anyone and everyone who’s actually obedient to it. You both get people killed in pursuit of a personal vision of an Empire set right … and then fail to achieve what you tried to do.
You’re less overtly mad, of course. But these days, when I need Mr. Nauplius to understand that he’s acting in defiance of the Empire’s order and damaging what he claims to serve, I point out that he’s acting like you.
It is cruel of me to say this, but I say it regardless, as an ounce of vengeance for the harm you’ve done-- to your cause, to your people, to the Empire, to yourself … and to me.
And also because it’s true.
Don’t you dare compare me to him.
If the glove fits.
It doesn’t.
@Aria_Jenneth if that’s the sort of thing you’re telling Nauplius these days, I have to seriously question your sanity. Samira is openly working toward reforming the Empire. Her intentions are to save lives, to root out corruption and cruelty, to make things better. Napkins is attempting genocide.
That’s ‘acting like’ Samira? Really? And you say this… for ‘vengeance’? What, exactly, do you have to avenge on Samira? That she maybe put Luna out a bit and made her feel bad? Is it because she dared to blow up your Abaddon after your organization declared war on her? Because she and two other pilots PIE had declared war on killed Maria Daphiti?
She blew up Arsia, too. But you don’t see her whining about Samira and trying to land cheap shots with claims Sami’s acting like Napkins.
You’re a capsuleer. You’ve got money. Go out and buy a pair, Aria.
Hehee … you’re not someone I should have to tell how to read battle reports, Arrendis. No: I expressed that aspect of my feelings on the matter already. Anyway, I’m not someone who feels a lot of need to be petty about losses in battlefields.
It’s good of you to back her up, though.
Quoted for truth…
You know, Ms. Kernher, with all the crimes Mr. Nauplius has committed, as far as I know he never fell so low to side with the enemy. And despite Alizabeth was saying he committed a treason by mere heresy - he always was fighting against enemies of the Empire without siding with them to fight the Empire for the sake of his beliefs (or heresy as you Imperials love to call it), which the Empire didn’t accept. Just like yours. And I am not going to insult you over it or say that you’re like him, I am just asking you to think about it before insulting him, for your crimes are more severe.
Anyone who would call what I have done ‘more severe’ than Nauplius, is ■■■■■■■ evil.
Severity comes in many flavours.
A madman may murder, but he is expected to do so. Do these deaths have the same impact on another individual as, perhaps, a sudden and painful personal betrayal?
Far more. That it is ‘expected’ is irrelevant. He is a demon in human flesh.
If you say so…
I guess our notions on what is real evil are pretty much very very different.
But I am fine with it. Instead of explaining what I consider evil I’ll just say, that if I had that option put before me, I’ll really prefer to be known as the most evil of the eviliest evil evils than disgrace myself with an act of treason.