Lands of Red and Gold, Act II

[Jared]

I imagine the same is happening in TTL but from an even earlier point in time considering that at least the Nuttana and the Kiyungu city-states must be exploiting the rainforests for shipbuilding lumber.

Certainly much of the easily accessible timber, i.e. near rivers and/or the coast, will be gone. It's not quite the same as it was in OTL where there was rapid clearing of a lot of the tropical forests for farming and timber exports, and with transportation technology not being at the same level,there's not quite the same demand for that.

At least there are wattles to make sure that wood used for fuel or papermaking are from a more reliable source.

Wattles are the short-term solution, but if they want wood for fuel and useful construction timber, they can (and eventually will) turn to faster growing taller species such as some Casuarinas, Grevillea and Eucalyptus.

On an unrelated note, have any Aururian nations imported any crops that can be used medicinally / pharmaceutically? I was thinking of the opium poppy for one since it's used to produce both a very useful analgesic as well as an addictive recreational drug.

Poppies are quite likely at some point, since they grow very well in OTL in Tasmania (the largest source of legal opiates today) and presumably elsewhere in southern Australia, although I haven't checked much.

It's a certainty that the Five Rivers will have tried their utmost to find such plants, being always on the lookout for new crops both for cash crops but also for cuisine. I'm not sure which ones would grow there easily, but they would certainly have tried.

I also thought that the Nuttana and Kiyungu can similarly go instead to growing kratom, which they could adopt from Southeast Asia. Not only has it been used in the same medicinal capacity as opiates have, having decent analgesic properties, it has also been used recreationally for both its sedative and stimulant properties (it has been used by those who need to work harder and by those who want to relax both, the different effects produced by different cultivars and dosages). Given that, it may hold some promise as a cash crop.

That is an intriguing possibility. Mitragyna speciosa is native to New Guinea, so there would presumably be easy access to it. Its cultivation could be encouraged there by trade, and/or grown in some of the more northerly parts of Aururia (Wujal/Cooktown, at least).

Is the author a Plirite? Or just an anti-imperialist in general, in a world where many of those types might find that Aururian qualifications are useful to have for one reason or another? But how would these qualifications be viewed amongst a more "normal" sort of academic, unless it indeed is normal to gain Aururian qualifications in many fields? Alternatively, as he's writing about Aururia (as a medical historian?), he is a specialist in Aururian (medical) history and thus might find it useful to gain those qualifications?

It is... difficult to answer those questions without revealing too much of the future of an alternative past. I will say that Aururian qualifications are considered of some use in a variety of parts of the world. This has already been foreshadowed in part by, say, an early Christmas special which showed a student in Louisiana who had spent some time at the Panipat. Granted, all Christmas specials should be taken with a certain light-heartedness of spirit, but still, that does at least suggest that there's some relevance to Aururian qualifications elsewhere in the world. It also suggests that Aururia, or at least part thereof, has deliberately kept a system of qualifications which are distinct from those used elsewhere in the world.

As to whether the author is a medical field, well, of the two OTL degrees, one of those is a medical degree. The Panipat was, of course, founded as a medical institution (though it quickly expanded), so there's a decent chance that medicine remains one of its areas of speciality. Past that, draw your own conclusions.

Is this a reference to any action taken by the Hunter against the Five Rivers? Or something less dramatic?

It's a reference to some of the previous foreshadowing taken when describing the Hunter, and more generally the framing sections for Act II. If you read between the lines of those sections, that can probably give a good idea of what it means.

 

[Cochlea]

That is an intriguing possibility. Mitragyna speciosa is native to New Guinea, so there would presumably be easy access to it. Its cultivation could be encouraged there by trade, and/or grown in some of the more northerly parts of Aururia (Wujal/Cooktown, at least).

There are a lot of different cultivars of kratom around South East Asia all with differing psychoactive properties (although still all opiate-like, working the same way pharmacologically) and so on. The Nuttana would very likely benefit from getting some of every variety they can find to experiment with, cross-breed and selectively cultivate different strains with different properties.

When processing it for long distance transport, the best method would be to dry the leaves and probably grind it down. The resulting product can then be taken as is or prepared into a tea for either medicinal or recreational purposes.

As a recreational drug I think it holds a lot of promise of profit for whoever first markets it in Aururia, likely the Nuttana. I can see Aururian workers from all over imbibing kratom daily as an energizing, uplifting tonic, just as it was used IOTL in SE Asia by labourers such that they wouldn't feel pain or fatigue even with the most backbreaking work.

On the other hand you have opium which is not productive in the least, even though it has the same properties of analgesia, euphoria etc. but historically only led to shirk rather than industriousness. I can easily see most Aururian governments being more than happy to encourage imports of kratom, rather than opium. Even though both drugs can lead to physical dependence, I don't see kratom causing the same social ills that e.g. widespread opium availability created in 19th century Qing China. And besides, I think the chance of addiction will only encourage those who trade in the stuff.

 

[Cochlea]

Where are the Australian Forests suitable for large scale paper making? (I'm talking at a level of what New Zealand has, or the Eastern USA)

The Nuttana can also just use bagasse for their papermaking, which should be a plentiful waste byproduct from the sugar industry.

 

[mojojojo]

Reintroduction of koalas is possible, but it would be more of a late seventeenth or eighteenth century idea. Essentially, this is the time when population decline has brought about more regrowth of forests and the like, which might lead to people importing koalas as either exotic pets or as part of the fur trade.

Were they ever kept as pets historically?

 

[mojojojo]

* * *

Thoughts?

The Nuttana use of ship’s goats was still widespread and noted enough that sailors from other trading companies started to refer to first Nuttana sailors, then all Nuttana, as goaties.
a general belief that there was nothing which they could learn from backwards heathens.

A bunch of heathens paying special attention to a goat? Did anyy Europeans take that as witchcraft?

 

[B_Munro]

Were they ever kept as pets historically?

Koalas are fairly nasty little critters if you take them out of their trees: I don't think they've ever been much of a success as pets.

 

[Cochlea]

Koalas are fairly nasty little critters if you take them out of their trees: I don't think they've ever been much of a success as pets.

Maybe a few captured as cubs and raised in enclosures owned by aristocratic / plutocratic types, or maybe even by temples or somesuch if there's a case that some cult considers the koala to be of sacral importance. I don't know if koalas raised in captivity are still as ornery as wild ones but they could just be left more or less alone in that case and the prestige of having a garden with a koala remains.

 

[mojojojo]

Maybe a few captured as cubs and raised in enclosures owned by aristocratic / plutocratic types, or maybe even by temples or somesuch if there's a case that some cult considers the koala to be of sacral importance.

IIRC some Aborigines though koalas were the reincarnated souls of dead children,

I don't know if koalas raised in captivity are still as ornery as wild ones but they could just be left more or less alone in that case and the prestige of having a garden with a koala remains.

Kind of like how peacocks & swans are kept as ornamental birds nowadays. Koalas might not care for a cuddle, but I don't think they would get into things the way monkeys would.
Koalas with unusual features turn up from time to time, I would imagine breeds could be developed

 

[Cochlea]

IIRC some Aborigines though koalas were the reincarnated souls of dead children,

There might be some deities Gunnagalic pantheons for which koalas are considered symbolic and thus revered, like how Hindu deities Ganesha and Hanuman are linked with elephants and monkeys respectively, and in festivals related to those gods elephants may be brought to temples and parades, or monkeys may be attracted to temples and given offerings of fruits and such.

I believe Australian shamanism has some notions of magic working that shamans are capable of, and tranformation from man to animal is one such magical power. It's actually a common trait in shamanistic practices across cultures that shamans can communicate with wildlife, and one way was to become an animal. That was done through imitating the animals in behavior and sounds so becoming the animal in mind, and some myths include shamans magically becoming the animals in form as well.

The Shape Of Ancient Thought argued that many customs and practices within early Egyptian, Mesopotamian, and Indian religions owe their ancestry to pre-civilizational shamanistic practice, and one of those practices was imitation of cattle where there was a cattle cult of sorts, like in Egypt and India. Similar to how spritual belief and practice from before the agrarian society was appropriated and reformed to suit the purposes of the newly forming states and their top-heavy elite structures in Mesopotamia and Egypt, there probably would have been something of the same in Aururia.

Perhaps ITTL early Gunnagalic religion would retain the animistic reverence of particular animals and shamanistic practices revolving around animals but instead assimilate it into the evolving priesthood structure and practices of the Gunnagalic state. Instead of cow imitation in Eurasia, there could be a similar form of meditation / ritual revolving around emus instead, or even around other important animals like kangaroos, and indeed, koalas. Maybe the priests of particular cults can adopt costumes based on their own sacred animals as their holy garb and esoteric rituals would involve imitating birdcalls or suchlike.

It would also be interesting if there's the idea of deriving magical powers from animal worship for oneself, or for other blessings like the fertility of the herds etc. And as such there would be incentive to capture and raise wild animals and birds in captivity, including koalas, just because it's good to have a few of such spiritually significant creatures around to guarantee the power and efficacy of priestly rituals.

 

[mojojojo]

Would growing enough eucalyptus to sustain them be difficult?

 

[PlotVitalNPC]

Aururians already grow eucalyptus as part of their forestry system.
Whether for charcoal or lumber, I don't recall.

 

[Cochlea]

Would growing enough eucalyptus to sustain them be difficult?

It might not be if the habitat is something like a timber farm containing only the eucalyptus that koala's are accustomed to feeding from. I suppose if the area was controlled well enough that a small number of koalas could sustainably live there, though I suppose it might require some careful gardening on the part of the koala keepers to maintain the eucalyptus farm environment.

Another solution for smaller temples might be to keep only one or two tame koalas around, possibly imported from larger temple-zoo complexes in larger settlements, and have people collect the right type of eucalyptus leaves fresh for feeding time. This is assuming that the koalas won't reject the gathered leaves and strictly prefer to eat off trees. Though modern zoo / captive raised koalas seem to eat a whole bunch of foodstuffs like fruits. I imagine that with centuries of koalas being raised tame that folks will know how to get them to eat foods other than eucalyptus leaves.

 

[PlotVitalNPC]

Koalas tend to be dumb enough that they will only eat eucalyptus off of the branch.
They have very, very simple brains.

 

[mojojojo]

Koalas tend to be dumb enough that they will only eat eucalyptus off of the branch.

Well, as the previous poster pointed out that might not always be the case

 

[Jared]

Sorry, this first post was one I realised I missed a while ago before posting the last chapter.

I don't think that this is applying a scientific mindset (that which derives from the scientific method) at all, far from it, really.

In fact, if you were to read The Shape of Ancient Thought, it's clear that the ancients asked exactly the kind of questions and applied exactly the same kind of logic that would produce the idea of paradoxes stemming from the notion of atemporal reincarnation, if they had the notion of atemporal reincarnation to deal with, that is.

I'm not disagreeing that they would recognise paradoxes, but that the forms of solution they would propose are different. The solutions offered to, say, the Ship of Theseus, while logical, are not the ones I would class as arising from the scientific method.

The multiple timeline solution would definitely be one solution provided by thinkers in my opinion. Few religious thinkers were content with accepting mysteries for the sake of it, explanations for the unexplained were vigorously pursued within the framework of pre-scientific religious and spiritual thought.

The idea of mystery is in the sense of it not being explainable by human reason alone, but requiring a spiritual understanding. This was explicitly affirmed by the First Vatican Council (i.e. 1864), but this was just making formal a much older tradition.

It's in that vein that I think that the variety of other solutions offered would be equally or more acceptable to a multiple timeline one, from the perspective of those raised within the tradition of Gunnagalic religions. As discussed before, I think that a multiple timeline solution would be more acceptable when Plirism is spreading beyond Gunnagalic peoples.

Actually, Buddhist ideas spread far and wide and came under the purview of thinkers who weren't of the priesthood and even those who weren't even Buddhist. The trend for societies where the priesthood held monopoly over the spiritual, metaphysical, philosophical etc. discourse was a slow rate of cultural and philosophical innovation. Greece enjoyed a faster rate of philosophical development in comparison to India, Mesopotamia, and Egypt.

The Buddhist example was that as far as I know, theological disagreements in Buddhism didn't lead to wars. Or not on the same scale as early Christianity, at any rate.

The paradoxes as I see them are more complex, even when only considering persons being born or not born. One can take millions of different actions, some of which could affect the births of people even centuries down the line. It's really more of a chaos effect in terms of persons being born or not depending on actions in the present or with past reincarnations.

The self-consistency protocol doesn't come close to explaining why only a particular subset of people will be born stemming from the actions of one person, but that doesn't deal with the subset of people that could've been born had that same person taken actions that were entirely different.

This view of the chaos effect and the effects on which subset of people are born follows from the idea of modern genetics and a different person being born (or not born) if there's different genetics involved. The Plirite view (well, pre modern genetics) is that that the reincarnated soul is the determining factor for what makes a person who they are, and that the body is just a vessel. So self-consistency ensures that a vessel is still born, and then the soul is the same. There's no real belief in a subset of people who would have been born if the same person had taken different actions; the same people (souls) would still have found vessels.

After all, I imagine that if there's one principle that I that all Plirites would hold dear, that would be the principle of free will.

Kind of, but it's subject to all of the same kinds of philosophical arguments that were seen elsewhere in OTL to what does free will actually mean. After all, they recognise that the life you lead is also buffeted by the consequences of others' actions and which have effects on other people, which is a kind of view of determinism (but not a complete one). Some thinkers express it in terms of people being both receivers (influenced) and instigators (influencers). Others express it in terms of the world affects you, but how you bear yourself and understand things is a reflection of your own free will. Others adopt positions similar to the George Kelly personal construct theory of psychology, which essentially argues that free will is determinism, properly understood. And there would be other positions adopted as well.

I could take up a project like this. I also have that WIP political map from a while ago.

Bit belated to reply, but still, it would be good if you're in a position to do this.

As a recreational drug I think it holds a lot of promise of profit for whoever first markets it in Aururia, likely the Nuttana. I can see Aururian workers from all over imbibing kratom daily as an energizing, uplifting tonic, just as it was used IOTL in SE Asia by labourers such that they wouldn't feel pain or fatigue even with the most backbreaking work.

On the other hand you have opium which is not productive in the least, even though it has the same properties of analgesia, euphoria etc. but historically only led to shirk rather than industriousness. I can easily see most Aururian governments being more than happy to encourage imports of kratom, rather than opium. Even though both drugs can lead to physical dependence, I don't see kratom causing the same social ills that e.g. widespread opium availability created in 19th century Qing China. And besides, I think the chance of addiction will only encourage those who trade in the stuff.

Okay, now I need to think about Aururian drug policy. Short version, I can see the Nuttana shipping kratom, while the Five Rivers grows poppies and exports opium (though also consuming poppyseed etc as a flavouring).

The Nuttana can also just use bagasse for their papermaking, which should be a plentiful waste byproduct from the sugar industry.

A bunch of heathens paying special attention to a goat? Did anyy Europeans take that as witchcraft?

Possibly, but there were already enough other Aururian beliefs which would be considered witchcraft, and they already thought of the Aururians as a bunch of pagans, so probably not too much additional to that. Although it would be darkly amusing if belief in pagan goat witchcraft was another reason that Europeans didn't adopt the practice to prevent scurvy.

Were they ever kept as pets historically?

Koalas are fairly nasty little critters if you take them out of their trees: I don't think they've ever been much of a success as pets.

Maybe a few captured as cubs and raised in enclosures owned by aristocratic / plutocratic types, or maybe even by temples or somesuch if there's a case that some cult considers the koala to be of sacral importance. I don't know if koalas raised in captivity are still as ornery as wild ones but they could just be left more or less alone in that case and the prestige of having a garden with a koala remains.

I presume that a few people have kept individual koalas as pets over the years, but it's really not suitable on a wide scale. Very finicky diet - yes, you can give them some fruit, but they mostly need eucalyptus leaves for protein and other essential nutrients afaik - and they generally get stressed by having too frequent contact with people. So individual koalas ATL would probably be kept as tame and at least semi-pets, but not on a large scale.

Kind of like how peacocks & swans are kept as ornamental birds nowadays. Koalas might not care for a cuddle, but I don't think they would get into things the way monkeys would.
Koalas with unusual features turn up from time to time, I would imagine breeds could be developed

There might be some deities Gunnagalic pantheons for which koalas are considered symbolic and thus revered, like how Hindu deities Ganesha and Hanuman are linked with elephants and monkeys respectively, and in festivals related to those gods elephants may be brought to temples and parades, or monkeys may be attracted to temples and given offerings of fruits and such.

I can certainly see sacred koalas in the sense of keep them around and feed them from time to time. More in a sacred forest than a close enclosure - koalas wander around a fair bit - but the practice is possible.

Would growing enough eucalyptus to sustain them be difficult?

Dpends how it's done. In general just planting the right kind of trees and leaving the koalas to it would be enough.

Aururians already grow eucalyptus as part of their forestry system.
Whether for charcoal or lumber, I don't recall.

Some of each, depending on the area. I'm not sure whether the species which are best for quick regrowth of timber are ones which koalas like, though.

 

[mojojojo]

I can certainly see sacred koalas in the sense of keep them around and feed them from time to time. More in a sacred forest than a close enclosure - koalas wander around a fair bit - but the practice is possible.

Yeah, that is what I meant with the swan & peacock comparison.
Would it be possible to do any sort of selective breeding of koalas, in such conditions?
I know there are a couple of towns in the USA how to large numbers of wild albino squirrels http://www.roadsideamerica.com/story/29067

 

[Cochlea]

I'm not disagreeing that they would recognise paradoxes, but that the forms of solution they would propose are different. The solutions offered to, say, the Ship of Theseus, while logical, are not the ones I would class as arising from the scientific method.

The solutions that ancient thinkers came up with had nothing to do with the scientific method, maybe the misunderstanding here is based on this sort of thinking being systematic, and systematic metaphysics was a thing long before the scientific method. There was a trend towards more abstraction and logical methods of reasoning in religious / spiritual circles in antiquity, and the same sort of framework can produce a solution like the multiple timeline view thats abstract yet derives from logical priors.

The idea of mystery is in the sense of it not being explainable by human reason alone, but requiring a spiritual understanding. This was explicitly affirmed by the First Vatican Council (i.e. 1864), but this was just making formal a much older tradition.

It's in that vein that I think that the variety of other solutions offered would be equally or more acceptable to a multiple timeline one, from the perspective of those raised within the tradition of Gunnagalic religions. As discussed before, I think that a multiple timeline solution would be more acceptable when Plirism is spreading beyond Gunnagalic peoples.

There's an even older tradition which includes the likes of Heraclitus and Parmenides who were exploring an ontology based entirely in spirituality and metaphysics but derived through principles of logical and systematic thought. The idea that reason leads away from spiritual understanding is in many ways detrimental to philosophical and theological innovation. Buddhism's unanswered questions for example locked off Buddhist thought and society from many philosophical developments.

The Buddhist example was that as far as I know, theological disagreements in Buddhism didn't lead to wars. Or not on the same scale as early Christianity, at any rate.

Buddhism didn't face the problem of a single totalizing political power like the Roman Empire which wanted one church and one doctrine alone due to the church being a pillar of imperial power.

This view of the chaos effect and the effects on which subset of people are born follows from the idea of modern genetics and a different person being born (or not born) if there's different genetics involved. The Plirite view (well, pre modern genetics) is that that the reincarnated soul is the determining factor for what makes a person who they are, and that the body is just a vessel. So self-consistency ensures that a vessel is still born, and then the soul is the same. There's no real belief in a subset of people who would have been born if the same person had taken different actions; the same people (souls) would still have found vessels.

That sort of view could pretty heavily alienate the non-wealthy, non-powerful strata of society; i.e. where the Plirites community will most heavily draw from, at least where Plirism isn't state doctrine. The common folk would definitely see a distinction between being born into the vessel of a king and being born into a vessel of a beggar. If it is the soul itself that makes the person, then the beggar by his deepest nature is meant to be downtrodden. But in any case, I think it's somewhat difficult to argue in any society where population growth is perceivable that there's a limited number of souls going about, and when souls aren't considered to be bound to a temporal plane, there could be countless different souls "simultaneously" inhabiting a particular body. For atemporal entities I don't see any reason to put down a "one soul at one time" rule when there's no real way that souls can be seen as inhabiting one time.

I would also imagine that in a pre-modern world with widespread infant and child mortality there would be quite a few people willing to believe that there were a subset of people that would have been born, even if in a different timeline, or at least if the idea is presented to them first.

Kind of, but it's subject to all of the same kinds of philosophical arguments that were seen elsewhere in OTL to what does free will actually mean. After all, they recognise that the life you lead is also buffeted by the consequences of others' actions and which have effects on other people, which is a kind of view of determinism (but not a complete one). Some thinkers express it in terms of people being both receivers (influenced) and instigators (influencers). Others express it in terms of the world affects you, but how you bear yourself and understand things is a reflection of your own free will. Others adopt positions similar to the George Kelly personal construct theory of psychology, which essentially argues that free will is determinism, properly understood. And there would be other positions adopted as well.

The multiverse view would render determinism meaningless and free will paramount, where you will still be constrained by the consequences of others' actions and how harmonious / disharmonious the timeline you're in is, but through choosing to live a life of harmony as best you can overcome your circumstances, which after all is the point of free will in Plirite thought anyway. Some schools could operationalise it by introducing some aspects of soteriology, for example by holding that the worse one's particular circumstances are (i.e. the harder to reach harmony) the better will their reward be if they forged through and lived a harmonious life as much as they humanly could. There may be even be a notion of social justice stemming from this, where the better off you are the more you have to do to reach harmony, including by helping out those who're worse off by improving their lives. With the receiver / influencer thing, there's still the choice on the part of those most influential to positively influence the lives of those who've only received negative influence (as they'd theologically vision it).

Bit belated to reply, but still, it would be good if you're in a position to do this.

Certainly, if you can send me an outline for it then I can do it.

Okay, now I need to think about Aururian drug policy. Short version, I can see the Nuttana shipping kratom, while the Five Rivers grows poppies and exports opium (though also consuming poppyseed etc as a flavouring).

I can only see the Five Rivers exporting to a local market over landroutes since they can't ship and most international markets can just get it more locally. There's also fact that historically, whenever new cash crops were introduced to places where they could be cultivated, they were. If the Five Rivers starts cultivating poppy first, if it can be grown wherever they export then the locals would start farming it for themselves and satisfy demand through local production.

On the other hand, basically no one ever farmed kratom on any major scale let alone imported it. If the Nuttana can set up local production, then kratom is different enough from opium (for one, it doesn't cause somnolence and respiratory depression, at least not as much as opiates do) for it to be marketable in places where opium was already around.

 

[Mark-ITSOT]

Given that koalas and opossums are the only non primate mammal species that have anything resembling thumbs it'd be cool to see a TL where one of the two's evolution takes a different tack and produces a more primate like lineage leading to some kind of sapient quasi human creatures.

 

[Arkenfolm]

I can only see the Five Rivers exporting to a local market over landroutes since they can't ship and most international markets can just get it more locally. There's also fact that historically, whenever new cash crops were introduced to places where they could be cultivated, they were. If the Five Rivers starts cultivating poppy first, if it can be grown wherever they export then the locals would start farming it for themselves and satisfy demand through local production.

On the other hand, basically no one ever farmed kratom on any major scale let alone imported it. If the Nuttana can set up local production, then kratom is different enough from opium (for one, it doesn't cause somnolence and respiratory depression, at least not as much as opiates do) for it to be marketable in places where opium was already around.

Kratom's recently gained a bit of popularity in the West, and largescale bans on it have only been recently. Could the Nuttana or others try and create markets for it? It certainly sounds like an appealing enough drug. And I don't see the side-effects being apparent enough before modern times to make the West clamp down on the drug for any reason but xenophobia. However, considering the history of marijuana, I could see kratom being banned in the West in the 19th or 20th centuries based on mostly exaggerated reasons and/or fears of scary Aururians and their heathen Plirite faith corrupting you through their drug. Which would be interesting in that you'd be shifting kratom's association from Indonesian to Aururian.

 

[Cochlea]

Kratom's recently gained a bit of popularity in the West, and largescale bans on it have only been recently. Could the Nuttana or others try and create markets for it? It certainly sounds like an appealing enough drug. And I don't see the side-effects being apparent enough before modern times to make the West clamp down on the drug for any reason but xenophobia. However, considering the history of marijuana, I could see kratom being banned in the West in the 19th or 20th centuries based on mostly exaggerated reasons and/or fears of scary Aururians and their heathen Plirite faith corrupting you through their drug. Which would be interesting in that you'd be shifting kratom's association from Indonesian to Aururian.

They very certainly can market it, and very successfully I think, both within Aururia and without. If they procure the kratom varieties known to be more aromatic and potent, i.e. the Thai ones, they would have a solid cash crop on their hand. All they need to do is grow it and once the crop is ready to cure and dry the leaves then shred it, allowing it to be brewed into a tea or chewed and swallowed by itself.

It's an energizing drug compared to opium's sedating effects, so I can see those who work long hours becoming the primary market for kratom. That presents a whole different sort of cultural impression that cannabis or opium / opiates would, where the latter was considered by the elites as making users (i.e. the lower classes) lazy and looking to get high to escape responsibility, while the same stigma didn't apply so much to the elites themselves. But kratom would be something that, although as enjoyable as opium in big enough doses, is more motivating and eliminates pain and fatigue from long hours of hard work. It's harder to justify as a corrupting influence to the elites when it is something used in the same capacity as coffee or tobacco (albeit lasting longer), not something with a "mind-bending" quality to it or something which leads people away from the Christian values of hard work. The Aururian origin of it can more or less be ignored, just like how the oriental origin of tea and coffee didn't matter, but the oriental connotations of opium and cannabis / hashish use were usually brought up in regards to how it was a corrupting influence, even though elites and aristocrats didn't face as much a stigma from drug usage as did commoners.