Shadowrun
Shadowrun General => General Discussion => Topic started by: JanessaVR on <01-07-16/1244:07>
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I confess, I’m not a fan of the Infected. I think the whole concept of “Infected Rights” is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard of in the entire history of Shadowrun and as far as I’m concerned a cure for HMHVV was found long ago; it’s called fire – apply lots of it to the Infected patient until the infection disappears. This cure has a 100% success rate, and should be applied globally as soon as possible. Granting monsters that want to eat you civil rights? Why not just shoot yourself in the head? It’s quicker. Apparently it’s supposed to be a not-too-subtle allegory for [insert oppressed group X here], but it’s a terrible one, as I don’t know any members of [insert oppressed group X here] that actually kill and eat people (something that would, in fact, fully justify discrimination against them).
That said, they do make good (and nasty) villains in the game, but, in their canon incarnations, I have some problems with them. To wit:
The Trouble with HMHVV (as I see it)
Issue #1 is all of this ridiculous, touchy-feely, politically correct nonsense about making nice with the monsters that want to eat your face off, when the obvious solution is to just toss all the ones you can catch into a big bonfire and be rid of the threat. 5th Edition seems to be doing a better job about this than 4th Edition, however. Well, sort of, sometimes. They should be present in the campaign setting as monsters, not as PCs, and not as this week’s hippie/liberal cause célèbre to champion the “rights” of these poor, oppressed creatures who just want to kill and eat people.
Issue #2 is correct viral taxonomy. A few years ago on Dumpshock, it was brought to my attention that the canon viral taxonomy was rather incorrect at the time, and, from what research I’ve been able to do so far, I highly suspect that it still has not been correctly classified in the later SR4 and now SR5 books. So, I’ve taken a stab at trying to flesh this out; I even managed to find a physician to assist in my efforts.
Issue #3 is…sprawl, for lack of a better term. The list of Infected critters is a bit too large, IMHO. A look at reference sources give me this listing of HMHVV critters:
Bandersnatch*
Banshee
Chupacabra*
Drop Bear*
Dzoo-Noo-Qua*
Fomóraig*
Ghoul*
Gnawer
Goblin*
Grendel*
Harvester*
Jabberwock
Loup-Garou*
Mutaqua*
Nosferatu
Vampire
Wendigo
That’s quite a few (17, in fact), and – to me at least – it seems a bit too much for all of those creatures to have come from just one virus. Another point here is that we don’t really need any more feral creatures in the campaign setting, which several of these critters are (those with an asterisk above are feral, or nearly so, or at least some noticeable number of them are). I mean, we already have street punks aplenty, so do we really need any more mindless monsters? I don’t think so. Monsters that can think are better foes than just mindless thugs, so this should be stressed as a design goal of any revisions to HMHVV.
Issue #4 is that ghoul infection rates need to be dialed down – way down. I’m scarcely the first person to comment that, as written, even George Romero must be impressed at the Ghoul Apocalypse that would already have happened long ago with creatures this incredibly infectious (though in SR5 it’s at least been dialed down from where it was in previous editions, where one little scratch and your becoming a ghoul was guaranteed).
Issue #5 is that some of the creatures that are canon HMHVV monsters are being wasted as such. The Wendigo in particular shouldn’t be consigned to being just another plague carrier or run-of-the-mill monster, but the terrifying creature of Native American legend that it ought to be. Really, go look up the legends of the Wendigo. It’s a fantastically terrifying creature and relegating it to the status of being just a furry, Infected ork is such a waste it’s practically a crime. It should be reintroduced as either a magical creature or a spirit, in all its horrifying glory, which is a much better use for it in the campaign world. The Banshee is another good example here – it should be a frightening spirit harbinger of impending death instead of just a hyped-up elf with fangs.
Streamlining the Viruses
Instead of a single virus that’s responsible for the creation of 15 creatures (and carried by 2 more), we’re going to consolidate the Infected down to just vampires and ghouls (they’re the ones that get most of the press in-game anyway), with each monster being made by a distinct virus, as follows in the sections below.
HMHVV
Isolated in 2034 by Dr. Emil Harz and Dr. Carla Greenbaum, the Human-Metahuman Vampiric Virus transforms victims into vampires.
Viral Taxonomy
Group:....Group VIII (Magically Active Viruses)
Order:.....none
Family:....Vryolakiviridae
Genus:....Strigoivirus
Species:..Human-Metahuman Vampiric Virus
Etymology Notes
Based on their names, the researchers who isolated this virus aren’t themselves Greek or Eastern European, so I assume that they were just by people with a Classical education. At any rate, I tried to try to stay close to Greek terminology/folklore for this virus. The Greek vampire, the Vyrolakas, is the classic corporeal vampire of Greek and Eastern European folklore. The Strigoi is a Roman/Romanian vampire.
Viral Infection Mechanics
Vector: Special
Penetration: Special
Power: Special
Notes: If the vampire uses its Essence Drain power to drain a victim to 0 Essence, it might infect them with HMHVV. Make an Opposed Test, rolling the vampire’s Magic + Charisma versus the victim’s Body + Willpower. If the vampire wins, its victim becomes infected. If the victim wins, they die (a 0 Essence score = death). An infected victim enters into a near-death state for 24 hours, then awakens with 1 Essence and overwhelming hunger to drain Essence from the first (meta)human unlucky enough to encounter them.
Critter Template
Physical Attributes: +2 to all Physical Attributes
Mental Attributes: +2 to all Mental Attributes
Powers: Compulsion, Dual Natured, Enhanced Senses (Hearing, Low-light Vision, Smell, Thermographic Vision), Essence Drain, Fear, Immunity (Age, Pathogens, Toxins), Infection, Influence, Magician, Mist Form, Natural Weapon (Bite: (STR+1)P, AP -1, -1 Reach), Regeneration, Sapience, Other (+1 initiative die, +1 to all movement rates)
Weaknesses: Allergy (Sunlight, Severe), Dietary Requirement (Metahuman Blood), Essence Loss (every month), Induced Dormancy (Lack of Air, (Essence) Minutes), Mind of a Monster, Vulnerability (Wood)
Notes: The victim’s skin becomes paler and their lateral incisors become more pronounced. If not Awakened as a Magician before their infection, they become one afterwards. Vampires are exclusively hemovores and can consume only blood. Any other food makes them sick and causes nausea (see p. 409, SR5 Core Rules) within an hour when they consume most other foods; this is especially true if they consume alcohol, in which case the nausea kicks in within 15 minutes. The maximum Essence that a vampire can drain is equal to three times its natural maximum Essence. Damage taken from sunlight is not healed by their Regeneration power, nor is damage from wooden weapons.
Critter Design Notes
This is a mix of SR4 and SR5 specs for both vampires and nosferatu. Also, having vampires being allergic to wood was just really, really stupid. A vampire’s attacking you? No worries, just poke him with a stick and it’ll burn him like acid! Need refuge from the vampire chasing you? Just head into those dark, spooky woods – he won’t dare follow you into all those trees. That was changed to a Vulnerability instead (see pp. 401 – 402, SR5 Core Rules).
HMHGV
Isolated in 2051 by Dr. Jeffrey Krieger, the Human-Metahuman Ghoul Virus transforms victims into ghouls.
Viral Taxonomy
Group:....Group VIII (Magically Active Viruses)
Order:.....none
Family:....Nachzehriviridae
Genus:....Draugarivirus
Species:..Human-Metahuman Ghoul Virus
Etymology Notes
Krieger is clearly a German name, so I chose German terminology/folklore for this virus (assuming that this is what he would have chosen/suggested). The Nachzehrer is a German vampire / mostly ghoul which feasts upon the dead. The Draugr is a Nordic/German predatory revenant, which also served as the inspiration for Tolkien's Barrow Wights.
Viral Infection Mechanics
Vector: Injection
Speed: 12 hours
Penetration: -3
Power: 2
Critter Template
Physical Attributes: Body +4, Reaction +2, Strength +3
Mental Attributes: Charisma -2, Willpower +2
Powers: Armor +1 (cumulative with natural dermal armor), Dual Natured, Enhanced Senses (Hearing, Smell), Immunity (Pathogens, Toxins), Infection, Natural Weapon (Bite: DV (STR+1)P, AP -1, -1 Reach), Natural Weapon (Claws: DV (STR+1)P, AP -1), Sapience
Weaknesses: Allergy (Sunlight, Moderate), Dietary Requirement (Metahuman Flesh), Mind of a Monster, Reduced Senses (Blind; -6 dice modifier to all tests involving purely physical sight).
Notes: The victim’s skin becomes rough and takes on a grayish tone, while all body and facial hair soon falls out. The fingers elongate, and the fingernails become claws. The teeth become sharper and more prominent. Their eyes film over with thick white cataracts as they lose their sight, but their senses of hearing and smell become hyperactive. Ghoul characters can overcome their Reduced Senses by taking cybereyes. Ghouls can only easily digest raw meat; cooked meat makes them sick and causes nausea (see p. 409, SR5 Core Rules) within an hour when they consume most other foods, especially cooked foods.
Critter Design Notes
This is a mix of SR4 and SR5 specs for ghouls. I’ve added immunity to disease and poisons as well; if they eat the dead and live in the sewers, these are a necessity or they’d all be dead already. Also, regardless of any canon descriptions to the contrary, all ghouls are to be considered intelligent monsters, not just feral predators.
New Critter Weakness
This is a new mechanic to reflect the “descent into monsterdom” for the Infected. It’s based on the trope for Stages of Monster Grief (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/StagesOfMonsterGrief).
Mind of a Monster
Stage 1 – Denial: The victim pretends that they can go on with their old life.
Stage 2 – Defiance: The victim realizes that’s not going to work and becomes enraged, taking out their anger on whatever targets seem most appropriate (or just close at hand).
Stage 3 – Acceptance: The victim accepts that they’re now a blood-drinking / flesh-eating creature, and that this is their new normal.
Stage 4 – Betrayal: The victim abandons any pretense of trying to co-exist with the creatures that are its food source, and henceforth views (meta)humans as nothing more than prey or toys for their amusement.
A just-Infected vampire or ghoul starts off at Stage 1. Every month, they must make a Willpower roll (Threshold 3), to avoid slipping down to the next level. Eventually, the virus will win, and they’ll be monsters in both mind and body.
Optional Critters
If this trims down the list too far for you, you can add your favorite canon HMHVV critters back in “À la carte” via separate viral strains. To add new vampire / blood-drinking creatures, list the original virus as HMHVV-1, then add HMHVV-2, HMHVV-3, etc. To add new ghoul / flesh-eating creatures, list the original virus as HMHGV-1, then add HMHGV-2, HMHGV-3, etc.
Other Rules
Any PC infected and transformed by either virus immediately becomes an NPC under GM control; tell the player to roll up another character.
And this should clean things up considerably, from 17 creatures down to just 2, and relegating the Infected to strictly NPC status. They’re monsters, not people – treat them as such.
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A DM i know had similar rules about vampirism in DnD. It doesnt help there is a cure (albiet it involves high powered magic.) for it though. I agree that we should be wary and stuff but id still go for a cure.
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A DM i know had similar rules about vampirism in DnD. It doesnt help there is a cure (albiet it involves high powered magic.) for it though. I agree that we should be wary and stuff but id still go for a cure.
Again, there is already a cure - fire (or acid). Just apply enough of it and the infection disappears.
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Great work!
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Great work!
Thanks! I've put about a month of effort into this.
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Mkay... I disagree with you on some points, so I'll just go case by case there.
Issue #1: People do that politically correct stuff all the time, and this isn't a clear-cut case. Those infected with HMHVV are still sentient 'people.' Of course people will advocate their rights. Being the victims of a disease doesn't make them any less deserving of some rights, a least. In some cases (ghouls, gnawers and others who don't have Essence Drain), they can in fact live without ever hurting a living person. There's also research going on to substitute non-metahumanity as a food-source, or, you know find a cure. Just because VITAS or the Black Plague exists, doesn't mean you condemn all people with it to death and start lighting up the flamethrowers. So yeah, they should have people advocating their rights, as well as themselves; it's not like they can't speak.
They should be present as what they are; people with a disease that is both a power-up and a flaw. There's nothing that automatically sends them to NPC-ville.
The whole kill and eat people thing isn't much of a 'want' amongst the sane Infected if you read most of the fiction. A lot of them realize it is morally wrong and sucks; they'd rather live than die, though. There's also the ones whose change has caused brain damage or psychological issues, like feral ghouls, the sister of the HMHVV researcher in Sail Away, Sweet Sister, etc. Those places are good arguments for euthansia/application of liberal amounts of fire.
Issue #2: It is a magical disease. It does magical things to various people, depending on what they are. Even the researchers who've spent their whole lives studying the disease in-game say they barely understand it and it can go out and defy identification and its own rules pretty frequently. Busting down the three primary strains and the sub-strain into just vampires and ghouls is ludicrous.
Issue #3: Technically, Drop-Bears only carry the disease, they aren't Infected. That happens in a number of diseases. Chupacabra are apparently genetically modified critters with HMHVV worked into them somehow, not anything natural. There's an easy break-down; Strains I and II cause the six vulnerable beings to change into their related 'kind.' All Strain III are ghouls. There's also Strain Ia, which either kills the being or in rare cases makes a nosferatu or mutaqua. That's 15 (14 if you don't count the Jabberwock, which was never in a printed book anyways), with 2 of them being far less than 1 in a million chances, like the expression of the extremely rare disease it is.
Those 'mindless' ones aren't always mindless, for one. Two of them, like I said, aren't actually Infected, they're carriers or creations. The disease can cause brain damage, which can cause the 'mindless' specimens, but that's by no means concrete. There's an entire ghoul nation, which really puts the kibosh on ghouls all being feral. Fomoraig have been seen building villages in swamps in some regions as well. Plus, nobody knows much about mutaqua, so calling them feral isn't really supportable.
That mindlessness is actually quite useful in some cases. Think the concerned parent whose child was Infected, and subsequently lost their reasoning from brain damage. Now, that's their child, and nothing can convince them otherwise (family and friends of the Infected are another supporter of Infected rights, by the way). So they pull their kid out of school, put them in the basement, and do some very terrible things, all to protect and care for their kid. How is that not horror?
Issue #4: Why would the ghoul infection rate need to be toned down? Unlike the Romero zombie-apocalypse, people actually act intelligently, for one. The vectors aren't that common, for two. It takes days to weeks for the change to happen, for three. Ghouls have bounties on them to keep the population down, for four. Ghouls are sentient and realize if they turn loads of people, there won't be enough food for them in an area, for five. They also realize if they get too populous, they're going to be purged, for six.
Issue #5: A wendigo in Shadowrun isn't just a plague-carrier/run-of-the-mill monster. If you think that, then you're not using it to the full extent of what an Awakened Ork with immortality, Essence Drain, super speed, Regeneration, and a taste for metahuman flesh with a predilection for building cults can do (also keep in mind the enhanced Willpower, Charisma and Intuition; they make some nasty spellcasters). There is tons of 'horrifying glory' in there right now, especially since they were once a normal ork. If you want to make something really scary, use the 'original' Wendigo for something; the ancient, newly arisen progenitor of the name, a millennia old wendigo with enough Initiations on top of their already nasty stats to make them on par with a dragon.
There's something you aren't considering here, by the way; names can be used multiple times. Just because there's Infected called Wendigos and Banshees, doesn't mean the spirits you're looking for don't exist. Maybe the Infected were named after the spirits, maybe it was the other way around. There's plenty of options.
Anyway, that's what I've got against your points so far. In regards to your house-rules... Yeah, no. To reiterate:
They are people, even if you want to argue otherwise (no really, the rules explicitly make them a playable form of metahuman).
The variety isn't actually bad.
Don't blame the mechanics for not being 'scary' if you don't use them to the full extent.
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*slow claps*
Nicely done! The effort definitely shows, and while I don't necessarily agree with reducing all 17 variants to just 2 (ghouls and vampires) I can see why you'd want to based on the list of issues. The reworked infection is definitely more appropriate than actual Canon.
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Good work Janessa, I'm sure there are many who think & feel similarly on the subject. I just happen to agree with MijRai.
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Main issue I have is that the diseases are pretty much unresistable, even if you have built a character focussed on surviving them. Those numbers desperately need a tweak.
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I always considered that a part of the point, myself. It is hard to resist, because it is extremely dangerous.
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Main issue I have is that the diseases are pretty much unresistable, even if you have built a character focussed on surviving them. Those numbers desperately need a tweak.
Um, how so? In my rules here, to become a vampire (HMHVV) you have to get grabbed, held down, and drained all the way to 0 Essence (that's actually dead) - this matches canon. As for HMHGV, I've set the pathogen's Power at only 2. Exactly how much lower can they get?
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Was a comment on RAW, not your alternative
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So, Mijrai already touched on this, but while I appreciate all the work you have done here in creating an alternate trope for Shadowrun, I think that as both a player and a GM, I prefer the rules for Infected characters over this variant. (But hey, you obviously worked real hard on it and I think it's great for rules variants in systems to fit GM and party play styles. Kudos.)
The reason I actually prefer what you call the “touchy-feely, politically correct nonsense” version of the Infected aspect of Shadowrun is because of the ethical issues that come up in this setting.
You mention that you recognize that Infected rules are a “not-too-subtle allegory for [insert oppressed group X here],” and, at the risk of sounding like the P.C. Police, I think that's exactly why it needs to stay how it is.
It's already been mentioned in the thread that infected people are people too, and that's an important thing to remember. Sure, it's an allegory for [insert oppressed group X here], but the fact that it's an oppressed group that has to kill/eat people to survive doesn't make HMHVV too “out there” to warrant an “infected rights” movement.
For the record, I think HMHVV+ characters in Shadowrun are most closely an allegory for persons with disabilities and diseases. I'll get into that later.
For the sake of a hypothetical anecdote, meet Griz, a relatively normal chummer who has lived in Seattle since he was born. Though times are hard, it's reasonable to assume that Griz is a relatively decent guy. He works a job at stuffershack, pays his rent and bills on time, and helps his old landlady clean the halls and common areas of his building in exchange for a slightly reduced rent. Most people could subjectively assume that Griz is a “good person.” He's never killed anyone, never stolen anything more than a sip from his parents' liquor cabinet when he was seventeen, and occasionally spends time with his friends at eClaire, a small bar,
One night, at eClaire, Griz, somehow is infected with HMHVV. Either from a ghoul mugger in the alley, or making out with the seductive woman in the cocktail dress who boosted his ego by pretending to be into him. No matter the case, let's assume Griz contracts HMHVV, manages to survive and becomes a Vampire.
Suddenly, Griz is faced with an absolutely terrible choice. He needs to drink blood and essence in order to survive, just like people with diabetes need insulin and specialized diets. We don't bat an eye about insulin that comes from sheep because, well, sheep are livestock, but Griz is completely aware of the moral, legal and ethical rammifications of murdering someone. He doesn't want to do it, but when most decent human beings are placed in a “them or me” situation, a fair number of them are going to eventually draw the line and choose self-preservation. It's hard to say what the future will hold for Griz Lee Anecdote. Either killing his landlady sends him on a downward spiral into monsterous psychosis, or maybe he struggles to survive, forced to live with his guilt. Maybe the guilt breaks him and causes him to find a way to commit suicide, (a reasonable outcome considering the higher rates of suicide in veterans,) or maybe he finds some way to cope with his disorder, either by only killing and eating those who “deserve” it.
The point is, while Griz has a condition that forces him to behave in these ways for his own survival, he's still a sentient person. Granted, this is an anecdote, and a hypothetical one to boot, but I think it's reasonable to assume there is definitely more of a struggle as part of the change. He still has rights and responsibilities. If he could find a cure or a substitute for his needs, he—like almost any reasonable individual—would jump at the chance.
Now, I mentioned earlier that HMHVV (in my opinion) fits as an allegory for persons with disabilities and diseases, and here's why I think this is the case:
Social Stigma: Similar to people with disabilities, people who are HMHVV+ face social stigma and discrimination, especially if you consider mental disorders in normal people. According to The Disability Studies Reader by Leonard J Davis, (seriously good read if you're into history,) people will treat persons with disabilities differently depending on how much of the person they believe the disability to affect. A person with a missing limb or sense is seen as disabled in those areas, but we assume the person is relatively capable and competent in other areas. In cases of mental disorder, even slight mental disorder, we assume the entire human being's character is compromised. (The concept of your “mind of a monster” rule reminded me of this.) To be fair, certain strains of HMHVV can definitely be said to have compromising behaviors and mental differences, (such as the rage of the loup-garou), it's unfair to assume that every person with HMHVV actively embraces what most would consider “evil” behavior.
Stigmatizations from media: Part of the reason people might make the assumption that HMHVV people are more likely to be “evil” and actually desire to do harm to others is due to their portrayal in media. Granted, we can't be certain whether HMHVV was caused by the fictions and media about vampirism or vice-versa, once HMHVV was public knowledge, a lot of people might make the assumption that legends and text surrounding vampires, ghouls, and other “monsters” may have held some truth to them. People with disabilities have had similar treatment, if you look at a history of literature. From Charles Dickens using disabilities to create an “external representation of internal wickedness” to even the bible describing disabilities as punishments from God, the disabled have long been viewed and treated by many cultures as on the same level as criminals, the insane, and the diseased.
Changed Abilities: This connection is the easiest to justify. Ability is defined as a skill, natural talent or competency that is related to the expression of the will of the holder of said ability. While most people worry about the abilities of others in terms of whether they will be “below average,” Infected characters (much like adepts and other character types with potential attribute score adjustments) are a concern because heightened abilities make them seem more dangerous, similar to how breeds of dogs with high jaw strength are seen as more dangerous (and often mistakenly described as more aggressive breeds.)
Attempts to “fix” the problem: With the existence of vampires, ghouls, loup-garou, and so on, it's not hard to assume there would be individuals who deemed them enough of a threat to society at large that the “infection” should be “sterilized.” But, (real-life) history has seen similar reactions to people with disabilities. While eugenics programs conducted by Nazi Germany are one of the most well-known instances of this, (and forgive me for risking the invocation of Godwin's law,) there have been several similar eugenics programs carried out by multiple “civilized” nations, including the United States, where forced sterilization programs were targeted at people with mental disabilities, physical disabilities, and the blind and deaf. Programs like this existed in the US from the late 1890's up until WWII, when popular opinion of eugenics programs dropped significantly. In Shadowrun, many countries and corporations offer bounties on infected kills.
I could go on and on about this “not-so-subtle allegory” but I think it's a complete enough parallel to the issues surrounding disability and mental health that it's a worthwhile aspect of the lore of Shadowrun.
As for the infection vectors and whatnot surrounding the communication of HMHVV from one person to the next, I'm just going to go with “magic is weird, yo.” and leave it at that.
TL;DR HMHVV is a lot like a disability/disease IMHO, and I think they have just as much claim to “rights” as other metahumans of the sixth world, although there are ethical implications abound.
Again, excellent work. :D
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@Jeeves:
Long attempts at justification and rationalization aside, in the end you're still arguing for the "rights" of serial killers to keep going out and killing people, indefinitely. If that's to be social policy, you might as well dismantle the justice system and let all the other killers out of prison while you're at it. They're rabid dogs - just put them down.
Don't get me wrong, they have a place in the game. This is a "dark cyberpunk future" world, after all. But recognize that they're monsters; they stopped being people when a magical virus remade them into serial killers.
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Just a point of contention, JanessaVR; not all Infected are serial killers. Several of the players behind infected rights are specifically mentioned in the fiction as doing everything they can to not give in to their inner monster, so to speak.
Ghouls that have agreements with morgues, Vampires that only drink the blood of willing victims (hello, True Blood), and so on. This doesn't apply to all of the infected, by far, but generalizing them all as "serial killers who EAT people" is patently untrue a little naive, and maybe a little ironic as that's exactly what the Infected are on the receiving end of in-setting. :D
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I agree with you, Brackhaus. I guess I didn't emphasize that information enough in my post.
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Just a point of contention, JanessaVR; not all Infected are serial killers. Several of the players behind infected rights are specifically mentioned in the fiction as doing everything they can to not give in to their inner monster, so to speak.
Ghouls that have agreements with morgues, Vampires that only drink the blood of willing victims (hello, True Blood), and so on. This doesn't apply to all of the infected, by far, but generalizing them all as "serial killers who EAT people" is patently untrue a little naive, and maybe a little ironic as that's exactly what the Infected are on the receiving end of in-setting. :D
Here's an excerpt from the recent novel Crimson:
“These past few years...it’s like the hunger has become sharper. We don’t need to eat more, but the craving for flesh has gotten so much more insistent. Mouths salivate easy, and the temptation to go hunting for real human meat is always there, always at the back of your mind or right behind your eyelids when you go to sleep.”
.....
He paused. “I…I want to chew them up. I want to eat them while they’re still alive. I want to feel it, and I want them to feel it.” He turned his eyes on me with more soul than you’d expect from cyber replacements. “Don’t you ever feel like that? Don’t you just want to tear into them, let it drip around and flood over you?”
Even if they try to hold out, the Beast lives within them, constantly pushing - it'll win eventually. A magical virus is compelling them to be serial killers.
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Not to mention, Shadowrunning can be a perfect cover for being an infected. Typically, break-ins (Infiltrations) are done at night when there is less collateral presence and thus (frequently) less security presence. And casualties are a fat of life - many Shadowrunners are mass murderers (not serial killers) anyway, and so whether you put a bullet in their brainpan or drain them to death is mostly a matter of expediency. Ideally, you would avoid unnecessary killing (brings less heat), but if you can't risk leaving behind a witness, drain to 1 essence then kill via another means - so far as I know, there is now way to determine the peri-mortem essence rating of a corpse. And if flesh is your thing, you just have to make it hard to notice that pieces of an already dead foe will be missed - fire or chunky salsa-fied works well here.
Point being, if you decide that killing is the way to go to feed your unique dietary requirements, Shadowrunning could provide a more ethical purpose for such activities, or at least a more profitable one. And certainly a less conspicuous one.
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Not to mention, Shadowrunning can be a perfect cover for being an infected. Typically, break-ins (Infiltrations) are done at night when there is less collateral presence and thus (frequently) less security presence. And casualties are a fat of life - many Shadowrunners are mass murderers (not serial killers) anyway, and so whether you put a bullet in their brainpan or drain them to death is mostly a matter of expediency. Ideally, you would avoid unnecessary killing (brings less heat), but if you can't risk leaving behind a witness, drain to 1 essence then kill via another means - so far as I know, there is now way to determine the peri-mortem essence rating of a corpse. And if flesh is your thing, you just have to make it hard to notice that pieces of an already dead foe will be missed - fire or chunky salsa-fied works well here.
Point being, if you decide that killing is the way to go to feed your unique dietary requirements, Shadowrunning could provide a more ethical purpose for such activities, or at least a more profitable one. And certainly a less conspicuous one.
I (and my group) abandoned traditional Shadowrunning years ago. Honestly, there's more than enough excitement in the Sixth World without having to play an amoral psycho who's only morals are "I shoot people in the face for money, and I don't care who." The recent novelette "DocWagon 19" by Jennifer Brozek was a perfect example of this. Such "alternative campaigns" have far more appeal for me these days. If you're in search of excitement in the Sixth World, there's no shortage of ways to get it legally. A DocWagon HTR team, monster hunters, bounty hunters, escort duty / assisting the Draco Foundation or the Atlantean Foundation on digs in dangerous parts of the world (Tomb Raider, anyone)?
As for more "traditional" Shadowrun campaigns, I didn't mind basic industrial espionage/sabotage, as long as the damage was strictly property. Corp A hires you to spy on / trash the warehouse of Corp B, well, that's no biggie. Corp B will probably hire you to do the same thing to Corp A the next week. Both of them understand that's just how the game is played in the Sixth World. But the idea of wetwork for hire does not appeal to me.
I don't blame people for shooting at Shadowrunners - they typically have good reason to. So I'm all for them shooting at the Infected while they're at it - they have even more reason to.
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Yeah, I feel the need to reiterate this; just because they're Infected, doesn't make them Not People. It makes them sick, messed up people. You know what we do with those? We don't just immediately kill them, we try to treat them (though yes, people do still advocate just euthanizing them all). There are a number of ways for the Infected to go around without ever having killed a person in their lives (as unlikely as it is). I could easily see an Infected Rights group offering hard nuyen if people donate their bodies to the kitchen post-mortem. There's also the whole taboo thing about Infected leading people to idolize them.
Arguing they're rabid is misrepresenting them because they can have self-control, and there hasn't been enough time/experience to develop a vaccine, cure or alternative food source with less moral problems (Dunkelzhan's Will still has a payment ready for the first group to make a non-metahuman meat that satisfies the ghoul dietary requirements, one developer in Chicago has been working on pigs). Yes, it's getting harder to resist; that doesn't mean they won't succeed. People get a whole lot of monkeys off their backs today.
You're also sort of ignoring the sheer power and utility of the Infected; yeah, they could become monsters. Has danger ever stopped a Megacorporation or government in the Shadowrun Universe?
P.S. Essence Drain is actually addictive and can feel good. You don't always need to hold down the victim.
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Even if they try to hold out, the Beast lives within them, constantly pushing - it'll win eventually. A magical virus is compelling them to be serial killers.
To be fair, that is very recent fiction (and one I haven't read yet, unfortunately), but the fiction within the setting has recently indicated that something is ... for lack of a better term... inciting the Infected. Something is going on that causes symptoms to be worse (sunlight allergies are mentioned as being harsher, regeneration increases to the point where the body of an infected rejects even deltaware implants, etc). We don't know what's causing this (yet), but something is going on and it's been going on for a few years at least.
Which, of course, just serves to escalate the whole problem. As others have said, though; some infected are still clinging to metahumanity, and I think you paint a purposefully darker picture than necessary when you say that they'll all end up as serial killers, when we specifically have no grounds to believe that's true. I'd also point out that even though this person you've quoted admits to a hunger, he's conversing with someone and hasn't eaten them (yet, anyway). I'd appreciate it if you didn't quote any more as I haven't gotten around to reading that one yet, as mentioned, but that is hardly the only example of infected in the fiction resisting their new urges.
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To be fair, that is very recent fiction (and one I haven't read yet, unfortunately), but the fiction within the setting has recently indicated that something is ... for lack of a better term... inciting the Infected. Something is going on that causes symptoms to be worse (sunlight allergies are mentioned as being harsher, regeneration increases to the point where the body of an infected rejects even deltaware implants, etc). We don't know what's causing this (yet), but something is going on and it's been going on for a few years at least.
Which, of course, just serves to escalate the whole problem. As others have said, though; some infected are still clinging to metahumanity, and I think you paint a purposefully darker picture than necessary when you say that they'll all end up as serial killers, when we specifically have no grounds to believe that's true. I'd also point out that even though this person you've quoted admits to a hunger, he's conversing with someone and hasn't eaten them (yet, anyway). I'd appreciate it if you didn't quote any more as I haven't gotten around to reading that one yet, as mentioned, but that is hardly the only example of infected in the fiction resisting their new urges.
Near as I could tell, this was also the character in question Leaning on the Fourth Wall (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/LeaningOnTheFourthWall), telling the reader about the transition from 4th Edition to 5th Edition game mechanics for the Infected. They talk about this in SR4 Storm Front and then again in SR5 Run Faster. Reading between the lines, I was guessing that it was rising magic levels causing the virus to "go into overdrive," as this was all of a sudden (within one year, I believe), and affecting all of the already Infected worldwide. This argues against viral mutation, which ought to just be responsible for creating new and more hungry / sunlight sensitive creatures from newly-Infected victims.
And the reason he hadn't eaten the person he was speaking to was because that person was a vampire - "Red" - the so-called protagonist of the novel.
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I like the streamlining of the virus, but would also love to see a Strain II universal template. I disagree that they should all be monster NPCs though, but that's because I've always loved vampires and the idea of playing them (although IRT Shadowrun, the Ghoul struck me as more iconic).
I like your idea behind Mind of a Monster, but there does not seem to b a mechanical effect to enforce it (although, if only NPC, its a moot point). Have you thought of replacing it with the Berserker Negative SURGE Quality? It would be thematically appropriate; apex predators consumed by hunger, having to make the roll under stress to not just lash out and kill/eat that which annoys them.
Another thought (tied in with the fiction in Run Faster), perhaps there could be a mechanical effect (beyond wanton Essence draining) that 'rewards' the ones giving in to their urges?
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Uh... 'So-called' protagonist? How is Red not the major character of Crimson?
And no, you don't know that the Infected Red was talking to would have just eaten a mundane metahuman they were talking to at that point in time. Hell, I'd argue that HMHVV-infected metahumans still count as metahumans in regards to Dietary Requirements, and they're totally vulnerable to Essence Drain (when it comes to Strain I).
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Your streamlining gave me an idea about Strain II. Instead of the one we are familiar with, what if Strain II is a rare form of the virus, between Ghoul and Vampire? Essentially, someone getting Infected by a Ghoul but not having the 1 point of Essence to make the transition. Normally, they'd die. But with it (the virus) being magical (and wanting to survive) perhaps in some rare cases, a transformation occurs. The individual would be a cross between Ghoul and Vampire.
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Hell, I'd argue that HMHVV-infected metahumans still count as metahumans in regards to Dietary Requirements, and they're totally vulnerable to Essence Drain (when it comes to Strain I).
Most ghouls won't eat other ghouls for the same reason they don't eat clowns.
They taste funny. 8)
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Just a point of contention, JanessaVR; not all Infected are serial killers. Several of the players behind infected rights are specifically mentioned in the fiction as doing everything they can to not give in to their inner monster, so to speak.
Ghouls that have agreements with morgues, Vampires that only drink the blood of willing victims (hello, True Blood), and so on. This doesn't apply to all of the infected, by far, but generalizing them all as "serial killers who EAT people" is patently untrue a little naive, and maybe a little ironic as that's exactly what the Infected are on the receiving end of in-setting. :D
Um....
Not to be a jerk, but I think some of you are over simplifying or maybe under-importancing the horrificness of the virus(es).
This isn't a bad case of chicken pox or someone addicted to cocaine.
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I'm not trying to make the negatives sound less painful, myself; all I'm trying to get across is there is a stable presence of Infected who aren't going along with their urges, who don't hurt people (who don't volunteer for it, at any rate), who fight for their rights as sapient beings with an affliction/addiction they would like to see cured (or at least treated). That is inarguable by the books/history of Shadowrun.
I'm all about the horrific nature of the virus, of what it does to metahumans on either side of the Infected situation. Those people who fight it give a bright spot that only makes the depraved/fallen even worse in comparison, and the feral are easily a source of both pity and disgust.
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What MijRai said.
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That is where I think SR itself has let the player-base down.
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I don't think there's been any let-down in the case of HMHVV. Sure, they don't grab you by the hair and rub your nose in 'THEY MUST EAT HUMANS TO LIVE' as much as some people want. That shouldn't be necessary. We're all adults (or old enough to comprehend), we can read the dietary requirement and Essence Drain/Loss and figure what they need to survive, especially when it is pointed out. Most of us also know chewing on your neighbor is generally bad, mkay?
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It's been said, but I will say it again:
"Fire cures all HMHVV problems"
The way I look at it is, it's simple survival. They EAT people to live. I am People. There-fore I am dinner. Thus, to stop being dinner, burn the infected to ash. Problem solved.
You and whine and cry and gnash your teeth with the rally cry of "The infected are people too!!" all you want, it doesn't change the fact that they have to EAT PEOPLE to live.
Yes, Ghouls do not actually have to go out and kill someone for their food... they can make deals with hospitals, or morgues, or ask people to leave them their bodies when they die so the Ghouls can make human cupcakes out them.... but have you actually done the math? To survive (the last I saw anyways,) a Ghoul must eat at least 1 pound of meta-human flesh a week.. Now that doesn't sound like much, especially considering the average person in North America eats 5 pounds of food each day... But, that is Human flesh we are talking about!
So to just survive, they need 52 pounds of human flesh a year.... to SURVIVE! Not be healthy, but survive... so that is the bare minamum they need.... lets examine that for a minute.
When butchering an animal for meat, there is a large loss in the procedure as you get rid of unwanted fluids and 'waste cuts', so much so in fact that for cattle, what starts off as a 1200 pound steer alive turns into about 750 pounds for butchering. (a loss of about 40%!) from there, if you want to butcher that carcass into trimmed boneless meat, that 750 carcass turns into about 500 pounds of meat....(about 40% of the original 1200 pound steer).
So a 200 pound man would yield about 80 pounds of meat.....or feed a single ghoul for a year.
So, for that single ghoul to live reasonably for a year, a single person has to die. Basically a 1 to 1 ratio.
Now, lets look at Vampires... these sad, sorry little fangs need essence to survive... you know, the very 'SOULS' of the people they feed off of. (if you believe that essence = soul....) and they lose essence at the rate of 1 a month even if they are not doing anything... "Vampish"... So to survive a year, a Vampire must consume the very souls of at LEAST 2 people. (12 months in a year. 6 essence per juice bag person...)
So a 2:1 ratio for the survival of "poor little innocent vampire", at least 2 people must die to save 1 vamp.
****
I'll say it again.
Fire cures all HMHVV woes.
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For all the whining and crying and gnashing of teeth from the 'kill all Infected monsters' brigade, there are a heck of a lot of people dead to other causes. Shadowrunners as an industry usually rack up a few kills per run, and that's just in keeping a quiet run quiet.
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Also, seriously, a ton of people die every day in Seattle in Shadowrun without a ghoul doing the killing. I find it quite plausible that a ghoul can survive off of dead bodies ... but don't take my word for it, let's do some math.
The death rate in the US right now is 8 people per 1000 per year. I'm willing to bet that it's higher in Sixth World Seattle, but let's just leave the numbers there. The Seattle metro area has a population of 3.6 million people today. I really have no idea what the difference to the Sixth World Seattle is... I'd guess that it's higher, but not by a ton.
Okay, so let's apply those numbers - 28,000 people die per year in SWSeattle, so about 75 people a day. Presuming an average poundage of meat gain of, let's say 50 pounds a person ... that means we get around 3750 pounds a day of human flesh potential. If a ghoul needs a pound of flesh a week to survive, that means that our SWSeattle can easily support 25,000 ghouls a year without the ghouls killing anyone.
These numbers were generous in some ways (lbs per corpse) and quite conservative in others (death rates), so I think it would about even out. Suffice to say, a well connected ghoul network of 5000 individuals could easily feed themselves in SWSeattle without resorting to killing.
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That assumes people are just fine with their lived ones being turned into ghoul chow....
Trust me, the majority wouldn't be. Look at the opposition that comes from just asking if organs can be harvested to save lives! If people wigg out at the thought that 'Daddy' isn't whole if they take his kidney after his tragic death, they definately aren't going to let 'Daddy' be turned into ghoulburgers.
And hence why they are still fighting for rights, and some countries put bounties on them...
Until a food source, other than Grandma, can be found, ghouls will continue to be hunted.
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That assumes people are just fine with their lived ones being turned into ghoul chow....
That's why I was conservative with my number of pounds. Rather than the stated 80 lbs, I went for 50 lbs average. If you adjust further downwards (let's say 20 lbs), you can still support 10,000 ghouls and a 2500-5000 ghoul population is trivial. Death rate is probably, conservatively, twice the current. I could see as high as three or five times the current in Seattle.
In my mind, providing a corpse to ghouls is actually a fiscal transaction. They give you a stipend per year for the right to an amount of your flesh after death. The stipend pays for 10 years or until you die, whichever comes first, after which they have unfettered rights to your corpse unless you buy them out.
I would guess most wageslaves would jump at that deal, especially with a 2000 nuyen per year stipend. That helps pay for a decent vacation. Or VR-cation.
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Yeah, if some group offered to pay a 2-5k nuyen payout to a Barrens resident if their body is 'donated' to the ghoul cafeteria after they're dead? I could easily see it working. This is the dystopic future full of poor people. Giving them a payout like that would do wonders.
Reaver, that is true; you are on the menu. That still doesn't obviate their sentience and desire for rights and self-preservation in the setting. The Infected Rights movement has a proper basis to exist, at the very least.
I also agree with the fact that until a cure or vaccine or alternate food-source is discovered, they'll be persecuted or hunted in most regions (don't forget the Feral problem either). I totally understand that. My argument hasn't been me wholeheartedly waving the Infected Rights flag; mine is waving the 'Infected Rights Are Viable And Should Exist' flag, because by canon they do and the ramification/morals are right there. I've just been stuck on one side of the argument because of folks going 'the only option is fire' when it really isn't. It's totally a viable and valid character perspective, but not really accurate to an objective view from outside.
P.S. You're totally overlooking the fact that a vampire could also just take 1 Essence each from 12 people to survive for a year without killing or overly hurting anyone. People are crazy, and there's explicitly vampire groupies/fetishists who volunteer for that kind of thing. I'm trying to remember where the numbers Patrick Goodman posted are, but he actually drew up the Infected numbers per million or so, it shows Strain I and Strain II are extremely rare. There's plenty of crazy groupies compared to actual Infected.
Also, they updated Dietary Requirement; it's about a pound a day now to survive as a ghoul, and there's that whole fresh/raw requirement as well, storage is difficult. That said, a 200 pound person should actually provide about 140-150 pounds of meat, since bones are about 20% of your body-weight and offal/skin is edible to ghouls as well. So almost every dead person a day can feed at least 80 ghouls, fomoraig, harvesters, loup-garou, or grendels and 20 gnawers.
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I would be highly surprised if you retained an 80%+ weight on a butchered human. I'm an exceedingly careful hunter, keeping parts of the animal most don't (I keep the heart, lungs, liver, kidneys. Most hunters don't) and after butchering I am lucky if I get 60% weight to food ratio...
Remember, its FLESH you need. That means muscle tissue. Fat is not tissue. In fact eating straight fat is a good way to make your self sick! Also, don't confuse marbling with fat... they are different as well...
Unless you have actually butchered an animal by hand, its hard to imagine just how much we don't/can't use. Some of it becomes toxic just from the processing (anything related to digestion you want to stay clear of.... fical matter can spread easily).
Mind you, I am not going out and butchering a person to find out :p
My only real question though is: 'where would ghouls get the money to pay people for their bidies???'
Yes there are lots of people in the barrens who might be tempted by such an offer.... but how are the ghouls paying? They can't hold real jobs, they are hunted in many countries, and they are not exactly welcome in the workplace.... so where are THEY getting that extra 2 to 5k a year to pay for a body when they themselves live in the barrens?? If anything, thry are worse off then the SINless in the barrens. At least the SINless can actually look for a day job without worrying about getting shot for bounty money....
And I agree, there would and should be a 'Infected Rights ' group in SR. It is totally something that would spring up.
Heck we have right now:
Flat Earth Society
Freemen on the land associaton
Ancient Aliens Society
And those are just the crazy idiots I watched yesterday on You-Tube for a chuckle!
The only thing you can be sure of is: "If it is a Cause, it will have a supporter." (Note: this doesn't mean those supporters are intelligent...... kinda like all the college kids in the USA right now that want to BAN free speech...)
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I would be highly surprised if you retained an 80%+ weight on a butchered human. I'm an exceedingly careful hunter, keeping parts of the animal most don't (I keep the heart, lungs, liver, kidneys. Most hunters don't) and after butchering I am lucky if I get 60% weight to food ratio...
I figure ghouls are not overly fussy and all of the organs are fair game.
It is a shame they can't have it cooked because liver is sooooo much better when fried IMO.
Remember, its FLESH you need. That means muscle tissue. Fat is not tissue. In fact eating straight fat is a good way to make your self sick! Also, don't confuse marbling with fat... they are different as well...
Ghouls are still living organisms though and probably need some level of fat in their diet. Granted you wouldn't just go snarfing a lot of it straight, but you can still chop it up and mix it with the rest for flavour. Indeed Suet (raw beef or mutton fat -including the hard fat found around the liver and kidneys is still a key component of haggis and similar dishes, so you are not losing all the fat.
Edit:
That said, we did mention here (http://forums.shadowruntabletop.com/index.php?topic=22954.msg423205#msg423205) how a human skeleton would account for 12% -15% of body weight and fat does count for 12-17% on the average person which like you said a lot of that fat probably is not going on the menu.
As I mentioned before ironically the best meat is on the lean runner type with the lowest body fat that is also unfortunately the hardest ones to catch. ;)
This also raises a good point.
We automatically assume that bones are out, because the requirement says flesh. However would bone marrow count?
I mean it's not a lot, but hey some people like crab legs.
Hmm.. note to self: possible market for bone crackers for the ghoul market. Have Roddy see what kind of pressure we are talking about and can a manual device do it easily.
Unless you have actually butchered an animal by hand, its hard to imagine just how much we don't/can't use. Some of it becomes toxic just from the processing (anything related to digestion you want to stay clear of.... fical matter can spread easily).
Yes and no. We do have some idea as we did our share of hunting in earlier years, but having been abroad as well, I recognize Western hunters do not use as much of the kill as some hunters in other corners of the world.
Tripe (beef intestines) are often eaten and many cultures eat animal intestines. Indeed the French still eat Andouille of which some varieties use the entire pig gastrointestinal system.
Granted in the later case this is smoked, but it does not mean a dry cure could not be done that could fit a ghoul's requirement with a bit of culinary magic.
Plus like the requirement says, Flesh. So they don't need to be skinning a dwarf (though I would insist on washing one) before eating, compared to where you wouldn't keep the hide on a cow or deer for consumption.
Mind you, I am not going out and butchering a person to find out :p
Awwww..... *puts away the Knife and Scale set*
My only real question though is: 'where would ghouls get the money to pay people for their bidies???'
Yes there are lots of people in the barrens who might be tempted by such an offer.... but how are the ghouls paying? They can't hold real jobs, they are hunted in many countries, and they are not exactly welcome in the workplace.... so where are THEY getting that extra 2 to 5k a year to pay for a body when they themselves live in the barrens?? If anything, thry are worse off then the SINless in the barrens. At least the SINless can actually look for a day job without worrying about getting shot for bounty money....
That is a good point, though a smart ghoul might well offer their.... cleanup ..... services to the local criminal organizations and get some bodies/favours/gear that way.
Or a team up, I recall in another thread we were discussing a Wendigo using his abilities to hunt and drain bodies and letting his ghoul allies eat the remains, plus probably being unknowing scapegoats if anyone comes looking for the missing people.
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@Reaver:
You are just the type of player I wanted to share my house rules here with. I hope they're of some use to you.
Honestly, what's next? Rights for the Shedim, the Invae and the Horrors, while we're at it?
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Too late... ;)
#HugAHorror (http://pbs.twimg.com/media/CXxhPHXWEAAgi8Q.jpg)
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Not to mention there are plenty of insect cults. Universal Brotherhood for all! *shudders*
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Honestly, what's next? Rights for the Shedim, the Invae and the Horrors, while we're at it?
Or rights for Trolls and Orks, amirite?
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Or rights for Trolls and Orks, amirite?
Invalid comparison. Neither Orks nor Trolls eat people (Humanis propaganda aside). Every last one of the Invae see (meta)humanity as nothing more than hosts for their spawn, and the Shedim and the Horrors outright want to exterminate (meta)humanity as a whole. But the Infected Rights crowd probably think they're misunderstood, cute, cuddly little bunnies who just need a hug (right before getting eaten, with a terribly shocked expression on their face).
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Or rights for Trolls and Orks, amirite?
Invalid comparison. Neither Orks nor Trolls eat people (Humanis propaganda aside). Every last one of the Invae see (meta)humanity as nothing more than hosts for their spawn, and the Shedim and the Horrors outright want to exterminate (meta)humanity as a whole.
That does still leave the Shedim in the 'doesn't eat people' category.
But the Infected Rights crowd probably think they're misunderstood, cute, cuddly little bunnies who just need a hug (right before getting eaten, with a terribly shocked expression on their face)..
No, we think they are dangerous sufferers of a disease which has severe mental and physical impairments. What if they suddenly found a cure for HMHVV, or a type of vat grown meat product that can be eaten by and sustain the infected without needing to feed on metahumans (alive or dead). Would you still want to kill them all?
Think back about how people with AIDS were treated back in the 80s and 90s and how those with mental disorders have been treated throughout history. The more you create an 'us vs them' dialog, the more you gear up for a war. I'd be willing to bet that most of the infected rights folks aren't advocating for them to be everywhere, just not to to be treated as animals rather then the sapient beings they are (outside of the ferals, who basically are animals at this point). Besides, I'm pretty sure it's be easier to find a cure or food substitute then to kill them all. Being a magical virus that can cross species mutate it'll probably be neigh-impossible to completely eliminate from the world.
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I don't think there's been any let-down in the case of HMHVV. Sure, they don't grab you by the hair and rub your nose in 'THEY MUST EAT HUMANS TO LIVE' as much as some people want. That shouldn't be necessary. We're all adults (or old enough to comprehend), we can read the dietary requirement and Essence Drain/Loss and figure what they need to survive, especially when it is pointed out. Most of us also know chewing on your neighbor is generally bad, mkay?
Issue #3
Also, what about the peculiarities of the individual Infected? Sure any part of the human works for the Infected, but "Hell I got tastes and refinements just like you prey animals er non infected. Ima Psoas man myself."
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That does still leave the Shedim in the 'doesn't eat people' category.
Oh, yes, how terribly remiss of me - they're in the "wants to kill everyone" category.
No, we think they are dangerous sufferers of a disease which has severe mental and physical impairments. What if they suddenly found a cure for HMHVV, or a type of vat grown meat product that can be eaten by and sustain the infected without needing to feed on metahumans (alive or dead). Would you still want to kill them all?
Yup. Their minds have been twisted into serial killers and can't be trusted not to go hunting humans. Chuck all of them into a big bonfire and end the threat.
Think back about how people with AIDS were treated back in the 80s and 90s and how those with mental disorders have been treated throughout history. The more you create an 'us vs them' dialog, the more you gear up for a war. I'd be willing to bet that most of the infected rights folks aren't advocating for them to be everywhere, just not to to be treated as animals rather then the sapient beings they are (outside of the ferals, who basically are animals at this point). Besides, I'm pretty sure it's be easier to find a cure or food substitute then to kill them all. Being a magical virus that can cross species mutate it'll probably be neigh-impossible to completely eliminate from the world.
And as I said in my first post in this thread (did you read it?), that's a bad comparison. AIDS patients don't kill and eat people - if they did, discrimination against them would be fully justified. If HIV had the magical properties of HMHVV, it would be an entirely different issue. But it doesn't, so comparing HMHVV to HIV doesn't really work.
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But the Infected Rights crowd probably think they're misunderstood, cute, cuddly little bunnies who just need a hug (right before getting eaten, with a terribly shocked expression on their face)..
No, we think they are dangerous sufferers of a disease which has severe mental and physical impairments. What if they suddenly found a cure for HMHVV, or a type of vat grown meat product that can be eaten by and sustain the infected without needing to feed on metahumans (alive or dead). Would you still want to kill them all?
Think back about how people with AIDS were treated back in the 80s and 90s and how those with mental disorders have been treated throughout history. The more you create an 'us vs them' dialog, the more you gear up for a war. I'd be willing to bet that most of the infected rights folks aren't advocating for them to be everywhere, just not to to be treated as animals rather then the sapient beings they are (outside of the ferals, who basically are animals at this point). Besides, I'm pretty sure it's be easier to find a cure or food substitute then to kill them all. Being a magical virus that can cross species mutate it'll probably be neigh-impossible to completely eliminate from the world.
Yes I would still want to kill them all. Humans do not need to eat meat to survive, yet we do. They can create the Best Meattm doesn't mean they will eat it. Are you going to force them to only eat Best Meattm?
Personally I think Shadowrun, as time has gone on, has lost it's edge.
*bonus points if someone knows the best meat reference.
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Admittedly, I enjoyed SR a whole lot more before Twilight got made into movies......
How something (a series of novels) that is used a substitute toilet paper got made into 4 movies is beyond me....
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How something (a series of novels) that is used a substitute toilet paper got made into 4 movies is beyond me....
Soooo....... this might not be a good time to mention they made an additional seven short films (http://www.hypable.com/twilight-short-films-watch-online/) set in the Twilight universe?
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Soooo....... this might not be a good time to mention they made an additional seven short films (http://www.hypable.com/twilight-short-films-watch-online/) set in the Twilight universe?
This (http://cdn1.bigcommerce.com/server3400/v4eyu8t/products/1595/images/2608/Edward_and_Bela_Juniors__38895.1431037480.1280.1280.jpg?c=2) link may provide some therapy.
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How something (a series of novels) that is used a substitute toilet paper got made into 4 movies is beyond me....
Because tweens are too dumb not to love abusive relationship crap? At least we can take solace that the SR vampires burn in the sun rather then sparkle.
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How something (a series of novels) that is used a substitute toilet paper got made into 4 movies is beyond me....
Soooo....... this might not be a good time to mention they made an additional seven short films (http://www.hypable.com/twilight-short-films-watch-online/) set in the Twilight universe?
Stop the World. I want off. Now.
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I've always considered Twilight to be propaganda, myself. Any modern setting with vampires, I automatically assume there is some form of Twilight or create an equivalent myself, and the entire origin of it is less-than-noble vampires using it to beguile people/make them easier to target (and don't just say tweens, I've seen far too many mothers loving those books too).
By the way Reaver, comparing those groups and Infected Rights is flat-out ridiculous. We've got conspiracies with no evidence as compared to sapient, intelligent Infected who really aren't happy with the disease they've contracted wanting to not kill people but still live.
I've also done my share of hunting and butchering; my main thought was that the parts we humans throw out are likely edible to a ghoul, since flesh as a term can apply to all soft parts of the body, to include organs, fat and muscle. They also have an increased Body as part of their 'eaters of raw flesh' gig, so I'd imagine the stuff that is toxic to metahumans is less so to ghouls.
Janessa, I know you have me on Ignore for some reason most likely related to the fact that I don't pander to your biased ideas. Regardless, I'll address your arguments for other people to see.
One; we trust a number of criminals and mentally ill people out of prisons and hospitals after their release; claiming you can never trust any Infected is silly. Especially when they are still metahumans. Yes, some of them will lose control, or just don't care to keep control. Trying to exterminate them all when it is a fraction that do wrong is pretty messed up.
Two; comparing Insect Spirits, Shedim and Horrors to the Infected is just as preposterous as comparing HIV to HMHVV, if you want to make that argument. The first three aren't metahumans at all, and are generally alien to our understanding except for their desire to mess with metahumanity in some way; Insect Spirits use us as hosts, Shedim have a hatred for all things living and the Horrors apparently feed on negative emotions and sensations or something (I've never actually played Earthdawn, I may be a bit off on the last one). Infected are metahumans who are biologically dependent on eating other metahumans in some way, shape or form. They don't get much of a choice there.
Three; no-one at any point here has said the Infected Rights people are going 'oh, they just misunderstood and victimized!' Some of them may be idiots like that, sure; I expect those ones die pretty quickly. Look at Thomas McAllister. He had a sister who got Infected. His response? Study the disease and try to find a cure, as well as treat and help the Infected survive. Sure, in his case his sister couldn't maintain her control and he put her down in the end. Keep in mind she'd been Infected for decades at that point.
And Sipowitz, if some form of meat/blood/Essence substitute is created for the Infected... Yes, you make them eat that (unless there's volunteers for giving them the 'good stuff,' I suppose). Even if it is sub-par compared to the real deal, if they start going for fresh meat that's justification for actually putting them down. If you have the option between 'eat this stuff nobody got hurt to make' and 'go kill and eat people' and choose the latter one, you deserve what you get. When the decision is either 'I starve to death' or 'I eat someone' there's a nice moral gray area.
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I like that this thread has essentially turned into a mirror into the Shadowrun universe debate of infected rights. Some posters want to kill them all, others align with the "they are sentient and as such are worthy of protections".
In short, this whole thread is a good example of why Infected rights are a thing in the Shadowrun world...
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It is sort of amusing.
Like I said earlier though, I'm not personally arguing for or against Infected Rights in-game (that varies from character to character). I'm saying out-of-character 'they should all go to the furnace' for the reasons given is an invalid viewpoint when the books explicitly show how it is looked at from a few perspectives. It is accurate from some angles, sure. But not all (or most) of them by any means.
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I like that this thread has essentially turned into a mirror into the Shadowrun universe debate of infected rights. Some posters want to kill them all, others align with the "they are sentient and as such are worthy of protections".
In short, this whole thread is a good example of why Infected rights are a thing in the Shadowrun world...
It has been an interesting read. I'll admit it's gotten me a bit riled at times like real-world debates of this nature do.
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@MijRai
Actually, I can compare infected rights groups to those other batshit associations, for the simple reason that they are batshit crazy.... just like infected rights advocates :D
And, I would argue that the infected are not even 'human' anymore, the physiological changes the disease brings about are extensive.
Also, in the case of Ghouls, we are talking a disease with a very high vector of transfer! (A single scratch to infect you? Yea.... you're staying 3 meters away at ALL times!)
And as for Twilight.... its just a sign of the times... I'm old. My generation's vampires are the Anne Rice vampires. You know, centuries old killing machines who look on people as pets and playthings. Not emo crybabies coated in 10 pounds of glitter when hit by a ray sunshine.
Since thise books and vids, there has been a steady stream of "I'm a vampire. But I am not Baad... I'm just all angsty and brooding. With shares in a glitter company" type of characters.. (with some people so glossing over the fact that they consume SOULS, you would swear they were vegans!)
Said it once
Said it twice
Will say it again, "fire cures HMHVV. Apply to source of infection liberally. Keep applying fire until fine white ash is present."
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I have to disagree with you, then. Especially since like I said, those groups have no evidence, while a ghoul comedian can stand up and go, "*cough* You know, having to eat people to live sucks. Have you noticed how much soy you all eat? You taste like a shitty soyburger even Stuffer Shack wouldn't sell!" Or, actually say 'this sucks, I've never killed a person or Infected someone in my life, etc. etc.' How is it insane to not want people to kill your Infected family member while scientists search for a cure? How is it insane to not want people chasing you with UV lights and shotguns? How is it insane to realize that could have happened to you, and those people at least deserve the right to have a voice that isn't batshit crazy (like Fear the Dark)?
I'd definitely argue they are metahuman; they have the same basic form, sapience (excepting ferals, the joys of brain-damage), etc. They still have families, free will, a chance for a (real) cure or alternative source of sustenance. I'm not saying how people should treat them besides bounties (internment camps to quarantine them seems like a good option if a government/corporation doesn't start culling them; once you're infectious and dangerous, keeping you alive doesn't mean letting you go around with no restrictions or monitoring). Having those bits of humanity in them makes even the 'lost' ones a morally gray area.
Oh, I despise Twilight to an immense degree. I couldn't even get through half of the first book when I tried, and I finished the Sword of Truth series! My taste towards vampires is more along the lines of Lestat, Dracula and Co. (World of Darkness is a little iffy for me, but that's generally due to players, not the game itself). Even have a first edition Interview with a Vampire on my bookshelf. That said, I like humanizing them to some degree; making them closer to human can sometimes make the horror even more, well, horrific. A tortured conscience is more interesting than a mustache-twirling villain, usually. Knowing that monstrous creature used to shop at the same grocery store as you do and donated to charity before they lost their minds is better than someone who was Infected and just tossed all morality out the window before investing in a curly-straw augmentation to replace their fangs.
I do not support the whole 'I'm just angsty and brooding' part people try to play up with vampires while downplaying the negatives either. Those flaws are really what makes the Infected so interesting to play, in my mind. If someone tried to skate over or ignore those in my game to an excessive degree, they'd be magically cured somehow! And all sorts of people would be after their hide to see how it happened. Though, it'd take a lot to push me that far.
This whole 'cure with fire' thing makes me think of discussions on the death penalty. For those who support the whole 'reprogrammed serial killer' thing (which I still maintain isn't valid in all or probably most cases), do you advocate torching all the sociopaths, psychopaths, violent schizophrenics and other violent, mentally ill people? Is it mandatory death penalty for all murderers? Should all shadowrunners be shot on sight? Why are you so vehement against the ones whose lives depend on killing, when there's a whole lot more people who kill others for dumber reasons?
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it not the act of killing that makes them so..... distasteful.
A murderer can choose to kill, or not. But a Ghoul or a vamp has (generally) no choice, they must consume people to live.
Sure, some can get by on the kindness of strangers, be that donating bodies (which I really don't see happening, at least not in numbers to support a community) or people volunteering to have part of their soul consumed due to their fucked up romantic mental imagery.
A Murderer is not infectious. If a murderer scratches you, you don't suddenly grow claws and fangs, lose body hair, go blind, become awakened and then have an almost irresistible urge to eat other people.
HMHVV is the bubonic plague of the 6th world. except instead of growing pusstules and dying, you turn into a monster and eat people.
Don't kid yourself, it's been 50 years since HMHVV was discovered, and they don't have a cure, or a vaccine. Nor (I suspect) will they ever find one, thanks to the disease being awakened. In the almost 20 years since the Big D kicked the mana-hole in the sky, not a single company has found a substitute food for ghouls.... And again I doubt they will, since the prime ingredient seems to sapience and not the food stock. (hence why Whimps are not a valid food source, Whimps are not sapient. Which leaves us with 2 options:
1: Feed Ghouls regular people (be it dead, the terminally ill, condemned convicts, small unwanted children)
2: develop a new sapient species solely as a food source for ghouls.... such as actually growing fully developed clones (that are sapient!!).
Number 2 leads you back into the same moral dilemma, you are STILL killing one sapient person to feed an other.
As for #1, that is what they are doing now! (eating the dead, the terminally ill, SINless, street kids, and anything else they can catch)
Don't confuse an emotional stance for one of practically, I would fully expect a family member to do whatever they could to help an infected loved one.... They have an emotional attachment to the poor infected. But Emotional decisions are NOT rational ones. Without going too much into it, there are numerous cases of family members making ill-rational decisions for family members when an injury or illness is involved. I have had to make such a call (and it is never easy!). But family members often will go to great lengths to save the unsaveable, even if that means someone else has to suffer for their decisions. The 2 best cases that come to mind are in the first case, a child suffered a brain injury and was brain dead (zero brain function) BUT, the family insisted that the child stay hooked up to the life support systems even though there was zero chance of recovery. (It ended when the hospital got a court order to terminate life support, but they also had to have police remove the entire family has they were physically attacking the staff who were court ordered to turn off the machines) The other case was when a family got a court order to STOP cancer treatments for their 11yr old child because it wasn't "traditional native American medicine". Sadly the girl died 6 months later from the cancer (that had a 80-90% survival rate WITH chemo treatments).. and ended up before the courts AGAIN as the family sued the hospital for NOT saving their little girl and providing Chemo treatments..... Grief over the suffering of a loved one makes people do strange things.
So yes, Fire. Lots and lots of fire.
Is it the best solution? the most humane solution?
Dunno, but it does stop the infection rates if you reduce the number of carriers. And given the fact that corporations and countries can't even afford to take of actual, uninfected people (hence the HUGE amount of SINless) They definitely don't have the resources (or the Will) to care for, house, and isolate Ghouls....
Which again leads us back to... FIRE!!
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I've played more than a few characters that would find the idea of working with even the most genial ghoul uncomfortable, to say the least. Even some that "wouldn't risk it". None of them are me, though, and I wouldn't (metaphorically or literally) torch another player's sheet for their choice of character. I'd consider getting everyone happy with the game and team we're playing. I (usually) get that not every table is like that, but sometimes comments make me wonder if everyone sees the limits of their own table.
you save those you have a real investment in until they are hungry for another kill. Till they can not make it without the next job. Until I really need them. It is a nasty cycle… but that is the world we live in…
The quote is about a fixer's life, talking about runners. Murder might not be infectious, but the way it's dangled before runners? Doesn't exactly leave them whole worlds apart from the Infected.
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Well Reaver, I do understand the perspective you're coming from. There's some quite valid points, it's well argued and it makes sense from that perspective. It does seem we'll have to agree to disagree, though.
As a tangent, that whole 'can't afford to take care of the SINless' thing is sort of crazy. The reason governments and megacorporations don't take care of SINless is because they don't want to! Why give rights to the expendable work-force and risk them crawling out of poverty? The money is totally there, they just lack a motivation. Plus, by not keeping track of the SINless population, they can easily say the numbers are low with some estimate and ignore the vast majority, misleading people into thinking the SINless are a smaller problem than they really are.
P.S. VITAS is totally the Bubonic Plague equivalent. HMHVV is more along the lines of super-HIV from my mind's eye.
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Well Reaver, I do understand the perspective you're coming from. There's some quite valid points, it's well argued and it makes sense from that perspective. It does seem we'll have to agree to disagree, though.
As a tangent, that whole 'can't afford to take care of the SINless' thing is sort of crazy. The reason governments and megacorporations don't take care of SINless is because they don't want to! Why give rights to the expendable work-force and risk them crawling out of poverty? The money is totally there, they just lack a motivation. Plus, by not keeping track of the SINless population, they can easily say the numbers are low with some estimate and ignore the vast majority, misleading people into thinking the SINless are a smaller problem than they really are.
P.S. VITAS is totally the Bubonic Plague equivalent. HMHVV is more along the lines of super-HIV from my mind's eye.
Oh, I am not expecting you to agree, or to even change your mind. (Or the minds of anyone else). We are individuals who come from different walks of life and countries (I suspect) its only natural we won't see eye to eye on this, or even a lot of other topics :P And that's great! If everyone held the same opinion on everything, it would be a boring place!
As for the economies of countries, lets not drag that into this thread.... (my fault from bringing it up). There are several threads here on this subject already about that.
Yea.... VITAS is probably a better fit to the black plague now that I think about it.
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I'm still waiting for VITAS IV. Bring on the super-plagues!
I generally tend towards the option that provides the most utility in a game (provided the game doesn't explicitly spell out how it works, like with shedim); having the Infected be both monsters and men has so much more flavor and directions to go as compared to 'Oh, they're all bad and should feel bad.' Allowing the game setting to leave them some wiggle room and gray areas helps with that. The ambiguity written with the Infected lets us try to find a line, maybe we'll succeed, maybe we won't. It'll be a fun trip either way.
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I'm still waiting for VITAS IV. Bring on the super-plagues!
I'm wondering if they might not tie in a new plague to the CFD story line -- could be purposeful or unintentional. I actually think unintentional would be more scary; no, I take that back -- having a virus spread with an intelligence would definitely be more of an issue.
Unable to overwrite someone? Infect them with the plague of your choice. Could have it built in as a self-destruct when trying to remove the 'infection'.
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I'm wondering if they might not tie in a new plague to the CFD story line -- could be purposeful or unintentional. I actually think unintentional would be more scary; no, I take that back -- having a virus spread with an intelligence would definitely be more of an issue.
Unable to overwrite someone? Infect them with the plague of your choice. Could have it built in as a self-destruct when trying to remove the 'infection'.
I'm one of the people who consider CFD an unworkable addition to the game. It makes older edition ghoul infection rates look fun by comparison. If CFD exists as written in the Sixth World, there's no way it didn't infect everyone on the planet in less than a month.
Please correct me if I'm wrong (I'm really still using SR4 for the most part, even if I own many of the SR5 books to mine for ideas and I'm still reading through them a bit at a time), but CFD is spread by simple touch, right? That kind of infection speed would engulf a major city in just one day.
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Nope. Takes the transfer of an appreciable amount of nanites to pull it off; so bodily fluids can do it. Or if you aerosolize the nanites and people breathe enough in.
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Yea CFD is basically kinda like a technological STD...
Common contact is not an issue. Engaging in an exchange of body fluids however is a really bad idea! (Blood, saliva, semen, and other body fluids all contain the nanites.
From there, the rate of set in can take some time. Took FJ almost 3 years for it to overwrite him to the point he had to step away... others have been overwritten in weeks...
While I don't hate the CFD plotline, I think it could use a little more coherant write ups...
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I like all this a lot. Right on. We don't need to be touchy feelie with the zombie apocalypse.
Very nicely put together, and well said. Essence feeding monster are essence feeding monster and they should be solved accordingly.
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All the craziness of CFD aside (and that's a whole lot of crazy). Having nanites programmed to spread any type of biological virus or infection would be catastrophic. Granted HMHVV has a magical component, so much less likely to spread via tech - but anything else could be fair game.
This is where I think the various factions of the CFD plotline would battle it out behind the scenes. If a faction had majority control and was bent on destroying <fill in the blank target >, I'm not sure the 6th world could stop them...not without a ton of collateral damage. It's bad for business if you let your customer base be wiped out by the black plague! Heck just putting nanite trackers in people would be bad enough. :o
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I like all this a lot. Right on. We don't need to be touchy feelie with the zombie apocalypse.
Very nicely put together, and well said. Essence feeding monster are essence feeding monster and they should be solved accordingly.
You mean Essence feeding monster is diseased metahuman who sort of needs it to survive. And only about 10% of them feed on Essence. The rest only need blood or flesh or bone (which doesn't actually take killing to provide).
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Honestly, I'm more okay with straight-up killing Vampires than Ghouls. Vampires have to feed upon the living. Ghouls have an unfortunate diet condition and odor.
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Honestly, I'm more okay with straight-up killing Vampires than Ghouls. Vampires have to feed upon the living. Ghouls have an unfortunate diet condition and odor.
Kinda the same here. Vamps are essence suckers who have to suck the living soul out, while ghouls just need to eat carrion flesh from a metahuman. Any willing donation or corpse will do and isn't addictive like essence drain is. Still want to try my hand at playing a vamp though.
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Still want to try my hand at playing a vamp though.
Just so long as you leave the glitter at home.
Otherwise it's KOS.
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Still want to try my hand at playing a vamp though.
Just so long as you leave the glitter at home.
Otherwise it's KOS.
The only Glitter Boys that should exist are the battle suits from Rifts. I'd be 0 Twilight and all Forever Knight!
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Still want to try my hand at playing a vamp though.
Just so long as you leave the glitter at home.
Otherwise it's KOS.
The only Glitter Boys that should exist are the battle suits from Rifts. I'd be 0 Twilight and all Forever Knight!
That wasn't a bad show, considering its budget and era it was produced in.
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It had a good mix of heavy seriousness and silly jokes. It also had an episode that addressed what all the stress of being a cop can do to cut you down. Few cop shows ever seem to do that.
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I remember the episode where Nick is napping in the trunk of his car during the day and his partner takes it for a joyride. :P
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Honestly, I'm more okay with straight-up killing Vampires than Ghouls. Vampires have to feed upon the living. Ghouls have an unfortunate diet condition and odor.
I appreciate that you pointed out the unfortunate odor! Gave me a well needed chuckle for the day! ;)
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Do your Infected suffer from a lingering scent of decay and rotted meat?
After a long night Running Against The Man, does your Infected find their team mates avoid them because of unpleasant undead odours clinging to them?
Then try new WIGHT GUARD™!!!
Guaranteed to leave your Infected smelling fresh and clean a full 24 hours.
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Lol!
That is up there with the new hunting past time of Mutaqua hunting (owned by Mutaqua Unlimited subsidiary of Ducks Unlimited).
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Do your Infected suffer from a lingering scent of decay and rotted meat?
After a long night Running Against The Man, does your Infected find their team mates avoid them because of unpleasant undead odours clinging to them?
Then try new WIGHT GUARD™!!!
Guaranteed to leave your Infected smelling fresh and clean a full 24 hours.
You should run that by the Horizon PR and marketing team - I think they could make an infectious jingle to go along with it! ;)
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Do your Infected suffer from a lingering scent of decay and rotted meat?
After a long night Running Against The Man, does your Infected find their team mates avoid them because of unpleasant undead odours clinging to them?
Then try new WIGHT GUARD™!!!
Guaranteed to leave your Infected smelling fresh and clean a full 24 hours.
You should run that by the Horizon PR and marketing team - I think they could make an infectious jingle to go along with it! ;)
<face-palm>
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Do your Infected suffer from a lingering scent of decay and rotted meat?
After a long night Running Against The Man, does your Infected find their team mates avoid them because of unpleasant undead odours clinging to them?
Then try new WIGHT GUARD™!!!
Guaranteed to leave your Infected smelling fresh and clean a full 24 hours.
You should run that by the Horizon PR and marketing team - I think they could make an infectious jingle to go along with it! ;)
<face-palm>
Oh, come on now! This is pure marketing gold! ;D
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Oh, it's a good pun. Hence the facepalm
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I've always been a little exasperated by the many, many expressions of Infection, so I applaud JanessaVR's efforts to clean them up. It's likely I will adopt something very close to these rules for future campaigns.
I would not take them entirely off the table as a playable character type, though. The moral dilemmas and roleplaying opportunities are just too good, especially with the "Mind of a Monster" weakness for structure. I'd reserve automatic NPC status as the logical consequence of reaching the last stage of monster grief. (Like "Borrowed Time," it gives the character an expiration date that helps offset other advantages.)
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Great debates. Fantastic effort by Janessa. Hopefully it is of some use to people who prefer an alternate take on the Infected.
For my $0.02, I like the Infected exactly as is. I think 5th edition has been the best version of them both as NPC's and as PC possibilities. The fact that there is a real stigma for working with them or even socializing with them is a great, if somewhat uncomfortable mirror into the way certain diseases and disabilities are handled in the real world.
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Necroed... Sorry.
Infected rights... Sure... Setting them all on fire... Sure...
Both are valid. But here is a stab for the pro-infected side.
When looking at it, HMHVV is a dangerous and deadly disease. Infected need to feed on metahumanity in one way or another. I sure as hell find the idea of being eaten alive to be terrifying. But after I am dead I could not give much of a crap what happens to that waste product that used to be my body, its just meat without a consciousness inside it.
Now liken HMHVV to other diseases that will seriously mess up life for oneself and possibly others. HIV, AIDS for example. These diseases are a life sentence and even with heavy meds they will still alter your life quite a bit and possibly lead to an early death. Just a few decades ago it was a death sentence to get infected. The disease is infectious, if you're being sloppy its only a matter of time until you ruin another persons life. Would it then have been alright just to burn everyone who contracted HIV/AIDS? I find it unlikely anyone would say yes to this.
Sure, HMHVV is way way worse but both cases can lead to a trail of bodies.
Another example... The chromed up Street Samurai with a potential for cyberpsychosis. Hey, he/she/it could snap at any time and butcher their way through a neighborhood before anyone is able to stop em. Euthanize right away?
What about the awakened with superhuman psychosis... They clearly give no shits for the lives of others. Euthanize?
Head Cases?
Followers of mentor spirits with hot tempers?
Any augmented metahuman is less "human" than someone that is not augmented. And as mentioned, augs might lead to cyberpsychosis or becoming a head case... Hell augs is not even needed to become a head case and its even more virulent than even the Krieger strain.
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Asamando ! (the Ghoul State in Africa)
Do you know how that state survives ?
by using its surrounding Villagers as living Cattle ! The people are caught, rounded up and slaughtered to feed the masses of Ghouls that "live" in Asamando.
IIRC a Ghoul needs 10% of it's weight in Human Flesh per week thats 5x its weight a Year.
there's 0.5 Mio Ghouls in Asamando.
That means they need to slaughter 2.5 Million People per Year to feed the Ghouls
(and thats only when the Ghoulpopulation is stable, but HMMVV is highly contagious...Highly )
If that's ok for You go ahead, but it sure ain't ok for me.
Hough!
Medicineman
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And what about the ghouls who work for morgues/sanitation/what-have-you that have never killed or Infected anyone else? Or an affluent person who was infected with Krieger Strain (or, a valued family member was Infected) and pays people for their bodies to go to the larder after their deaths?
While an Infected state has many flaws (especially since all of their neighbors could fall into the 'food' category to the militant ones), the Infected can get along in society with some effort.
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I like to quote Heinlein in regard to such moral questions:
"Morals — all correct moral laws — derive from the instinct to survive. Moral behavior is survival behavior above the individual level."
Hunting and neutralizing infected is moral since they are a serious threat to the individual and the human society as a whole. They are predators threatening normal sapients - not by choice but by design. This is what ironically differentiates them from the psychotic mage. They literally can't survive without harming others - their will to survive conflicts with normal humans will to survive. It's not evil but a necessity for both sides to neutralize the other.
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I am more of a treat it on a case by case basis, remember infected rights does not equal infected can kill freely. If they have rights they also have responsibilities and protections, that is the vampire who feeds on willing victims (fatal disease patient take the vampire assisted suicide option) sense has the same rights and protections as you, the vampire who kills for the pleasure as much as the feed has the same right to arrest and a fair trial before sentencing. Heck look at augmentation. Any cyberware or bioware permanently lowers your essence as well if your willing the vampire sucks up 1 essence and then you get those shiny new cybereyes/arm/sleep regulator implanted. With or without the vampire you lose the essence permanently for your new augments its just by feeding the vampire for a month you get the hole first AND say a 10-15% discount on purchase price.
Not all infected are the same there are (those who have gone feral) are a danger to themselves and others who may need to be contained, those who have retained their senses but embraces a "I am greater than you" mindset eating and killing because they believe the laws no longer apply to them and find it fun who should be punished UNDER the legal system of their area, those who have retained their senses and try their best to avoid giving into their new needs who may well need protection from those trying to kill them because they are infected. Which is partly why there is a strong infected rights movement in the first place. Its very easy to apply a monster + fire = yay mindset in a black and white them and us world view. Its not so easy when your son has had his life saved by a young girl you always liked (in the she'd make a good daughter in law sense) who has been infected and changed because she deliberately sacrificed herself to save him and who is determined to fight her own disease and only feed on the willing and never enough to kill or even deliberately walked into the sunlight and commited suicide because she was afraid of what she might become. If only there'd been a cure, other option developed.
Then of course there's going to be those who are only fighting it in case they get infected, those who buy into the "vampire sparkly hunky guy" view of things and want to become one, those who have ethical and moral concerns about the slippery slope of if you start slaughtering people because of this where do you go from there? Serial killers, criminally insane, those who have anger management issues and lack the self control to not kill someone in anger at a bar fight?
I'd also like to point something interesting about your argument Jack . . .
Hunting and neutralizing infected is moral since they are a serious threat to the individual and the human society as a whole. They are predators threatening normal sapients - not by choice but by design. This is what ironically differentiates them from the psychotic mage. They literally can't survive without harming others - their will to survive conflicts with normal humans will to survive. It's not evil but a necessity for both sides to neutralize the other.
An infected, any infected is forced to feed by changes in their mind and body by the disease its not a choice its a need. Many shadowrunners (pink mohawks especially) are also a serious threat to the individual and human society as a whole they are predators threatening normal sapients, they also can't survive without harming others (its how they make money) and their will to survive conflicts with normal metahumans in a lot of cases. Which seems worse? Someone who has to feed on essence because their infected but chooses to only take it from willing donors who are dying from incurable diseases and just want the pain to stop, one last enjoyable release from pain and suffering or someone who is not infected but enjoy's killing everyone at their run sight, who in fact takes pride on killing every single guard, employee, dog or just random passer by for the thrill?
Also on a purely personal level as someone who likes playing a fox shifter or elven mage this whole kill them because they're mosnters hits a little close to home as a lot of "humanis" clubs have the same view about me and want to kill me as a monster, or cut me up to see how I work.
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Yeah, that's why I wrote "ironical". It's not a question of fault or sin, but of need. The infected are an invasive species. They need to be quarantined or killed (which is why I wrote neutralized not exterminated).
The comparison with the runner lifestyle falls short: Runners are criminals, but they aren't infectious. That's why they aren't a threat to society as a whole. Letting infected run free is a recipe for disaster. Relying on the individuals commitment not to spread it or to violate other sapients is not a broadly applicable policy.
Quarantine zones won't let people out who claim they aren't infected with Ebola - no matter if it's true. From the individual perspective it might seem cruel, but for the survival of the society it is crucial.
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Given some of the fiction I've seen the running lifestyle is very contagious ;D. My point though was more along the lines of which is worse someone with a need to kill/eat people that tries to fight it and only take what's given genuinely freely or someone who kills/eats out of choice to do so? The vampire who eats the essence that would be lost to cyber/bioware anyway or the normal human who murders people in the backwoods and roasts their ribs up to enjoy a nice rack of sam?
Also on a side note I'm pretty sure I read somewhere that infected can eat any meat/blood/etc diseases, toxcity and the like don't affect them at all.
On a slightly off topic note how did the whole disease originate anyway? I know its a magic virus that appeared with awakening but does anyone know the original patient zero for it?
On a scary thought given its getting worse perhaps its like the metahuman variants in that there is a HMHVV pure strain for a peak mana period and all we've seen so far is the early symptoms as the natural environement slowly becomes saturated enough to sustain it. Just like as first you got orks then as mana got high enough you got the Oni. First you get the vampires, then you get the nosferatu, then you get the wamphyri (elven variant) and when the magic is high enough even the weakest HMHVV sufferer is a nigh unstoppable monster and you don't want to meet the sufferers of strain IV.
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I will point out the only Strain that has to kill people is Strain I- all of the others can feed on dead flesh/bone without ever harming a single hair on someone's head.
Only Strain I Infected have Essence Drain. They are also the rarest of Infected, because their method of spreading the disease is rather hit-or-miss, all in all. I think they're about one in a million, with Bruckner-Langer strain being even rarer (about seven hundred and fifty total in Shadowrun currently, which is one in ten million people or so)
There is no known Patient Zero, because the disease was lurking in the shadows for years before it was identified. It was even active before the Awakening as most people know it (the Mayan Calendar one).
I also sort of doubt there will be more Strain Ia showing up, because it's so rare. It'd be practically unique expressions for the very few, very unlucky victims. And Banshee is the elven variant of HMHVV Strain I. Strain II is Harvesters.
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Really I could have sworn there was a mention somewhere of nosferatu and muquata being the only two known variants of some strain with rumours of a hideously powerful elven one? That was what I refering to anyone as nosferatu is to the vampire so too is wamphyiri to the banshee.
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I remember a little spiel I had an NPC deliver back in 3rd edition on the subject of "Ghoul's Rights" (or those of HMHVV infected at large).
He was an MIT&T Biologist (specializing in Awakened/Para-biology) speaking before the UCAS Congress.
I've had to paraphrase it, as the original document with my notes has been lost to the wiles of time (and a broken thumb drive).
HMHVV by its nature is self-terminating in the long run.
If it spreads too fast (and given how overtly virulent it is, that is entirely possible) it will kills off its food source through two self-compounding vectors (consumption OR conversion).
Ignoring issues of ethics and morality for a moment, for both infected AND non-infected "food"...
Yes, intelligent non-feral Infected can "cattle ranch" meta-humans to sustain themselves (Asamondo does this).
However, the rate or HMHVV producing non-feral (sapient and sane) Infected is INCREDIBLY low; creating far more mindless monsters than productive ones.
Extrapolated to a large scale (space and time) cattle ranching people, even our "undesirables", is simply not a viable solution by sheer population vectors.
Fact is, the Infected don't age and are effectively immune to all other natural illness and disease. In practical terms, the only time Infected suffer population loss is death by starvation or trauma.
Since humane treatment of Infected obviously prohibits both, this means over time the Infected population can only grow. A food supply crisis is an ever-growing problem by default.
What this means, is that an uncontained HMHVV epidemic will occur, either by chance exposure (every additional infected poses an increased risk to all non-infected) or as an outbreak as the Infected's demand for food grows beyond supply's capacity. This disaster is inevitable occur regardless of whether it's on metahumanity's terms, or that of the sapient-infected.
Empirically speaking, culling must occur to keep the infected population down to sustainable; again, I remind that there exists no way to accomplish this in a "humanitarian" manner (or one that violates their "rights").
In any case, the outcome for such a scenario remains clear: Metahumanity dies, and then the Infected die shortly thereafter from starvation.
(This revelation raises an interesting and poetic irony: The Asamondo Infected State only came into being because metahumanity killed off enough Feral Infected to allow significant numbers of non-Ferals to congregate and organize. Otherwise, there would simply be too much competition for food between ferals and non-ferals)
Returning to the realm of morality and ethics now, I hope it's clear now that any sort of advocacy for granting and preserving the rights of Infected (even the intelligent ones) requires a powerful supplemental justification.
Noble intent is a start but clearly insufficient on its own, in light of what we know about HMHVV. (How does it go? "The road to hell is paved with noble intentions")
So now I ask: What do we really get out of giving Infected "fair treatment"? The benefits of their unique culture? Culture is a fine thing, but rather useless to a dead (or dying) species.
Barring a cure or other new control mechanism, mutual annihilation is inevitable given enough time. So all this would accomplish is threatening the rest of meta-humanity with a ticking bomb for no good reason.
As terrible as it sounds on the surface, the truth is that the most moral and ultimately humane decision is to cull the Infected rather than letting the problem grow greater with time.
I urge the people here to remember that few (if any) Infected wanted to be made into flesh eating monsters. We owe it to them and the memory of their humanity why we must carry such out such a grim task.
We do not make the victims by culling them, the Infected were victims of something far more insidious and malignant before we ever began.
And I say this because every victim of HMHVV going forward, be they feral, sapient-infected, or mere "food", is one more who could have been saved if action had been taken before.
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It's a nice write-up and stuff. But I can't say that those rules would be for me. I like the complexity and diversity of the different infected.
Now my 2 cents on the whole HMHVV ethics thing. In my personal opinion, HMHVV is a condition that the victim has no control over. And no matter how dangerous the infected is for his surroundings he deserves to live. If HMHVV was more dangerous than it is, I would shoot for containing all the infected in quarantine camps, but under no circumstance for killing them. But honestly, HMHVV is just another aspect of the Sixth World that could kill you, so I don't even find it that threatening to warrant even that. Just let the infected keep to themselves and put them down when they actually committed a crime. As for Asmando... well. I might not be making myself a lot of friends but... that's the culture of that country, I couldn't care less. A metahuman life in Shadowrun has a price tag, after all. Everybody is expendable.
No matter what your opinion on Infected Rights is, though. I am against treating them as NPCs. I personally LOVE characters who fight with their inner demons on a daily basis and being infected is an amazing way for exactly that roleplaying opportunity. I mean, I also use Daemonpacts in Dark Heresy, see them slowly fall into the madness they set out on in best will and intentions but ultimately... and the same fate could go for an infected character. Maybe at some point he'll do the noble thing and take his own life. Maybe he gets himself killed by the police when the hunger takes over and he just attacks somebody out in the open. Who knows. But it's definitely something I would like to explore more in the game than I get the chance to. Oh, and by the way. I don't see anything wrong with playing characters who have an expiration date. In the gritty realism of my games, runners aren't supposed to have high life expectancy.
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I remember a little spiel I had an NPC deliver back in 3rd edition on the subject of "Ghoul's Rights" (or those of HMHVV infected at large).
He was an MIT&T Biologist (specializing in Awakened/Para-biology) speaking before the UCAS Congress.
I've had to paraphrase it, as the original document with my notes has been lost to the wiles of time (and a broken thumb drive).
HMHVV by its nature is self-terminating in the long run.
If it spreads too fast (and given how overtly virulent it is, that is entirely possible) it will kills off its food source through two self-compounding vectors (consumption OR conversion).
Ignoring issues of ethics and morality for a moment, for both infected AND non-infected "food"...
Yes, intelligent non-feral Infected can "cattle ranch" meta-humans to sustain themselves (Asamondo does this).
However, the rate or HMHVV producing non-feral (sapient and sane) Infected is INCREDIBLY low; creating far more mindless monsters than productive ones.
Extrapolated to a large scale (space and time) cattle ranching people, even our "undesirables", is simply not a viable solution by sheer population vectors.
Fact is, the Infected don't age and are effectively immune to all other natural illness and disease. In practical terms, the only time Infected suffer population loss is death by starvation or trauma.
Since humane treatment of Infected obviously prohibits both, this means over time the Infected population can only grow. A food supply crisis is an ever-growing problem by default.
What this means, is that an uncontained HMHVV epidemic will occur, either by chance exposure (every additional infected poses an increased risk to all non-infected) or as an outbreak as the Infected's demand for food grows beyond supply's capacity. This disaster is inevitable occur regardless of whether it's on metahumanity's terms, or that of the sapient-infected.
Empirically speaking, culling must occur to keep the infected population down to sustainable; again, I remind that there exists no way to accomplish this in a "humanitarian" manner (or one that violates their "rights").
In any case, the outcome for such a scenario remains clear: Metahumanity dies, and then the Infected die shortly thereafter from starvation.
(This revelation raises an interesting and poetic irony: The Asamondo Infected State only came into being because metahumanity killed off enough Feral Infected to allow significant numbers of non-Ferals to congregate and organize. Otherwise, there would simply be too much competition for food between ferals and non-ferals)
Returning to the realm of morality and ethics now, I hope it's clear now that any sort of advocacy for granting and preserving the rights of Infected (even the intelligent ones) requires a powerful supplemental justification.
Noble intent is a start but clearly insufficient on its own, in light of what we know about HMHVV. (How does it go? "The road to hell is paved with noble intentions")
So now I ask: What do we really get out of giving Infected "fair treatment"? The benefits of their unique culture? Culture is a fine thing, but rather useless to a dead (or dying) species.
Barring a cure or other new control mechanism, mutual annihilation is inevitable given enough time. So all this would accomplish is threatening the rest of meta-humanity with a ticking bomb for no good reason.
As terrible as it sounds on the surface, the truth is that the most moral and ultimately humane decision is to cull the Infected rather than letting the problem grow greater with time.
I urge the people here to remember that few (if any) Infected wanted to be made into flesh eating monsters. We owe it to them and the memory of their humanity why we must carry such out such a grim task.
We do not make the victims by culling them, the Infected were victims of something far more insidious and malignant before we ever began.
And I say this because every victim of HMHVV going forward, be they feral, sapient-infected, or mere "food", is one more who could have been saved if action had been taken before.
This brought up an interesting thought. IRL, almost every virulent disease has asymptomatic carriers. People who contracted the virus, but through the grace of God, evolution, dumb luck, or whatever possess an immune system capable of allowing the victim to carry the disease without ever showing symptoms themselves. Technically speaking, HMHVV could very well have asymptomatic carriers whose blood could be used to create a vaccine, possibly even a cure.
Now finding those carriers, on the other hand...that's the tricky part.
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I remember a little spiel I had an NPC deliver back in 3rd edition on the subject of "Ghoul's Rights" (or those of HMHVV infected at large).
He was an MIT&T Biologist (specializing in Awakened/Para-biology) speaking before the UCAS Congress.
I've had to paraphrase it, as the original document with my notes has been lost to the wiles of time (and a broken thumb drive).
HMHVV by its nature is self-terminating in the long run.
If it spreads too fast (and given how overtly virulent it is, that is entirely possible) it will kills off its food source through two self-compounding vectors (consumption OR conversion).
Ignoring issues of ethics and morality for a moment, for both infected AND non-infected "food"...
Yes, intelligent non-feral Infected can "cattle ranch" meta-humans to sustain themselves (Asamondo does this).
However, the rate or HMHVV producing non-feral (sapient and sane) Infected is INCREDIBLY low; creating far more mindless monsters than productive ones.
Extrapolated to a large scale (space and time) cattle ranching people, even our "undesirables", is simply not a viable solution by sheer population vectors.
Fact is, the Infected don't age and are effectively immune to all other natural illness and disease. In practical terms, the only time Infected suffer population loss is death by starvation or trauma.
Since humane treatment of Infected obviously prohibits both, this means over time the Infected population can only grow. A food supply crisis is an ever-growing problem by default.
What this means, is that an uncontained HMHVV epidemic will occur, either by chance exposure (every additional infected poses an increased risk to all non-infected) or as an outbreak as the Infected's demand for food grows beyond supply's capacity. This disaster is inevitable occur regardless of whether it's on metahumanity's terms, or that of the sapient-infected.
Empirically speaking, culling must occur to keep the infected population down to sustainable; again, I remind that there exists no way to accomplish this in a "humanitarian" manner (or one that violates their "rights").
In any case, the outcome for such a scenario remains clear: Metahumanity dies, and then the Infected die shortly thereafter from starvation.
(This revelation raises an interesting and poetic irony: The Asamondo Infected State only came into being because metahumanity killed off enough Feral Infected to allow significant numbers of non-Ferals to congregate and organize. Otherwise, there would simply be too much competition for food between ferals and non-ferals)
Returning to the realm of morality and ethics now, I hope it's clear now that any sort of advocacy for granting and preserving the rights of Infected (even the intelligent ones) requires a powerful supplemental justification.
Noble intent is a start but clearly insufficient on its own, in light of what we know about HMHVV. (How does it go? "The road to hell is paved with noble intentions")
So now I ask: What do we really get out of giving Infected "fair treatment"? The benefits of their unique culture? Culture is a fine thing, but rather useless to a dead (or dying) species.
Barring a cure or other new control mechanism, mutual annihilation is inevitable given enough time. So all this would accomplish is threatening the rest of meta-humanity with a ticking bomb for no good reason.
As terrible as it sounds on the surface, the truth is that the most moral and ultimately humane decision is to cull the Infected rather than letting the problem grow greater with time.
I urge the people here to remember that few (if any) Infected wanted to be made into flesh eating monsters. We owe it to them and the memory of their humanity why we must carry such out such a grim task.
We do not make the victims by culling them, the Infected were victims of something far more insidious and malignant before we ever began.
And I say this because every victim of HMHVV going forward, be they feral, sapient-infected, or mere "food", is one more who could have been saved if action had been taken before.
This brought up an interesting thought. IRL, almost every virulent disease has asymptomatic carriers. People who contracted the virus, but through the grace of God, evolution, dumb luck, or whatever possess an immune system capable of allowing the victim to carry the disease without ever showing symptoms themselves. Technically speaking, HMHVV could very well have asymptomatic carriers whose blood could be used to create a vaccine, possibly even a cure.
Now finding those carriers, on the other hand...that's the tricky part.
If memory serves, aren't shapechangers and dracomorphs carriers, cuz they are immune to HMHVV? But I guess you couldn't use that blood for a cure since their immunity is a magical innate ability of their very self.
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That was chat about the later-revealed Harvester, Senko.
I'm going to have to disagree with Dwagon's NPC assessment for a few reasons.
There's no precise, overall numbers on feral to non-feral Infected, but the numbers are not 'incredibly low.' There's an entire nation of Infected in Asamando, which has a population of 500,000 (99% ghoul, 1% other Infected, Shapeshifters, Spirits, etc.). A nation of that size couldn't function if the majority were feral. The best numbers we can currently get (for ghouls) are out of Storm Front; in Chicago, it is 40% feral due to the poor conditions and FAB III. In the CAS and UCAS overall, it is 11% Asamando claims around 5.5% are feral, but most believe it is probably around the CAS/UCAS numbers ever since they sicced the ferals they keep in prisons for everyone's safety on folks during the food riots. Most Strain I Infected are also more likely to be sapient, while Strain II is more likely to be feral (with the situation reversed for the Dwarf versions). I'm not going to make any claims as to sanity, just the ability to comprehend and function in society. Given there hasn't been wave after wave of ghouls sweeping the world, turning it into a flesh-rending zombie apocalypse, it is pretty certain that estimate of humanity's extinction is rather... Unlikely. That definitely isn't the disease's goal (nor is it most diseases' goal); killing the host kills them.
Most Infected are not immortal. Only Strain I & Ia Infected are immune to aging (the rarest kind). All of them can still be infected with other diseases (except Banshees, Nosferatu, Vampires and Wendigo who develop the Immunity to Pathogens power). There's also their Allergies to contend with, other weaknesses and only some of them can develop Immunity to Toxins. They ain't invulnerable.
And Eira, Carriers do exist for Strains II and III. They're even known of by society (being a Carrier is an automatic +1 Notoriety if people find out, and a -2 Dice Pool to all social rolls with people who know). There are Qualities to represent it, in fact. There's no cure or vaccine, however. The doctors of the setting have been attempting it for decades with no luck whatsoever. It's an Awakened Retrovirus that is actively evolving and mutating en masse inside the bodies of people already infected, much less new victims.
Shapeshifters and Drakes are immune (the former by way of not being human, the latter by way of being incompatible (if I remember right, a latent Drake who gets Infected can't undergo dracomorphosis as of last edition).
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There are, at least for Strain II and III (RF p.141 has it as a negative quality)
Dwagonzhan has brought it to a very clear point: The infected are doomed to starve.
If you look at the infection rules you see that avoiding being infected by Strain II is very unlikely unless you are super augmented to deal with pathogens. Coupled with the high prevalence of feral infected it's just madness to think society can let that threat go unchecked.
Strain I lose constantly essence - the older they get the more powers they have and the faster they lose essence. Combined with the unlimited lifespan they are guaranteed to one day take their feeding to far - especially when there sanity erodes as they lose their connection to humanity.
Vampires aren't the people they were before they were infected. That person literally died. What comes back is the virus with the memories of the person. Again, madness to let them go unchecked.
Saying Asmando is a cultural thing... Well, my cultural thing is to annihilate such cultures because they are a threat to my culture.
Live by the sword, die by the sword.
Campaigning for infected rights is campaigning for killing your own species.
Once you are infected you are allowed to see this differently - you want to survive after all. But so does your prey and this conflict always has to end with one of the two parties dying.
@MijRai
Storm Front gives precise numbers: It's 1 to 8 Feral to Functional
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And Eira, Carriers do exist for Strains II and III. They're even known of by society (being a Carrier is an automatic +1 Notoriety if people find out, and a -2 Dice Pool to all social rolls with people who know). There are Qualities to represent it, in fact. There's no cure or vaccine, however. The doctors of the setting have been attempting it for decades with no luck whatsoever. It's an Awakened Retrovirus that is actively evolving and mutating en masse inside the bodies of people already infected, much less new victims.
Shapeshifters and Drakes are immune (the former by way of not being human, the latter by way of being incompatible (if I remember right, a latent Drake who gets Infected can't undergo dracomorphosis as of last edition).
Does the Cure Disease spell work on HMHVV? I can't find anything that gives a definitive yes or no.
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It would not cure them, but it would give them the extra dice to attempt to resist the disease.
And I utterly disagree with Dwagonzhan and you, Jack. The Infected are not doomed to starve. The whole 'high prevalence' of Feral Infected thing isn't that high to begin with, especially compared to how big the world's population is. They aren't going to be able to infect that large of a chunk of the world. Even if they could, a wholesale attempt would see the kind of purge people argue for. Hell, were it organized the current rate of deaths in the Sixth World would likely be able to feed all Strain II and III Infected with plenty to spare.
Strain I and Ia Infected do lose Essence, which can only be regained by Draining others, yes. Your assertion that the more powers and age they have increases their Essence loss is incorrect, though; the only thing that speeds up Essence Loss on Infected is by using active Powers/Abilities from their Infection; Mist Form for vampires or Compulsion for Nosferatu, for instance. Your argument that the people don't come back, just some kind of sentient virus takes over? That's freaking ludicrous, and an immense stretch. Plus, they don't actually die unless they successfully resist the disease. If they are properly Infected, they go into a coma for a bit over a day, and that's only Strain I. Strains II & III don't even have a coma, just an approximately 2 week metamorphosis.
However, I do agree with you that it is madness to let them go unchecked. Checks are good. Setting them up in places where they don't have to kill is great. Hire them at the morgues where they can get food regularly without harming anyone.
I'm not arguing Asamando is a cultural thing, nor am I saying I even agree with those practices (given they buy megacorporate 'prisoners' to go to their larders). I've already spelled out the way I'd incorporate Infected into society, and the one character I made who lived in the region around Asamando hated ghouls with a great passion.
Campaigning for Infected Rights is campaigning for the rights of sentient beings who really got the shit-end of the stick. And just because they deserve rights doesn't mean their rights should infringe on anyone elses'. If a vampire goes around killing people regularly, that's murder. I'm all for lighting them up outside of extenuating circumstances. If a vampire draws from the local blood-bank and has a bunch of groupies who want their Essence Drained while the vampire is very careful not to kill them... Well, those people might be stupid, but it is their body/soul and their choice. Just like it is their choice to go slot BTLs or snort novacoke.
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I agree with MijRai infected rights doesn't equal vampire can kill and eat anyone it wants too, it can mean feeding on willing volunteers or eating hte essence that would be lost to aguments anyway. If a vampire kills and eats little kids because it chooses too then it should be arrested/killed like any other serial killer who embraces that, if they fight the virus's urges and only feed on people who are willing then they should be protected against being killed like any other sentient being.
Speaking as a shifter when you've been chased by one mob of humans wanting to kill the monster under the urging of another human who wants to skin you and sell it for a profit you get a lot less tolerant to the purge it with fire viewpoint.
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I have to say on the topic of Asamando, I don't understand how that place still exists. They're almost 100% infected, so they can't just "live of hospital waste" or "people dying of natural causes".
Which means they're deliberately raiding neighboring countries for food, or something even worse. Some people mentioned human cattle farms, which sounds horrible.
Why has that place not been turned into a radioactive wasteland by ... anyone really? Or Thor-Shot? Or a couple of Dragons burned it to the ground?
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Saying Asmando is a cultural thing... Well, my cultural thing is to annihilate such cultures because they are a threat to my culture.
Live by the sword, die by the sword.
Campaigning for infected rights is campaigning for killing your own species.
You have to explain to me how ghouls that live on another continent are a threat to your culture? I am not eager to meddle in the affairs of other countries unless I have a damn good reason. Cause frankly more often than not its none of my damn business or that of my own nation for that matter.
Infected rights do not equal the wish to kill your own species. At best it means you are increasing the risk for members of your species to be eaten but infected will never be an extinction-level threat to metahumanity. And by the way we are also the prey of lions and we haven't eradicated them just because of that. We just build settlements were deadly animals can't get us. Why can't we apply the same principles?
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Yea, I'm not for the whole "kill them all" mentality either. Sounds way too much like Humanis drek-talking to me.
A slippery slope is often slicked with the blood of innocents. That slope especially.
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(OMG, lots of activity for a thread necro!)
People talk a lot about "just eating the dead", but forget that for many cultures, the dead are considered scared. Take the Native America culture where ancestors, elders and their remains are holy. in Today's world, multi BILLION dollar developments are cancelled, or put on hold for years thanks to the discovery of a single human bone. Once that bone is found, the entire site is shut down for months or years as experts are brought in to determine if this is a recent bone or an ancient bone and if its an ancient bone - is this a graveyard? And if it's found to be a graveyard.... That project is pretty much dead. (mass protests, camp-ins, and even terrorist acts have been linked to the Native Americans as they shut down these developments).
Do you REALLY think a culture that elevates their dead and elders to such a degree are EVER going to allow their dead to be shipped off to be butchered and sold to the 'undead monsters'?
In India, people have been killed for disturbing the graves of the dead, and there is even a religious group that eats the flesh of recently diseased whose members have faced (if you call being hacked apart in the street by locals) persecution for their actions. Can you really see them allowing their dead to be hacked apart to feed "monsters"?
Its great that you all are trying to come up with a logical way to help feed the infected. But we are talking people here, are people are not at all logical. We put poisons into our bodies, water and air everyday even though we know it's hurts us. We commit acts against each other, even though we rail against those same acts being done to us. For fucks sake, as a species we can not even come to grips on how we came to be the dominate lifeform on the planet (Creation VS Evolution), We can not come to grips as to how has what rights, and when(West VS East culture values). Nope, logical solutions will not solve this issue, this issue will be solved locally but the cultures that are affected. Which means, while we have "Ghoul rights" protests here in the UCAS, there is probably government sanctioned death squads killing the infected in droves in other countries (like the Death Squads that roamed Latin Americas in the 1910s to 1980s)
The simple fact is, you have a disease that turns people into monsters that have to eat humanity to survive. In essence, you have a disease that turns people into parasites! And that disease can be spread by a simple scratch! (aka Hannabelle) We work pretty tirelessly to destroy parasitic invasions now..... The Infected should be no different.
Now, I can just hear the wailing now... "But, but the Infected are people too!".
No.
They WERE people. Now they are a dangerous parasitic infection. And should be treated accordingly. And like any infection, there are a couple solutions. Isolation, extermination, quarantine, and control are the steps taken today when serious infection rears it head (like the Ebola outbreak).
those that had the infection where isolated from the general population, no contact was allowed between those infected with Ebola those not infected (Quarantine). And those with the Ebola were treated until they either recovered or died. If they died the bodies were burned (Extermination and Control).
Well, unlike Ebola where we have a treatment, HMHVV has no treatment. There is no clue. There is no medication..... Just the healthy and the Sick, and if care is not taken the Healthy can become the Sick very quickly. So, start those flamethrowers, learn how to mix gasoline and gelatin in glass bottles, and let them all fly!
Is this a horrible action and consequence to the disease? Yes. But then again, sometimes extreme measures have to be taken to save the greater host. We cut off cancerous limbs today in order to save the rest of the person. Cutting the Cancer that is HMHVV out from the rest of the host (humanity) may be the only solution to save the host....
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Asamando doesn't actually farm metahumans. They get their bodies through a few means; any non-Infected who are imprisoned by them for felonies (smugglers, for example), invaders who keep trying to kill them (going to war to Asamando is basically putting you on the dinner plate, and is the primary source of their food) and corporate prisoners traded to them in return for Asamando's mineral wealth once they received Corporate Court recognition. They don't actually need to go on the offensive, as their mere presence incites people to attack them. Why go out and be the aggressor when the food comes to you, all angry and with excuses for you to kill them? There probably are some raids by desperate Asamandans, but those aren't going to be sanctioned, as it hurts their standing/projection of victimhood.
Besides, you don't just go and nuke a country (or Thor shot it) just because. The Megacorporations make money there, they don't mind. Dragons don't have much of a reason to care either; they could even have dragon allies for all we know, since they're a very ecologically-friendly Awakened nation. Other countries don't really care. The locals don't have the resources.
Jack does have a point in that the Infected have to feed on metahuman tissue. This is something they can't avoid. Lions and tigers and bears (oh my) can eat other things, Infected need to have one meal a day made out of metahumans.
And Reaver, the dead can be considered as sacred as can be, but Megacorporations don't care. And poor people don't care if they get a couple thousand nuyen in cold, hard cash for selling their body after they are dead. That money could mean the difference between joining your ancestors now or in years to come. There are some very vehement groups that won't do it, that's a given. But that doesn't mean no-one will do it.
The disease doesn't make parasites, it makes predators. There's a difference. You can argue the Infected are no different, but they are. They are still people, even if they are really messed up from the disease they've been Infected with. The arguments that they should be killed have some merit, this is true. I admit it. I've played characters on both sides of the fence in the Infected Rights discussion. But the denial of their personhood is too far out of line, objectively. They have sapience. They can think, they can reason. They have family. They have at least some self-control. They have the rules to make them functional PCs. All of this combines to show the Infected are thinking beings, and at least they have an excuse for the horrible things they do to people; there's plenty who do just as bad or worse with less cause.
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I would like to point out that the responses that NPC received were not unlike those here. ;)
...And that was the point of the character: To provoke debate and let the players choose which side they were going to back in an FDC centered run.
It's so strange to see some people actually getting worked up over this again almost a decade later.
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And Reaver, the dead can be considered as sacred as can be, but Megacorporations don't care. And poor people don't care if they get a couple thousand nuyen in cold, hard cash for selling their body after they are dead. That money could mean the difference between joining your ancestors now or in years to come. There are some very vehement groups that won't do it, that's a given. But that doesn't mean no-one will do it.
You make a very GRAVE mistake in your assumptions that all people value money more then their cultural heritage.
2 cases for you in the real world, and both are from North America
In May 2015, as part of the negotiations with the native Lax Kw’alaams band near Prince Rupert BC, Petronas offered them 1.1 BILLION dollars to the band members, paid over 20 years for the use of Lelu Island as a terminal. (there are 270 members of the band, or @185K a year for 20 years!) They voted 97% to REJECT the offer! (And now, just in the last 2 weeks, the Federal Government has signed off on the deal, meaning Petronas now DOES NOT have to offer them the money, or offer them anything at all beyond the 5% royalty shares to ALL the bands along the affected pipeline route)
The next case, is also from North America and is much, much older. (while I was still in college, so 1996?). Almost the same situation, but in this case it was Alberta and Oil.... Chevron offered to hire only Band members to work the field, including training costs to get the workers the skills needed to operate the oilfield, $100k per band member over 25 years, and 10% of royalties to the band for dispersment to the members. they rejected it out of hand. A year later the government approved the Oilsands, over rode the Native Bands desire to not have the development, and didn't require Chevron to pay anything extra then the Royalties, nor hire an all band member workforce.
In both cases, the Band members rejected financial security for themselves for their Cultural Heritage.
And these are just 2 examples from Canada that I can personally remember. (a country with less then 0.5% of the world population) So I can see this happening many times over the world, And know for a fact it has happened at least a half dozen times in Africa (because I was at the sites).... But Africa deals with it differently then Canada does. (Those protesters "disappear" in Africa with alarming frequency!)
In short, In Western Culture, the Dollar may rule all, but Western Culture isn't the only culture out there, and may Cultures do not place as much importance on Money as we do.
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I have to say on the topic of Asamando, I don't understand how that place still exists. They're almost 100% infected, so they can't just "live of hospital waste" or "people dying of natural causes".
Which means they're deliberately raiding neighboring countries for food, or something even worse. Some people mentioned human cattle farms, which sounds horrible.
Why has that place not been turned into a radioactive wasteland by ... anyone really? Or Thor-Shot? Or a couple of Dragons burned it to the ground?
Its a nice convenient place for corps to dispose of unwanted people.
@Reaver
The thing is that examples can come up for both sides of the fence. Take Japan lots of ancestor worship, local gods, very relgious yet I know for a fact that about a decade an entire village (only had 7 elderly people left) decided to sell all their land to a corporation for chemical storage. Shrines, graveyards and all. Then there's this more recent one https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jul/21/olympics-media-village-sacred-grave-african-slaves-rio-games sure a part of the community is upset that their dead are being built over but another part just went ahead and did it. More specifically relevant there's the case of Charle's Byrne http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/broughttolife/people/charlesbyrne where the undertaker accepted money to sell his dead body to science against his express wishes.
That's the point of this issue in a world with billions of individuals there are going to be groups on the whole spectrum from considering infected as just people with special dietry requirements through those happily selling their or others bodies to the infected for cash into those who are afraid or upset about them to the death squads sanctioned or otherwise that kill them as dangerous threats.
However not only do you have those who think their sparkly, misunderstood and cool but you have entirely different species who'll have their own take on the matter. Returning to my shifter example I can't be infected by them, not human but I can be fed on (I assume). So I'm prey to them, scary, frightening but they only want to eat me you humans want to lock me up in a cage and hack away at my body to figure out what you can sell for a profit because I'm "just an animal". Take it a step further and consider the viewpoint of the Bovine shifter who see's humans stuffing their faces with "steak". From their perspective your a dangerous threat indeed.
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You have to explain to me how ghouls that live on another continent are a threat to your culture? I am not eager to meddle in the affairs of other countries unless I have a damn good reason. Cause frankly more often than not its none of my damn business or that of my own nation for that matter.
Infected rights do not equal the wish to kill your own species. At best it means you are increasing the risk for members of your species to be eaten but infected will never be an extinction-level threat to metahumanity. And by the way we are also the prey of lions and we haven't eradicated them just because of that. We just build settlements were deadly animals can't get us. Why can't we apply the same principles?
Why do you assume that my characters live on an other continent? Or that they don't care? Ebola happened in Kongo - where I don't live - but you can bet that I perceived that as a threat and that I certainly would not campaign for people there to leave quarantine zones unchecked. Infected are a global problem and Asamando is affecting people world wide (especially if you are captured by a megacon and sold there to become food).
You don't have to take the lion as an example. Look at the wolf in Germany: It's been gone completely for almost 100 years. Only now it is slowly coming back - and yet farmers shoot them as soon as there are casualties within their herds.
We aren't talking about extinction - yet . We are talking about the threat of an invasive species that feeds on us and is seeking dominance.
The infected are not people - they are aliens. Humanity is their food source which is why they cannot truly be part of humanity. Granting them rights is the first step to becoming their cattle - as the Ghoul nation demonstrates quite succinctly.
We as a society don't deny someone who needs donor transplants the right to live, but we surely don't have enough donors to supply all who need a transplant. Likewise we as a society don't force anyone to be a donor - on the contrary, it is illegal to force someone to do so, despite the fact that this means the ill person likely dies.
Vampires are equivalent to people who need a transplant every month. And if we don't keep them in check they are creating others who also need transplants. Allowing them to grow in number is inviting catastrophe. Feeding them means giving them opportunities to grow in numbers. Not allowing them to feed means they have to die.
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And Reaver, the dead can be considered as sacred as can be, but Megacorporations don't care. And poor people don't care if they get a couple thousand nuyen in cold, hard cash for selling their body after they are dead. That money could mean the difference between joining your ancestors now or in years to come. There are some very vehement groups that won't do it, that's a given. But that doesn't mean no-one will do it.
You make a very GRAVE mistake in your assumptions that all people value money more then their cultural heritage.
2 cases for you in the real world, and both are from North America
In May 2015, as part of the negotiations with the native Lax Kw’alaams band near Prince Rupert BC, Petronas offered them 1.1 BILLION dollars to the band members, paid over 20 years for the use of Lelu Island as a terminal. (there are 270 members of the band, or @185K a year for 20 years!) They voted 97% to REJECT the offer! (And now, just in the last 2 weeks, the Federal Government has signed off on the deal, meaning Petronas now DOES NOT have to offer them the money, or offer them anything at all beyond the 5% royalty shares to ALL the bands along the affected pipeline route)
The next case, is also from North America and is much, much older. (while I was still in college, so 1996?). Almost the same situation, but in this case it was Alberta and Oil.... Chevron offered to hire only Band members to work the field, including training costs to get the workers the skills needed to operate the oilfield, $100k per band member over 25 years, and 10% of royalties to the band for dispersment to the members. they rejected it out of hand. A year later the government approved the Oilsands, over rode the Native Bands desire to not have the development, and didn't require Chevron to pay anything extra then the Royalties, nor hire an all band member workforce.
In both cases, the Band members rejected financial security for themselves for their Cultural Heritage.
And these are just 2 examples from Canada that I can personally remember. (a country with less then 0.5% of the world population) So I can see this happening many times over the world, And know for a fact it has happened at least a half dozen times in Africa (because I was at the sites).... But Africa deals with it differently then Canada does. (Those protesters "disappear" in Africa with alarming frequency!)
In short, In Western Culture, the Dollar may rule all, but Western Culture isn't the only culture out there, and may Cultures do not place as much importance on Money as we do.
There's also the protest going on in North Dakota as we speak over the building of yet another pipeline through Native American lands (and yet another sacred burial ground. Shock, stun, surprise. *rolls eyes*). Frag, I'm about as white as a person can be, and I'd still probably punch someone in the face for merely suggesting such a thing. The dollar doesn't rule in "western culture", it rules in "greedy asshole culture". My character would turn you into a greasy red smear outright.
I can see the logic on both sides. It's definitely a very complicated problem, with some frightening implications either way, and there is no simple and/or easy solution. If history is any indicator, "kill them all" is NOT the way to go. That has never ended well.
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And Reaver, the dead can be considered as sacred as can be, but Megacorporations don't care. And poor people don't care if they get a couple thousand nuyen in cold, hard cash for selling their body after they are dead. That money could mean the difference between joining your ancestors now or in years to come. There are some very vehement groups that won't do it, that's a given. But that doesn't mean no-one will do it.
You make a very GRAVE mistake in your assumptions that all people value money more then their cultural heritage.
2 cases for you in the real world, and both are from North America
In May 2015, as part of the negotiations with the native Lax Kw’alaams band near Prince Rupert BC, Petronas offered them 1.1 BILLION dollars to the band members, paid over 20 years for the use of Lelu Island as a terminal. (there are 270 members of the band, or @185K a year for 20 years!) They voted 97% to REJECT the offer! (And now, just in the last 2 weeks, the Federal Government has signed off on the deal, meaning Petronas now DOES NOT have to offer them the money, or offer them anything at all beyond the 5% royalty shares to ALL the bands along the affected pipeline route)
The next case, is also from North America and is much, much older. (while I was still in college, so 1996?). Almost the same situation, but in this case it was Alberta and Oil.... Chevron offered to hire only Band members to work the field, including training costs to get the workers the skills needed to operate the oilfield, $100k per band member over 25 years, and 10% of royalties to the band for dispersment to the members. they rejected it out of hand. A year later the government approved the Oilsands, over rode the Native Bands desire to not have the development, and didn't require Chevron to pay anything extra then the Royalties, nor hire an all band member workforce.
In both cases, the Band members rejected financial security for themselves for their Cultural Heritage.
And these are just 2 examples from Canada that I can personally remember. (a country with less then 0.5% of the world population) So I can see this happening many times over the world, And know for a fact it has happened at least a half dozen times in Africa (because I was at the sites).... But Africa deals with it differently then Canada does. (Those protesters "disappear" in Africa with alarming frequency!)
In short, In Western Culture, the Dollar may rule all, but Western Culture isn't the only culture out there, and may Cultures do not place as much importance on Money as we do.
There's also the protest going on in North Dakota as we speak over the building of yet another pipeline through Native American lands (and yet another sacred burial ground. Shock, stun, surprise. *rolls eyes*). Frag, I'm about as white as a person can be, and I'd still probably punch someone in the face for merely suggesting such a thing. The dollar doesn't rule in "western culture", it rules in "greedy asshole culture". My character would turn you into a greasy red smear outright.
I can see the logic on both sides. It's definitely a very complicated problem, with some frightening implications either way, and there is no simple and/or easy solution. If history is any indicator, "kill them all" is NOT the way to go. That has never ended well.
I try to NOT follow what is happening in the US. (which is next to impossible considering I live North of you.... and you guys own the airwaves :P)
It's just a basket full of crazy. And stupid, but mostly crazy.
Still waiting for a good explaination how the 2 most HATED people of their political parties are now up for the Top Job.... Either you get a blow-hard, or you get a Lair. (you decide which is which :P)
But, that's OK.... At least you don't have a male Queen of Feminism running your country like I do....
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I can see the logic on both sides. It's definitely a very complicated problem, with some frightening implications either way, and there is no simple and/or easy solution. If history is any indicator, "kill them all" is NOT the way to go. That has never ended well.
Actually, it has - at least for those who did the killing.
The whole of human history is plastered with cultures being wiped out by more advanced cultures, animal species going extinct that were threats or resource concurrents and most recently, diseases being eradicated.
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Why do you assume that my characters live on an other continent? Or that they don't care? Ebola happened in Kongo - where I don't live - but you can bet that I perceived that as a threat and that I certainly would not campaign for people there to leave quarantine zones unchecked. Infected are a global problem and Asamando is affecting people world wide (especially if you are captured by a megacon and sold there to become food).
Because we are arguing from a western world perspective.
You don't have to take the lion as an example. Look at the wolf in Germany: It's been gone completely for almost 100 years. Only now it is slowly coming back - and yet farmers shoot them as soon as there are casualties within their herds.
As soon as there are casualties. That's exactly what I have been saying about the infected. The same laws should still apply to them. IF they commit murder, THEN they will get prosecuted. If they stick to legal means to feed themselves you can leave them alone. Same way as in your example the farmers also don't go into the forest with torches and guns (because pitchforks are just too retro) and exterminate wolves for NO... GOOD... REASON. Even if they COULD become a danger later. At least I'd like to believe that most people in our modern world don't do that anymore.
The infected are not people - they are aliens. Humanity is their food source which is why they cannot truly be part of humanity.
Aliens are people too. As long as they possess sentience they are people. Like Spirits and AIs and uplifted animals (not strictly an example from Shadowrun AFAIK but you get the point)...
The only question is, can you come to an agreement with them so that both sides don't threaten each other. This makes infected a lot different from Shedim, Insect Spirits, Horrors, Unknown Spirits,... because those creatures can't be reasoned with, but an infected can. Even feral ghouls can be lead to some degree by the non-ferals.
Granting them rights is the first step to becoming their cattle - as the Ghoul nation demonstrates quite succinctly.
If I had the choice between becoming a murderer and cattle, I would choose to be cattle. Luckily, those aren't the only two choices with infected because a middle-ground is absolutely possible.
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And Reaver, the dead can be considered as sacred as can be, but Megacorporations don't care. And poor people don't care if they get a couple thousand nuyen in cold, hard cash for selling their body after they are dead. That money could mean the difference between joining your ancestors now or in years to come. There are some very vehement groups that won't do it, that's a given. But that doesn't mean no-one will do it.
You make a very GRAVE mistake in your assumptions that all people value money more then their cultural heritage.
2 cases for you in the real world, and both are from North America
In May 2015, as part of the negotiations with the native Lax Kw’alaams band near Prince Rupert BC, Petronas offered them 1.1 BILLION dollars to the band members, paid over 20 years for the use of Lelu Island as a terminal. (there are 270 members of the band, or @185K a year for 20 years!) They voted 97% to REJECT the offer! (And now, just in the last 2 weeks, the Federal Government has signed off on the deal, meaning Petronas now DOES NOT have to offer them the money, or offer them anything at all beyond the 5% royalty shares to ALL the bands along the affected pipeline route)
The next case, is also from North America and is much, much older. (while I was still in college, so 1996?). Almost the same situation, but in this case it was Alberta and Oil.... Chevron offered to hire only Band members to work the field, including training costs to get the workers the skills needed to operate the oilfield, $100k per band member over 25 years, and 10% of royalties to the band for dispersment to the members. they rejected it out of hand. A year later the government approved the Oilsands, over rode the Native Bands desire to not have the development, and didn't require Chevron to pay anything extra then the Royalties, nor hire an all band member workforce.
In both cases, the Band members rejected financial security for themselves for their Cultural Heritage.
And these are just 2 examples from Canada that I can personally remember. (a country with less then 0.5% of the world population) So I can see this happening many times over the world, And know for a fact it has happened at least a half dozen times in Africa (because I was at the sites).... But Africa deals with it differently then Canada does. (Those protesters "disappear" in Africa with alarming frequency!)
In short, In Western Culture, the Dollar may rule all, but Western Culture isn't the only culture out there, and may Cultures do not place as much importance on Money as we do.
There's also the protest going on in North Dakota as we speak over the building of yet another pipeline through Native American lands (and yet another sacred burial ground. Shock, stun, surprise. *rolls eyes*). Frag, I'm about as white as a person can be, and I'd still probably punch someone in the face for merely suggesting such a thing. The dollar doesn't rule in "western culture", it rules in "greedy asshole culture". My character would turn you into a greasy red smear outright.
I can see the logic on both sides. It's definitely a very complicated problem, with some frightening implications either way, and there is no simple and/or easy solution. If history is any indicator, "kill them all" is NOT the way to go. That has never ended well.
I try to NOT follow what is happening in the US. (which is next to impossible considering I live North of you.... and you guys own the airwaves :P)
It's just a basket full of crazy. And stupid, but mostly crazy.
Still waiting for a good explaination how the 2 most HATED people of their political parties are now up for the Top Job.... Either you get a blow-hard, or you get a Lair. (you decide which is which :P)
But, that's OK.... At least you don't have a male Queen of Feminism running your country like I do....
I don't have a good explanation for that one because I can't comprehend it either. I may be a complete loon myself, but even I can't wrap my head around that particular brand of crazy. My own conscience simply won't allow me to vote for any of the candidates, even the third party ones (Help us, Bernie! You're our only hope! Come back!). I don't even get mad anymore when people tell me it's an act of surrender to not vote because...well, it is. There's no shame in walking away from a lost cause, and I have reached "get drek-faced drunk and konk out on a pile of thermite" levels of donotgiveafragitis.
Funny, I'd much rather live in Canada than here, but I'm too damn broke to move across the street, never mind to another country. At least in Canada I could get some respectable healthcare, even if I have to wait a while for it. Scandinavia is looking awful nice right about now too.
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Contrary to popular belief, healthcare in Canada isn't free....
What you pay is based off your tax return.
In my case I pay $271/month to maintain the public healthcare system that allows people to die waiting for treatment of serious diseases....
And if you leave the country to get treatment, the Feds charge you with tax evasion!
(Lost 3 family members to cancer waiting lists, and spent tens of thousands of dollars fighting the tax evasion charges when I went to the states to get my liver spurr treated because I couldn't wait the 16 weeks here in BC)
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Contrary to popular belief, healthcare in Canada isn't free....
What you pay is based off your tax return.
In my case I pay $271/month to maintain the public healthcare system that allows people to die waiting for treatment of serious diseases....
And if you leave the country to get treatment, the Feds charge you with tax evasion!
(Lost 3 family members to cancer waiting lists, and spent tens of thousands of dollars fighting the tax evasion charges when I went to the states to get my liver spurr treated because I couldn't wait the 16 weeks here in BC)
What if you can't work and don't have a tax return? Technically I can work, but every place I've applied to suddenly loses interest the moment I mention my issues, and they come up with some BS excuse for not hiring me. So, because people are ableist assholes, I can't work. Can't prove they're discriminating either. They're careful not to do or say anything that could get them sued. I feel an awful lot like one of the SR infected sometimes with the way people treat me.
At least I'm not contagious, so I got that going for me.
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Honestly?
Don't know. I have worked every year to some degree which means I have a tax return.
Sounds like you would qualify for Permenate Disability.... which pays 60% of your averaged yearly salary until you hit 65... (then Old Age Pension kicks in)
In your case (because you don't have a tax return) it would be Welfare, which pays a base rate of $675/month.... and covers your health care costs. And as you can imagine, you can't really live off of $675 a month..... as rent alone hovers around $800/month in my city, and we are not a major one! Vanvouver rental rates are hovering around $1200 for a 1 bedroom. Even SROs run $600 to $800/month.
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After re-reading the thread from the begining, I have a question and can't remember the answer (and away from books so I can't look it up).
Can ghouls eat other ghouls for food?
My gut says 'No'....
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I think they can.
As for governements we're not doing so hot in Australia right now . . . vote in PM, PM gets removed by parliment and replaced with who they want till next election, vote in new PM, PM gets removed by parliment and replaced with who they want till next election, vote in new PM, new PM tells us Australia is suffering major debt and has to cut healthcare/education but because our parliment is so badly paid and has so few perks (indexed pension for life, free travel for life) they need to give htemselves a payrise so they can afford their multimillion dollar mansions, parliment removes PM and replaces them with who they want till next election, vote in yet another new PM, massive numbers of parlimentarians accidentally make mistakes on their benefits (such as using free travel to attend their own/someone elses wedding) but hey its fixed up now its been pointed out, parliment removes PM and replaces them with who they want till the next election, vote in new PM, watch said PM break all the promises that would help lower income families while stating they will stand by their election promises (that help higher income campaign donors), waiting to see if parliment removes him currently.
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Well, IF they can, then that is partial solution to feeding them....
Take all the Ferals, round them up, let the bloodsuckers drain em for food, then when they die, use their bodies to feed the intelligent ones!
3 birds, one stone:
1: The farels are dealt with, thus reducing random attacks on people, and helping their reps...
2: the fangs get a meal without fucking up the citizens' souls (willing or not)
3: the intelligent ones get food, thus reducing their dependance on other sources (like living people!)
But, the simple fact that Asmando jailed all their farels (and fed them!) Says to me that they probably can not eat other infected..... Or the common thinking in Asmando runs along:
"We can't eat ghouls! They are people! We can only eat people-people"
And if THAT is the case...... lots and lots of fire, apply liberally to infection site until infection has turned to a fine white ash
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I think they can.
As for governements we're not doing so hot in Australia right now . . . vote in PM, PM gets removed by parliment and replaced with who they want till next election, vote in new PM, PM gets removed by parliment and replaced with who they want till next election, vote in new PM, new PM tells us Australia is suffering major debt and has to cut healthcare/education but because our parliment is so badly paid and has so few perks (indexed pension for life, free travel for life) they need to give htemselves a payrise so they can afford their multimillion dollar mansions, parliment removes PM and replaces them with who they want till next election, vote in yet another new PM, massive numbers of parlimentarians accidentally make mistakes on their benefits (such as using free travel to attend their own/someone elses wedding) but hey its fixed up now its been pointed out, parliment removes PM and replaces them with who they want till the next election, vote in new PM, watch said PM break all the promises that would help lower income families while stating they will stand by their election promises (that help higher income campaign donors), waiting to see if parliment removes him currently.
Australia: The land where even your own government wants to kill you! ;D
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(OMG, lots of activity for a thread necro!)
People talk a lot about "just eating the dead", but forget that for many cultures, the dead are considered scared. Take the Native America culture where ancestors, elders and their remains are holy. in Today's world
...and that right there is the problem: Shadowrun is removed from "today's world" by far more than the calendar. IRL we take a rather dim view of things like Bunraku parlors, murdering security guards in the commission of a crime, blood sports on TV, or declaring yourself a souvereign nation to escape annoying laws. And if you want to draw religions views on treating bodies into it, Abrahamic religions already have problems with tattoos placed on your own, living body. Chopping off your god-provided arm for a cybernetic upgrade or even worse rewiring your brain to slot chips overriding part of your personality (i.e. soul) would give any religious authority a fit.
We aren't talking about extinction - yet . We are talking about the threat of an invasive species that feeds on us and is seeking dominance.
The infected are not people - they are aliens. Humanity is their food source which is why they cannot truly be part of humanity. Granting them rights is the first step to becoming their cattle - as the Ghoul nation demonstrates quite succinctly.
The funny thing about this whole "Infected are a threat to humanity" thing is that the haters manage to elevate ghouls from pretty disgusting carrion feeders to potent and ferocious apex predators, which humanity actually holds in higher regard :D
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Sengir has some really good points.
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Everything you listed happens in today's world too.
While we don't have the tech for bunraku, if you live in a modest sized city, just do a search for "body rub" or "massage Parlour" in your town..... same idea just no mind altering tech.
And exactly HOW many police have died in the US in the last few months?
Get out of a 1st world country and into developing world. Cock fights, dog fights, pack on boar fights are all on TV through out Africa. And in darker spots, other fighting happens (and generally one of the fighters isn't there willingly)
The Ex-wife's pastor made a great coffee fountain when he saw my shoulders, arms and back.... at least he paid for the cleaning of the shirt...
Check out the Soverign Citizen movement... or Freemen on the land movement....
In the SR universe they lightly touch on the views of various religions. Such as the catholic chuch declaring meta-humans and magic "works of the devil", and then recanting that stance.
How Islam bans outright the use of magic unless you are an Imam. And other views.
As for Apex pedators.... we are ok with them as long as we are on the top of the list.... but the infected are higher then metahumans simply because they EAT us as their SOLE form of food. That's were the problem lies there, we are no longer the Apex of apex predators.
(Also keep in mind, for some countries, these things are not crimes! Prostitution is state sponsored in some countries. To the point that declining a sex work job disqualifies from unemployment payments and welfare! Looking at you NZ. Ghana has no animal abuse laws, thus animal fights are common sporting and gambling activity you can find in many bars)
Trust me. The Real Life world is more fucked up (from an insulated Western view) then people know. Slavery still happens. You can buy children easily. Mutilations happen for the fun of it. And mass gang rape is a sport.
The shit I have seen in 13 years of working in developing and 3rd world countries is the greatest contributor to my sleepless nights. There are things that once you see, you never forget...
<And that is why I knock the teeth out of North American Social Justice Warriors when ever they get in my face... these fuck heads have absolutely NOTHING to bitch about! And if they really want to bitch... now they have a reason! Their missing fucking teeth!>
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Well since I didn't give my typical code for dealing with Infected:
-Terminate Feral Infected as opportunity presents; otherwise avoid. Any possible humanity they had fled with their sanity. They serve no useful purpose save possibly research and present a threat to everyone else.
-If any sapient Infected deliberately infects another without that person's consent, terminate the perpetrator.
(I hold a similar code for forced augmentation. Unless augmentation is necessary to save someone's life and they are absolutely unable to make that decision due to circumstance, just don't do it.)
-If someone wants to become a vampire, ghoul, etc has carefully considered what it truly entails and finds a host infected to turn them, then fine. Their body, their essence, their decision (no matter how foolish I personally think it is)
Basically, if the sapient Infected find useful outlets for their needs and otherwise act with dignity and respect towards others (Infected and Uninfected alike), I will show it in kind.
But any infected tries to turn my runners without their consent, they can expect a lethal response. (and yes, I've lost a character to HMHVV; he was a dwarf who went Feral Ghoul. Fun times! :) )
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Have to say, you treat them better then I do.
My encounters with infected generally run along these lines...
I see the infected and feel the slightest bit threatened, Flamethrower spell overcast. Enough said.
I don't work with them. Period. The risk of infection is just too great. And I don't like the "snack on legs" look they all get in their eyes especially when hungry.
But I do have a 'Drop and Wire' policy with a single ghoul... I dead drop a body I need gone, he wires me money. But it also knows I see it within 5 meters of me, it gets extra crispy....
Vampires.... nope. Burn them where they stand. Too dangerous.
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Have to say, you treat them better then I do.
It's more about risk mitigation than humanitarian effort. Well-fed ferals don't hunt, and unless my job is to clean out a nest of ferals, I stand to lose more than I gain by engaging them.
As for those seeking to become infected, well, you can't fix stupid, you can only treat the symptoms.
If a newly turned vamp decides it was a terrible idea and expresses their displeasure through an uncontrolled blood sucking rampage, I treat the problem with a liberal application of force and fire.
Vampires.... nope. Burn them where they stand. Too dangerous.
Only encountered one vamp in my many games oddly enough, and seeing how he was munching on my extraction target when I found them, I had no reason to extend my usual courtesy.
Trust me. The Real Life world is more fucked up (from an insulated Western view) then people know. Slavery still happens. You can buy children easily. Mutilations happen for the fun of it. And mass gang rape is a sport.
The shit I have seen in 13 years of working in developing and 3rd world countries is the greatest contributor to my sleepless nights. There are things that once you see, you never forget...
<And that is why I knock the teeth out of North American Social Justice Warriors when ever they get in my face... these fuck heads have absolutely NOTHING to bitch about! And if they really want to bitch... now they have a reason! Their missing fucking teeth!>
If we ever met, I'd buy you a beer.
I've done a limited amount of mission-relief work, some on Native American Reservations in North Dakota (they were good folks, living in squalor, but good folks all the same), but the most eye-opening stuff I've personally witnessed was in Mexico City (and El Paso, to a lesser degree...barely).
And even that stuff pales in comparison to the brutality perpetrated in the shitholes of the world.
(South Africa, the effective drug cartel states in South America and Mexico, most of Asia outside of Japan and South Korea, and of course the vortex of bloodlust and religious zeal that is the Middle East)
The peace and stability we enjoy in the west is not something I take for granted.
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Everything listed happens, sure. The implication for Shadowrun is that it is much more commonplace/ingrained everywhere, however. It's where even the 'civilized' world has blood-sports where people die and police are targeted more frequently than even today in the States (approximately 60 have been killed this year, which is about 7 a month). It's where there's entire sections of cities in the so-called 'First World' that law enforcement won't enter without being in platoon-strength with armoured support. It's where nobody cares, so people are free to be as bad as they want to be, civilized or not; it just takes some extra nuyen to do it where people might see it.
I believe you when you speak of what you've seen. I've seen some of it too, and I've gotten plenty of second-hand experience from people I trust explicitly. The world is a shit-hole and I actively block things out to function regularly. I'd say the main reason I try to keep a positive outlook is so the negative doesn't drown me.
I still think the implication of Shadowrun, as well as the intent, is to be a setting that is worse than today by far. It's a place where the thin restraints holding society together are even more frayed and stretching, with gaps for all the bad things to start leaking through.
And yes, I agree that the entitlement people have been developing recently is absurd.
I've played characters on multiple sides of the HMHVV debate, which I find fun and interesting. I've played ones who think they're abominations, ones who think they're threats, ones who think they deserve rights, even one who was Infected. I definitely understand your viewpoint there, Reaver. I mean, the last character I played literally went on regular ghoul-hunts after they tried to snatch a kid from his neighborhood.
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Don't get me wrong, I am glad there are infected in the game. And I enjoy the socio-political touch they have put to it. And I am even glad they are a playable 'race' (for those that can actually play them more the uber-jumped up adept/mage killing machines.... but that is a different can worms)
But that doesn't mean "I" have to like them ;D
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Trust me. The Real Life world is more fucked up (from an insulated Western view) then people know. Slavery still happens. You can buy children easily. Mutilations happen for the fun of it. And mass gang rape is a sport.
The shit I have seen in 13 years of working in developing and 3rd world countries is the greatest contributor to my sleepless nights. There are things that once you see, you never forget...
<And that is why I knock the teeth out of North American Social Justice Warriors when ever they get in my face... these fuck heads have absolutely NOTHING to bitch about! And if they really want to bitch... now they have a reason! Their missing fucking teeth!>
If we ever met, I'd buy you a beer.
I've done a limited amount of mission-relief work, some on Native American Reservations in North Dakota (they were good folks, living in squalor, but good folks all the same), but the most eye-opening stuff I've personally witnessed was in Mexico City (and El Paso, to a lesser degree...barely).
And even that stuff pales in comparison to the brutality perpetrated in the shitholes of the world.
(South Africa, the effective drug cartel states in South America and Mexico, most of Asia outside of Japan and South Korea, and of course the vortex of bloodlust and religious zeal that is the Middle East)
The peace and stability we enjoy in the west is not something I take for granted.
Here's some mead from another victim of sleepless nights, Reaver. I've seen some drek in my life as well, and it's the main reason behind why I do what I do, and why my goals are what they are. I don't want to see anyone else suffer like I have, so I volunteer as often as my health will allow. I may be cynical and jaded with a broken body, but I can still help, dammit. You know the city you grew up in is a shithole when finding a homeless man dying of multiple stab wounds doesn't even make your personal top ten list of the most fucked up things you've seen.
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Nobody has to like them, but the whole 'denying personhood' bit is where I sort of get snagged. They're sapient, can obviously act on their emotions/feelings, are self-aware. Objectively calling them anything but people (even if they're some messed up, evil people who do need to be put down) detracts from the point of their existence in the game. Which is part of why I've been so active in this conversation.
And yes, how people play things is a very different can of worms than the setting's depiction. I've had issues like that before as well. I think all players have at one point or another.
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Nobody has to like them, but the whole 'denying personhood' bit is where I sort of get snagged. They're sapient, can obviously act on their emotions/feelings, are self-aware. Objectively calling them anything but people (even if they're some messed up, evil people who do need to be put down) detracts from the point of their existence in the game. Which is part of why I've been so active in this conversation.
And yes, how people play things is a very different can of worms than the setting's depiction. I've had issues like that before as well. I think all players have at one point or another.
Oh, I don't deny that they were people. And I don't deny they are sapient. But they are no longer People-people. People are Omnivores, they can eat anything they like. Infected are not -they can only eat one thing, Us!
I put forth to you this supposition:
They were people. Now they are a walking infectious disease with the memories and feeling of the person they once were.
Have sympathy for them. Have empathy for them.
And throw them in the bonfire.
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Oh, I don't deny that they were people. And I don't deny they are sapient. But they are no longer People-people. People are Omnivores, they can eat anything they like. Infected are not -they can only eat one thing, Us!
Now I am intrigued. Would you consider an AI a person? One with human+ intelligence is what I am saying. And does it become less of a person if it wants to kill all humans (metahumans, if you want to strictly talk about Shadowrun).
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Oh, I don't deny that they were people. And I don't deny they are sapient. But they are no longer People-people. People are Omnivores, they can eat anything they like. Infected are not -they can only eat one thing, Us!
Now I am intrigued. Would you consider an AI a person? One with human+ intelligence is what I am saying. And does it become less of a person if it wants to kill all humans (metahumans, if you want to strictly talk about Shadowrun).
they are alive, yes. but they are not people.
AIs do not have a physical body.
AIs do not interact with the physical world (directly. They can interact through a medium, like a drone, sure.)
AI's have no mass. (ok, technically this is not exactly true as they are also formed from electrons, and electrons have mass.... )
They are a bunch of complex ones and zeros arranged in such a way as to give them sapience, but do not confuse Sapience for People.
Wikipedia, Wisdom (redirect from Sapience)
Sapience is often defined as wisdom, or the ability of an organism or entity to act with appropriate judgement, a mental faculty which is a component of intelligence or alternatively may be considered an additional faculty, apart from intelligence, with its own properties. Robert Sternberg[24] has segregated the capacity for judgement from the general qualifiers for intelligence, which is closer to cognizant aptitude than to wisdom. Displaying sound judgement in a complex, dynamic environment is a hallmark of wisdom.
The word sapience is derived from the Latin sapientia, meaning "wisdom".[25] Related to this word is the Latin verb sapere, meaning "to taste, to be wise, to know"; the present participle of sapere forms part of Homo sapiens, the Latin binomial nomenclature created by Carl Linnaeus to describe the human species. Linnaeus had originally given humans the species name of diurnus, meaning man of the day. But he later decided that the dominating feature of humans was wisdom, hence application of the name sapiens. His chosen biological name was intended to emphasize man's uniqueness and separation from the rest of the animal kingdom.
Something can be Sapient, but that doesn't mean it's people.
(and TBH, AIs and other spookies of the matrix is the reason why a couple of my character WILL NOT EVER use the matrix! And it is also the reason why several of my characters will)
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Which is why I come down on the other side because I've had too much experience of the "sure you can imitate us but your not really a person" school of thought in games towards my characters and to a lesser extent in real life to deny it to other beings. In the past women were considered not people, in the past blacks were considered not people, in the past homsexuals were considered not people and even today they (and other groups) still have a lot of problems getting equal treatment. Fast forward 10 years and jump a dimension over now they are largely accepted but its the orcs and Trolls (as well as to a lesser extent the elves and dwarves) who are "not people". Go forward another 50 and they're starting to be accepted but its the infected, technomancers and AI's who's "personhood" is being actively denied.
For me they have problems but they are still people with all the rights and responsibilities that entails.
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Which is why I come down on the other side because I've had too much experience of the "sure you can imitate us but your not really a person" school of thought in games towards my characters and to a lesser extent in real life to deny it to other beings. In the past women were considered not people, in the past blacks were considered not people, in the past homsexuals were considered not people and even today they (and other groups) still have a lot of problems getting equal treatment. Fast forward 10 years and jump a dimension over now they are largely accepted but its the orcs and Trolls (as well as to a lesser extent the elves and dwarves) who are "not people". Go forward another 50 and they're starting to be accepted but its the infected, technomancers and AI's who's "personhood" is being actively denied.
For me they have problems but they are still people with all the rights and responsibilities that entails.
Funny how the Victorian Era set Race-relations back 1000 years. :P
If you look at ancient history, there was no real problem between the races, Yes they all fought amongst themselves, and slavery was a commonplace in EVERY society (People have this stupid silly idea that slavery only happened in the 18th/19th century, and only to Blacks, when in reality it happened in every society across the globe, from Native Americans to Aztec, from Europe to Japan.)
Women in history are a little more complex. They were both treasured as objects, and as property. Mostly because they are the only ones that can have children. And in an age where there are no antibiotics, or understanding of disease, and not to mention constant warring/raiding, Women were the only way to keep your community growing (thus they were the target of many raids, and the most protected and valuable object in your communities. But many societies in Ancient times allowed women to do and be anything they wanted (the Dacians, the Celts, the Thracians, Gauls,).
It's not until much, much later in our history (almost co-siding with the rise of Eugenics as a scientific method) do we see people being called "inferior" or "sub-human".
And sadly a lot of that has carried over today. (I guess it's the old saying about the genie...)
Now I find it interesting that you mention Orks and Trolls.
Well, on the surface view, and to the non-genetic scientist, you are going to have a VERY hard time telling someone that Orks and Trolls are People.
People don't have tusks protruding from their lower jaw.
People don't stand 3 meters tall with enlongated arms and horns growing out of their head. Or have 40 teeth in their mouth.
But, they are people. And Ork and Trolls are found in every society on the planet.
However, are the infected still people? No question that they once were, but just what has HMHVV done to them?
Can the infected reproduce naturally? (there have some hints that some variants can breed).
Can they gain nutrition from multiple food sources?
The answer to those 2 questions is thought to be "no" for the most part.
Most infected are sterile, so the only way for the infected to "reproduce" is to infect others. THIS IS NOT NATURAL!
They can ONLY exist by consuming sapient food. They can't eat beef, or chicken, or pig.... again THIS IS NOT NATURAL!
Several infected can be sprayed with bullets, only to have the trauma heal up seconds later.... yet again THIS IS NOT NATURAL!
So, what you are telling me is that something that exists UNNATURALLY is a person?
No. By the very fact that they are unnatural, they are no longer people, they are something else.
And I call that "something else" a threat. And I deal with threats appropriately.
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Well, on the surface view, and to the non-genetic scientist, you are going to have a VERY hard time telling someone that Orks and Trolls are People.
People don't have tusks protruding from their lower jaw.
People don't stand 3 meters tall with enlongated arms and horns growing out of their head. Or have 40 teeth in their mouth.
I don't agree with you even there. You might be right if you said HUMANS don't have tusks and stand 3+ meters. But people can. Actually you have to be more precise: UNMODIFIED HUMANS. By your logic even transhumans wouldn't be people. Hell, not even a person with real world cybernetics as they exist in real-world 2016 would be considered people anymore by that logic. Actually that last bit kind of plays into cyberpunk again with losing your humanity and soul if you replace parts of yourself.
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I'm quite aware of the issues with slavery and women just making the point that at that time (and cultture) being a woman or being a black made you "not a person" and that attitude annoyingly still persists today such as getting the "let your husband deal with the car maintenance sweety" attitude of some repair shops.
> Most infected are sterile, so the only way for the infected to "reproduce" is to infect others. THIS IS NOT NATURAL!
So are most mules.
> They can ONLY exist by consuming sapient food. They can't eat beef, or chicken, or pig.... again THIS IS NOT NATURAL!
Tree's can't eat beef, chicken or pig. Not saying they are sentient just pointing out not human species may have not human food sources that doesn't mean they aren't a people. What if hypothetically we encounter an alien species in real life that only exists by absorbing sunlight or eating arsenic would you define them as not human? What if you encounter a cannibal who will only eat people are they not a person? I'm not denying the later isn't a threat just saying it is still a person and if the person who choses to eat people is a person why isn't the being who HAS to? They may be a threat, they may be dangerous, they are a person.
> Several infected can be sprayed with bullets, only to have the trauma heal up seconds later.... yet again THIS IS NOT NATURAL!
Up to 4th ed the same applied to shifters then they took our regeneration away (while leaving the references to it). Technically speaking a troll adept can also do the same thing high body so it survives spraying with bullets then the heal spell plus say the unnatural healing quality and it heals up. Not to mention all the paranormal critters which have it still.
You keep saying "its not natural" but the simple fact is that infected are natural, its an awakened issue yes but they are the result of a virus that has been around for thousands of years not the result of genetic experimentation (aside from the Chupacabra). Nice or not it is natural and it may even have a very vital role in the ecology we aren't aware of. Wild theory maybe the infected are the planets way of trying to control metahumanity that is acting as an invasive species planetwide?
Again recognizing infected, shifters, orcs, technomancers, AI's as people with rights is NOT the same as saying a vampire has the right to feed on however they like. They are intelligent, they can reason, they can control their own urges, they may need to feed on sapient being but it doesn't have to be unwilling or even on something that isn't going to be lost anyway (my example of feeding on those who are about to get cyber/bioware that would cause the person to loose that essence anyway). I'm not arguing you don't contain, kill one who slaughters innocents for the fun of it, I am arguing that you do that by the law and under the same rules as everyone else i.e. innocent until proven guilty.
Still I think we're just going to go round and round in circles here as neither of us is likely to change our views. I just hope that you can recognize that the infected rights movement is quite a realistic phenomena given how many here would support it even if you personally view them as the Buffy style vampire i.e. the real person is dead and replaced by a virus puppet that should be burned.
For me any personal views aside I'd feel I HAVE to support the movement because while you personally draw the line at infected there are plenty of others out there who'd see me as an animal i.e. not having any human rights and probably should be chipped, collared and kept on a lead when out in public because I'm a vulpine shifter. There are others who would happily stone or kill me for being a mage. There are probably even more who feel as a woman I should not really be trying to do certain "mens jobs", intolerance and discrimination never really dissapears it just gets new subjects added to it. Today its the infected, tommorow its us shifters, next week its the orcs then ?.
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Well, on the surface view, and to the non-genetic scientist, you are going to have a VERY hard time telling someone that Orks and Trolls are People.
People don't have tusks protruding from their lower jaw.
People don't stand 3 meters tall with enlongated arms and horns growing out of their head. Or have 40 teeth in their mouth.
I don't agree with you even there. You might be right if you said HUMANS don't have tusks and stand 3+ meters. But people can. Actually you have to be more precise: UNMODIFIED HUMANS. By your logic even transhumans wouldn't be people. Hell, not even a person with real world cybernetics as they exist in real-world 2016 would be considered people anymore by that logic. Actually that last bit kind of plays into cyberpunk again with losing your humanity and soul if you replace parts of yourself.
you have a little point on the human thing... but then lose it :P
A human that loses a hand and get a cybernetic one is still a person, they are just a person that lost a hand. There is no GENETIC difference in a person with 1 hand and a person with 2 hands. Even if he the hand he lost was by choice... (that just may mean he has mental-health issues).
The WHOLE point of transhumanism is to become MORE then human. If it happens to the entire race, then the bar just gets adjusted. If it happens to an individual, they COULD cease being people and become something else..... A human that has modified themselves to the point that they are a blob of goo with telekinetic abilities probably doesn't qualify as human anymore.... they are .... "Blob-ites"??
trans·hu·man·ism
/tranzˈhyo͞omənizm/
noun
noun: transhumanism
the belief or theory that the human race can evolve beyond its current physical and mental limitations, especially by means of science and technology
HMHVV overwrites the genetic code of it's host. This is a fact. It can been seen, measured, studied, and verified.
MY supposition is that during that genetic re-write, they cease to BE people and become.... something else.
Orks and Trolls are NOT infected by a virus. (that we know of!) They had those markers in their genetic structure for Orks and Trolls activated in their genome by the rising mana levels.
And it's interesting to note, some of what I say is used by Humanis to support their views that Orks and Trolls are not people either. But where Humanis fails is in the fact that Trolls and Orks CAN breed and even interbreed. Which means we must be very closely related for that to happen.
Humans and Chimps share 98% of the same DNA, but you don't see any "Chimpans" running about do you? But you do find inter-metahuman couples with children. *they just take after one or the other parent... (or a human)
But, you don't see and ghouls with kids (unless they infect the kids), or do you see Vampires with kids (again, unless they infected them).... Nor do you find any kids from a ghoul/metahuman coupling. Nor any kids from a Vampire/metahuman coupling. (and since Sex is mentioned as an easy way for vamps to establish the emotional connection for feeding, if it was possible, it would have happened!)
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I'm quite aware of the issues with slavery and women just making the point that at that time (and cultture) being a woman or being a black made you "not a person" and that attitude annoyingly still persists today such as getting the "let your husband deal with the car maintenance sweety" attitude of some repair shops.
> Most infected are sterile, so the only way for the infected to "reproduce" is to infect others. THIS IS NOT NATURAL!
So are most mules.
So? Mules are the off spring of donkey and horses and are mostly a genetic dead-end...
> They can ONLY exist by consuming sapient food. They can't eat beef, or chicken, or pig.... again THIS IS NOT NATURAL!
Tree's can't eat beef, chicken or pig. Not saying they are sentient just pointing out not human species may have not human food sources that doesn't mean they aren't a people. What if hypothetically we encounter an alien species in real life that only exists by absorbing sunlight or eating arsenic would you define them as not human? What if you encounter a cannibal who will only eat people are they not a person? I'm not denying the later isn't a threat just saying it is still a person and if the person who choses to eat people is a person why isn't the being who HAS to? They may be a threat, they may be dangerous, they are a person.
Agrument invald. Trees are NOT people. Nor is an Alien! (hence the world: ALIEN!) A cannibal CAN still survive off any other food stuff, he just chooses not too. Don't confuse choice with necessity.
> Several infected can be sprayed with bullets, only to have the trauma heal up seconds later.... yet again THIS IS NOT NATURAL!
Up to 4th ed the same applied to shifters then they took our regeneration away (while leaving the references to it). Technically speaking a troll adept can also do the same thing high body so it survives spraying with bullets then the heal spell plus say the unnatural healing quality and it heals up. Not to mention all the paranormal critters which have it still.
And in 5e too now thanks to the errata. But shifters are NOT people that turn into animals, they are ANIMALS that turn into people. Very big difference! No matter how much you love your housecat shifter, you will never have a fur-baby with it. Now, are they Sapient? Yes, but do not confuse Human level intelligence for being human. They are, always will be and always HAVE BEEN animals. End of story. (Run Faster, page 100, very first paragraph, very first sentence)
You keep saying "its not natural" but the simple fact is that infected are natural, its an awakened issue yes but they are the result of a virus that has been around for thousands of years not the result of genetic experimentation (aside from the Chupacabra). Nice or not it is natural and it may even have a very vital role in the ecology we aren't aware of. Wild theory maybe the infected are the planets way of trying to control metahumanity that is acting as an invasive species planetwide?
Ok, yes HMHVV seems to be a natural disease that has comeback with the rise in Mana, but are we SURE? (and leave ED out of this... not a fan of that retconn work) But lets look at this shall we. If it is an "Invasive Species" as you say, then as a species they are no longer metahuman, they are something else. Thus NOT people. And by the VERY fact they are invasive, they must be contained, controlled, and terminated for the natural species to survive. Thank you for making my argument for me!
Polo was natural, and we have done everything in our power to eliminate that disease. Small Pox was natural and we did eliminate that disease. Seems to me like HMHVV should be high on that list as well... and you can't eradicate an infectious disease while there are still carriers about... Start the fires now folks!
[/i]Again recognizing infected, shifters, orcs, technomancers, AI's as people with rights is NOT the same as saying a vampire has the right to feed on however they like. They are intelligent, they can reason, they can control their own urges, they may need to feed on sapient being but it doesn't have to be unwilling or even on something that isn't going to be lost anyway (my example of feeding on those who are about to get cyber/bioware that would cause the person to loose that essence anyway). I'm not arguing you don't contain, kill one who slaughters innocents for the fun of it, I am arguing that you do that by the law and under the same rules as everyone else i.e. innocent until proven guilty.
Again, just because something is sapient, doesn't mean it's metahuman, or a person. Technically AIs are "its" as they don't have a physical body. Without a physical body, they can't be people. But they are Sapient.
Again, Shifters are NOT metahumans, they are really smart animals. Thus, not people, but Sapient.
Yes, vampires are Sapient (never said they weren't), yes they can reason and rationalize. This is also what makes them such good predators. And the simple fact that they eat essence to live makes them parasites. Sapient, disease spreading parasites, sure. But parasites none the less. Meta-humanity works very, very hard at eradicating parasites everywhere else we find them, So why NOT vampires? oh right, feelings! Again, start the fires!
Still I think we're just going to go round and round in circles here as neither of us is likely to change our views. I just hope that you can recognize that the infected rights movement is quite a realistic phenomena given how many here would support it even if you personally view them as the Buffy style vampire i.e. the real person is dead and replaced by a virus puppet that should be burned.
For me any personal views aside I'd feel I HAVE to support the movement because while you personally draw the line at infected there are plenty of others out there who'd see me as an animal i.e. not having any human rights and probably should be chipped, collared and kept on a lead when out in public because I'm a vulpine shifter. There are others who would happily stone or kill me for being a mage. There are probably even more who feel as a woman I should not really be trying to do certain "mens jobs", intolerance and discrimination never really dissapears it just gets new subjects added to it. Today its the infected, tommorow its us shifters, next week its the orcs then ?.
Never said I was hoping to change your mind, or anyone else's mind. This isn't an issue were one side is right and the other wrong, this is a discussion of opposing points of views. I fully expect you to continue believing in what ever you wish to believe. I am merely laying out why many people DO NOT consider "Hug a Ghoul/Kiss a Vamp" bumper stickers to be valid. They are a threat, not just to metahumanity, but to the world. And as a threat they must be contained, controlled, and ultimately destroyed. (be that by a Cure that will never come, old age, or my favorite: FIRE!)
There are many movements out there and many of them are valid movements, I just don't consider the infected rights movement one of them. To me, that is like saying people with Ebola should be treated in malls, because they have a right to shop too! NO! it's a lethal infectious disease!
Annnnnd once again. as a shifter, YOU ARE NOT A METAHUMAN. you are a smart animal. End of story. Sorry the truth hurts, but its the truth. You may be a very smart animal and can think and reason and feel just as well as a metahuman, but that doesn't mean you are one. Sapient, yes. Metahuman (people) no.
Something can be sapient and not be human.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wisdom#Sapience
Wisdom or sapience is the ability to think and act using knowledge, experience, understanding, common sense, and insight.[1] Wisdom has been regarded as one of four cardinal virtues; and as a virtue, it is a habit or disposition to perform the action with the highest degree of adequacy under any given circumstance with the limitation of error in any given action. This implies a possession of knowledge or the seeking of knowledge to apply to the given circumstance. This involves an understanding of people, objects, events, situations, and the willingness as well as the ability to apply perception, judgement, and action in keeping with the understanding of what is the optimal course of action. It often requires control of one's emotional reactions (the "passions") so that the universal principle of reason prevails to determine one's action. In short, wisdom is a disposition to find the truth coupled with an optimum judgement as to what actions should be taken.
The Oxford English Dictionary defines wisdom as "Capacity of judging rightly in matters relating to life and conduct; soundness of judgement in the choice of means and ends; sometimes, less strictly, sound sense, esp. in practical affairs: opp. to folly;" also "Knowledge (esp. of a high or abstruse kind); enlightenment, learning, erudition."[2] Charles Haddon Spurgeon defined wisdom as "the right use of knowledge".[3] Robert I. Sutton and Andrew Hargadon defined the "attitude of wisdom" as "acting with knowledge while doubting what one knows".[4]
Wisdom and knowledge have different meanings, but are often portrayed as synonyms. This is corrected by giving an example: it's wise to run a successful business because wisdom includes action. It's nothing more than smart to write a business plan proposing a successful business because knowledge is strictly cognitive. The difference in knowledge is knowing it; wisdom is doing it.[
I'm sorry, but your feelings don't matter.
Metahumans are people. Shifters are animals. AI's are constructs. Infected are monsters. But they are all sapient.
It may make you feel better to treat AI, shifters, and the infect as people, but that doesn't make them people... Any more then a can of shoe polish applied to my face makes me an African.
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> A team I know recently wound up in the Paris catacombs and stumbled upon a colony of grendels. Not only did they put up a hell of a fight, they had infants and small children. Either they’d Infected a couple of families wholesale, or they were breeding.
> Sticks
> We know bandersnatches breed, and there are confirmed sightings of fomóraig mating, though there haven’t been any confirmed offspring there. Rumors have abounded for years of loup-garou and their pups. Who’s to say whether or not Strain II victims are as sterile as we’ve been led to believe? Might have to look into a study on the subject.
> The Smiling Bandit
While most of the Infected are transformed later in life, the ghilani retroviruses can and do pass into the germ line, which means that the children of the Infected can be born with the Infected quality. Such “native” Infected characters are no different mechanically from any other Infected characters. They simply grow up afflicted by their condition.
Only bandersnatchii, fomóraig, ghouls, and loup-garou can reproduce in this manner—banshees, dzoo-noo-qua, goblins, nosferatu, vampires, and wendigo pass the virus along in the germ line, and the fetus fails to develop properly.
(trimmed the bit about infertile Infected, as that's apparently bothered the 5e writer)
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Like I said, some are sterile. (Just not entirely sure which ones in 5e.)
And some can seem to reproduce (I remember the Grendel story... but even that is unclear).
Which, should scare the heck out of people!
Because if they CAN breed, then you are not longer looking at a less then 1:1 transformation... (sometimes the virus just kills you, and doesn't infect/turn you). You could suddenly end up with an entire nest of these blood, flesh and bone eaters out of just a mated couple. How long is their life cycle? How dies it take to becone large and competant enough to attack and feed on people??? For that matter, how long is the pregnacy cycle? 9 months like humans? 16 weeks like orks? Is it a single birth or a pair or an entire litter???
We just don't know. But its just more reason for a bigger bonfire in my eyes!
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For that matter, how long is the pregnacy cycle? 9 months like humans? 16 weeks like orks? Is it a single birth or a pair or an entire litter???
Is there a place where the reproductive cycles of the various metatypes are listed?
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For that matter, how long is the pregnacy cycle? 9 months like humans? 16 weeks like orks? Is it a single birth or a pair or an entire litter???
Is there a place where the reproductive cycles of the various metatypes are listed?
The only one that has been noted as being different then humans are Orks.
Orks reach maturity by age 13, their reproductive cycle is 16 weeks long, and they give birth to litters of 4 to 8 (down from 12 in 1e).
6WA has a blurb on them, as well as several other books. (But to my knowledge not yet in 5e)
So you can see my concern, IF they reproduce as fast as Orks, in a single year, a mated couple of infected could have as many 24 offspring! That's a lot of essence/flesh to keep that family going!
<but, there has not been much stated on if they can reproduce since the change to 5e. And with the noted change to infected in Storm Front, I am waiting to see if it gets any mention in future books.... but I doubt it will.>
Sadly, I am not sure what books novocrane is quoting from, as he didn't list them.
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And I am laying out why many do consider those bumper stickers and movements to be valid. Still if your happy to continue debating onwards just be sure to let me know when you want to let it drop rather than just putting me on ignore.
So with strain II it sems you've lost the sterile and can't breed argument.
My point was alien, shifter, AI or infected while they are not HUMAN they are PEOPLE. Furry people, blobby people, digital people, humanovore people, whatever they are they are PEOPLE. Shifters can breed with other shifters, can eat non sentient food, can reason or think in some cases better than humans they are people not human but from where I stand people. I have never claimed them to be human in fact my shifters have all found the idea of having sex with one to be rather abhorrent but that doesn't mean they are not and I emphasize this again PEOPLE.
I used invasive to describe metahumanity (elves, dwarves, HUMANS) and that the infected are natures way of trying to combat them. Infected in my example were the natural biological (or ecological) response to try and eradicate the disease of metahumanity.
The argument I and I suspect others in this thread are holding too is that sentient DOES mean people, it may or may not mean human depending on which species your talking about but it does definately mean people. Otherwise yegods the slippery slope your diving down "Infectted aren't people, AI's aren't people, shifters aren't people, orcs aren't people sure they can talk and may seem to be as intelligent as us but they're not people look when I beat it up it loses count of how many times I hit it."
That I think is the core of the argument here. To you people = human or human variant anything outside that is not a people. Alien = not people, sasquatch = not people, shifter = not people, AI = not people and thus they have no rights you can do whatever you want to it without repurcsusions.
To many of us on the other side however people = sentient and has nothing to do with metahumanity. If the being is sentient its a people we may have different bodily states, different diets, different viewpoints it doesn't matter we are all PEOPLE because to us people and human are not the same thing.
I have never argued I am human, I have argued that I'm a people I can reason, I can vote, I can like or hate, I can create, I should have the exact same rights, protections and responsiblities as any other PERSON whether they be a human, an elf, an AI, an infected, a dragon.
Hmmm yesssss go up to a dragon and tell it that its not a person and that your here to pick up some of the gold and precious items since they don't belong to anyone see how far that gets you. You may cling to the dictionary defination that defines people as human (I'm sure humanis clubs do) but that's produced for a world that only has humans as a sentient race I expect that would change in a world that has other races capable of proving their sentience.
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For that matter, how long is the pregnacy cycle? 9 months like humans? 16 weeks like orks? Is it a single birth or a pair or an entire litter???
Is there a place where the reproductive cycles of the various metatypes are listed?
The only one that has been noted as being different then humans are Orks.
Orks reach maturity by age 13, their reproductive cycle is 16 weeks long, and they give birth to litters of 4 to 8 (down from 12 in 1e).
6WA has a blurb on them, as well as several other books. (But to my knowledge not yet in 5e)
So you can see my concern, IF they reproduce as fast as Orks, in a single year, a mated couple of infected could have as many 24 offspring! That's a lot of essence/flesh to keep that family going!
<but, there has not been much stated on if they can reproduce since the change to 5e. And with the noted change to infected in Storm Front, I am waiting to see if it gets any mention in future books.... but I doubt it will.>
Sadly, I am not sure what books novocrane is quoting from, as he didn't list them.
Well, that sounds like a whole lot of nope. I was asking because I remember seeing somewhere at some point that elves have a longer gestation period than humans, but I can't remember where I saw it or if there's any truth to it. That also makes me wonder if Trolls have a similar shortened gestation period since they also mature far more quickly than humans, dwarfs, of elves.
My feelings on the matter are simple. They are sick and suffering horribly, sane or not, and there is no treatment or cure. Put the poor bastards out of their misery. I see it as being similar to euthanasia for a terminal cancer patient, the difference if that an Infected will likely take out or infect a bunch of other people before they die.
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lets see:
People. noun, plural peoples for 4.
1. persons indefinitely or collectively; persons in general:
to find it easy to talk to people; What will people think?
2. persons, whether men, women, or children, considered as numerable individuals forming a group:
Twenty people volunteered to help.
3. human beings, as distinguished from animals or other beings.
4. the entire body of persons who constitute a community, tribe, nation, or other group by virtue of a common culture, history, religion, or the like:
the people of Australia; the Jewish people.
5. the persons of any particular group, company, or number (sometimes used in combination):
the people of a parish; educated people; salespeople.
6. the ordinary persons, as distinguished from those who have wealth, rank, influence, etc.:
a man of the people.
7. the subjects, followers, or subordinates of a ruler, leader, employer, etc.:
the king and his people.
#3 for the most part, the other refer back to "persons"
Person. noun
1. a human being, whether an adult or child:
The table seats four persons.
2. a human being as distinguished from an animal or a thing.
3. an individual human being who likes or prefers something specified (used in combination):
I've never been a cat person.
4.Sociology. an individual human being, especially with reference to his or her social relationships and behavioral patterns as conditioned by the culture.
5. Philosophy. a self-conscious or rational being.
6. the actual self or individual personality of a human being:
You ought not to generalize, but to consider the person you are dealing with.
7. the body of a living human being, sometimes including the clothes being worn:
He had no money on his person.
So, strictly speaking:
An AI is not a person nor People.
A Shifter is not a person nor People
A Sasquatch is not a person nor People (but HAVE been granted HUMAN rights by the UN)
A Pixie is not a person nor People
should I go on?
MY argument is that while originally they were people, the disease has had such a radical change to their body they are no longer human.
CRB page 404, ghouls
The disease
causes extreme changes in the victim’s body. He loses
all body hair, and the skin becomes a grayish-tinted, scabrous
hide. The fingers grow elongated, and the nails
harden into sharp claws. The teeth become longer and
sharper, and the eyes film over, leaving featureless white
orbs glaring out of their sockets
That doesn't sound human to me.... Elongated fingers ending in claws, longer sharper teeth, grey scabrous hide (not skin! hide! like a cow!) Featureless white eyes..... yep. Not human sounding at all!
I don't have the new critter book, so I can't see what they have to say about Vampires in there (and the CRB doesn't denote any physical changes to them... other then they can ONLY eat blood and must consume essence. )
And for the record Senko, I have had you on ignore for over a year. (I just sometimes click the "show post anyway option)
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Yes a lot of people put me on ignore because I don't get bored and quite willing to spend years arguing the same points.
As I said those definitions are for OUR world where there are only humans as a sentient being. Find me a definition of "people" from say star trek with multiple races and see if it defines it in terms of humanity where they have examples of other sentient beings or even better a DND type world where they have had multiple races that aren't human or evolved from humans for their entire history and then we'll talk. The shadowrun world has AI's, shifters, naga's, sasquatch's, centaurs all of whom aren't human and have never been human so I imagine a lot of those nations/corporations will have a very different definition of "people" than our online dictionaries.
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Yes a lot of people put me on ignore because I don't get bored and quite willing to spend years arguing the same points.
As I said those definitions are for OUR world where there are only humans as a sentient being. Find me a definition of "people" from say star trek with multiple races and see if it defines it in terms of humanity where they have examples of other sentient beings or even better a DND type world where they have had multiple races that aren't human or evolved from humans for their entire history and then we'll talk. The shadowrun world has AI's, shifters, naga's, sasquatch's, centaurs all of whom aren't human and have never been human so I imagine a lot of those nations/corporations will have a very different definition of "people" than our online dictionaries.
Sure, Find me an official Star trek dictionary that has a definition of "People" in it and I MAY except that. Or, find me a Shadowrun official dictionary and I'll accept that too. :D
Every time race has come up in Star trek, they always refer to the species (those Vulcans, these Andorians, those Klingons.) they have never used the word "people" when talking about an other race. In fact in many episodes they prattle on about "humanity" and how it's human's greatest gift to the galaxy.... never once to my knowledge do they use Person or People to refer to any other race.... Unless it's used such:
"The Cardassian people will not stand for this insult Sisko, you best be ready for the consiquences of your actions today" <Dukat, season 3, esp 8 I believe?> In which case he has identified exactly who he is speaking about and falls under article 4 of the definition of People.
But please, show me an episode where they just refer to an other race as simple "people" without using an identifier.(I own the ToS, NG, DS, voyager, and Enterprise on bluray, so I can look it up, if you provide me with a season and Ep number)
Also keep in mind, most TV shows have the language proficiency of a grade 4 student. (so it can be easily understood by the largest possible audience), and they make massive mistakes all the time. There have been several episodes where they try to get technical while talking about power... and ROYALLY fuck it up... They fuck it up so bad, that what they were doing, and what they wanted to do, were exact opposite steps! But that is common when you get someone writing about something they have NO idea about, but want to make it sound like they do....
For example, If you can get your hands on the original Star trek Operations Manual (published in 1973 I believe) that goes into the technical specs of the original constitution class vessel; Look at it's computer core. A 486 33mhz computer was FASTER by several orders of magnitude! And now, my Calculator is more powerful!
*bangs on desk* "Hello Scotty??? No intelligent Life here, beam me up" <And yet my calculator, more power then the NCC-1701 Enterprise can not transport me to the stars....Sad, sad day.>
You are arguing Street vernacular, VS actual word definition... and THAT is a slippery slope that gets played a lot by uneducated and dysfunctional people every day today. For example:
"You can't talk about Islam like that, that's racist!!"
Note: Islam is not a race, it is an ideology, one can be a follower of Islam and be born to any ethic group on the planet. Thus it is NOT racist..... And yet that is a common argument thrown around every single day on college campuses, blogs, and newspapers across the world....
Again, you're trying to expand the definition of words to suit your personal views. You can do so if you want, but that doesn't make you correct.
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lets see:
People. noun, plural peoples for 4.
1. persons indefinitely or collectively; persons in general:
to find it easy to talk to people; What will people think?
2. persons, whether men, women, or children, considered as numerable individuals forming a group:
Twenty people volunteered to help.
3. human beings, as distinguished from animals or other beings.
4. the entire body of persons who constitute a community, tribe, nation, or other group by virtue of a common culture, history, religion, or the like:
the people of Australia; the Jewish people.
5. the persons of any particular group, company, or number (sometimes used in combination):
the people of a parish; educated people; salespeople.
6. the ordinary persons, as distinguished from those who have wealth, rank, influence, etc.:
a man of the people.
7. the subjects, followers, or subordinates of a ruler, leader, employer, etc.:
the king and his people.
#3 for the most part, the other refer back to "persons"
Person. noun
1. a human being, whether an adult or child:
The table seats four persons.
2. a human being as distinguished from an animal or a thing.
3. an individual human being who likes or prefers something specified (used in combination):
I've never been a cat person.
4.Sociology. an individual human being, especially with reference to his or her social relationships and behavioral patterns as conditioned by the culture.
5. Philosophy. a self-conscious or rational being.
6. the actual self or individual personality of a human being:
You ought not to generalize, but to consider the person you are dealing with.
7. the body of a living human being, sometimes including the clothes being worn:
He had no money on his person.
So, strictly speaking:
An AI is not a person nor People.
A Shifter is not a person nor People
A Sasquatch is not a person nor People (but HAVE been granted HUMAN rights by the UN)
A Pixie is not a person nor People
should I go on?
MY argument is that while originally they were people, the disease has had such a radical change to their body they are no longer human.
CRB page 404, ghouls
The disease
causes extreme changes in the victim’s body. He loses
all body hair, and the skin becomes a grayish-tinted, scabrous
hide. The fingers grow elongated, and the nails
harden into sharp claws. The teeth become longer and
sharper, and the eyes film over, leaving featureless white
orbs glaring out of their sockets
That doesn't sound human to me.... Elongated fingers ending in claws, longer sharper teeth, grey scabrous hide (not skin! hide! like a cow!) Featureless white eyes..... yep. Not human sounding at all!
I don't have the new critter book, so I can't see what they have to say about Vampires in there (and the CRB doesn't denote any physical changes to them... other then they can ONLY eat blood and must consume essence. )
And for the record Senko, I have had you on ignore for over a year. (I just sometimes click the "show post anyway option)
Then I think we need a new word other than person / people to describe the thing I am talking about. The thing only is, all the things that aren't people according to you, I still treat them with the same respect as people. And it is something I deeply believe in real life as well.
If a human, an AI and a Shapeshifter were about to die, and I could save exactly one of them I would choose whoever I have the deepest emotional connection to, not the human by default just because it is the only person in there.
Would you choose the human automatically? You could argue this makes me a horrible member of my species as some others have (Like in a similar debate about hypothetical AI rights in the real world).
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Then I think we need a new word other than person / people to describe the thing I am talking about. The thing only is, all the things that aren't people according to you, I still treat them with the same respect as people. And it is something I deeply believe in real life as well.
If a human, an AI and a Shapeshifter were about to die, and I could save exactly one of them I would choose whoever I have the deepest emotional connection to, not the human by default just because it is the only person in there.
Would you choose the human automatically? You could argue this makes me a horrible member of my species as some others have (Like in a similar debate about hypothetical AI rights in the real world).
I agree with you. One of my characters has a "brother" who is an e-ghost and interacts with the physical world via an anthro drone. She would absolutely save him first. The only exception to that being if her son was in danger as well.
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Lets see....
Between a Human, An AI, and Shifter.... And I could only save one.....
Well that would depend. What is the situation.... Arguably, I could never "save" an AI as it not a corporeal being, and I am not a digital being.
Between the human and the shifter then.
Dunno. which ever one I could get to the quickest given the limited info.
Between a complete stranger (human) and My Bulldog...
The Bulldog. I care more for it then a complete stranger.
Between the Ex-wife and Bulldog....
hmmmm.... Save the Bulldog while waving goodbye as the Ex-wife dies! (Yes, I hate her THAT much)
Between my Daughter and the Bulldog...
My daughter in a heartbeat. Not even a question.
Between an Infected and a complete stranger.
Please! I AM probably the reason why the infected is in danger!
People form emotional attachments all the time to non human beings (AKA The Crazy Cat Lady!). It's in our nature and we have done so for thousands and thousands of years. Heck we bond with animals so completely we assign human motivations and feelings to them!
But that doesn't mean your housecat is considered a Person. (well, except for the Crazy Cat Lady... but the reason why that is, is right in the descriptor :P )
See, this is part of the problem, we form an emotional attachment to living things, and transplant our emotional connection into a belief that they are somehow "special". They are not, no matter how much we love them, they are NOT people.
Don't know if you are old enough to remember this, but a dozen year ago or so there was a great big movement to ban Tuna because Dolphins were getting caught in the tuna nets.... "Dolphins are such smart and beautiful animals! We can't let them die!!!" was the general outcry.
All I ask is "Have you actually TRIED dolphin? DAMN tasty!! Especially with some sea salt, lime and chili oil!" (Not joking. Very tasty and it's a traditional Ghana meal.)
Note for you animal lovers: When you pass away in bed, your Cat/dog WILL eat you. Every time.
<so that shows you just how much Fluffy loves YOU, huh :P >
What I do find interesting, is that this is mostly a Frist World phenomenon. Get into the developing world, and the concern for animals, animal well being drops well down. Only the rich have pets, for everyone else, an animal comes in 3 types, A service animal, a Production animal, or a food source.... and in many cases all three! Get down to the 3rd world, and animals basically come in two forms: Protection animals, and food sources... and that protection animal becomes a food source once it can no longer do its job.
They do not form the emotional attachments to animals that you see in the Western World. For example, when someone's dog dies in the western world, they are sad for weeks or even months. In the 3rd world, they are sad for about as long as it takes to prepare that dog for dinner. and once they eaten it, they go get an other dog to fill in for the one that died.
So I guess, only the fortunate have the luxury to form a human-like bond to an animal.....
Food (mmm!) for thought!
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My point is that the definitions we have are based on a world where we are the only species that is sentient. Dictionary meanings change, evolve or even get dropped entirely as language is a living thing (normally). Right now those definitions say people = human but they say that in a world which has only humans, a few hundred years ago it probably said people = man because as far as the dictionary was concerned there was no need to be politically correct and say human because man was sufficient.
If I were arguing street vernacular vs word definition I would be pointing out it says HUMAN not metahuman which means that it is only HUMANS who count not elves, dwarves, trolls, etc. They may have been human once but aren't any more. You don't call them humans with pointy ears, short humans, humans with a skin condition do you? Yet your extending your definition to cover them because they used to be human or their ancestors where but the dictionary defintion is human only. If you call them an elf you call them not a person and thus not covered by any of the laws governing people. However I'm not, I'm just pointing out that street vernacular or word definition the term in our world is based on an entire history of their only being one intelligent race. That's not the case in shadowrun, there you've had elves, dwarves, shifters, dragons, centaurs, pixies for decades all of whom are not "human" and many of which were never human to begin with it seems to me that in that case the definition of "person" would change as well.
As for the scenario ignore any connections. You have a human you don't know, an AI you don't know and a shifter you don't know. Complete and utter strangers no emotional connection and no way to talk to them as they are in a magical silence field and can't talk to you. In front of you are 3 buttons and a timer. The left button will release you and the human while killing the AI and shifter, the middle one will upload the AI to the net freeing it while releasing you and killing the human and shifter, the right button will release you and the shifter while killing the human and the AI. You have 1 hour to pick a button to press if you press none all 4 of you die. Who do you save?
Lets take another hypothetical scenario in the future nanotech has evolved and can completely rewrite a persons DNA. I use it on your daughter turning her into a feline shifter, a complete and total change. She can only breed with other cats not humans, she has all their abilities and weaknesses, in a low enough mana area she'll be stuck as a cat, she is right down to the DNA a feline shifter only distinguishable from a normal one because she remembers being human. Have I stripped her of her personhood is she now an animal? If that hits too close to home its a random male wage mage in his mid 30's, I inject him with the nanite serum and turn him into a female, teenage, feline shifter is she human?
The point we are making is that this is not an attachment to a non-human thing that is not intelligent it is aknowledging a non-human or previously human being is just as intelligent, just as emotional, just as creative, just as justfied to be considered a person as you are. No dolphin as far as I know is going to create a majestic painting glorying in the majestic tragedy of life, a shifter, AI or infected might.
Finally if nothing else look at it from a survival point of you if you deny us our rights to be "people" because we aren't human what's to stop us appying the same to you? The Tir na og army sends out its most elite fighters and mages to burn you to death along with every other human in your home city because humans are a dangerous threat and hey its not like they're elves (in fact that was the plot of a shadowrun novel).
I used star trek because I was watching the film (I very much doubt there is a star trek dictionary) but insert any other series with multiple species and ask yourself would they really only consider "humans" the one true race and if they do what tends to happen in those series?
Remember we aren't animals the rich are forming a bond with we're an animal with our own views, our own desire and in many cases a profound dislike of metahumanity but we're still people.
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@Reaver
I am a vegetarian so no thank you to Dolphin Meat. I know my dog would probably eat me if I died but that's no reasoning for me to do the same thing. At the end of the day I am the superior being and as such I can make such a decision while the animal is not. Yes I understand that it is a first world problem. But on the other hand I think at some point every person on earth should have first world problems only and we should work on making life better for everyone.
But a least now I understand you a lot more. Your problem with infected is primarily the threat they pose and not just that they aren't humans anymore. Because I would agree that they aren't human. But I also respect all life that isn't human and you draw some form of line. Thank you for entertaining my questions.
Just as a sidenote you could safe an AI if it was bound to one data core or robotic body that's trapped in a burning building. If it has the ability to upload there probably wouldn't be a reason ever to safe it (safe for a digital attack and that would probably be a conflict too fast and complex for a human to ever do anything meaningful if two human+ digital entities went at it with an intent to kill each other)
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well, you partly right.
I found a dictionary from 1792 that is online: https://books.google.ca/books?id=bXsCAAAAQAAJ&pg=PT7&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false
It's in PDF form so I can't copy and paste, but this is directly what it says:
People. F. (Peuple, Fr. populous, Lat)
1: A nation; thofe who compofe a community.
shakefp. 2 the vulgar. Walfer 3. the commonalty ; not the princes or nobles
4: perfons of a particular clafs Bacon. 5 Men, or perfons in general. Arbatbnot
and.... that's as close I can get it, spelling and all.... (I spelled it out EXACTLY as it is, you can use the link to check)
1792 marks the almost the early beginning of what would become to be known as the Victorian Era... An era that saw many cultural changes in the great kingdom of that time (the British Empire)... They were freeing slaves and sending them to their own colony and country (A hell hole we know today as Sierra Leone). Capt. George Vancouver maps the west coast of Canada and the united states and claims the Puget sound in the name of the British empire. And racism was at its height....
(so yes, while they considered Blacks to be inferior, they also didn't see them as just animals, as they were beginning to abolish the slave trade into Britain.)
And as we can all see, the language has evolved a bit over the last 200 years.... but the meaning of the word has not changed much.... Except for explicitly listing women, and explicitly noting animals as NOT.
<ANNNND a computer error deleted the next 10 paragraphs I had written out. Posting this as is. Then will retype out what got lost..... Fuckiing computers>
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@Reaver
I am a vegetarian so no thank you to Dolphin Meat. I know my dog would probably eat me if I died but that's no reasoning for me to do the same thing. At the end of the day I am the superior being and as such I can make such a decision while the animal is not. Yes I understand that it is a first world problem. But on the other hand I think at some point every person on earth should have first world problems only and we should work on making life better for everyone.
But a least now I understand you a lot more. Your problem with infected is primarily the threat they pose and not just that they aren't humans anymore. Because I would agree that they aren't human. But I also respect all life that isn't human and you draw some form of line. Thank you for entertaining my questions.
Just as a sidenote you could safe an AI if it was bound to one data core or robotic body that's trapped in a burning building. If it has the ability to upload there probably wouldn't be a reason ever to safe it (safe for a digital attack and that would probably be a conflict too fast and complex for a human to ever do anything meaningful if two human+ digital entities went at it with an intent to kill each other)
Wait....
Vegetarian? VEGETARIAN?!?!?
You Sir are NOT People!
(Kidding, could care less what you eat. Just don't try to ram your way of life down my throat and I won't do the same.)
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<continuing with the post that the computer fucked up on>
Elves, dwarves, trolls and Orks are Persons and People because The UN, the WHO (no, not the band!), and even the Catholic church says they are (admittedly for the church, only after a mass revolt of the faithful). Also, humans can easily interbreed with them and produce viable offspring. Even though we look nothing alike we are all humans - just a different races of humans. (and not in the social construct way we consider it now...)
That Troll may be big and ugly and have horns, but he's still a human... the way that a Pug and Great Dane are still dogs, even though they look nothing alike.
As to your first little hypothetical:
I free the human. Which is exactly what Psychology says I would do. When all else is equal in a stressful situation, people are most likely to pick the solution that most resembles themselves..... This is an actual Psychology test done 25 years ago where they gathered people from different ethnic backgrounds and placed them is controlled situations. Every time, people chose to "help" those of the same ethnic background as themselves before all others.
As to your second Hypothetical:
Easy. I find you. I capture you. I skin you. Repeatedly. Until your regeneration gives out and your die. and for a shifter that takes a LONG time! I got 8 full pelts off that Tiger Shifter last year before he failed his regeneration roll and died. Easiest 80k ever! Then once you have been deal with, I use nanites to turn her back. If they could turn her to a shifter, they can change her back! Easy-peasy! Next Hypothetical please :P
I acknowledge freely that anything with Sapience is as smart as me, has the same range of emotions as me, and is just as capable of producing great works of art, science and literature. But that still doesn't make them a Person, or People. an AI is still a digital construct, it doesn't matter how may electrons it cries, or how smart it is. A shifter is still an animal, no matter how many languages it's learned or poems its written.
Just because something is as smart as human, as wise as human, and as emotive as a human does not make it human, and thus a Person or People. There are a great many differences between us which you seem to be forgetting... In the books there is a great example of a Wolf Shifter getting confused with our mating habits. He was utterly confused why we would spend hours talking, drinking and eating before having sex. To him it was a simple matter, If the chick was in Estrus, just take her and be done with it. That right there shows just how different we actually are. Sure that Shifter is smart and wise.. but its not human, nor does it understand what it means to be human. Simply because, even though it is Sapient, it's STILL a wolf.
It's not me, that denying your "human rights". Its everyone EXCEPT the NAN, Amazonia, Azania, Aztlan and Yakut...And, in the non-UN countries they actively consider you a threat. Such a threat they actually pay ME to come kill you! (Don't worry, I generally don't take wetwork jobs. Unless you betray me, or backstab me.. then the work is VERY wet, and takes DAYS! [Hurrah for Torture rank 8 backed up with Anatomy 6 and Medicine 6 knowledge skills!]) So what's that? 70% of the world population doesn't think you are People either. And of that 70, say 40%(?) actively consider you vermin/threat and pay for your errdaication :D (better get that shifter policlub geared into overdrive! you have HUGE uphill battle)
I am not worried about the elves getting uppity. Its happened before, (3 times in fact) and they have gotten their Pee-Pee slapped each time. Hence why the Tirs are not doing so great anymore (at least up to 4e.. still waiting for word in 5e)... And besides, There is a crap tonne more human then elves. And despite all this talk of how "powerful" the few immortal elite elves are, There is some SERIOUS mojo and power mostly in human hands... Remember the Ghost Dance? And how the American Indian Shamans blew the tops off 11 mountains along the Ring of Fire 40 years ago AT THE SAME TIME? Something tells me they could do it again.. if they had to. Remember Aztlan/Aztechnology and their Viiculum, blood magic, and Blood Rituals? Enough tech know-how and magical mojo to beat up and Great Dragon! And Really, on a personal level, I have yet to meet anyone outside of Harley that can match me in the magic department (intitation rank 18. Have ALL the meta-magics I can, and if I REALLY need it, I have bonded a force 20 Power focus, and a force 20 Ally spirit)
And honestly I could care less about shifters. In my career as a running spanning 30 years, I have run into exactly 2 shifters. The first was the adept tiger assassin that I skinned 8 times. And the second is a Wolf Shifter who happens to be my telismonger. And the only reason I know he is a shifter is I spend 6 years being blind and relying on Astral Perception and saw his astral form. Other then that, he takes my money and I get my reagents. All's good.
I trust AI as far as I can throw them.. and considering they are a digital construct, I can't throw them!
(I take threats of dropping a space station and releasing toxic viruses on the planet VERY seriously Mr. Sojourner)
But then again, I refuse to use the matrix, so chances of running into an AI are remote, to say the least.
and YES, you are AN animal. A smart animal. An animal with a human range of emotions. But still and animal no matter if you want to acknowledge it or not :P And I don't really care who you like or dislike....
But a word of advice? Keep your Racism in check while around humans..... It's not a crime to shoot a fox! It's pest control!
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Which is proving my point. You only consider humans worth protection under the law even though humans are just one part of the law by your own argument the moral thing to ensure the survival of shifters, AI's, sasquatch's anything that wasn't human or can trace its ancestry back to that is to hire as many assasins as it takes to kill you to ensure our own survival. Really the only difference between you and the most racist humanis club member is where you draw the line on what counts as human.
As for that dictionary it also proves my point about the way definitions evolve with time. Like you said it doesn't say "humans" it say's men, in fact it also excludes lords and nobles as their own seperate class distinct from the "people".
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Between the Ex-wife and Bulldog....
hmmmm.... Save the Bulldog while waving goodbye as the Ex-wife dies! (Yes, I hate her THAT much)
True story.
Some local punks once kidnapped Reaver's Ex and sent him a text message from her phone saying pay up or we cut her into little pieces.
He sent back a message asking for hi res pics of the cutting up.
Then the punks sent another message saying pay up or they give her back.
Sadly before he could get the monies together, the cops found them and brought her back. :P
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Which is proving my point. You only consider humans worth protection under the law even though humans are just one part of the law by your own argument the moral thing to ensure the survival of shifters, AI's, sasquatch's anything that wasn't human or can trace its ancestry back to that is to hire as many assasins as it takes to kill you to ensure our own survival. Really the only difference between you and the most racist humanis club member is where you draw the line on what counts as human.
As for that dictionary it also proves my point about the way definitions evolve with time. Like you said it doesn't say "humans" it say's men, in fact it also excludes lords and nobles as their own seperate class distinct from the "people".
Yes, And we are also talking a 224 year old dictionary that has words spelt MUCH different then we do now.
The point I was bring up about my Daughter's dictionary and the Word Gay better proves my point...
Gay has been slang for homosexual since the mid 1950s... that's what? 60+ years ago??? In 60+ year LGTB(xyz) community can't get a word changed in the dictionary to match the common usage of it?? The LGBT(xyz) Community floods social media, you-tube, and the internet with demands to change bathroom signs, change rooms rules, shower rules and have even come up with 60,0001 and new pronouns for Him/Her!!! YET they forgot to bitch/whine/cry to the dictionary companies????
Shadowrun is ONLY 60 years into the future, yet you expect them to CHANGE the definition of Human and People to match the whim of a bunch of animals that 70% of the world consider throw rugs and 40%(?) of those 70% percent actively PAY for you eradication... Espoecially since many of these species weren't found until the 2040s... that a little stretch of the imagination. Hateto say it, but civilizations don't change the definations of words THAT fast.... But who knows, get a UN resolution stating your Rights and it may happen as an honorific as is the case with sasquatch (who are still not Human. but have Human Rights)
And you are worried about ME??? I have ZERO political power, except for that I can blackmail out of a person (and blackmail only takes you so far).
Best get your piorities straight :P I don't give a rat's ass if you live or die. (for that matter, I don't give a rat's ass if humans, orks, trolls, elves, dwarves, pixies, sasquatch, 3 eye purple people eaters die!) Right up until you MAKE me care... Which has never ended well for anyone that has :P
And, do REALLY want to pick a fight? Shifters are 0.003% of the World population, OR LESS. The ENTIRE shifter species in all its forms don't even form a large city.... That is a fight you can not win. Ever. At best, with concerted effort and the extinction of a few species, you are all gone in 2 decades tops. (Hint: Races that number 200k total, don't get to threaten people.... ESPECIALLY animal species with NO rights!) And in your little war, what do you think happens to the support given to you by those other countries hmmm??
You think the NAN is going to happily protect you when you declare war on metahumanity??? (since the NAN is 99.8% metahumans... I'm gonna say "no")
So keep your little fox teeth covered.... or I May end up with a new Fox Skin jacket... (how high IS your body? Do you feel you could you survive 8 to 10 skinings?? I need to know! It makes the difference between a sports jacket, a bomber style jacket, and a longcoat!)
And sorry, no matter how much you whine and cry and gnash your teeth, you are STILL an animal.
Again, I freely admit you have human level intelligence, and human level emotions, and human level wisdom.
But you are also covered in fur (50% of the time), reproduce with animals, give birth to litters appropriate to your species and think more like your original species then you do a human... regardless of what you think. I am truly sorry you can not understand that. Some times in life, you just don't the things you want, no matter how badly you want them...
And no, Life is not fair. Never has been, never will be. But keep wishing on those rainbows and unicorns!
And BTW, its not ME that think only humans are worth protecting under the law.... Its LAW that says only metahumans are worth protecting under it. Take it up with them, I am not a lawyer, I steal shit for a living! So really you're railing against the LAST person that can help you..... Nor do I have any desire to, as it has no bearing on my life one way or the other. Don't get in my way, and you get to live. Get in my way, and I'll burn you down. Same with any other humans, orks, trolls, elves, dwarves, and poodles (what can I say, I'm an equal opportunity burner!)
In short, you want to Live? Fine, don't care. You want Rights? Fine, don't care again.
But I can't GIVE you those rights. So go ask those that can.
and until they DO give you those Rights, you are not a Person, nor are you People by the strictest definition of the word.
And even then, maybe not. (Like I have pointed out many times, Sasquatch are NOT human, thus not People or Persons by strict definition.... But they DO have Human Rights under the law.)
But that doesn't change the fact that the infected should be burned out and excised from the population. When you are dealing with Cancer, Sometimes the only thing you can do is cut it out - even if that means the whole limb- in order to save the host. And make no mistake, the infected are a cancer on the earth.
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Between the Ex-wife and Bulldog....
hmmmm.... Save the Bulldog while waving goodbye as the Ex-wife dies! (Yes, I hate her THAT much)
True story.
Some local punks once kidnapped Reaver's Ex and sent him a text message from her phone saying pay up or we cut her into little pieces.
He sent back a message asking for hi res pics of the cutting up.
Then the punks sent another message saying pay up or they give her back.
Sadly before he could get the monies together, the cops found them and brought her back. :P
No.
I asked for high rez video. With sound.
anything THAT personally enjoyable I want to watch and hear repeatedly!
(I even offered to send them a spoon!)
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Between the Ex-wife and Bulldog....
hmmmm.... Save the Bulldog while waving goodbye as the Ex-wife dies! (Yes, I hate her THAT much)
True story.
Some local punks once kidnapped Reaver's Ex and sent him a text message from her phone saying pay up or we cut her into little pieces.
He sent back a message asking for hi res pics of the cutting up.
Then the punks sent another message saying pay up or they give her back.
Sadly before he could get the monies together, the cops found them and brought her back. :P
No.
I asked for high rez video. With sound.
anything THAT personally enjoyable I want to watch and hear repeatedly!
(I even offered to send them a spoon!)
Any chance you could send those guys after my ex? I can't pay them, but I can supply snacks...and pie!
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My point is that the definitions we have are based on a world where we are the only species that is sentient. Dictionary meanings change, evolve or even get dropped entirely as language is a living thing (normally). Right now those definitions say people = human but they say that in a world which has only humans, a few hundred years ago it probably said people = man because as far as the dictionary was concerned there was no need to be politically correct and say human because man was sufficient.
If I were arguing street vernacular vs word definition I would be pointing out it says HUMAN not metahuman which means that it is only HUMANS who count not elves, dwarves, trolls, etc. They may have been human once but aren't any more. You don't call them humans with pointy ears, short humans, humans with a skin condition do you? Yet your extending your definition to cover them because they used to be human or their ancestors where but the dictionary defintion is human only. If you call them an elf you call them not a person and thus not covered by any of the laws governing people. However I'm not, I'm just pointing out that street vernacular or word definition the term in our world is based on an entire history of their only being one intelligent race. That's not the case in shadowrun, there you've had elves, dwarves, shifters, dragons, centaurs, pixies for decades all of whom are not "human" and many of which were never human to begin with it seems to me that in that case the definition of "person" would change as well.
Is now a bad time to bring up the old theory about how early UGE Elves and Dwarves were actually Changelings, swapped out for human babies by various Factions within the Faerie Court to infiltrate society while what we saw as Goblinization was really just reborn Fae-descendants re-emerging thanks to the rising mana? So what some call metahumanity is actually a parallel, but separate set of species?
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Ahhh Humanis. Don't ever change :P
Humanis has lots little wonderful 'theories' over the years. I especially enjoyed the original arguments you guys used.
"Meta-humanity is a sexually transmitted disease"
●In a way that is true. All life is sexually transmitted.... its how life is formed outside of a lab! But I'm not going turning into a Ork by sleeping with one. Trust me..... tested that theory out.
"They are monsters with out souls!"
●First prove that *I* have a soul please... because I keep getting told that I am a soulless bastard by my ex-wife nearly daily. By my daughter every time I threaten her prospective boyfriends with a Control Actions induced removal of their Junk....
"If left unchecked, they'll over-populate planet, comsume all the resources and drive us all into extintion!"
● I would say you might actually have a point with this one, IF the tuskers didn't have such pathetically short lives and such a high infant death rate. Yes a female Ork can have up to 24 kids in a year. But many Orks can barely feed themselves yet alone 24 extra mouths. And there is the biology side... with only two breasts, that's not enough milk to feed 8 new borns at once... so many Ork families usually lose a couple infants before they can transition to solid food...
Poor little guys....
"Look at the size of a full grown Troll! Look at the size of their mouths! They could swallow your whole head!!!"
●???? I thought that was a troll mothering technique! Kid freaking out? Mother mouthes the kid's head until it calms down... Seriously though, yes they are Big. I get that. But at least someone can get things off the top shelf without a step ladder. And if you ever need an engine carried, A trolls the man for the Job!
I may be apathetic towards metahumanity and the other freaky species out there. But I don't actively speak of their destruction. (Except Infected. Those monsters get a lake of fire.)
I also don't really care if they survive or not... I have my own problems to deal with.... like what is for dinner tonight.... Salmon or steak...
<edited because: On phone. It missed and misspelled words to the point that even I noticed.
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While we don't have the tech for bunraku, if you live in a modest sized city, just do a search for "body rub" or "massage Parlour" in your town..... same idea just no mind altering tech.
In other words, not the same at all. Bunraku is not voluntary sex work, but slaves turned into puppets.
Also, you completely missed my point: I didn't claim murder and sovereign citizens don't exist, I pointed out that "we take a rather dim view of things like" the aforementioned. IN Shadowrun on the other hand, it's between "yeah well, what are you going to do about it?" and what the PCs do for a living.
As for Apex pedators.... we are ok with them as long as we are on the top of the list.... but the infected are higher then metahumans simply because they EAT us as their SOLE form of food. That's were the problem lies there, we are no longer the Apex of apex predators.
Mankind has at all times revered wolves, bears, lions, and other predators as embodiment of strength and power, precisely because they can easily put you on their menu. On the other hand, I've never heard of a vulture shaman.
And metahumans are not the sole source of food. Ghouls only need a certain amount of metahuman meat, and they even prefer that meat to come from already dead "donors" (because they're lowly carrion feeders and not ferocious predators). Given that dead bodies don't eat any food and therefore don't meet your definition of "people", that shouldn't be anything you find objectionable :D
(Also keep in mind, for some countries, these things are not crimes! Prostitution is state sponsored in some countries. To the point that declining a sex work job disqualifies from unemployment payments and welfare! Looking at you NZ.
Oh, that urban legend has evolved from "in Germany" to "in NZ"? Good to know :D
Elves, dwarves, trolls and Orks are Persons and People because The UN, the WHO (no, not the band!), and even the Catholic church says they are (admittedly for the church, only after a mass revolt of the faithful).
"They are not people because we don't define them as people, we don't define them as people because they are not people"...sorry, that's a bit too circular to make a valid point...
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Nothing I daid you can't find without a little google-Fu Sengir.
If you think those women in many of those body-rub and massage parlours are there by choice, think again. Sexual slavery is a trillion dollar a year industry with over 2 million women FORCED into the sex trade against their will each year. Many of them end at such establishments. If that's not the 20th centery version of a bunraku parlour, i don't know what is.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/World/No-job-no-excuse-for-turning-down-sex-work/2005/01/30/1107020262141.html
Looks like it was Germany. My bad.
Yes we have. Especially the Native Americans. They also hunted those animals for food and clothing as well. Venerated the killer whale, eagle, raven, and other animals so much that form part of their mythos. And people travel thousands of kilometers, and entire countries for a chance to kill apex predators. And we as a species have fone a very good job of killing off things we find threatening...
Alligater Gnarr from US rivers. The Artic Wolf. Grizzley bears, cougars (no not slang for middle aged women hanging out in bars... although those ones have been know to drag a 400lbs man off his barstool... and are never seen again) all animals that are on the endangered list due to overhunting, or state sponsored execution.
You last point makes no sense. Care to try again...(me thinks you talk yourself into your own corner).
A few posts up you'll find the dictonary definitions of the words People and Person.
They both go out of there way to tell you that ANIMALS are not a person, or a people. ONLY humans are a person, or people.
Humans, elves, trolls, orks, dwarves are all humans (hence why they all fall under the term metahuman). Thus they are Persons, and People.
Shifters are animals. Sorry it hurts your fee-fees, but that is clear. As animals, they are NOT Persons nor People. Yes language sucks, but thems the rules. Suck it up buttercup!
AI are a DIGITAL contruct. Not humans. So again not a Person nor People. Just the way it works. I'm sorry you don't like it, but thems the rules.
Words have meaning and context. PERSON and PEOPLE are used for HUMANS. Flock, gaggle, murder, pride, host, swarm, are all descriptors for animals.
Again, I don't make the rules, I just follow them. And nor am I arrogant enough to expect the definition of a word to change to fit my "fweewings".... there is process for that if you really want to whine and cry about, talk to those in charge.... but until then the definition of PERSON and PEOPLE is that those terms apply to humans only.
(And before you go off on it. Yes trolls, elves, orks, and dwarves are humans. Because GENETICS say so.)
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http://www.smh.com.au/news/World/No-job-no-excuse-for-turning-down-sex-work/2005/01/30/1107020262141.html
Looks like it was Germany. My bad.
Now on a side note for clarity, that did turn out to be false:
http://www.snopes.com/media/notnews/brothel.asp
However, this should not be taken to mean there is not a massive problem in human trafficking, with many young women (and men) getting lured away in hopes of better jobs only to travel to foreign locales and their passports taken off them, before being forced into the skin trade.
And for the regular joe nowadays, most of them would put up their hands and say 'what can you do about it?' not too unlike the SR citizen as most folk simply don't consider it their problem.
Not that SR must make a lot of that seem downright tame when furries can hook up with shifters, blood dolls stick their neck out for vamps and somewhere out there is probably Mantis Snuff Porn.
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Well, that restores my faith in humanity by a tiny fraction.
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So if your daughter got turned into a ghoul on her sweet 16th birthday.
She would incerated by you when she approached you saying she needed money for a fancy wig?
I thinl in shadowrun the only people are those with a valid SIN. A sterile cannibalistic cloned awakened pedophile is still "people". (unless he is SINless).
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Nothing I daid you can't find without a little google-Fu Sengir.
If you think those women in many of those body-rub and massage parlours are there by choice, think again. Sexual slavery is a trillion dollar a year industry with over 2 million women FORCED into the sex trade against their will each year. Many of them end at such establishments. If that's not the 20th centery version of a bunraku parlour, i don't know what is.
Hate to break it to you, but while slavery certainly exists in many sectors, the stories about the trillion-dollar industry, ten thousands of trafficking victims ferried in for the Super Bowl, yadda yadda, are vastly exaggerated claims made up to get more funding or justify people's Victorian moralities. If you go looking for the source of these numbers, you will find two:
a) They got pulled straight out of somebody's rear
b) Police declaring any vice-related arrest to be another spectacular blow against human trafficking, your tax dollars doing good work folks! The fact that they're doing so while arresting both parties and parading them in public should give some hint as to how much they believe the whole "liberating poor enslaved victims" spin themselves.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/World/No-job-no-excuse-for-turning-down-sex-work/2005/01/30/1107020262141.html
Looks like it was Germany. My bad.
Speaking of stuff pulled out of somewhere: Whether it was NZ, Germany, or Farawayestan, the story been boiled over for more than a decade, without ever producing any shred of proof.
You last point makes no sense. Care to try again...(me thinks you talk yourself into your own corner).
Alright, let me try to put it a bit more directly: Your argument was such a textbook example of circular reasoning that I find myself wondering whether you are trolling us with a minimally modified version of the famous "Wellington is in New Zealand, therefore Wellington is in New Zealand"...
A few posts up you'll find the dictonary definitions of the words People and Person.
I've got an inherited dictionary from 190x, if I look up "power plant" there it certainly won't list nuclear power plants. Did I just prove that nuclear power plants are not power plants at all, or might the problem just be that dictionaries can only list what was known when the entry was written? ;)
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A few posts up you'll find the dictonary definitions of the words People and Person.
They both go out of there way to tell you that ANIMALS are not a person
Shifters are animals. Sorry it hurts your fee-fees, but that is clear. As animals, they are NOT Persons nor People. Yes language sucks, but thems the rules. Suck it up buttercup!
AI are a DIGITAL contruct. Not humans. So again not a Person nor People. Just the way it works. I'm sorry you don't like it, but thems the rules.
Again, I don't make the rules, I just follow them. And nor am I arrogant enough to expect the definition of a word to change to fit my "fweewings".... there is process for that if you really want to whine and cry about, talk to those in charge.... but until then the definition of PERSON and PEOPLE is that those terms apply to humans only.
Well. I don't tend to follow the rules if they cause sentient beings to be harmed. I don't expect the definition of the word to change because I want it to. But in the end it's just a word and words have no power. The only thing that matters are your actions. As a shifter I wouldn't demand to be strictly called a person. But I expect you not to attack me just because the law allows you to do so. Because I strongly believe that a sentient being should never resort to harming another sentient being. And that extends to infected for me as well to connect back to the actual topic. With that said I am only willing to accept infected as long as they don't cause suffering for other sentient beings. Easier for ghouls, A LOT harder for vampires.
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Sadly yes.
I don't want to see her suffer, both mentally, emotionally, and physically. Which is both the trauma that the virus puts them through, the mental anguish of realizing what they have become and what they have to do to survive; And the trauma that society itself will inflict on her because of what the virus has done to her.
It's a mercy, and humaine thing to do.
●●●●●
Have you people considered what this virus does, and the consiquences of infection?
First, the disease painfully ravishes both the body and the brain as it warps both into its new form over the onset time. It is this mental trauma, coupled with extreme pain that drives many ghouls Feral.
Next is the social side of the disease. By law in many countries, Ghouls lose their SIN status. So suddenly they can't find legal work anymore. They can't rent or own property, have a bank account or even have a say in their own country (can't vote). This drives them straight into the street.
Once on the street, things get even worse. As a ghoul many people are not going to help them,. Heck many people will actively go out of their way to harm ghouls! which just drives them deeper into the dark places.
There is talk of ghouls digging up graves to gind food.... well thanks to the Shedim many cities have taken to burning bodies instead or inturning them (to say nothing of the land usage) so graveyard robberies are getting slimmer. Other mentions have been medical waste or corner offices.... But both of those have some problems too, the first is what exactly are you eating from medical waste??? Removed cancerous toumors? Disease infested amputations? The fat from rich bitches' asses? Yummy. Corners offices are part of a chain evidence and investigation. Bodies are carefully examined for evidence of death and trauma... which makes it a gard to walk off with a snack...
So that basically leaves shadow services..... streetdocs who need a body cleanup (but how many times can a street doc lose a patient before clients dry up... or an angry teammate gives them a double tap to the brainpan?). Or the organleggers. And really if you are working for the organleggers chances are you are also hunting (after all, where do you think organleggers get their goods from??)
●●●●
So yes, to spare her that pain and suffering and moral choices, I would end her life.
Now, does that make me a monster? Most likely. But then again I am already damned from the rivers of blood on my hands from past mistakes and actions.... So I might as well be damned for an act of love.
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With that said I am only willing to accept infected as long as they don't cause suffering for other sentient beings. Easier for ghouls, A LOT harder for vampires.
"Your right to swing your arms..." ;)
That's why vampire rights are limited to Amazonia and other places where the vampire with a K-12 habit might be the most humane guy in the neighborhood...
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A few posts up you'll find the dictonary definitions of the words People and Person.
They both go out of there way to tell you that ANIMALS are not a person
Shifters are animals. Sorry it hurts your fee-fees, but that is clear. As animals, they are NOT Persons nor People. Yes language sucks, but thems the rules. Suck it up buttercup!
AI are a DIGITAL contruct. Not humans. So again not a Person nor People. Just the way it works. I'm sorry you don't like it, but thems the rules.
Again, I don't make the rules, I just follow them. And nor am I arrogant enough to expect the definition of a word to change to fit my "fweewings".... there is process for that if you really want to whine and cry about, talk to those in charge.... but until then the definition of PERSON and PEOPLE is that those terms apply to humans only.
Well. I don't tend to follow the rules if they cause sentient beings to be harmed. I don't expect the definition of the word to change because I want it to. But in the end it's just a word and words have no power. The only thing that matters are your actions. As a shifter I wouldn't demand to be strictly called a person. But I expect you not to attack me just because the law allows you to do so. Because I strongly believe that a sentient being should never resort to harming another sentient being. And that extends to infected for me as well to connect back to the actual topic. With that said I am only willing to accept infected as long as they don't cause suffering for other sentient beings. Easier for ghouls, A LOT harder for vampires.
And I general y don't go out of my way to hunt down infected either... But at the same time, I have ZERO qualms of opening up with a force 20 flamethrower spell if one so much as looks at me sideways....
And I could really care less about the other things out there (Shifters, Pixies, etc).....Mostly because my interactions with them have been so limited.
Never seen a Pixie, EVER.
I have run into exactly two shifters. One sells me reagents, the other tried to take out my team (and I made a message out of him).
I have a huge problem with AIs, no secret there.... But you survive the Renraku Incident, and see how much you trust a construct again. (especially when you are already leery of the Matrix)
BUT, that said, I am also a criminal that has a job to do, and if you get in the way of that job, I WILL take you down, and I don't care who/what you are.
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<<After typing out a huge post last night and having the webpage hiccup and lose, I typed this out off line then pasted it here. >>
>>Hate to break it to you, but while slavery certainly exists in many sectors, the stories about the trillion-dollar industry, ten thousands of trafficking victims ferried in for the Super Bowl, yadda yadda, are vastly exaggerated claims made up to get more funding or justify people's Victorian moralities. If you go looking for the source of these numbers, you will find two:
a) They got pulled straight out of somebody's rear
b) Police declaring any vice-related arrest to be another spectacular blow against human trafficking, your tax dollars doing good work folks! The fact that they're doing so while arresting both parties and parading them in public should give some hint as to how much they believe the whole "liberating poor enslaved victims" spin themselves.
Lets see.....
https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/books-and-monographs/trafficking.pdf
http://www.soroptimist.org/trafficking/faq.html (feminist spin)
http://www.un.org/events/women/iwd/2007/factsfigures.shtml
https://www.stopthetraffik.org/the-scale-of-human-traffiking (human trafficing mostly)
http://www.ilo.org/global/about-the-ilo/newsroom/news/WCMS_182109/lang--en/index.htm (trafficing and slavery in all forms)
Now, the numbers in these documents fluctuate wildly with some listing 200k-1mil, others listing 700k to 4mil... with economic gains listed anywhere from $500 million all the way up to $400 billion. And even the writers admit that thanks to this being a underground illegal activitiy, it is very hard to get a full picture and true value.
If you dont' like or accept those documents, would you be so kind as to provide links to documents you feel are more inclined to "tell the truth"?
Thanks.
>>>Alright, let me try to put it a bit more directly: Your argument was such a textbook example of circular reasoning that I find myself wondering whether you are trolling us with a minimally modified version of the famous "Wellington is in New Zealand, therefore Wellington is in New Zealand"...
Ah, you are talking about petitio principii. Sadly, you are all bit off here. petitio principii relys on a burden of proof. I have given the proof by a direct copy/paste to this thread, that showed the meaning of the words in question. (and you can check my evidence/proof with a simple search. Go ahead, I'll wait :P)
now, If I had said "People are persons cause only persons are people" you may have a case. But I did not do so, I listed out what the word means, how it applied, the conditions of use, and the its terminology. That is as far as the Burden of proof is required from my end. I have stated my position, disclosed my evidence in support of my position, and rested my argument. Now it is up to YOU to disprove my claim with your burden of proof, which you have not done. All you have done is level an emotional attack, and then deflected. Which, I believe is refered to as a "strawman" (but you seem to be more acedemically minded, Am I wrong?)
So, please, explain to me, and show your burden of evidence that proves that animals are Persons and People. I'll wait.
>>>I've got an inherited dictionary from 190x, if I look up "power plant" there it certainly won't list nuclear power plants. Did I just prove that nuclear power plants are not power plants at all, or might the problem just be that dictionaries can only list what was known when the entry was written? ;)
Yes, actually it does. It proves that in 190X, there were no nuclear powerplants. And you are correct that it only shows what was know at the time of the writting; But you seem to have missed a large point. (I'll wait while you go back up top and read the previous posts and see where you missed it.)
I compared the entry of People and Person currently with a known common word that is in use today and then compared to a dictonary of modern times to see if they had a entry that matched the common use of the word. It did not.
I then made a supposition that was founded on that (admitted slim) evidence of how long it takes to get a word's newly common meaning added to its official definition. And compared THAT to what was being expected by an other poster. And since I don't have a timemachine that allows me to not only travel to the future, but visit imaginary places, its the best I could do. And is very common when dealing with futureistic, fantasy settings.
What I did NOT do, what pull out a dictonary from 300 years ago and say "this is what it says, There-fore, THIS is Correct (like you did with the 190x and nuclear power). I did respond to Senko's request for what the definition of the word was 224 years ago by tracking down an online 1792 dictonary and carefuly reprinted the info here. (which wasn't even MY burden -it was Senko's- as it was his position that the word had changed, yet never directly proved. But I felt like being nice.)
The base point is, Words have meaning and definitions attached to them, those definitions do not change quickly nor do the change to fit the whims of a single individual, or an minority of individuals.. No matter how you feel about it.
And I STILL waiting for *proof* that animals are People and Persons.
(Ball's in your court now Sengir)
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https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/books-and-monographs/trafficking.pdf
http://www.soroptimist.org/trafficking/faq.html (feminist spin)
http://www.un.org/events/women/iwd/2007/factsfigures.shtml
https://www.stopthetraffik.org/the-scale-of-human-traffiking (human trafficing mostly)
http://www.ilo.org/global/about-the-ilo/newsroom/news/WCMS_182109/lang--en/index.htm (trafficing and slavery in all forms)
Now, the numbers in these documents fluctuate wildly with some listing 200k-1mil, others listing 700k to 4mil... with economic gains listed anywhere from $500 million all the way up to $400 billion.
...and also wildly confounding human smuggling, trafficking for any kind of involuntary labor, trafficking just for sexual slavery, underage prostitution (which is mostly homeless minors prostituting themselves) and so on and so forth, with a healthy dose of moral panic added on top. My absolute favorite is the claim that 133 sex trafficking arrests were made during the 2011 Super Bowl. That number, which has been repeated so often that it's got to be true, was made up by counting every vice arrest in a two-week period as "human trafficking" (https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-watch/wp/2015/01/30/your-handy-criminal-justice-guide-to-the-super-bowl/?utm_term=.de9c6049c16f). Not even just prostitution-related offenses, everybody arrested for pot became a human trafficker and that joint in his pocket a sex slave. And of course, those number go "upstream" into nation- and worldwide statistics, too.
TL;DR: The statistics are more Gish Gallop than evidence. All they prove is that involuntary and exploitative labor exists, and that the sex trade is no exception to that. Which nobody denies.
The rest is fanciful narrative about vast secret networks abducting helpless persons for their nefarious and perverted purposes, powerful enough to suppress any real evidence of their existence -- that should ring a bell somewhere (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satanic_ritual_abuse), especially for role players.
The fact that this moral panic exists does however nicely illustrate my point: We consider these crimes to be so horrible that they've even become the subject or horror stories. A bit of statistic variance in the overall decreasing number of police killed in the line of duty is enough to start a conversation about a "war on cops". In Shadowrun, Bunraku is "so what", and murdering all kinds of security is what the eponymous operatives do for a living. It's a truly fragged-up world, especially in the circles PCs move in.
Ah, you are talking about petitio principii.
No, I am talking about the classic example of circular reasoning, which you minimally rephrased into "Elves, dwarves, trolls and Orks are Persons and People because The UN, the WHO (no, not the band!), and even the Catholic church says they are (admittedly for the church, only after a mass revolt of the faithful)."
Yes, actually it does. It proves that in 190X, there were no nuclear powerplants. And you are correct that it only shows what was know at the time of the writing;
In other words, the whole dictionary discussion is a useless sideshow: All of recorded history took place in a world where there are no sapients besides Homo Sapiens, the Sixth World has one or two more, including one who was eligible for President of the UCAS.
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And I general y don't go out of my way to hunt down infected either... But at the same time, I have ZERO qualms of opening up with a force 20 flamethrower spell if one so much as looks at me sideways....
I have a huge problem with AIs, no secret there.... But you survive the Renraku Incident, and see how much you trust a construct again. (especially when you are already leery of the Matrix)
BUT, that said, I am also a criminal that has a job to do, and if you get in the way of that job, I WILL take you down, and I don't care who/what you are.
And that's what I would never do. I only attack if they attacked me first. Maybe I am too kind to play a game like Shadowrun?
Well, I am too optimistic and tech-obsessed as to let any catastrophe hamper my enjoyment of technology (even if it will be my downfall someday, somewhere).
I agree with the last point. A job needs to be done. Altough I would never accept a job that requires murder from the get-go (maybe if the target is somebody evil beyond any doubt...? No not even then I think).
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@Sengir
So, no evidence, no proof, no support to your argument..... just an emotive, passive agressive, touchy-feely rambling, not even phrased as in character (which I give props to Senko and Gizzle for!)
I'll just chalk this argument up so a 'win' then. :D
(Can't back up what you are saying with anything but 'feels', then you don't have a position worth discussing. At least Senko and Grizzle tried)
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And I'd love to continue the debate unfortunately I'm back at work for 11 day's so I leave at 4am and get back after 5pm so not much time to post especially with everything else I have to deal with right now.
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I find it kinda amusing that you're resorting to calling out both not replying in character and tarring Sengir's entire response as 'touchy feely', Reavs.
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And I general y don't go out of my way to hunt down infected either... But at the same time, I have ZERO qualms of opening up with a force 20 flamethrower spell if one so much as looks at me sideways....
I have a huge problem with AIs, no secret there.... But you survive the Renraku Incident, and see how much you trust a construct again. (especially when you are already leery of the Matrix)
BUT, that said, I am also a criminal that has a job to do, and if you get in the way of that job, I WILL take you down, and I don't care who/what you are.
And that's what I would never do. I only attack if they attacked me first. Maybe I am too kind to play a game like Shadowrun?
Well, I am too optimistic and tech-obsessed as to let any catastrophe hamper my enjoyment of technology (even if it will be my downfall someday, somewhere).
I agree with the last point. A job needs to be done. Altough I would never accept a job that requires murder from the get-go (maybe if the target is somebody evil beyond any doubt...? No not even then I think).
We are talking about a highly infectous disease that can be spread by a mere scratch.... damn straight I am turning that ghoul to ash the first hint of trouble!
I prefer investigative, blackmail, snatch, and recovery jobs my self. Those are my bread and butter.
But sometimes, other members of our crew get other jobs (when you've run the shadows as long as my crew <playing since 1e> all members end up getting offered jobs from contacts...) And sometimes those jobs are combat related. Not my favorite as the risk is usualky greater then the reward... but you have to watch the back of your team: else there is no one to watch yours!
And sometimes, despite the best laid plans, shit goes sideways....
And I have also learned, if you prove you are willing and have the stomach to do what others are not, you can actually avoid future problems.... if you don't let your morals get in the way.
Eventually, your team will mess up bad, and someone will send the goons after you. That's part of the job.
I have found that a very liberal application of extreme cruelty keeps these goons away....Fewer people are willing to come after you (or the fee they charge is too extreme) after you demonstrate that 'yes' there ARE fates worse then death, and you are not shy about delivering them.
An ampule of adrenaline, coagulate in spray form, and a cheese grater work well. Adrenaline keeps him awake. Coagulate to stop death from blood loss, cheese grater to remove all their skin. (Silence spell works wonders at keeping the screams unheard).
A pot of boiling water, and a control actions spell is also very effective.
its distasteful. But after you get a rep for dealing with reprisals with extreme violence, they stop.
Just be aware, you also make enemies. And even your rep for such actions isn't going to save you from a full on Corp backed blackbook assualt squad....
If you don't have the stomach to get knee deep in the gore every now and then, stick to softer side of the shadows. It pays less, but you sleep better without as heavy a conscience.... there's room in the shadows for all types.
Our old decker went 15 years without ever firing a single shot.... until the crash 2.0 took her down.
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I find it kinda amusing that you're resorting to calling out both not replying in character and tarring Sengir's entire response as 'touchy feely', Reavs.
He touched it off by asking for verification and support. I provided it. Pointed to where I got my sources and how I supported my opinion and conclusions.
If you are going to ask for that, then you repond in kind.
If you want an emotional debate, or in character debate fine too...
There are different rules there as well.
But DO NOT ask for evidence, proof and support, the come back with an emotive response. Its disingenous.
You'll note I have not ask Grizzle for proof, evidence or support of his stance because he has not used that approach, he's used an in character-emotive one, and I respond in kind.
2 different styles, and they don't mix.
You want a fact based argument, you support with facts. You want an emotive argument, you support with emotive.
But what you DON'T do is demand factual support, then respond with emotive.
Senko has done a fair job of trying to mix the two. (And considering I have them on ignore, yet still willing to praise his attempts should tell you something)
《And if I seem to be rambling, its due to me being up for 40hours straight with zero sleep. Sorry》
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@Sengir
So, no evidence, no proof, no support to your argument..... just an emotive, passive agressive, touchy-feely rambling, not even phrased as in character (which I give props to Senko and Gizzle for!)
Kinda cute when the guy who subscribes to pearl-clutching moral panics and urban legends from the last decade accuses others of "emotive, passive agressive, touchy-feely rambling" :D
As for the accusation itself, it seems I still wasn't blunt enough for you to understand, so let me try again: For a discussion on the merit of arguments, you would have to present an argument. Your circular reasoning is not an argument at all. It's like delivering a PC game that crashes on startup, and then complaining that the reviewer didn't focus on the graphics.
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What I do find interesting, is that this is mostly a Frist World phenomenon. Get into the developing world, and the concern for animals, animal well being drops well down. Only the rich have pets, for everyone else, an animal comes in 3 types, A service animal, a Production animal, or a food source.... and in many cases all three! Get down to the 3rd world, and animals basically come in two forms: Protection animals, and food sources... and that protection animal becomes a food source once it can no longer do its job.
They do not form the emotional attachments to animals that you see in the Western World. For example, when someone's dog dies in the western world, they are sad for weeks or even months. In the 3rd world, they are sad for about as long as it takes to prepare that dog for dinner. and once they eaten it, they go get an other dog to fill in for the one that died.
This is absolutely untrue. There are many places in the "third world" where animals are worshiped and/or revered. for example: cows in India. But that aside, they are still not "people".
On the other hand, I think a better example of the evolution of the terminology is in the US constitution where "all men are created equal" did not include women or black people at the time of writing. Over time the meaning changed to include them as attitudes changed. History is riddled with examples of not thinking other people were human for one reason or another. So I could definitely see it changing over time in the SR as people came to accept that a meta-human was "people", then a meta-human with a terrible disease (like HMHVV), then other sapiens like Naga.
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Fair point Overbyte.
Yes there some cultures that do worship some animals and hold them so scared, they don't eat them. But those are few and far between (Hindi are the only ones I can think of... but there probably more)
Now, how fast is that vernacular change VS legal definition?
It hasn't happened since the awakening very often! So far, the only two species I know of that have been accepted the UN are dragons and sasquatch. And, admittedly some countries DO extend Human Rights to other species (like shifters in the NAN).
But when you look worldwide, this simply isn't the case for the majority of the planet. And I doubt VERY much ghouls are going to be accepted after countries have gone to great lengths to DE-classify them as metahumans. (Doesn't stop those miss-guided souls from trying to get their rights reinstated however.)
@Sengir:
STILL nothung other then emotive and personal attacks huh?
Reaver:2
Sengir:0
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This is absolutely untrue. There are many places in the "third world" where animals are worshiped and/or revered. for example: cows in India. But that aside, they are still not "people".
Furthermore, animals serving a double role as pets and food source is not limited to the "noble savages" Reaver is extolling while being forgotten by the degenerate West: The most common example being rabbits, then there are guinea pigs in the Americas, horses in Europe, dogs in Korea...
@Reaver:
Reaver:2
Sengir:0
You seem deeply shaken by having your beliefs questioned, so if that makes you feel better, be my guest :)
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Between the Ex-wife and Bulldog....
hmmmm.... Save the Bulldog while waving goodbye as the Ex-wife dies! (Yes, I hate her THAT much)
True story.
Some local punks once kidnapped Reaver's Ex and sent him a text message from her phone saying pay up or we cut her into little pieces.
He sent back a message asking for hi res pics of the cutting up.
Then the punks sent another message saying pay up or they give her back.
Sadly before he could get the monies together, the cops found them and brought her back. :P
No.
I asked for high rez video. With sound.
anything THAT personally enjoyable I want to watch and hear repeatedly!
(I even offered to send them a spoon!)
Any chance you could send those guys after my ex? I can't pay them, but I can supply snacks...and pie!
What type of Pie??? And how much Pie??
I know several people who'd kill for some good pie! (Literally!)
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Between the Ex-wife and Bulldog....
hmmmm.... Save the Bulldog while waving goodbye as the Ex-wife dies! (Yes, I hate her THAT much)
True story.
Some local punks once kidnapped Reaver's Ex and sent him a text message from her phone saying pay up or we cut her into little pieces.
He sent back a message asking for hi res pics of the cutting up.
Then the punks sent another message saying pay up or they give her back.
Sadly before he could get the monies together, the cops found them and brought her back. :P
No.
I asked for high rez video. With sound.
anything THAT personally enjoyable I want to watch and hear repeatedly!
(I even offered to send them a spoon!)
Any chance you could send those guys after my ex? I can't pay them, but I can supply snacks...and pie!
What type of Pie??? And how much Pie??
I know several people who'd kill for some good pie! (Literally!)
The rates some of our local talent use:
Apple Pie = Make someone's knees bend the wrong way.
Blueberry Pie = Breaking all major limb joints, though leaving them intact enough for a few years of physical therapy or cyberreplacement to recover with.
Rhubarb Pie = All Problems All Gone. 8)