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[voice]
[Ryuuzaki's low voice is accented in a way that people from places other than the U.K. might think of as "generically English," and when the message begins, his tones are pleasant and measured without being effusive.]
Hello, everyone.
The Ingress has brought us to the Moira from any number of places. When I meet someone, I can't say whether our similarities will outweigh our differences, or vice-versa... when you're this far from home, even small commonalities can seem important. It's led me to be curious about the broad strokes of everyone's backgrounds.
[A pause, as he approaches his real question.]
What can you tell me about the government in the place you came from before this? Both the form of government and, if possible, specific names of leaders.
If it wasn't your original home, I'd be interested in hearing about that, too, even down to what year it was for you.
If you'd prefer to answer privately, that's all right with me. I can promise you my discretion.
Thank you.
Hello, everyone.
The Ingress has brought us to the Moira from any number of places. When I meet someone, I can't say whether our similarities will outweigh our differences, or vice-versa... when you're this far from home, even small commonalities can seem important. It's led me to be curious about the broad strokes of everyone's backgrounds.
[A pause, as he approaches his real question.]
What can you tell me about the government in the place you came from before this? Both the form of government and, if possible, specific names of leaders.
If it wasn't your original home, I'd be interested in hearing about that, too, even down to what year it was for you.
If you'd prefer to answer privately, that's all right with me. I can promise you my discretion.
Thank you.
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And before that -- why the initial decision to launch missiles was made? There must have been tensions leading up to it.
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[It was the oil fields in Alaska that everyone wanted. But Deacon finds it hard to take any of the reasons for the War seriously. Nothing, nothing could justify what happened, the mess that was left for those people's descendants to suffer through.]
maybe a moose bit someone's sister
[His tone dips, becomes dry for a moment -- but the subject is sober, and he doesn't continue in a wry tone.]
What would you do to restore order there, if you could?
a majestic moose
[He replies in an equally dry tone.]
Yeeeeah, I don't like the phrase "restoring order." The idea is nice, but it sounds too much like the sort of thing that some creepy old guy in a uniform dripping medals would say before sending out the secret police to go oppress the masses.
I'm totally behind the general goal of fixing things, I've just never seen a big fix that anyone's proposed that I could really get behind, you know?
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It's fair to say that restoring order on a large scale when everything is in chaos could involve some state oppression... furthermore, whose idea of order are we talking about? That's always a loaded question.
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[That's said maybe a little too flatly: there's something he especially dislikes about the situation under discussion, about what people do to people they don't consider "worthy." The case is a few years in the past, but there may never be a day when its outlines don't annoy him to some extent.
And this conversation mirrors what Cassandra has been saying to him: that civilization falls apart, that survival depends on the protection of the strong, and so on. Neither of them is wrong -- it's just disappointing.]
It doesn't seem that there's any efficient way to empower the "unworthy"... but the situation you're describing has been typical for most of human history. Even the ideals of Magna Carta, or of some Enlightenment thinkers, favored privileged classes... the people who were speaking at the time. I suppose it's part of human nature.
That said, because you wouldn't want to leave things in the hands of a despot, how would you run them if you were in control of a territory? Or is that too much trouble... or is despotism inevitable under those conditions?
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Man, I don't know. There's a reason no one puts me in charge of anything. I am not the guy to make the big decisions.
I don't think despotism is inevitable. I guess if it were me...I'd start with the little things. Like, just make sure everyone's got the basics--food, water, shelter. I think you could cut down on a lot of the assholery if people didn't feel like they had to murder their neighbors and steal their tatos to survive. People have got to reach a point of at least sort of trusting each other and caring about each other and not all "every man for himself" before we can even begin to have a functioning, not-corrupt government. To have a social fucking contract, Rousseau-style, we need an actual community first.
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Would it be feasible, however?
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Is there anything good?
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[Worlds die, civilizations fall, but ramen is apparently indestructible. It figures, he thinks.]
Is it a noodle stand?
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We say "city" but it's more like a shanty town built inside an old baseball stadium and run by one of the previously mentioned despotic mayors. If you don't mind bigotry and authoritarianism, though, it's one of the nicer places to live.
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Somehow I'm not completely surprised that a noodle stand might be a viable concern, under the circumstances.
What about the worse places?
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[The rest is almost self-explanatory.]
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The Commonwealth is a fun and exciting place to live.
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Isn't there any other scientifically inclined group, to balance that?
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Is there any particular group whose success you'd favor?
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Man, that's a weird phrase. "Cut of their jib." I wonder what a "jib" even is.
Anyway, they're called the Railroad. And they're basically the only organized group that's really standing up to the Institute without stepping on other people's necks to do it like the Brotherhood of Steel is. I'd seriously consider joining up, but like I said, shadowy and secretive. They've gotta make sure the Institute can't find them but the side effect of that is that nobody can find them. For gathering recruits they're, like, the epitome of "don't call us, we'll call you." Sucks.
[Says the man who is the Railroad's main intel and operational security guy.]
There was another group that had been showing promise, called the Minutemen. The idea sounded nice--normal folks banding together and promising to help each other and anyone else in need. But like a lot of nice ideas, it didn't work. There was corruption, betrayal, massacres, nasty stuff. That raider nest I mentioned? Libertalia? Yeah, half of those raiders used to be Minutemen.
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[It could be rumor, it could be a friend who was recruited, but there's still an implication of... something, there.
On one hand, L is willing to reevaluate his impression of anything he hears in any of the responses to his query if more information comes in at a later date that contradicts what he's been told. On the other, he's inclined to believe responses to a greater extent than he would in, say, an interrogation, simply because there's little incentive for anyone to spin an entirely false story from the ground up, and if they do, it's unlikely to matter much to him anyway. It's a cover story that's probably been created for someone else's benefit, and he's prone to similar self-preserving impulses.
Which is to say that while he's skeptical of Deacon in the way he might be of anyone, he doesn't leap to the conclusion that Deacon is a major figure in the Railroad. It's a possibility that Deacon is involved in it, but it's also a possibility that Deacon was involved in the Institute or the Minutemen or some other group he's not mentioning. It's also a possibility that he's making these groups up as he goes along. Still, L's conversation with Cassandra makes him think it's unlikely that Deacon has never been involved with any group if he's telling the truth about his home environment, but that's as far as it goes for now.]
And what happens if they go the way of the Minutemen?
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They've got to get new blood in from somewhere and I don't see any posters or booths or pep rallies encouraging people to sign up for honor and glory and a king's shilling or whatever, so I figure they must be making the first move.
If they go the way of the Minutemen...I don't know. I guess I always assumed that if they went kaput it'd be because the Institute slaughtered them all, not because of petty corruption.