Steampunkette

Remember, Progressman. You're dealing with a woman who cannot or will not see reason or utilize logic beyond the most simple of concepts.

She will simply toss a winking smiley face on the end of her sentences with the same authority of the common forumite and believe, in haughty arrogance, that she has proven beyond all doubt her beliefs are true.

-Rachel-

Actually, having given it further consideration, a government -can- be either moral or immoral. Though not due to it's method of governing, but how it spends it's funds.

For example, the least moral of the economic styles is likely as not either Fascism or Capitalism, since both put profit ahead of the individual.

The Most Moral form of economic policy would be Socialism, in which each member of society is provided for.

However Socialism does have it's sociological downfalls due to the amount of capitalism bred into our mindsets, wherein upon reaching a socialist plateau a portion of the population will rest upon the wealth offered by he government, rather than working for a living beyond that point.

Look to any religion for how to act in relation to your fellow man and you'll find Socialism the easiest path, while Capitalism throws stumbling blocks into the path of anyone trying to hold to religious doctrine.

Fascinating stuff, that!

However, we know Praetoria to be a Capitalist society, since the Syndicate are separate from the government and control separate businesses.

-Rachel-

Governments are all AMORAL. They lack morality.

There is no Good or Evil in the eyes of a government. No right or Wrong. Only Law and Chaos.

Democracies and Parliments have created pain just as horrid as any dictatorship, possibly moreso.

Nazi Germany wasn't a Dictatorship. Hitler was -ELECTED- in an Open Election. The holocaust happened under a Democracy.

The Colonies of Virginia, Georgia, and the Carolinas -REFUSED- to vote for revolution at the Continental Congress until the Prohibition of Slavery was removed from the Declaration of Independence.

Democracy is not Moral. It is not Good. it is not Evil. It is simply a form of Government. Government being the organization and allocation of funds to supply security, prepare laws, and design public infrastructure. These things are not Good or Evil. They simply ARE.

-Rachel-

So are people finally getting that Golden Girl has no understanding of what she's saying, and is just mindlessly repeating a mantra or devising short snarky comments which -support- her mantra?

The fact that a Democracy (The only MORAL form of government) performs standard imprisonment methods and has, in the past, tortured people consistently is swept under the rug of "Only Dictatorships do it"

South Africa, a nation ruled through Parlimentary (I.E. Democratic) methods complete with a Prime Minister is declared a Dictatorship...

Communist = Soviet, even though they have different meanings.

Everything is Black and White if you support the evil side you're evil unless you're a Warden because even though you're supporting the Crusaders you're a special exception.

She has only blind faith in her cause and attempts at witty repartee which make her look like a stroke victim with a facial tick...

Ignore her, folks. it's the only way she'll be stopped.

-Rachel-

http://www.prisonexp.org/

So far as I'm aware Stanford isn't a Dictatorship... But i could be wrong..?

http://www.stanford.edu/

Hmm... NOPE!

-Rachel-

Love and Compassion

Love and Compassion

Love and Compassion

Love and Compassion

Yeah. Pretty basic stuff, there. All that Compassion for their fellow man and all.

-Rachel-

Aaaaaaaaaaaaand back onto ignore you go. You simply can't argue with people so dogmatically blinded they can't see the atrocities their beliefs have wrought.

So sad.

And to preempt anyone going "Pot, you're black" I'll point out that i -know- the Government is corrupt and Tyrant is evil, but I also know that the Government can be saved after Cole is dealt with. Some people are too busy trying to blow up -everyone- and -everything- to pull their fingers out of their ears and realize what they're doing.

-Rachel-

Can we get a Sticky on this thread, please?

-Rachel-

You're saying all the right things and offering a convincing argument, Hammerstar.

Unfortunately you're trying to convince Golden Girl. You'd have better luck standing hip deep in the Nile and convincing it to flow south through logical discourse.

During the Beta there was a MASSIVE thread on Loyalists with Principles, the issue was one of the first arcs available to a Loyalist. You have no choice but to kill SOMEONE in the morality mission and it's a difficult choice for some people to make. Do you kill the nice lady who helped you stop a Resistance Bomb Plot while manipulating you into getting several cops killed and tried to send you into a murderous ambush? Or the Cop who, while gruff, is still doing his best to do the right thing in this world. He helped you to track down a serial killer.

The Devs chose to write the Morality Text as Revenge and Violence for the Loyalist option, and sweet caring bunnies for the Resistance option, barely mentioning ou'd have to kill the cop. I found this disturbing and Preposterous, since you know she's a treasonous spy who just got several cops killed, tried to kill you, ordered you to plant bugs in a police station and plans to use her boyfriend's governmental pull to get away with it... While Killing the Cop means shooting a man whom, to your knowledge, has done -no- wrong whatsoever. He's a good person if a little stern.

For the first half of the thread GG gave her patented one-line + method of posting about how all Loyalists are evil heartless bastards and the only option is to kill the cop. When confronted about it she explained that she'd never -played- the Loyalist arcs, but heard they were evil.

...

Long debates went through about governmental structures, wartime policies, murder, morality, etc. Venture came in the thread in order to shout "You're Dumb, But I don't have time to explain why because I'm awesome like that" a few times, -then- started kind of explaining his views and Ethics straight from the mouths of Professors and Philosophers, more or less...

In the end it was a massive thread which showed me i wouldn't -mind- living in a Police State within a certain threshold of control. This, in turn, cause GG to lash out and tell me I'm a heartless evil monster for not seeing that the Loyalists are pure evil and the Resistance is made up only of happy kittens who love everyone. having -played- the various arcs to different degrees and read synopses of their storylines I disagreed.

You cannot win, with GG. You simply can't. She's going to continue telling you her black and white Good and Evil spiel until she turns blue in the face or you turn red. And she'll probably do it with a metric ton of winking smiley faces.

The Wardens willingly create panic and rioting, the Crusaders bomb hospitals and kick puppies, The Responsible allow evil to go unpunished in order to prevent utter annihilation, The Powers use the system shamelessly to aggrandize themselves.

Cole may be the single biggest threat to PRIMAL Earth. But the Resistance is the greatest threat to Praetorian Earth. The Loyalist NPCs may be pretty villainous, but the PCs can run the gamut.

And finally, She's going to tell you that Schindler was a Warden, not a Responsible Loyalist. And in a way, he was. Except for the use of cheap Jewish Labor to create weapons of war which would keep their people (and most other people) oppressed if Germany had won the war. So i agree. Responsible Loyalist. Trying to do what he can to make the world a better place with his hands tied.

-Rachel-

He may have... But there may be more to it, beyond the eye-witness.

For example, perhaps the government of said nation forbade him from interfering? Or wouldn't submit to his demands of fealty for his help. So he let -them- die, then saved the remaining people of Rome.

That's the problem with an eye-witness. they can only tell you what they, themselves, saw. Not what actually happened.

And for those who scoff at that statement I give you This. Just because you -saw- something doesn't mean it actually happened in exactly the way you saw it.

-Rachel-

Hammerstar... That is, without a doubt, the best description I know of when it comes to Praetoria.

The Zombie House analogy perfectly synchs with that -aspect- of playing a Loyalist. You don't -want- to shoot the guy who is about to let the zombies in while he makes a break for the car. But you know everyone will die if you don't. And after you make the decision to shoot him, everyone immediately looks at you as though you're evil, and starts tossing the recriminations. Maybe one or two members of the survivorship agree, but the others think of you as a horrible person and try to wrest control from you. You're even willing to let them take charge, so long as they don't make stupid decisions that will get everyone killed.

Thank you, Sir. for that marvelous moment of insight into Praetoria through Geekdom!

-Rachel-

Having played through most of the warden and power arcs -and- the entire Responsible arc...

Noone is really heroic.


SPOILERS!


The Wardens intervene against the Crusaders and Cops, trying to police their own faction, but their motive sucks. They're doing it -just- so they don't lose public opinion. Sure, there are some who think the Crusaders are doing the wrong thing, but they maintain the alliance and cover stuff up. They're also incredibly short sighted, in that they're willing to get a lot of people tortured, killed, or maimed in order to spread knowledge that will cause even -more- pain torture and death before anything gets better. Blowing up the single potable water supply so that Vanguard can be heroic when they come six months later? It smacks of the Power Arc!

In the Power Arc you manipulate the populace and media to aggrandize yourself. In one arc you need to get into a laboratory, so you try to convince the Resistance to attack it so you can go in after them, arrest them, get the data you need, and come out looking like a hero. The Wardens are -almost- doing the same thing on Vanguard's behalf. Meanwhile the Power arc isn't so horrible as people like to let on (at least through Imperial City). Sure you're self-serving, but it's more "Booster Gold" than "Doctor Doom"

The Responsible arc is, officially, the most Heroic arc I've done. You're given bad circumstances and you have to fight against the people whom you know are, at least in part, right. Why do you have to fight against them? For the good of the common man. Because they intend to get -everyone- killed in their petty plots for revenge. By the end of the Responsible Loyalist arc you exile yourself to Paragon or the Etoille in order to take down Cole and his Oligarchs. The right way, with the support and power of others, rather than bombing hospitals or starting city-wide riots. Take out Cole, Take out the Praetors, THEN rebuild. Don't randomly blow stuff up and get a ton of people killed in the process.

The Crusaders... I couldn't finish the Nova Praetoria arcs. They were just -too- vile. Gassing people, reprogramming robots into death machines to loose on the populace... It's wanton Destruction, not revolution.

-Rachel-