Word meanings and "nice guys"

I talked a bit about changes in word meanings in a previous post. I'll give an example.

I assert most planetside Matari would consider "a nice guy" to be somebody who is nice to other people. An Angel Cartel loyalist would not be "a nice guy" because they seek to extort, enslave and kill other Matari.

Many Matari capsuleers, on the other hand, seem to use "a nice guy" to mean "somebody who is talking pleasantly to me". They seem to attach to the words no requirement to actually be nice to other people. Sometimes not even the requirement to be very nice to the speaker himself, the words may just mean said person is entertaining company.

Measuring morals

I believe a capsuleer's morals are measured by their deeds. Things they do, and things they choose not to do.

I believe one cannot be separated from their deeds - a man who does evil deeds is an evil man, not a good man who does evil deeds. Otherwise, the world would only have good men and the whole distinction would become rather useless.

Yes, there is a theory of moral relativity. One man's good is another man's evil and so forth. However, should one happen consider all viewpoints to be equally "right", choosing between using one's own moral standards and enemy moral standards should hopefully not be particularly difficult choice.

Looking into darkness

I believe you cannot look into the darkness without the darkness looking back into you.

I see this as part of how human contact works, not a weakness in any specific person or a flaw in their integrity.

The very act of seeking to understand and emphatize with an enemy's views is an act of mentally trying on their justifications. There is little harm of doing it once and then rejecting it.

However, making a mental habit of thinking of an enemy as a nice guy will slowly over time affect what one considers to be characteristics of nice guys, subtly changing value sets and meanings given to words.

Choosing the evil you fight

I came to the realization that the world is not a very nice place sometime after I became a capsuleer.

I just can't fix it all. That task is just too huge for me, for anybody. So I try to make just a small part of it better. That is better than trying to do everything and achieving nothing.

Or so I prefer to tell my concience.

The "death is preferable to slavery" argument

Some people justify shooting ships carrying slaves by arguing that death is a better fate than slavery.

I personally choose not to justify causing the death of our kin with the "death is preferable to slavery" argument. I do not feel I should be making that choice for those unfree people and for their clans and tribes.

Instead I choose to justify causing their death by my opposition of the Amarr and their evil. By the right of our kin to make their choices themselves.

The fact of the matter is the Amarr are using the lives of our kin as shields. And the Amarr will keep doing more of it as long as they follow their evil religion.

On the needs of free and unfree Matari

There is often discussion about how one should prioritize the rights and needs of different groups of Matari - free and unfree. So far, I have chosen for to work mainly for the Republic, for the free Matari.

I do wish to free our kin in captivity. But I also want to protect the lives and freedom of our kin who are already free. If a captive Matari dies, we have lost one of our kin. If a free Matari dies, we have also lost one of our kin.

And the free Matari need to be strong and prosperous to be able to free the captive Matari.

On hating Amarr

My kin have much reason to dislike Amarr, and many do.

Yet, I feel to become strong our people need to see beyond hate and punishment, and not make it part of who we are.

We need to build identity and life of our own, not clutch our hate of Amarr and slavery close to our chest. I understand letting go cannot be easy and will take time, as many of us are former property.

However, I also feel that as long as we cling to that hate as a basic principle of life, we are giving Amarr power over us by seeing ourselves as their former slaves. That is not who we are.

We are a people of our own. A free people.