(Spoilers) UH questions and discussion

TFLYTSNBN wrote:

Thunder Child Actual wrote:Instead of shooting them out of hand I'll settle for unlocking the modifications for any offspring that the Wintons/Harringtons/other people have in the future. This whole "my genes WILL NOT lose out to my spouses" has always struck me as very wrong.

It also strikes me as a way to ignore the requirement for a Monarch of Manticore to marry a commoner. They are not going to be nearly as tied into the rest of the population as they would be if they know that their genes will win out in the creation of the next generation.

Why would society have any right to unlock the modifications?

Only reasonable exception would be criminal behavior.

Do not recall Wintons committing crimes.

Honor has gone postal a few times, but they were bad. Is killing rapists and mass murderers relly a crime?

Thunder Child Actual wrote:Instead of shooting them out of hand I'll settle for unlocking the modifications for any offspring that the Wintons/Harringtons/other people have in the future. This whole "my genes WILL NOT lose out to my spouses" has always struck me as very wrong.

It also strikes me as a way to ignore the requirement for a Monarch of Manticore to marry a commoner. They are not going to be nearly as tied into the rest of the population as they would be if they know that their genes will win out in the creation of the next generation.

TFLYTSNBN wrote:
Why would society have any right to unlock the modifications?

Only reasonable exception would be criminal behavior.

Do not recall Wintons committing crimes.

Honor has gone postal a few times, but they were bad. Is killing rapists and mass murderers relly a crime?

Thunder Child Actual wrote:Preservation of the human species sounds like a good reason to do it to me.
David has already given us at least three examples in the Honnorverse of “improved people” trying to take over or taking over the government and people that they are part of.
The Chinese Super Soldiers in the Final War.
What happened on Mesa.
How Darius was set up.
What happened in all of those cases should give a person pause as to thinking that allowing people to have their genetic code locked with “better” genes is a good thing. I certainly would not want to live in any of those societies.
Honor has only gone “postal” on people who were not attacking her at the time twice by my count. Both times in Honor of the Queen. She attacked Houseman after he tried to order her to abandon Grayson to its fate, for which she got a letter of reprimand in her file. She tried to shoot the Masadan Leader of Blackbird Base. As Lt. Tremaine’s actions caused her to miss the incident could be overlooked. The man in question was killed in the end, but only after he had been tried. So yes it has been established in the Honorverse that even mass murderers and rapists get a trial before you can kill them.

Randomiser wrote:A casual glance at European Imperialist/colonialist era behaviour outside Europe and Nazi behaviour even inside their own country ought to convince anyone that people who consider themselves superior to others behaving badly is a problem that long antedates, and has nothing much to do with, genetic modifications, locked, or otherwise.

Honor's 'beast' is sometimes overplayed and is not necessarily genetic. She is a very successful Naval officer who has been involved in 20+ years of warfare against people who have sometimes been inhumane and brutal. 3, count em, just 3, times she has gone near or over the edge of acceptable aggression. With Houseman because of inexperience and his thoroughly dishonourable and cowardly proposals, just after a beloved mentor was killed doing his duty. On Blackbird when her fellow naval personnel had been subjected to the most disgraceful, degrading and brutal treatment while prisoners of war. In Sol when she was grieving for her husband, her wife, and about 20 million other people recently killed. (As a result, one might say, of the SLN's tendency to obey illegal orders rather than arresting the people who gave them.) I think any officer forceful enough to shoot up the ranks like Honor might well have faced similar temptations.

Dauntless wrote:I see where you are coming from but I'd say no the beast was not in control of that execution (it was never a duel despite what they called it). it was far too precisely planned and executed then is the norm when honor's beast is in control.

PeterZ wrote:The Salamander was not forced to discard anything in challenging Summervale. There was a legal and socially acceptable outlet to achieve her desired goals. One would argue that the Salamander emerged and used every element of that acceptable code to destroy Summervale as completely as possible. In all those other instances The Salamander discarded every other consideration in her quest to fulfill her goal. At Blackbird that rapist commander deserved to die regardless of what the rules war demanded. Houseman had the authority to complicate the task at hand and needed to be discredited /cowed ASAP or admiral Courvoisier's mission and his sacrifice would come to nothing. Accomplishing those goals she desired required discarding niceties. The Salamander didn't even blink.

With Summervale accusation that he was a hired thug may have sent Him to jail after an investigation even if he had killed Honor. That accusation would have provided those he challenged a viable excuse NOT to accept his challenge making his value as an assassin evaporate. This would be also true even if Honor died in the duel. The Salamander and Honor were in complete accord in the Summervale affair. There were no conflicts in personal priorities, societal niceties or legal requirements. I would argue that in every dire circumstance of battle the same thing was true, the Salamander and Honor were in accord and both were present in equal measure.

ldwechsler wrote:

PeterZ wrote:The Salamander was not forced to discard anything in challenging Summervale. There was a legal and socially acceptable outlet to achieve her desired goals. One would argue that the Salamander emerged and used every element of that acceptable code to destroy Summervale as completely as possible. In all those other instances The Salamander discarded every other consideration in her quest to fulfill her goal. At Blackbird that rapist commander deserved to die regardless of what the rules war demanded. Houseman had the authority to complicate the task at hand and needed to be discredited /cowed ASAP or admiral Courvoisier's mission and his sacrifice would come to nothing. Accomplishing those goals she desired required discarding niceties. The Salamander didn't even blink.

With Summervale accusation that he was a hired thug may have sent Him to jail after an investigation even if he had killed Honor. That accusation would have provided those he challenged a viable excuse NOT to accept his challenge making his value as an assassin evaporate. This would be also true even if Honor died in the duel. The Salamander and Honor were in complete accord in the Summervale affair. There were no conflicts in personal priorities, societal niceties or legal requirements. I would argue that in every dire circumstance of battle the same thing was true, the Salamander and Honor were in accord and both were present in equal measure.

Talking about Honor's "beast" is pure nonsense. She is not a saint and never claimed to be. When she acted out of anger, she was simply being a person. A kid twice my daughter's size literally ran over her on a track while they were in junior high. He had tried to bully her before. I was very angry and, frankly, wanted to smack the kid especially when the school's leader pooh-pooh'd the whole thing. A letter from an attorney changed their minds quickly particularly when the kid smacked another smaller child around.

We get angry a lot. Wanting to kill someone who has tortured people or who has killed the person you love is hardly abnormal.

Too much has been made of the whole genie thing. A large portion of the Sphynx population has the the genetic mod and there were no reports in all that books of those people being aggressive.

ldwechsler wrote:Talking about Honor's "beast" is pure nonsense. She is not a saint and never claimed to be. When she acted out of anger, she was simply being a person. A kid twice my daughter's size literally ran over her on a track while they were in junior high. He had tried to bully her before. I was very angry and, frankly, wanted to smack the kid especially when the school's leader pooh-pooh'd the whole thing. A letter from an attorney changed their minds quickly particularly when the kid smacked another smaller child around.

We get angry a lot. Wanting to kill someone who has tortured people or who has killed the person you love is hardly abnormal.

Too much has been made of the whole genie thing. A large portion of the Sphynx population has the the genetic mod and there were no reports in all that books of those people being aggressive.

Henke leaned back and rubbed her face with both hands in a futile effort to scrub away her own fear. She'd never seen Honor like this—never imagined she could be like this. She hadn't shed a single tear when Henke told her. She'd only swayed, white-faced, her brown eyes those of a maimed animal that didn't understand its own pain. Not even the heartbreaking keen of Nimitz's lament had seemed to touch her.
Then she'd turned to Clinkscales, still without a tear, expressionless as a statue, no longer human but a thing of ice, and her voice hadn't even quivered as she gave her orders. Nor had she seemed to hear him when he tried to speak to her, tried to express his sympathy. She'd simply gone right on in that terrible, undead voice, and he'd darted one agonized glance at Henke and bent his head in acceptance. Fifteen minutes later, Honor had been in Henke's pinnace, headed for Agni.
She hadn't spoken to Henke—hadn't even turned her head when Henke spoke to her. She might as well have been on another planet, not in the seat just across the pinnace aisle. She'd simply sat there, dry-eyed, clutching Nimitz to her chest while she stared straight ahead.
That had been two days ago. Agni had been delayed breaking orbit by the need to take on reactor mass, and Lord Clinkscales and Protector Benjamin had insisted on holding her another six hours while they transferred up an entourage for Honor. The Protector hadn't said so in so many words, but his tone conveyed a message Henke would never have dared ignore: Honor Harrington would return to the Star Kingdom only in a way that made Grayson's support for one of its own unmistakable.
Honor hadn't even noticed. She'd retired to her sleeping cabin, a silent, white-faced ghost with eyes of agony, and Henke was terrified for her. If not even Nimitz could reach her, perhaps there was nothing left to reach. Mike Henke was probably the one human in the universe who knew how desperately lonely Honor had been, how much courage it had taken to let Paul into her heart at all, and how much she'd loved him once she had. Now Paul was gone, and—
Henke's worries broke off in mid-thought, and her head snapped up as the sleeping cabin hatch opened.
Honor wore her captain's uniform, not the Grayson gown in which she'd come aboard, and Nimitz rode her shoulder. She was perfectly, immaculately groomed, but not even the 'cat's fluffy coat could hide his gauntness, and Honor was even worse. She was drawn and ashen, her lips bloodless in a hollowed face. She wore no makeup, and the strong bones of her facial structure, graceful no more, poked at her skin like eroded mountain crags.
"Honor?" Henke stood slowly, as if afraid of frightening some wounded wild thing, and her soft voice ached with pain of her own.
"Mike." No expression crossed Honor's face, and her eyes were worse than dead. They were brown flint, frozen and cold, like steel quenched in agony, but at least there was recognition in them once more. Recognition and something more-a frightening something. They moved to MacGuiness. "Mac."