No, it’s still a matter of choice. It’s simply a crime not to. Don’t mistake ‘a crime’ for ‘something you cannot do’.
Compulsory != Involuntary.
It’s not onyl simply a crime. It’s a requirement. Taxes are defined as compulsory financial charge. It’s a crime to go against that, but either way, the taxes will be taken from you, if the state notices that you have to pay by their standards.
You are basically claiming that if someone compels you to do nothing against something, and has the force to compel you effectively, you are tacitly supporting that something if you comply - not out of free will, but against your will and intent.
So, basically, someone who is kept from intervening in the enslavement of someone by gunpoint is tacitly supporting the enslavement, by not acting up against it, even if it would, for example, mean death, or at least being themselves ensalved or imprisoned or something alike.
Yah, it means they don’t give two cent about wether you are voluntary or involuntary. You will doesn’t matter in this.
To an extent, yes. This is why the totality of one’s efforts and opportunities must be taken into account. For example: if someone is held at gunpoint while another person is taken as a slave, and then the slavers leave, if that person continues to do nothing? Yes, they’ve giving tacit support. A case can be made that the persistent imminent and immediate threat of personal harm ameliorates that situation some, but absent that persistent and immediate threat… yeah.
Sure it does. If it’s impossible for you to avoid doing something, that’s a very different thing from it simply being illegal to do it. It is compulsory that I not throw my neighbor out a 40-story window. I can still do it. If I do, he’ll have a hard time not falling, though, laws or no laws.
Choosing not to pay your taxes, and risking legal trouble for it… that’s an act of opposition. And not being willing to make that choice, whether because you agree with the policies of the government, or because you’re unwilling to face the consequences of that choice… that’s choosing to buy into the system. It’s support.
The idea that we are nice is certainly an illusion. Amarr is not nice, it is Righteous.
But I think something that must be clarified here is that Amarr as an Empire is historically notorious for not being subtle about our mission and is proud of this fact. This has, unfortunately, somewhat changed in the political environment of the CONCORD years and as a direct result of the recent wild successes of Sani Sabik infiltration, but valuing the Truth above all has long been a core identity for the Empire. The contrast between the Truth of the Divine Message with the Lies of Molok the Deciever is a metaphor that appears often in Amarr ideologies.
A corollary to this is that we also value Compacts to a degree that cannot be emphasized enough. If a True Amarr signs a compact saying they will do something, it is a moral imperative that they follow through to the absolute best of their ability. We were not lying when we expressed the ideology of the Pax Amarria, that was a sincere offer to effectively make a Compact with the CONCORD signatories to outright take militant reclaiming off the table so long as the other parties kept their side of the agreement. It is imperative that we not be the ones to break such treaties, even if they are with parties that we consider outside of God’s light.
As such, Amarr who talked about a peaceful and patient reclaiming of CONCORD Signatories being a permanent option were not lying, to themselves or to anyone else. They certainly underestimated the Sani Sabik forces arrayed against the Pax Amarria, though, an omission that allowed the Blood Chamberlain to manipulate the Republic into breaking it’s end of the Compact. But even with that catastrophe, it was still not the Amarr that broke the peace.
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This would appear to be contradicted by House Sarum’s directive for AmarrMil signatories to the WZ treaty to break that treaty. Obviously, doing so was an abrogation of other commitments, but if it is imperative that True Amarr not be the ones to break their word, it would have seemed to me to be a situation where the appropriate measure for Sarum would have been to arrest those involved and direct others to act in contravention to the ill-advised agreement.
Sarum is not breaking the treaty.
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This runs into the issue, Arrendis, that you have to be very careful about who you give your word to. Because keeping to your promises is very important, but if you are breaking some promises in the forging of new ones, or giving promises to untrustworthy or disreputable groups, then you are also ruining yourself.
AmarrMil capsuleers were breaking their commitments to Amarr by the treaty they created. Yes, it will be disreputable for them to go back on their word, but it was also disreputable for them to have given their word in this situation to begin with. They put themselves in this situation, and now have to live with the consequences. They have no honorable course to take here, and it is their own fault for putting themselves in this situation.
That being said, it’s not like most of them even care.
Also, what Lord Lok’ri said. House Sarum has not broken its treaties. It is demanding those that are supposed to be sworn to it to uphold their rightful commitments – to Amarr authority.
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I couldn’t have said it any better. If so, I already would have.
Chapeau.
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No, they’re not, and if I gave the impression that I thought they were, that was my lack of clarity. Rather, I was under the impression that the Sarum announcement included what amounts to ‘get back to doing what you’re supposed to be doing’. I’ve since dug it back up, and reviewed it, and found my memory to be incorrect. So on that score, muh bad, conflict resolved.
Indeed. That is very much a concern I’m aware of, and share. I don’t disagree that it was foolish and disreputable for the AmarrMil pilots to have entered into the agreement. I was simply wondering why a culture that places such emphasis on keeping one’s word would push to violated it, even in extremis. However, as I’ve indicated, that was a misunderstanding based on not remembering things correctly.
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Because nothing is so simple and binary. “Oh, we value keeping one’s word, therefore all word-keeping is sacrosanct no matter the circumstances!” There are many, many competing duties and commitments we are held to in our lives. And there is different value to different duties and commitments.
If I, for example, make a commitment to follow a lord’s decree, and then also make a commitment to defend my lord’s rival, then there would likely come the situation where I am held to two competing oaths. In many cases, there is no possibility to uphold both simultaneously. Ergo, I must break one of those oaths. The lord, of course, would be demanding me to cast off my ties to his rival, saying that I am violating his trust and my oath to him by supporting them. And vice versa the rival would be demanding me to cast off my ties to the lord, probably with some talk about how the lord is sinful, is failing to uphold his own duties to me, is cruel, etc. I would have to decide which oath to uphold, and which to break, and each person would have their own perspective on which oath is more valid than the other.
In this case, the militia members were violating their commitments to the 24IC and Amarr. Ergo, of course they will be demanded to forsake the treaty. In the view of the authorities, those militia members are being more disreputable by keeping to their word to the enemy than they would be if they broke the treaty. Keeping their word, in this case, has less social value than breaking it. Of course, if they held on to it in spite of the orders to break it, then they might be viewed with some measure of respect for their personal dedication, but still viewed unfavorably overall for what they have chosen to promise themselves to.
This is a situation most Amarr have personal experience with, to some degree or another. I’ve certainly had to deal with it often. Sometimes, you must decide which you value more: Your personal honor, or your society’s honor. Of late, I have violated the latter, in favor of the former. There are many Amarr who will have less respect for me, rather than more, because of that. To them, it would have been better if I had sacrificed my personal honor, in favor of upholding to what society expects of me. Some might still respect my adherence to my own principles, but it is viewed as inferior to what I am expected to do and be.
Honor and oathbreaking are complicated things.
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See, in this example, I see another way forward: Your first Lord tosses you in a cell and forgets you exist.
Neither one has asked you to violate your given word to the other, but at the same time, they don’t tolerate your conflicting loyalties, which is, after all, their prerogative. And you haven’t violated your word—at least, not any more than you did when you took on the additional commitment in the first place.
So I was wondering why Sarum didn’t just say ‘fine, we’ll just toss you in jail’ and leave them there.
Were CONCORD capsuleer policies not what they are, I’m sure they would have done just that.
Usually, though, prison is the second course of action, rather than the first. The first is usually, “Recant.” Refusal to recant is what lands you behind bars. Which is why I was given the opportunity by my lord to disavow my revolutionary proclamations. I refused the offer, because my principles wouldn’t allow for it. My decision was expected and respected, such as it was, but now I have a standing warrant for my arrest and can never set foot on Thebeka again.
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Honestly, in some ways, I feel like CONCORD causes more problems than they solve.
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I see Arrendis’s head has exploded all over this thread due to her staunch refusal to understand anything Amarr.
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It’s funny that you say that so often. If no-one understands anything Amarr, perhaps you should teach them?
Ever stop and think"hey maybe the teachings of Amarr are not compatible with the rest of society as a whole?"
I’m sorry, Meatpuppet, is ‘tacit’ too big a word for you? Should we keep it down around 1 syllable? Oh, wait, sorry, lemme try again.
Does Meat Sock’s head hurt from big words? You need small words to make head not hurt? Stay with talk if all small words?
I see why y’a all are talking here instead of the council of intellectuals!
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You missed a crucial point in my argument, Lok’ri, as have others. I have spoken of Amarr violently reclaiming and holding slaves. Again: even if conquest of us is not done by force, Amarr is an Empire where slavery exist, slavery is enforced, and yes, new slaves are taken.
When someone voluntarily turns, they turn into that system. Amarr abolitionist movements exist, of course, but they need to work somewhat carefully to not cross the line to “crime” or “heresy”. The Amarr, as a whole, considers using force to bring others to and keep them in slavery just fine, even righteous.
And this was always the case.
And it is, as they say, why we cannot have nice things.
I don’t say that because I particularly like this state of affairs or consider the current escalations preferrable to Pax Amarria holding - I don’t. I do consider something like this pretty much inevitable; if it had not happened this way now, it would have happened some other way at another time.
I do not frankly understand why so many Amarr argue me on this. I am not trying to show the Empire is wrong (though you are, it is not the point here). I am trying to show that your ways and mine are inherently incompatible, because even a peaceful reclaiming is reclaiming to a system of enforced slavery. Like you say, Amarr is not nice; it is Righteous.