BEOWULF - THE KARMA SUITSYA

Hasta! That's the name I couldn't remember and was too lazy too look up. Thanks. You're an officer and a gentleman. You just need a little rehabilitating. Anyway, the SLN attack was a diversion that allowed the Bullets success and the Trojans to be overlooked. IINM.

Karma -- you never truly understood her. You're really hurting her feelings. She doesn't care how she delivers her payload. She doesn't care whose help she solicits. Once she's dispatched, her programming simply says "deliver."

If it wasn't for karma's fortuitous delivery that was already in the queue by SL Ubers, the MA's operation would never have seen the light of day. So, Karma has precognizance as well? ::shrug::

cthia wrote:Hasta! That's the name I couldn't remember and was too lazy too look up. Thanks. You're an officer and a gentleman. You just need a little rehabilitating. Anyway, the SLN attack was a diversion that allowed the Bullets success and the Trojans to be overlooked. IINM.

Karma -- you never truly understood her. You're really hurting her feelings. She doesn't care how she delivers her payload. She doesn't care whose help she solicits. Once she's dispatched, her programming simply says "deliver."

If it wasn't for karma's fortuitous delivery that was already in the queue by SL Ubers, the MA's operation would never have seen the light of day. So, Karma has precognizance as well? ::shrug::

What are you talking about? The SLN attack NOT was fortuitous, it was orchestrated by Malign agents who convinced the SLN that Beowulf would be open to attack.

If you are mean the bombs when you say the Trojans, they and the Silver Bullets were already in place before the SLN arrived. The Silver Bullets were to aid the SLN attack by removing Mycroft. The bombs were command detonated and could have been used at any time. It is not clear why the Malign chose to wait until the SLN arrived and because of traffic delays the bombs were not triggered until the SLN was leaving.

I am done trying to explain to you that Beowulf was hurt by Malign for reasons that had nothing to Beowulf's karmic burden from leaving the League and everything to do with the hatred of the Detweilers.

tlb wrote:

cthia wrote:Hasta! That's the name I couldn't remember and was too lazy too look up. Thanks. You're an officer and a gentleman. You just need a little rehabilitating. Anyway, the SLN attack was a diversion that allowed the Bullets success and the Trojans to be overlooked. IINM.

Karma -- you never truly understood her. You're really hurting her feelings. She doesn't care how she delivers her payload. She doesn't care whose help she solicits. Once she's dispatched, her programming simply says "deliver."

If it wasn't for karma's fortuitous delivery that was already in the queue by SL Ubers, the MA's operation would never have seen the light of day. So, Karma has precognizance as well? ::shrug::

What are you talking about? The SLN attack NOT was fortuitous, it was orchestrated by Malign agents who convinced the SLN that Beowulf would be open to attack.

If you are mean the bombs when you say the Trojans, they and the Silver Bullets were already in place before the SLN arrived. The Silver Bullets were to aid the SLN attack by removing Mycroft. The bombs were command detonated and could have been used at any time. It is not clear why the Malign chose to wait until the SLN arrived and because of traffic delays the bombs were not triggered until the SLN was leaving.

I am done trying to explain to you that Beowulf was hurt by Malign for reasons that had nothing to Beowulf's karmic burden from leaving the League and everything to do with the hatred of the Detweilers.

Thank you! Though your promises have been empty vessels.

You'll never understand that once you've stirred up bad karma, all kinds of shit is likely to happen to you. You seem to think that karma is measured, or fair, or anything nice, or that it's something you order out of a Dr. Seuss book. It doesn't matter tlb. None of the facts you've laid out matters. Beowulf ordered up a big fat bowl of karma. Once you do that, a phucking house could fall on your head. Ask the Wicked Witch of the West. Karma is not as difficult to understand as you're making her out to be. I never even wanted to rehash this thread, but you rushed through UH just to untimely unleash spoilers on my head, and you've been dropping anxious crumbs in any and every other thread just to get this party started again, so I obliged. And you're no closer to understanding karma than you've ever been. Rehabilitating you is hopeless.

Heck, look at the bad karma I've unknowingly ordered up from you. And you've been chasing me with that karma all over the place, in other threads that have absolutely nothing to do with it. See? That's just how bad karma works.

This should put to rest the argument of treason occupying most of the thread . . .

UH wrote:Although Devorah Ophir-Giacconi was only sixty-eight, which was very young for a Beowulfan Director, she’d headed the Beowulfan Directorate of Justice for almost nine T-years now. She was smart, a highly respected member of the Beowulf Bar and a stubborn defender of the integrity of the legal process. Which, Benton-Ramirez y Chou reflected, undoubtedly explained her utter disdain for the Solarian League’s current state.

“Oh?” He smiled at her. “You mean now that we’re all officially traitors?”

A chorus of chuckles, some with a slight edge of nervousness, perhaps, ran around the conference room, and Ophir-Giacconi snorted.

“Actually, Jacques, I mean now that we aren’t traitors anymore. Arguably, at least.”

“Excuse me?” Konstantin Brulé-Chou raised both shaggy eyebrows. The Director of Human Affairs was almost eight centimeters taller than Ophir-Giacconi, but his legs were actually shorter than hers, and he was very broad shouldered and powerfully built. That probably helped explain his nickname of “Bear,” but his heavy eyebrows, low hairline, and big, powerful hands had contributed their bit to its inevitability. “I’d think the fact that we just supervised a vote to secede from the Solarian League definitely makes us traitors, at least in Old Chicago!”

“No,” Ophir-Giacconi said. “We were traitors while, as a member of the Solarian League, we were actively aiding and comforting a star nation—arguably, three star nations, really—who are in a state of war against the League. Now we’re either an independent star nation or we’re rebels, not traitors. There is a legal distinction. Our own judiciary’s interpretation is that we just became an independent star nation again for the first time in seven hundred and seventy T-years through the legitimate exercise of our constitutional rights as a member system of the Solarian League. That means that—like any independent star nation—our foreign policy, including any military alliances we choose to make, is our affair and no one else’s, so no one can accuse us of treason for whatever we decide. I doubt anyone in Old Chicago’s interested in our interpretation, but it is a matter of public record. And as a nitpicking attorney, I’m glad to get out of the moral and legal middleground.”

She probably had a point there, Benton-Ramirez y Chou acknowledged. There was a certain legal and moral…murkiness to the Republic of Beowulf’s actions over the last seven months or so—starting with the decision to warn both Landing and Neaubeau Paris about Filareta’s impending attack—regardless of how justified its position might be.

It was still difficult for him to realize Beowulf, the primary mover behind the creation of the Solarian League, really, was in the process of destroying it.

I hate to say I told you so, but, well, I DID I DID I DID TOLD YOU SO!

Do also note the remarks about the moral implications of Beowulf's actions, as well, that, I was oh so nice to point out, oh so long ago.

It was simply shocking to me that Beowulf had abandoned certain morals, scruples and values. Out of their understandable festering hatred for the Mandarins, Beowulf had become much of what they detested. They still had a moral obligation to those innocent men and women of the League it helped form. Informing the SKM that Filareta was coming, yet not personally making it known to the SLN/Mandarins/League that they had done so -- and that a welcoming party had been formed -- was not only appalling, but morally bankrupt.

Cthia, this is getting to be a stale joke.

So, once I was a simple english/history major taking a course in comparative religion. The concept of karma was Hindu or Buddhist and was concerned only and solely to individuals, not societies, and related solely to what sort of future you got when you were reincarnated. You seem to be conflating that with the weird of the Norns, the Fates of the greeks, and the Furies, and anthropomorphizing it into a sentient being as well. Of course, that was in the 1970's, and I have some memory issues, but it seems very unlike what you keep rambling about.

Karma relates as well to the good or bad (malicious) intent of an action taken. In this regard, the Mandarins and the Solarian League are only starting to get what they deserve. And as Beowulf's "intent" was to prevent if possible Solarian deaths, I don't see that as "malicious."

ymmv

Rob

cthia wrote:

tlb wrote:So, no real change in your viewpoint, and certainly not in mine. This becomes another one of those things that you believe will be addressed in some indefinite date in the future of the Honorverse; like the SLN's "karmic" retribution against Beowulf.

After digesting UH, how can you deny the telltale signs of karma. I don't know what you have against her, but she plays no favorites. UH is loaded with professions of SL officers as well as the Mandarins that they believe Beowulf's actions are traitorous (they have a point), and that reprisals are a result of that. UH has so much content to support the claim of karma that I find it humorous to even dredge this topic back up. Heck, karma is broadcasting an all points bulletin in UH! Even Oravil Barregos of MARS knew what he was getting himself and his planet into. He knew the karma he was haphazardly summoning up. But, like Beowulf, he knew he had a firebreak in the Manties. Karma was threatening to spread itself amongst other stars, even beyond Hypatia. Although Beowulf herself was the author of some very stinky crap, that was upwind of karma.


I have never claimed any subject I broach in the Honorverse will be addressed in the future. Sometimes ya just gotta let sleeping dogs lie.

Rob, the very origin of the citing does seem to be conjuring up confushun. Many people seem to think that this hidden entity is limited in scope to the religion that exposed her. She isn't. Some people might feel this hidden entity is a figment of someone's imagination, much like the MA. She isn't. Many people also fail to understand that there is a certain karma that can be summoned up called "nationalist karma." She, also, isn't always bad, nor is she always good. Some people seem to think that Donald Trump is summoning up all sorts of karma for America. And she isn't the good sister. STRIKE THAT POLITICAL STATEMENT FROM THE RECORD PLEASE!

I, on the other hand, have no problem understanding the bankable certainty that treason will beget some bad karma. Perhaps not always, but the perpetraitor certainly should expect his future to be woefully riddled with bad causal effects. He certainly should always carry an umbrella, because his weather forecast isn't good. In Beowulf's example, she made some awful moral mistakes as well. Combined with treason, I'm sure you can guess what side of karma I bet that effect would have.

At any rate, I think I see my disconnect . . .

How can Beowulf's treason, moral bankruptcy and collusion with the enemy possibly summon up bad karma. Whatsa matter me?!

It isn't the first time I've been all alone out on a limb in this forum. I was alone and dangling precariously by a thread regarding the question of Beowulf's treason, collusion with the enemy, and questionable moral decisions. I didn't allow your pitchforks to sway the obvious truth. Truth is truth no matter how it's discolored.

I also recognize that thirty six million of Beowulf's civilians suddenly becoming dead is not considered by many in the forum to be a part of, or a result of, any such entity called karma. But these are people who will argue the sky isn't falling, even while it's pooling around their feet -- shamelessly borrowing an old phrase of one of my sister's.

Armed Neo-Bob wrote:Cthia, this is getting to be a stale joke.

So, once I was a simple english/history major taking a course in comparative religion. The concept of karma was Hindu or Buddhist and was concerned only and solely to individuals, not societies, and related solely to what sort of future you got when you were reincarnated. You seem to be conflating that with the weird of the Norns, the Fates of the greeks, and the Furies, and anthropomorphizing it into a sentient being as well. Of course, that was in the 1970's, and I have some memory issues, but it seems very unlike what you keep rambling about.

Karma relates as well to the good or bad (malicious) intent of an action taken. In this regard, the Mandarins and the Solarian League are only starting to get what they deserve. And as Beowulf's "intent" was to prevent if possible Solarian deaths, I don't see that as "malicious."

'I don't know what you mean by "glory",' Alice said.

Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. 'Of course you don't — till I tell you. I meant "there's a nice knock-down argument for you!"'

'But "glory" doesn't mean "a nice knock-down argument",' Alice objected.

'When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, 'it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.'

'The question is,' said Alice, 'whether you can make words mean so many different things.'

'The question is,' said Humpty Dumpty, 'which is to be master — that's all.'

Just substitute "karma" for "glory'; your argument has been tried before.

Thanks, I know; I tried it myself back at the beginning of the thread. Basically, Cthia said he was taking the stance or worldview of the Mandarins or the federal bureaucracy (which includes the SLN, and EXCLUDES the man in the street on every system except Sol).

I wish he'd speculated on whether the actions taken by the GA (invasion of Sol) fit better into the Harrington Plan, or the Detweiler plan. RFC pointed enough hints at the basic instability of the League, and the factions/cliques running the various systems, to indicate that the League will see a mass exodus of systems. Shell and verge because their ancestors moved out there in the first place to get OUT of the league; and in the second place because they are being allowed into the League as members only after the dubious joy of being a protectorate.

In addition, there are inter-system rivalries that predate the League, or have flaired up since. Barregos began prepping years ago, because there isn't a lot of chance that the Core Worlds could treat everyone else as poorly as they did and not generate tons of resentment.

With the SLN and OFS yanked out of the protectorates, I think a lot of the intentions of the Harrington Plan will be realized; and breaking up the League was always the Malign's intention. Maybe not with an intact Haven Sector, but it provides a starting point with a lot of what they wanted also.

ymmv

Rob

tlb wrote:

'I don't know what you mean by "glory",' Alice said.

Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. 'Of course you don't — till I tell you. I meant "there's a nice knock-down argument for you!"'

'But "glory" doesn't mean "a nice knock-down argument",' Alice objected.

'When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, 'it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.'

'The question is,' said Alice, 'whether you can make words mean so many different things.'

'The question is,' said Humpty Dumpty, 'which is to be master — that's all.'

Just substitute "karma" for "glory'; your argument has been tried before.

Armed Neo-Bob wrote:Thanks, I know; I tried it myself back at the beginning of the thread. Basically, Cthia said he was taking the stance or worldview of the Mandarins or the federal bureaucracy (which includes the SLN, and EXCLUDES the man in the street on every system except Sol).

Again, I wasn't "taking" their stance. I was "explaining" their stance, along with the flavor of human element revolving around why they felt the way they did, and why that human element made them react the way they did. I solicited help from an analogy to marriage, much to the chagrin of many, to facilitate in understanding what was to come and why it should have been obvious to everyone involved. Also, it DID include the man in the street -- perhaps mainly from Sol -- because that was the system which houses the jaded citizens who had a history of being easily force-fed slop, who would be the enablers behind dispatching the angry, hairy ape. Do consider that the Mandarins did finally get the funding they needed to take the war to the upstart neobarbs (from the violin they played on the sensibilities of the average man in the Solly street), albeit much too late to do them any good.

That's why I kept using the global word "LEAGUE" to represent the Mandarins/SLN/citizens, even when some of you objected to me lumping them all together, because it was clear to me the Mandarins didn't, and couldn't, corner the market on their inevitable -- and quite common, and quite human -- reaction.

Armed Neo-Bob wrote:I wish he'd speculated on whether the actions taken by the GA (invasion of Sol) fit better into the Harrington Plan, or the Detweiler plan.

It certainly didn't fit into the Harrington Plan. Except indirectly.* The rice paper that plan was written on was actually making things worse, as I also said long ago. You can't keep turning the other cheek and getting the unholy hell slapped out of that cheek too and expect to remain calm, and likewise expect the asshole doling out that punishment won't continue to get off on it and give up on it before your own patience run out. Honor finally came to her senses about what I was laying down too, when she accepted that attacking the Cradle of Civilization was playing into the Alignment's hands. But, like I also said long ago as well. "It doesn't matter," Honor said. "This has to stop."

Armed Neo-Bob wrote: RFC pointed enough hints at the basic instability of the League, and the factions/cliques running the various systems, to indicate that the League will see a mass exodus of systems. Shell and verge because their ancestors moved out there in the first place to get OUT of the league; and in the second place because they are being allowed into the League as members only after the dubious joy of being a protectorate.

In addition, there are inter-system rivalries that predate the League, or have flaired up since. Barregos began prepping years ago, because there isn't a lot of chance that the Core Worlds could treat everyone else as poorly as they did and not generate tons of resentment.

With the SLN and OFS yanked out of the protectorates, I think a lot of the intentions of the Harrington Plan will be realized; and breaking up the League was always the Malign's intention. Maybe not with an intact Haven Sector, but it provides a starting point with a lot of what they wanted also.

ymmv

Rob

One of the League's favorite items to order from the menu is karma, as well.

I agree that this is becoming a joke. Déjà vu, just like the treason, complicity with the enemy, collusion and moral bankruptcy argument too. Reiterating something I've already said. When I first wandered through storyline and came across certain passages pertaining to Beowulf, I am completely gob smacked, simply shocked, taken aback even, that I am the only one who thought . . .

"BE WULF! WTF! W E GIRL! YOU'RE GONNA GIT YER PANTIES RIPPED CLEAN OFF!"

If you people honestly didn't feel the same way? You really really really need to lay off the coffee!

Mounting this horse from another side, I accept the author's predicament of having to balance the overall good in Beowulf with needing to attribute to her some bad decisions. Decisions that are bad enough to suspend the need for disbelief that it is bad enough to cause the Mandarins/SLN to react the way they did. It was a testy tightrope the Wizard walked. Seems he pulled it off.

But, about that coffee!

I hate to keep waxing eloquently about a couple of my English teachers telling me that I have an uncanny ability to become the character because it seems self-serving, but I truly can't believe the human element driving this particular slipper didn't fit us all.

*For diplomacy to work, it must be tempered by the weight of promise. There's an art to being reasonable. In this thread, I am simply pointing out what should be painfully obvious . . .

Treason and moral bankruptcy has an embassy on the planet Karma.

UH,pg 455 wrote:"I hope no one will be offended if I say, speaking as the Republic's Chief attorney, how deeply relieved I am to be out of what we might charitably call a legally ambiguous situation."

Although Devorah Ophir-Giacconi was only sixty-eight, which was very young for a Beowulfan Director, she’d headed the Beowulfan Directorate of Justice for almost nine T-years now. She was smart, a highly respected member of the Beowulf Bar and a stubborn defender of the integrity of the legal process. Which, Benton-Ramirez y Chou reflected, undoubtedly explained her utter disdain for the Solarian League’s current state.

“Oh?” He smiled at her. “You mean now that we’re all officially traitors?”

A chorus of chuckles, some with a slight edge of nervousness, perhaps, ran around the conference room, and Ophir-Giacconi snorted.

“Actually, Jacques, I mean now that we aren’t traitors anymore. Arguably, at least.”

“Excuse me?” Konstantin Brulé-Chou raised both shaggy eyebrows. The Director of Human Affairs was almost eight centimeters taller than Ophir-Giacconi, but his legs were actually shorter than hers, and he was very broad shouldered and powerfully built. That probably helped explain his nickname of “Bear,” but his heavy eyebrows, low hairline, and big, powerful hands had contributed their bit to its inevitability. “I’d think the fact that we just supervised a vote to secede from the Solarian League definitely makes us traitors, at least in Old Chicago!”

“No,” Ophir-Giacconi said. “We were traitors while, as a member of the Solarian League, we were actively aiding and comforting a star nation—arguably, three star nations, really—who are in a state of war against the League. Now we’re either an independent star nation or we’re rebels, not traitors. There is a legal distinction. Our own judiciary’s interpretation is that we just became an independent star nation again for the first time in seven hundred and seventy T-years through the legitimate exercise of our constitutional rights as a member system of the Solarian League. That means that—like any independent star nation—our foreign policy, including any military alliances we choose to make, is our affair and no one else’s, so no one can accuse us of treason for whatever we decide. I doubt anyone in Old Chicago’s interested in our interpretation, but it is a matter of public record. And as a nitpicking attorney, I’m glad to get out of the moral and legal middleground.”

She probably had a point there, Benton-Ramirez y Chou acknowledged. There was a certain legal and moral…murkiness to the Republic of Beowulf’s actions over the last seven months or so—starting with the decision to warn both Landing and Nouveau Paris about Filareta’s impending attack—regardless of how justified its position might be.

It was still difficult for him to realize Beowulf, the primary mover behind the creation of the Solarian League, really, was in the process of destroying it.

UH,pg 456 wrote:But there'd never been an alternative once Innokentiy Kolokoltsov and his fellows refused to acknowledge even the possibility of the Alignment's existence and doubled down on their conflict with Manticore and her allies, instead. The Mandarins' effort to scapegoat Beowulf for the disastrous outcome of Operation Raging Justice had only underscored his star system's lack of options, and the decision to call a plebiscite to consider secession had made itself.

cthia wrote:I hate to say I told you so, but, well, I DID I DID I DID TOLD YOU SO!

Do also note the remarks about the moral implications of Beowulf's actions, as well, that, I was oh so nice to point out, oh so long ago.

It was simply shocking to me that Beowulf had abandoned certain morals, scruples and values. Out of their understandable festering hatred for the Mandarins, Beowulf had become much of what they detested. They still had a moral obligation to those innocent men and women of the League it helped form. Informing the SKM that Filareta was coming, yet not making it known to the SLN/Mandarins/League that they had done so -- and that a welcoming party had been formed -- was not only appalling, but morally bankrupt.

Things are not as severe as you paint them unless RFC is being imprecise in his language. Note that the situation prior to the secession is described as "legally ambiguous", "moral and legal middleground" and "legal and moral murkiness". If the participants really believed that they were guilty of treason (as opposed to being considered traitors by the Mandarins), then those words would be much too mild. They were in a legal and moral murk because their obligations to friends and family at Manticore were being tested by the corrupt government of the Solarian League. They chose to resolve the ambiguity by seceding, which is not your favored course of action; but is as moral and legal as anything you propose.

As to why they did not believe their actions while part of the League were illegal, that is explained by a quote from A Rising Thunder:

ART,pg 185 wrote:There's been no declaration of war, and Article Five of the Constitution specifically denies the federal goverment authority to dictate to system governments in time of peace.

PS. I had to type the leading sentence into the first quote and the text of the next two quotes from the books, so I hope there are no mistakes. I corrected the spelling of "Nouveau".