So right, can someone please explain to me

how the fuck shit like this makes sense.

From MercNet btw.


Reason I'm even asking you all is 'cause some of you aren't completely fucktarded and the thread got locked 'bout an hour ago after it started tanking the servers after that post.

So uh

yeah.

Anybody gonna take a crack at this?

Yes.


If they don't pay the proper tithe to cross the territory then, yes, we will take your cargo as payment for passage.


Truth by convenience. We tend to prey on the weak and defenseless because usually they're the ones dumb or inexperienced enough to think they can get out of paying taxes, or are too poor to afford either the tithe or escorts. There are, of course, those who feel confident enough with their escorts that they will lose less money by resisting. They are usually proven wrong.



I'm almost certain that all military organizations practice zero empathy for those you're fighting . Tell me this:

Would a soldier function properly if all they ever fought about is how much the families of the people they killed suffer for what he or she has done?

Ohhhhh, shit son. It just be raining spit and polish Hierarchy dudes in this thread!

Mekan, bro, I ain't gonna retread ground my more eloquent buddies have already trod, but I can't just let this shit slide neither, you know? Look, if you don't get the reasons why you fight are important, you need to get your head straight. If you don't get how fighting for something you believe in is different from fighting for pay, especially after the fucking Reaper War.... shit, I just don't believe someone can be that dumb.



Hell fuckin' no! The primary purpose of a solider is to protect. You wanna know something, from a guy in actual fuckin' service who uses an actual fuckin' rifle instead of a 'tool and a terminal? I would be the happiest guy if I never had to fight again. I would love it if I was completely fuckin' useless because there was nothing out there threatening the Hierarchy.

Don't get me wrong, I love what I do. Except those bits when I got guys around me dying. Or when I'm responsible for ending some poor dumbfuck's life. If someone told me I didn't have to do that anymore, that I could spend the rest of my time doing some nice drill, I'd be over fuckin' joyed. Bored, sure, but I'd be happy.

Don't you fuckin' dare tell me that's my 'purpose'.


It ain't a profession. Seriously. That's the main fuckin' point we're all making. I didn't hand in a fuckin' resume to get here.


You really don't get how the Hierarchy works, do you?

Also, this


This is the smartest fuckin' thing said in the last couple of posts, and it came from a freakin' Sun. That's shameful, you know?

No personal slight there, dude.

How refreshing. A piece of animate scum that doesn't try to hide behind flowery justifications. I-


... oh fuck off you almost had something good going there. Oh well.

The answer is that soldiers aren't motivated by sheer bloody-minded personal gain you arrogant, amoral twit. Soldiers may sometimes go to war, but soldiers also stand guard in garrisons against varrenfuckers like yourself that want to raid colonies, and they also regularly chip in during relief work to provide raw manpower and labor after disasters.

When your personal crew of cutthroat thieves swings by Sur'Kesh to help clear rubble free of charge then you can get on your high horse.

My apologies. My intention was to say mercenary instead of soldier.

Also, cutthroat?

Really

really

After I just spent 5 minutes of my time explaining that "cutthroat" pirates have the average life expectancy of a Genophage era krogan infant.

As I said, mercs are a grey area that I'm not really inclined to get into right now.

Oh I am so sorry I misused 'cutthroat'. Allow me to rephrase.

When your personal crew of selfish, murderous, amoral thieves swings by Sur'Kesh to help clear the rubble free of charge, get back to me.

Again with the murder.

We're as "murderous" as any other private paramilitary organization. We don't kill people that aren't a threat, that's just bad business and really unprofessional. Most prisoners under our custody are released at the nearest civilized settlement or space station, others are negotiated with the company that employs them to be released elsewhere. Scrolls, some of them join our operation. They're that well treated.

Yeah, but encouraging that attitude makes it harder for people to agree to stop being pirates (Because, frankly, it's near-impossible to actually find and shoot all of them, and damn costly too), and it encourages toxic attitudes among the public that inhibit the passing of policies that actually reduce piracy and crime. Again, same issue as 'tough on crime'. If people go 'all pirates are assholes and aren't redeemable' then they're going to go 'why should we help them out, they're all pirates and assholes and irredeemable' and the shithole spawning pirates is going to remain a shithole spawning pirates until things go cataclysmally wrong.

Basically: Yes, pirates tend to be dicks (Often due to circumstances), but going 'all pirates are amoral dicks' isn't going to do anything useful, it's just going to help you feel better about yourself as you kill a few people and pretend that solves a problem.

Alright then. Enlighten me. What do you think we should do?

I get paid oodles of money to tell local governments, corps and not-so-local governments to tell them how to deal with pirates. I'm not exactly going to just blurt out everything on the extranet.

Short story is: Effective patrols to discourage attacks, regulation, economic and social reform. Occasional amnesty offers.

Even shorter is: Anything the asari republics are doing? Don't do it.

Convenient.


So basically everything you should be doing anyway. Insightful.


At last, common ground.

...Wait, seriously? That's how you guys look at this? It's not a profession for you?

Fuck, man. How the hell does that make any-

OK, now I’m getting it. Fundamental breakdown in communication, people. Allow me to explain. Where to start...

OK, Omegan Political Theory 101. Everything is based around organizations doing business in some form or another. This is the foundation on which the galaxy at large operates (not just T-Space or the Hierarchy or whoever - literally everything works this way in practice, if not on paper). Here's why.

(I'm getting to a point, I promise, sit tight.)

Here's the thing. Rules are determined by whoever has the most strength to back up their own batch of laws. This is usually determined by access to resources, and the firepower and numbers to hold onto those resources in the face of aggression by other groups. Anarchy, basically. Now, that's not to say gangs run everything 'on paper.' Gangs do run everything in practice; gangs have their own rules, constitutions, internal by-laws, whatever you want to call them. When I say 'gang', I know you're thinking 'street thugs in back-alleys', but that's not necessarily what I mean. Anything - ideals, heroic figures, literally anything - can end up with a gang formed around them at some point or another.

Now, keep in mind, I'm using the term 'gang' in a way that simply denotes some organization consisting of associates that work towards some kind goal - my usage of the term doesn't mean anything else.

In practice, most gangs end up forming around some kind of business. That is not to say that ‘business is everything, so money is everything’, ‘cus it’s not. Bargaining chips and resources are everything. Drugs, murder-for-hire, security and bodyguard work, medical work, smuggling, arms-manufacturing, making and selling plush toys, giving your opinion because it’s valued - Anything. It can be anything.

Now, where am I going with this? Because I know you're asking that at this point.

Simply put? The galaxy is not a nice place, and we've got literally thousands of different factions all trying to carve out their own little spot, or reinforce their positions, or secure some form of leverage over some other group for some purpose at some point somewhere, usually relating to resource-access of some form or another. Different salarian dynasties in the Union? Functionally gangs. The Hierarchy? Functionally a gang. Terminus states? All of them are their own little gangs. Omegan street crews? Gangs. And the majority of these form around some kind of business, or need to do business with others to stay operational while operating around an ideal (the Hierarchy and its Cause spring to mind).

Now, the reason I’m equating mercs to soldiers? Because they both basically serve as the enforcers of their respective gangs, whatever their other roles may be within that gang.

Now, that is not to say that ‘enforcer = DURRHURRHURRHURR KILL ERRYTHING BECUZ HURHUR GANG.’ That’s retarded. ‘Enforcer’ merely means ‘someone who enforces their gang or organization’s rules or laws, expands the gang's territory and assets at the command of their leadership (by force if necessary), or defends their assets against rival organizations.’ In this way, mercs and soldiers fill the same roles for their respective organizations.

That’s the core point I’ve been getting at this whole time. It’s all business, or at least business-related, even if we dress it up as something else or hold the whole concept in disdain - it’s the way the galaxy works in practice. ‘Formal anarchy’ is a term that was coined for it at one point, I think. We dress it up in rules and laws in C-Space and in a lot of Terminus states, but really? Anyone with the firepower and the backing to get their way gets their way, period. Even if the ‘firepower’ is something that’s as intangible as blackmail material (do what I want or everyone will know you fucked a varren) or tech-data (hey look at my new superweapon guys). Or sex workers (asari look good to virtually everyone).

Omega's just a...really shitty microcosm of the way the galaxy at large works on a basic level.

Kinda sucks, now that I think about it.

Damn, my secret to success is out.

They're not. They're not they're not they're not.

Here's the funny thing about this really dumb example you're using. Everyone in a mercenary company is a mercenary. Everyone in the Hierarchy is a soldier. No matter what they are doing. And that's the only similarity between the two no matter how long you try to create new definitions for things. A "soldier" isn't muscle for the Hierarchy any more than a "merc" is muscle for a mercenary group.

Because you are a part of that "group" you are that group.

And no matter how much you try to troll us by blathering on about "the Cause" without understanding it, that is the big difference between governments and not-governments. Governments are all their citizens and their shared cause (or Cause). Merc companies and pirates are credits.

Having blasted away our fair share of mercs I can say that they are not soldiers. At best they are amateurs, at worst they are degenerate scum.

Right. Credits. Resources. Specifically, a form of accepted currency (a resource in and of itself) used to acquire resources that can in turn be used to acquire other resources for the good of the organization, whatever it may be.

I'm not trolling you guys about the Cause, Harrad. It's an ideal. An ideal that a gang (in my usage of the term) happened to form around and then grow. It needed resources and enforcers to protect them and then expand. Soldiers fill that role for the Hierarchy; a typical trooper would fill the role for the Blue Suns, and a street thug does it for an Omegan gang.

Whether we call it a government or not is irrelevant. What matters is whether they fit this criteria. If it's a group with assets and the inclination to use them to acquire more, even if the organization was founded around an ideal like the Hierarchy, it is functionally a gang.

Credits are not causes, Mekan, no matter how hard you try to make them.

I'm with Harrad.

You can't explain the galaxy by saying it all comes down to guns and credits. Money and guns are hugely, hugely important to how things work, but they don't fully explain the Union's problems, the Sentients-of-Rannoch thing, or the Hierarchy (or the Compact issue) and if you tried to explain them on that level you'd get a dumb answer that'd lead you into trouble.

Plus, 90% of the time, who ever says "It's the same everywhere! They're corrupt gangsters too!" is someone who wants a pass for whatever destructive, money oriented thing they just did.

Poking a couple of freelancers full of holes doesn't mean you've actually got a dick fuckface. An sucking yourself off doesn't mean anyone else cares.

The credits aren't the cause in and of themselves, Harrad. You're not getting what I'm saying. The organization (or at least the individuals composing it) is the cause, or trying to further 'the cause', whatever that cause is.

Hell, in a way, day-to-day life for the average person is exactly the same. Think about it. You try to acquire resources (food, water, creature comforts) every time you wake up in the morning. It's another microcosm of the same basic concept, but this is the way the galaxy functions on a fundamental level. It's just existence and life in general. The cause becomes irrelevant if you lack the means to further it, right? And that cause can be different for any individual. Gotta look at the big picture and all the little pictures that make it up. Merc needs to feed his kids - Systems Alliance engineer's gotta do the routine check-up on a ship's systems - turian legionnaire's gotta die for the Cause.

Am I wrong on any of those points?