Blakes7 August 2001

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264 discussions

Re: Orbit
by Betty Ragan 01 Aug '01

01 Aug '01

Sally wrote: > Given that [a] Orac's first priority - by about a trillion miles - is its > precious self, but that [b] of all its humans, it appears to like Avon best, > what would the result have been had *Vila* been closer to the gun in Orbit > and had asked the fatal question? My immediate reaction is that - in > self-interest - it would have been 'Avon weighs more than 70 kilos', but > would Orac have been so certain of Vila's ability to win any fight for the > gun and/or shoot Avon if he *had* to? (my further opinion is that yes, Vila > would have killed Avon to save himself, but would the rat in a box agree?) Me, I think that, while Vila possibly might have been psychologically able to kill Avon in order to save himself, whether or not he would be *physically* capable of it is an open question. If he was lucky, he might be able to come up behind Avon and get a shot off before Avon's aware of anything, but if Avon's overheard the conversation as Vila did, or if Vila hesitates or gives him any reason to be suspicious... Well, in a confrontation between Vila with a gun and Avon without one, I'm honestly not sure which to put my money on. Frankly, I'd be inclined to call it 50-50 odds on each of them, really. Vila's not very good with guns, and Avon *is* very good with survival. And if Avon *did* manage to get the gun away from Vila, I have no doubt that he would have *no* compunction whatsoever about promptly turning it upon Vila. Either way, of course, Orac wins... > If Orac *had* nudged Vila into trying it, and they'd survived as they did in > the real Orbit, would Avon have shown any anger towards Orac? (BTW, would he > have done so towards Vila? I really aren't sure that he would - he is honest > enough to realise that Vila's self-interest exceeds his own) I don't think he would have shown any anger towards Orac, because, trhoughout the series, he makes a point of hanging on very strongly to his "It's only a machine, it doesn't have any feelings, I hate it when people anthropomorphize" atttitude. He might have been miffed, but he'd probably figure that Orac, being a machine, was simply doing the logical thing. Of course, if that reasoning lets Orac off the hook, it ought also to apply to Vila, who was following exactly the same logic... I rather suspect that the attitude he would take towards Vila -- at least outwardly -- would be one of sneering condescention for having botched the job of killing him. > While Orbit isn't on my Top Ten episodes (no Blake :-)) I do like the fact > that it has our three most blatant examples of self-interest smashing > head-on, and only one comes out of it the same ... And seems to get *far* less than his share of the blame, IMO... -- Betty Ragan ** bragan(a)nrao.edu ** http://www.aoc.nrao.edu/~bragan Not speaking for my employers, officially or otherwise. "Seeing a rotten picture for the special effects is like eating a tough steak for the smothered onions..." -- Isaac Asimov

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Re: [B7L] Re: namesakes
by Ellynne G. 01 Aug '01

01 Aug '01

On Mon, 30 Jul 2001 14:52:24 -0700 Helen Krummenacker <avona(a)jps.net> writes: > > > > isn't naming any mechanical device after Orac just *asking* for > > trouble? (OTOH, name it after Gambit and it could self-destruct on > you ...) > > > Does anyone else here name their cars? My husband and I named our > first one > > "Liberator"-- for the ship. There's "Fred." Mind you, I wanted to name it "Romana" but I lost the argument. Ellynne ________________________________________________________________ GET INTERNET ACCESS FROM JUNO! Juno offers FREE or PREMIUM Internet access for less! Join Juno today! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/tagj.

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Re: [B7L] Headhunter & Assassin
by Ellynne G. 01 Aug '01

01 Aug '01

On Tue, 31 Jul 2001 20:22:23 +1000 Kathryn Andersen <kat(a)foobox.net> writes: > No, what I think was illegal about the auction is that the slaves > themselves weren't legally slaves; but the pirates presumably had > fake > slavery papers that would pass muster, so the buyers would be able > to take them home with relative impunity. Just to throw out the odds and ends I've picked up about slavery - There were states owned by the state, privately owned slaves, slaves whose position was hereditary, slaves whose condition was a punishment, slaves with rights, slaves with power, slaves with none of the above, slaves who weren't legally recognized as slaves (people in debt bondage, for example), and probably other variations. There have been several areas that had a mixed bag. In the U.S., there were laws against _importing_ slaves dating from the early 19th century. Technically, smuggling slaves in was punishable by death (although I understand there was only one case on record of this punishment being given, the fact that it was the law had some impact on the Amistad trial). Descent, at least under law, was a critical element. In the American southwest, settlers from free states bought children from local Indians once it became known that the children were likely to be killed otherwise (selling a child was often the alternative to infanticide or letting them die of slow starvation) but they were also known to drive out or arrest slavers from nearby Mexico. Some cultures allowed a person to become a slave for cause (criminal offenses, being captured in war, etc) but recognized their children as free. While Mosaic law allowed for slavery under certain conditions, stealing someone to sell was punishable by death and escaped slaves had legal protections. Some places would prosecute for the murder of a slave. Others allowed it as public entertainment. Among one group of Indians, only a slave could marry a royal (of course, they were to be sacrificed when the royal died, but still). Serfdom was a type of slavery with certain rights attached - a serf couldn't be sold away from his or her home, their marriages were recognized, they had certain rights of ownership, their children usually had rights of inheritance, etc. Most other types of slaves _didn't_ have inheritance rights - but not always. In some cultures, the child of a slave woman and a free man was free if acknowledged. In others, the mother had to be free. In some, it didn't matter because slavery wasn't hereditary. There were indentured servants and other types of slaves for a fixed period of time. Also, debt slavery's been mentioned. It could be formal - a person was sold to pay debts - or informal - a person was legally free but was legally (or otherwise [debt slavery may be illegal but people feel social or other pressures]) bound to work to pay off debts (that never seemed to go away). Confused yet? OK, onto the Federation. Some slaves were definitely state owned. It seems safe to assume the mine workers, for example, were. We know slavery existed as a legal punishment. We _don't_ know if it was hereditary, but it would be a good guess. Federation citizenship seems based on a mixture of inherited status and actual performance or ability. A Federation slave probably varied from a Delta in that Deltas still had certain citizen rights whereas a slaves legal protections were probably limited to the same kind of protection property has. Anyway, a slave's child probably had no claim to citizen rights. In their case, being born free (assuming they were) might have translated as having no protections whatsoever and a pretty heavy pressure for them to give up the free status one way or another. Possibly a bond slave was a slave's 'freeborn' child forced to formally accept being bound over as a slave, which might have placed them higher than people enslaved for 'criminal' acts. If such slaves were ultimately considered property of the state, whether or not a particular citizen had paid a fee for rights to the slave's labor, an owner might have had no power to free a slave. Anyhow, the slave auction probably was illegal since, however slavery was conducted in the Federation, this wasn't it. These were 'stolen' people as opposed to 'legally acquired' ones. I suppose it's also remotely possible that the Federation, either under Servalan or her successors, had altered laws to make slavery more difficult. In Servalan's case, if I were to say something other than the milk of human kindness, the Federation had suffered devastating losses in the war, in people as well as territory. Amnesties or improving the condition of the people left might have had various political or PR advantages. The new regime could have had similar motives - improving conditions for its core area population while becoming more brutal on the frontier. Ellynne ________________________________________________________________ GET INTERNET ACCESS FROM JUNO! Juno offers FREE or PREMIUM Internet access for less! Join Juno today! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/tagj.

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Re: [B7L] Orbit (or who knows what evil lurks in a little plastic box ...)
by Sally Manton 31 Jul '01

31 Jul '01

Stephen wrote: <What amuses me about the little mutual deprecation society Avon and Vila have established by season 4 is that Avon knows that Vila isn't as cowardly and incompetent as he pretends to be and Vila knows that Avon isn't as unemotional and logical as he pretends to be.> Oh yes, but at the same time they don't have any illusions in the *other* direction, as well; the self-interest *is* an integral part of each of them, as the other knows (it just isn't as *big* a part as Avon, especially, would like to believe of himself; see that lovely little scene in Killer). They both *are* selfish bastards, despite reams of wallowy fanfic to the contrary. Which brings us to: <And then in Orbit Avon goes and acts as self-interestedly and as ruthlessly as his persona to Vila's absolute horror.> Horror, yes, but (IMO) *not* surprise. Watch Vila as Orac says the magic words: , Avon is stunned, had to stop and think - but Vila *doesn't*, not even for a milisecond thinking "he couldn't ..." He's off like a shot. Vila knew what Avon was going to do before *Avon* did; he never actually trusted Avon's heart, just Avon's self-interest. He believed that he was safe with Avon simply because Avon's self-interest dictated a more cautious and considered approach to danger than Tarrant's gung-ho-ism, *not* because he thought Avon would go out of his way to protect anyone except Avon (and probably Blake). Which of course begs the question, can there be a betrayal of trust where there's so little trust anyway? Vila is as mad as hell at the end of Orbit (he still isn't over the terror), and definitely he's sourer and more wary from then on, but I doubt he'd have fixed on it as a personal betrayal, rather a reminder that no he *isn't* safe, especially in the increasingly dangerous spiral they're in. If it happens again ... *it* will happen again. <If Vila had had the gun Avon would have been just as horrified. I seem to remember a couple of episodes where he takes betrayal particularly badly.> <grin> and that would include the last few minutes of *that* episode, yes? But that was different, that was *Blake*. I very much doubt that Avon has the same expectations of Vila as he does of Fearless Leader, or of Anna. _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp

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Blakes7 August 2001