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Added 2024-07-31 03:37:53 +0000 UTCLeysa wishes so badly to go over there and break up whatever nonsense this is.
Trying to figure out where the best place for the page dump is, and it may be Friday. This is a build-up of realisations and the pages need to go together for the proper flow.
Comments
Two of the principles I attempt to live by: Try to accept that life really is just chaos and blind chance. It will never make anything better if you try to justify your own unfairness by asserting that life isn't fair; what you make with your share of the chaos is up to you.
Josh
2024-08-03 05:09:33 +0000 UTCpffft lol ok tough guy
Nikaleles
2024-08-01 22:42:50 +0000 UTCI think most sibling arguments boil down to something like: Circumstances gave you something I didn't get, and it's not fair. There's no solution to this because it's NOT fair. No one said life was fair. Yet we all feel so keenly that it should be fair and we'll drive ourselves insane looking for ways to make it fair, or at least make sense. Because it's really hard to accept that we live in a world of blind chaos and chance.
Ashley
2024-08-01 17:24:02 +0000 UTCI realised today talking to Velasco that this time jumping when Duane and Lem argue makes me think that siblings are always just having the same argument forever
Capsandnumbers
2024-08-01 16:07:10 +0000 UTCAnother, perhaps better example, is that while yes, basically "easy for me to say" when not in danger of civil war or disenfranchisement (not sure they'd actually commit full-blown genocide on the Soud, but for the sake of argument, ok) β but there are definitely people who view the idea of murdering innocents as equally abhorrent as being murdered. Duane is one of them. He instantly recoiled from Bodie's plan... because it's horrific. Probably thought or felt something in the vein of "if our only recourse is killing civilians then what right would we have to live anyway." THAT'S moral courage. Not saying it's easy to have or easy to act on. I am saying it's the kind of thing where, if you wanna see it continue, you don't shoot it down unless it's perfectly enacted every single time. And maybe that's my real indictment of Aldish culture β it seems like they want to just jump straight to the duel every time. Arguing and debating, making concessions, ruminating β all that stuffs for women, sirrah! Whip your sword-dick out already!
Josh
2024-07-31 16:13:06 +0000 UTC@CD yeah, maybe I'm reading it wrong; and I definitely get where's he coming from with wanting Duane to actually stick to his convictions (per Ashley's response to Madison above) but, what, he wants Duane to stick up for these convictions all alone? Go against his entire society when even his own brother fights him on them every inch of the way? The thing is, Duane would not have lit the match, and Lem (I think) knows this. Duane would not have burnt prisoners of war alive. That he has trouble actually saying this when confronted (by a guy who's not only much more conventional in his "Aldish" opinions but is his freaking brother who he loves and doesn't want to hurt) shouldn't matter as much as that he wouldn't DO it. It's really easy to say freaking anything. We say all kinds of dumb shit that we don't mean, or that we meant at the time, or... But he would never have done that - to me that's the moral courage I'm talking about, although this example is perhaps lessened by it was so psychotic that he probably wouldn't even have THOUGHT of it.
Josh
2024-07-31 15:51:41 +0000 UTCA family of firestarters (cue the song by The Prodigy) ...
Rob N
2024-07-31 13:51:00 +0000 UTCWRECKING me to have all these little confirmations that really, deep down, he'd like to be rescued π From the war, the world, himself.
CD
2024-07-31 07:22:26 +0000 UTCLeysa actually loves her brother-in-law very much. She's also terrified of him :)
Ashley
2024-07-31 06:13:10 +0000 UTCDuane ignores a lot, man. But most of us do. I think one has to remember that the only stated reason we have for why Lem torched that cart was he promised Dhamphir he'd kill her for hurting Duane. She killed his comrade when they were pig hunting. She's the one he interacted with that night he lit the match. She was the object of his ire. When Lem asks Duane if he'd have lit the match he's asking him where the courage of his fucking conviction is. Where's his honour. If you say you're going to take us and leave, Duane, then DO IT. If you endeavour to be like Claggart and carry your mistakes with you then DO IT - don't make excuses to your Plats. Don't pretend there can be anything honourable, or protected, or sacred because there can't be! Lem needs all this either confirmed, or denied. And he'll get it next update, and then he'll know what he needs to do.
Ashley
2024-07-31 06:11:14 +0000 UTCWhen this page dropped I went back to chapter 15 to take a look at the last version of this sequence we saw and itβs soooo interesting how Lemuel is so heartbroken there. I wonder how much he want to and also didnβt want to do what he did. also lol I forgot about that HARD CUT on βI saw them tooβ on page 15.28. The Implications. What Duane has been ignoring all along.
Madison
2024-07-31 05:44:36 +0000 UTCYeah, all the more because Lemuel is absolutely correct in that there is in fact a growing majority of people who do in fact want to genocide him and his people and everyone he loves. Spouting morality and having the moral high ground... I can understand why he feels that isn't enough to stop real harms.
Luuuuuuu
2024-07-31 05:21:24 +0000 UTCBeing in the military from age 12... I don't agree with Lem but I certainly can understand how he's walked away with a moral framework that insists that not only is it acceptable to use cruelty and violence to subdue your enemies, but this is the morally correct position to take because anything less will leave them free to do the same to you instead. I honestly don't know that he cares about being perceived as weak, so much as he perceives a retreat from violence to equal a real physical threat to those he cares about - because unfortunately life has handed him a lot of very real examples to support it 8(
CD
2024-07-31 04:59:42 +0000 UTCI just realized what bothers me about Lemuel - not that Duane is all that great of a person, but in contrast to his recent revelations, Lem's convinced himself (or been brainwashed into thinking) that moral courage is all about summoning up the strength to be *inhumanly cruel to your enemies*. I always thought it was ludicrous when people would go "oh, those terrorists who did 9-11 are such cowards" cuz, yeah, I'm with Bill Maher, whatever suicide bombing type terrorism is, you can't argue that they're being TOO CAUTIOUS. Ah yes, the ultimate expression of fear, not caring if you get blown up. But maybe I kinda get it now? In just the very simple way that you can have a lot of physical courage, but be a complete moral coward. The strength to not care about seeming "weak" is hard for a lot of men to imagine, I think. It's all a bit of a stark indictment of brutal patriarchal revenge cultures with their sky god who demands blood sacrifice.
Josh
2024-07-31 04:52:02 +0000 UTCSomething tells me Duane just lit a match... and he's about to be consumed by the flames. π₯ π₯ π₯
astine
2024-07-31 04:29:34 +0000 UTCLeysa is a good wife! How did she feel about Lemuel prior to That Night? I'm guessing not a huge fan given his tendency to teach her daughter knife tricks.
Spider
2024-07-31 04:01:05 +0000 UTCplease drag your dad away from blowhard firestarting with your literal firestarting, little lady
BansheeClause
2024-07-31 03:59:53 +0000 UTCI am very interested in whatever trouble mikaila is trying to get into right now
BansheeClause
2024-07-31 03:59:25 +0000 UTCLemuel knows he's so full of shit.
Luuuuuuu
2024-07-31 03:59:19 +0000 UTCThat's the "heh" of someone who just got the wrong answer they'd been expecting.
Fitzy
2024-07-31 03:53:56 +0000 UTCClassic sibling double dog dare behaviour, feat. war crimes. Now I am thinking wistfully on the alternate Unsounded timeline in which Leysa indeed karate chopped the entire plot into submission π₯Ί
CD
2024-07-31 03:49:46 +0000 UTC
