with_discipline | 075

[Open, but filtered AWAY from the Borg Queen and O'Brien]

[So T'Pol is really bad at small talk. Really, really bad. She tends to need a few minutes just to figure out what to say, because it's awkward. So there's a few seconds of silence, because on some level she can't believe she's actually bothering.]

I'm - curious. Most take individuality for granted; I hope I'll be forgiven when I say humans particularly so. On Vulcan, individuality is honored and respected, to an extent, but even on Earth, there are those who would give up a portion of their identity as an individual in order to be a part of something. It is, I believe, more than a 'mob mentality.'[She's throwing in human phrases with less and less hesitation lately, but it still sounds kind of. weird.]'

I would like to know what the majority of you find an acceptable cause for one to give up his or her individual identity. [And that sounds terribly awkward, because she's thought about this plenty, and it's really just an almost desperate hope for new answers.]

[Private to Data]

What can you tell me of the Ba'ku?

[Private to the EMH]

[She actually sounds almost impatient.] Have you made preparations?

((OOC: Slightly backdated to earlier today. T'Pol's been acting off because her daughter died about this time a year ago for her. So recklessness and idle chatter, yay! :|))

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

Of course not. I've shared that knowledge in the past. It doesn't alter his personality.

Don't you dare try to tell me what his words mean! If I had died it would have been from my own inability to take control of my life. When Donnie died, it was from me fighting to save myself. Suicide by apathy and self defense do not make him a murderer!

You don't fucking get it. You don't want to understand, so you run from the details and hide behind generalizations. He knew one of us would die, and he set it up. So what? He didn't make that choice for me. I decided to survive. I decided Donnie would die, and if I hadn't, I'd just be killing myself.

He handed me the gun, that's all. I pulled the trigger, not John, and I did it in self-defense. There was no homicide involved.

If you had died, it would have been because he attached that device to your head.

Accepting the situation as you explain it, you've described him as an accessory to homicide. Hanging someone a weapon and instructing them to use it is cause for arrest on most planets and, I believe, in most centuries.

Which is why an individual is better than a collective. You need that option to do as you like, even if you function as part of a group.

Agreed. But enforcing that is somewhat more difficult.

He didn't make me follow the fucking rules! He gave them to me and I chose to follow them. A lot of people don't, you know, and they're the ones who don't appreciate life. They refuse to follow the rules and forfeit their right to live.

John never forced any of his test subjects to win or lose their games, and I follow that principle here. I didn't burn Victor's face; I didn't cut Clapet's leg apart. I gave them options, and let them make their own choices. If I followed a killer's rules, neither of them would have survived!

Edited 2011-01-20 06:34 (UTC)

It sounds like the ones who refuse to...follow the rules are the ones who appreciate life.

No. Like this John, you've orchestrated situations in which harm will be done. That is not proving the sanctity of life to anyone.

Not every test necessitates a death to win. Most don't.

They've learned not to fuck up again! Do you even know the things they did to land themselves in games, or are you going to see them as the victims along with everyone else?!

It's what you're talking about: Sacrificing identity.

People like to own stuff. That's why it always has to be enforced by the gun or it fails.

All.

You're doing better than I could.

Dissension must be discouraged by those who maintain the system, of course. But you can't paint all dissent with the same brush. The cause may have been worth losing, and the first soldier that dissented may have saved all of them from being a part of something they wouldn't be if it hadn't swept them up.

It is suicide. But you can do it for something. You can make it mean something.

[Bitter.]

To save people. When there's no other hope.

It's a lot easier to defend a cause when you're giving something of value to it. Suicide, generally, doesn't indicate someone values their life.

I think that an individual identity is not something that comes as one huge chunk. I think people everywhere, at least on Earth, surrender little bits of that individuality every single day. If we're talking individual desires, and individual freedom - people surrender bits of those to feel safe and protected within a society, they surrender bits of them so they can get along and live their daily lives all at the same time.

Because otherwise... some people have the individual desire to go and stab someone else. But that isn't tolerated within a society, and in order to feel safe from, say, being stabbed, we all agree we'd surrender that freedom too.

I think that's perhaps the thing. You surrender things on the grounds that everyone else has to surrender the same. Tiny little pieces of yourself, in order to have a relatively ordered and functioning society, one that isn't anarchic. So to ask what would cause someone to give up their individual identity is a bit...difficult to answer. Because I think we all do it.

Some people do it more than others, though. But I think, perhaps, under there, there is a desire to either feel safe, absolve themselves of personal responsibility, perhaps even feel powerful by being part of something larger.

I will admit my biases here, though, on this subject. I am religious, and do believe in a greater, divine power, and I am also a policeman, and do have great faith in law and order.

Stop trying to warden me, it's not your job. Academically. It's entirely possible to give ones life for a cause.

Academically, it's stupid to go into a fight with the expectation to die, because it inevitably lessens your chances of survival. I thought you were conversing. I have no interest in redeeming you.

We are conversing. Why the hell would you go into a fight you're expecting to die in in the first place? There are situations in which giving your life will change the tide in a cause or battle. You don't need to talk me off a fucking ledge. Like hell am I going to listen to your opinion on the matter either way.

Would it appease you if I asked?

Okay, so... if you're not going to listen to my opinion, why are you talking to me? You are apparently taking my general opinions on giving up one's life way too personally as it is.

Indeed. But then it isn't a choice.

I doubt that.

That seems unlikely.

Self-sacrifice, then. Is that the only acceptable situation to you?

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