Look to the West Volume V: To Dream Again
- Thread starter Thande
- Start date
xsampa
Banned
The Combine supports the nuclear family, not promiscuity, so this quote doesn't make sense in that context.
I was meaning it in a more (or would it be less?) literal sense. I mentioned earlier how we're still not quite sure of the Combine's stance on collectivism, but I could totally see the "Final Society" just being an excuse to collectivize life on a Brave New World scale, with community child-rearing centers to "supplement familial bonding" and implement some proto-conditioning on the side. There'd probably be a lot of shunning of those seen as "anti-social" and of course in the Final Society "everybody's happy, nowadays". But that's all just theory as it has been for the last decade, and I'm sure the actual Combine will be even crazier than we can imagine! I've got a small library of BNW quote awaiting!
Wow, I last left this timeline in the 1830s or so, and now I've spent a few hours looking at bits and pieces of the story, comments, and maps, in an attempt to get some idea of what's happened over the next 70 years. There's still huge stretches I haven't read, which I will try to do when I have the time!
A few thoughts-
I really like the idea of a world where the defining ideological conflict of the 20th century will be based not on opposing ideas about economics but rather opposing ideas on culture. In OTL, of course, there have been opposing views on whether cultural homogeneity or heterogeneity is more desirable, but those have mainly played out within countries, with people arguing either that a strong common language, culture, and sometimes religion are necessary to hold a country together, or that diverse languages, cultures, religious beliefs, and other types of identity are a source of strength. Even the most extreme proponents of uniform culture, who are certain that one culture is objectively superior to all others, never seem to follow the societists and openly advocate that the entire human race should follow one culture. On the other side, even the most extreme proponents of diversity don't go as far as the diversitarians here, who seem to advocate a kind of government-enforced diversity. Maybe I've gotten the wrong idea from my skimming, but that's my first reaction.
I get the impression that all written descriptions of the ATL are supposed to come from written material from within the ATL. That's a good way of telling the story, since it highlights the fact that we are looking at fallible sources that each have their own bias.
One text stated that nuclear [carytic?] weapons had been used more than 40 times in several different wars - holy s**t! On the other hand there seems to be a general agreement to not use them against cities and actual arsenals and delivery systems seem much more limited than in OTL (ICBMs sound like they are forbidden and instead nations are required to use super-complex suborbital bombers, if I understood it right.)
I feel bad for Japan in this TL. I feel even worse for India. China and Korea (sorry, Corea) are doing a lot better, though. Not to mention the Ottomans and Persia and the Maori (can't remember what the last are called in the ATL). Overall, the Europeans and Euro-Americans don't take over quite as much of the world as in OTL.
Haven't read much of the text on the actual Pandoric War (they use more poetic names for some of their wars than in OTL), but from what I know of how the technology is different in this world, I wonder if the weapons will be similar to WWI but the communications tech much less advanced (pretty sure they don't have telephones, let alone radio, until after the war.)
A few thoughts-
I really like the idea of a world where the defining ideological conflict of the 20th century will be based not on opposing ideas about economics but rather opposing ideas on culture. In OTL, of course, there have been opposing views on whether cultural homogeneity or heterogeneity is more desirable, but those have mainly played out within countries, with people arguing either that a strong common language, culture, and sometimes religion are necessary to hold a country together, or that diverse languages, cultures, religious beliefs, and other types of identity are a source of strength. Even the most extreme proponents of uniform culture, who are certain that one culture is objectively superior to all others, never seem to follow the societists and openly advocate that the entire human race should follow one culture. On the other side, even the most extreme proponents of diversity don't go as far as the diversitarians here, who seem to advocate a kind of government-enforced diversity. Maybe I've gotten the wrong idea from my skimming, but that's my first reaction.
I get the impression that all written descriptions of the ATL are supposed to come from written material from within the ATL. That's a good way of telling the story, since it highlights the fact that we are looking at fallible sources that each have their own bias.
One text stated that nuclear [carytic?] weapons had been used more than 40 times in several different wars - holy s**t! On the other hand there seems to be a general agreement to not use them against cities and actual arsenals and delivery systems seem much more limited than in OTL (ICBMs sound like they are forbidden and instead nations are required to use super-complex suborbital bombers, if I understood it right.)
I feel bad for Japan in this TL. I feel even worse for India. China and Korea (sorry, Corea) are doing a lot better, though. Not to mention the Ottomans and Persia and the Maori (can't remember what the last are called in the ATL). Overall, the Europeans and Euro-Americans don't take over quite as much of the world as in OTL.
Haven't read much of the text on the actual Pandoric War (they use more poetic names for some of their wars than in OTL), but from what I know of how the technology is different in this world, I wonder if the weapons will be similar to WWI but the communications tech much less advanced (pretty sure they don't have telephones, let alone radio, until after the war.)
I'm now imagining the combine as a crazy Huxley/Orwell crossover. Thanks for the night terrors!
Reminds me when I was young and green by internet standards and ran into the Draka verse. Reading about it made me literally sick to my stomach. It is implausible ofc but it is just enough plausible to be frightening that the world could have turned out so wrong. At least I had no night terrors
I vaguely remember that poster, mostly as Eurofed - I guess there are some exceptions.
Thinking about it some more, I guess quite a few people in OTL who think that their culture is superior to others might also think that the world would be better if everyone just did things their way. Very few, though, seem to consider it to be an important political issue. I've never heard of a significant political movement advocating bringing the entire human race into a single culture. Individual nation states have sometimes actively encouraged greater uniformity in terms of both language and culture (and sometimes religion), but not to nearly the same degree that the societists want to do, and of course not on a global scale.
One thing about societism that I wonder about is how it will deal with inevitably different interpretations. Clashing interpretations are an especially big problem for a movement that places such emphasis on unity. Societism might have an even bigger problem with it than OTL communism.
The diversitarians might have a different set of problems long term. Emphasizing and indeed embracing difference might help hold together an alliance for a while, but if the societist powers collapse like OTL Soviet Union or become societist "in name only", will diversitarian ideology allow the different countries to tolerate each other's different ways, or will it just encourage them to turn on each other even faster once there is no longer a common enemy. Does diversitarianism help to reduce the intensity of conflicts to a manageable level, or does it just encourage more conflicts by discouraging consensus? I guess only time will tell!
Couple more comments:
In the early 19th century New Spain looked like it was on its way to becoming a major power, but I can see that this was not to be.
Now, its successors in Mexico and Central America look like prime targets for the Societists who control almost all of South America. I've seen references to a crisis for the ENA coming up in the 1920s. My guess is maybe a big economic depression leading to Societist-backed unrest in Mexico and maybe Carolina as well, leading to military intervention by the ENA which in turn bogs down and leads to growing support for Societism within the ENA itself.
EDIT:
The events in England and Scotland didn't surprise me - eventually they would get tired of being treated like a colony by their former colonies.
In the early 19th century New Spain looked like it was on its way to becoming a major power, but I can see that this was not to be.
Now, its successors in Mexico and Central America look like prime targets for the Societists who control almost all of South America. I've seen references to a crisis for the ENA coming up in the 1920s. My guess is maybe a big economic depression leading to Societist-backed unrest in Mexico and maybe Carolina as well, leading to military intervention by the ENA which in turn bogs down and leads to growing support for Societism within the ENA itself.
EDIT:
The events in England and Scotland didn't surprise me - eventually they would get tired of being treated like a colony by their former colonies.
Couple more comments:
In the early 19th century New Spain looked like it was on its way to becoming a major power, but I can see that this was not to be.
Now, its successors in Mexico and Central America look like prime targets for the Societists who control almost all of South America. I've seen references to a crisis for the ENA coming up in the 1920s. My guess is maybe a big economic depression leading to Societist-backed unrest in Mexico and maybe Carolina as well, leading to military intervention by the ENA which in turn bogs down and leads to growing support for Societism within the ENA itself.
I suspect that is when we are going to see the War of Vengenance hit in the 1920s with the French and ENA being the primary losers in the resulting struggle. Although a major economic recession could be the thing that tips everything over the edge and it would be interesting if instead of one massive global war, instead we see a series of inter-connected but seperate wars breaking out around the globe that ultimately are linked by a Societist conspiracy.
It is interesting what you say about New Spain because while the potential strength of the Empire was always there, it never seemed that likely to be one of the top tier powers for the simple reason that the UPSA and ENA were both nearby, much stronger, and with an interest in expanding their sphere of influence. With is decentralized political system, New Spain was always vulnerable to having parts of being peeled off and being unable to marshal its resources effectively. Of course wasting vast amounts of men and material retaking Spain and then trying to hold it against its will didn't help one bit and I think the Great American War was the point when New Spain turned from at least a potential great power in its own right into a basket case.
"Are you, or have you ever been, a member of the Societist Movement?"
Thinking they are accomplishing their own goals, when they're actually accomplishing own goals.
What I am looking forward to the most about the next volume is finding out what theme the new opening quotes are going to be. Since Volume 4, we've had:
Volume IV: Solely quotes taken from Pablo Sanchez.
Volume V: Random notes found around in the house of David Batten-Hale.
Volume VI: Statistical summaries of various nations at the time of the Pandoric War.
Volume IV: Solely quotes taken from Pablo Sanchez.
Volume V: Random notes found around in the house of David Batten-Hale.
Volume VI: Statistical summaries of various nations at the time of the Pandoric War.
In the early 19th century New Spain looked like it was on its way to becoming a major power, but I can see that this was not to be.
Poor New Spain, so far from God, so close to the two American states.
According to the latest global map, the Combine has already invaded, though not the core region.
Non-Societist Angola is so far "de jure independent, subjected to influence by one or more external powers" which means this might be already happening.
No, too focused on Societist Mindanao.