From: blakes7-d-request@lysator.liu.se Subject: blakes7-d Digest V00 #37 X-Loop: blakes7-d@lysator.liu.se X-Mailing-List: archive/volume00/37 Precedence: list MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/digest; boundary="----------------------------" To: blakes7-d@lysator.liu.se Reply-To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se ------------------------------ Content-Type: text/plain blakes7-d Digest Volume 00 : Issue 37 Today's Topics: Re: [B7L] bullies Re: [B7L] Rights Re: [B7L] Sources Re: [B7L] Beatles 7 [B7L] Minds? Re: [B7L] bullies [B7L] Servalan's Manipulations (was Animals.. me too) Blake's 7 Magazines Re: Sources (was Re: [B7L] Motivations and Justifications (Part Three)) Re: [B7L] Beatles 7 [B7L] [Jerry Davies ] Blake's 7 Magazines Re: [B7L] Police ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 07 Feb 2000 04:47:26 -0800 From: mistral@ptinet.net To: B7 List Subject: Re: [B7L] bullies Message-ID: <389EBEDD.D289DC1E@ptinet.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Pat Patera wrote: > Except for Travis who, admittedly, gets 90% of Federation Trooper screen > time, few of the 'force' seem like bullies. First we meet baby doll > curly locks Ray (Seek Locate Destroy). In Rumours, we get to know the > philosophical palace guards, i.e. "Some days are better than others, > Trooper (Smith)" Courtroom guards Trooper Parr and pal seemed pleasant > enough (Trial). Even Old Starkiller seemed reasoned and fair. A slave to > tradition. Remember how he paused to adjust Trooper Parr's collar pin. > Likewise, the Major (Tharnia?) in Trial. She did not hold herself above > the law, as Servalan did. Good examples, although I did think Parr displayed the attitude of 'us' troopers being better than 'them' civilians. Although that stops a bit short of bullying, it could be a contributory attitude. The ones I was thinking of are Klegg and his death squad, and the troopers using drugged civilians for target practice in Warlord. Oh, and the ones in Moloch. Maybe it's a function of how distanced they are from the civilizing influence of mainstream Federation society? Considering the attitudes of the judges at Travis's trial, and the examples you mention, it certainly doesn't seem universal. Mistral > PS Mistral, you must type about 400 words a minute to type so much! Unfortunate side effect of writer's block. Don't tell Kathryn, eh? -- "Who do you serve? And who do you trust?" --Galen, 'Crusade' ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 07 Feb 2000 07:45:05 -0800 From: mistral@ptinet.net To: B7 List Subject: Re: [B7L] Rights Message-ID: <389EE881.C915CD0A@ptinet.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Avona wrote: > Well, what do you consider to be meant by the right not being infringed? Governments have the authority to limit rights; but our Constitution promises not to limit that particular one. A convicted criminal loses his rights as a citizen; but my position is you shouldn't limit the rights of people who have yet to abuse them. I'll concede that access to weapons of mass destruction such as bombs should be limited. OTOH, I'm more than a little annoyed that my government doesn't consider me responsible enough to light a string of firecrackers. It's really all perspective, isn't it? A Federation citizen would be overwhelmed by the amount of freedom we have, coming as they would from a society where there is no leisure transportation, they couldn't change residences without permission, where the strong implication is they can't even choose their own careers. Whereas my grandfather would consider our current culture the next thing to a police state. > Not all people who want gun control want them taken away. They simply > want gun owners to be knowlegable, careful, and to keep their guns out > of the hands of career criminals. I certainly agree with those ideas; but I'd be wary of how they might be put into practice. There are already plenty of laws aimed at keeping guns out of the hands of criminals. Taking them out of the hands of law-abiding citizens won't help with that; it also won't make gun-owners any more knowledgable or careful. It might make more sense to make gun safety a mandatory course in the public schools. I wonder how Hal Mellanby would approach these issues. He spent his life making weapons that he hoped would never be used; yet he certainly seemed to think people had a right to the means of self-defense. > And as for what people thought were the founding fathers intentions in > the 40s... that's only 60 years ago, hardly in a position to be more in > touch with the Constitution than we are. In terms of language shift, that's a great deal of time. There are hundreds of words that have come into the language since 1940, a few that have become disused, and far more that have shifted meaning significantly. That doesn't even account for idiom and context differences, nor for the acceleration of these changes brought about by increased mobility and communication. The language of 1940 is markedly closer to the language of the Constitution than the language of 2000 is. When you consider that the Constitution is just over 200 years old, 60 years is a large percent of that time. In the absence of incontrovertible evidence, it would be difficult for me to believe that people in the 1940s understood the Bill of Rights *less* than we do. Mistral -- "Who do you serve? And who do you trust?" --Galen, 'Crusade' ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 07 Feb 2000 07:41:13 -0800 From: mistral@ptinet.net To: B7 List Subject: Re: [B7L] Sources Message-ID: <389EE799.B204A295@ptinet.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Avona wrote: > Mistral, sometimes going to an expert is the best thing you can do, but > every person has their own biases. Very true, but all sources are biased. IMHO, part of choosing an expert or source is assessing the bias. Once you know what it is, you can compensate. > Would Avon, who was not very politically minded, taken Blake's word in > all matters of political policy? I think not! He might just do the exact opposite, actually. Interestingly, how politically minded Avon was can be argued either way from canon. My personal interpretation is that he disapproved of the system, but didn't think it could be changed, and settled on the embezzling scheme as a way to 'drop out'. You'll notice that Avon didn't claim expertise in a lot of areas, however, and made use of expert opinions even in cases where he did have good basic knowledge himself. For example, he knew something about firearms (Avalon, Gold), but he still asked Dayna for her opinion about the guns in Rescue. This even though her education was clearly informal, and closer to an apprenticeship than a standard Federation education must have been. There's a great deal of leverage in the Henry Ford approach. Mistral -- "Who do you serve? And who do you trust?" --Galen, 'Crusade' ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 07 Feb 2000 03:54:54 -0800 From: mistral@ptinet.net To: B7 List Subject: Re: [B7L] Beatles 7 Message-ID: <389EB28D.60687C12@ptinet.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Pat Patera wrote: > Or: Orac as the smart manager Epstein and Zen for loyal roadie Neil > Aspinel. Lovely :) Or, Orac works as George Martin. Joanne MacQueen wrote: > >From: Pat Patera > >Sleer and her minions can be the Blue Meanies. > > Oh God, I can see that - Servalan yelling "Smash them, glove"; and Jarriere > reappearing as the clueless Max, being beaten until he remembers that > affirmative answers require a "No, Your Blueness". ROTFLOL! I shall never be able to look at Max without collapsing again. But... but... who's the glove? Travis works pre-Sleer, but then we'd have to find another Pete Best. Ven Glynd in his second appearance might represent the Maharishi? Hm. Then there are the song characters, too. The android Avalon can be Polythene Pam, Inga Dear Prudence, Meegat Eleanor Rigby. Can I have Sara for Maxwell? Krantor as Lucy, he certainly glitters enough. Neil Faulkner wrote: > Except that by the time the Beatles were producing songs with any substance > to them, they were written by either Lennon *or* McCartney, though both were > credited. And of the two, give me Lennon any day of the week. As others have pointed out, the either/or is a gross oversimplification. And while lyrical substance may have not been immediately apparent, the musical sophistication relative to other rock songwriters started quite early with the incorporation of cadences and embellishments not usually found in the form. If you're interested in the relationship of the Beatles to a background of 'serious' musical composition, you might enjoy 'The Music of the Beatles', by Wilfrid Mellers, if you haven't read it. It's out of print, but a good library might be able to dig it up. Mistral -- "Ad hoc, ad loc, and quid pro quo. So little time! So much to know!" --Jeremy Hilary Boob, Ph.D. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 7 Feb 2000 13:20:09 EST From: KKrause658@aol.com To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se Subject: [B7L] Minds? Message-ID: Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Mistral wrote < I'll concede that access to weapons of mass destruction such as bombs should be limited. OTOH, I'm more than a little annoyed that my government doesn't consider me responsible enough to light a string of firecrackers.> That is because of the many idiots that have caused injury to themselves and others (not to mention property) causing some "well meaning" citizens to clamor for legislation in their states to regulate fireworks, not to mention other items. Just read some of the warning labels on your household appliances. Of course, some people see this as big brother coming into our homes under the guise of benevolence (is this the way the federation got started?). OTOH there are some days when I think we should just let natural selection take over and reduce some of the really big idiots. (and hopefully not the days when I suffer from idiot syndrome ) But this brings me to another form of idiocy: The rebels on earth trying to peacefully surrender to the federation troops in The Way Back. Foster already knew about at least one massacre of peaceful resistance. They knew about the executions regarding the other rebels who surrendered and were transported to other planets... did they really expect that the Federation would accept their surrender? Especially as the resistance was gaining force? Was Dev Tarrant their information liaison so he could lull them? Where were their minds? Karen ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 7 Feb 2000 20:20:15 -0000 From: "Julie Horner" To: "B7 Lysator" Subject: Re: [B7L] bullies Message-ID: <006a01bf71a8$df7e3d20$859abc3e@orac> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit From: "Pat Patera" > Mistral wrote: > >[ObB7: Does it strike others, as it strikes me, > >that the job of Federation Trooper attracts bullies? > >Does the screening process hunt for this trait or is it >>a result of the training? >>Is that a commentary on modern law-enforcement types?] > Except for Travis who, admittedly, gets 90% of > Federation Trooper screen time, few of the 'force' seem like bullies. Assuming that peace officers are what we might otherwise understand to be police officers, this seems to correspond to what we see of law enforcement in the Federation, i.e. as far as I am aware there are is no distinction between law enforcers and the military. Does this mean that all Federation citizens are subject to martial law? To whom are they ultimately answerable? Well I guess the answer would be the President but I wonder what the reporting structure is, through military personnel or through the judiciary? Julie ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 07 Feb 2000 20:01:35 -0500 From: Cam MacLeod To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se Subject: [B7L] Servalan's Manipulations (was Animals.. me too) Message-ID: <389F6AEE.B20CC305@ilap.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; x-mac-type="54455854"; x-mac-creator="4D4F5353" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Pat P wrote: >What if there were certain 'embarassments' Servalan/Sleer wanted to be >rid of? Federation citizens that she could not have (legally) >eliminated. People who knew things about her. How convenient if she >could program Avon to visit these folks. How even more convenient if >such encounters resulted in the untimely demise of those persons? >Persons such as: Dr. Mueller, Dr. Plaxton, the rotund Space Princess >Purser (Gold), the crooked miner (Games), Dr. Egrorian, Zukan, (the list >of 4th season fatalities is a long one) ... Blake! I find this idea totally fascintating - and completely believable. The idea that Servalan was "running" Avon throughout the 4th season seems entirely possible to me given the enormous co-incidences about the people they were both interested in and those people's previous personal involvement with Servalan. The concept certainly has a delicious irony to it. But, it seems entirely possible Servalan could have been manipulating the ENTIRE "resistance" including our crew. She did seem to be everywhere, including Helotrix. And it would in keeping with B7 precedent - The President of the Federation controlled the Terra Nostra in the 2nd season ("To have total control you must control totally, both sides of the law."). And it would nicely tie in with Avon's own wrenching history with Anna ("stayed close and let you run"). Use the rebels to further your own ambition of achieving Federation power, make sure the rebels don't really achieve much yet keep your rivals occupied, eliminate some pesky personal threats from your past, control one of your enemies, AND become rich in the process...Seems like a PERFECT Servalan plot to me. Just think of the evil glee she would have just waiting for the perfect moment to reveal all to Avon in her moment of victory. What a wonderful plot idea! Cam. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 8 Feb 2000 1:46:6 +0100 From: Jerry Davies To: "blakes7-d@lysator.liu.se" Subject: Blake's 7 Magazines Message-Id: Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Greetings and sorry to intrude on the list. I've been sorting out some old stuff and came across some Blake's 7 magazines from the early eighties which were printed in the U.K. As far as I can tell, the set is complete (25 - including a summer special). Could anyone tell me if there is a demand for this sort of thing or do I just chuck them on the bonfire? Thanks Jerry ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 7 Feb 2000 20:39:29 -0000 From: "Neil Faulkner" To: "b7" Subject: Re: Sources (was Re: [B7L] Motivations and Justifications (Part Three)) Message-ID: <002201bf7202$fc42cac0$e535fea9@neilfaulkner> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Mistral wrote: > > The tone was definitely intentional, and mainly because I found myself > > disagreeing with you even more than usual:) > > Would've been my guess. Irreconcilable viewpoints. Shall we meet > in the forest at dawn with pointy sticks? I'll bring my mutoid. I'll bring some fresh fruit. Neil "...Lennon got in the habit of issuing vague orders for the creation of evocative sounds (he once asked Martin to make a song sound like an orange)." ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 7 Feb 2000 20:48:06 -0000 From: "Neil Faulkner" To: "b7" Subject: Re: [B7L] Beatles 7 Message-ID: <002301bf7202$fd47b7a0$e535fea9@neilfaulkner> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Mistral wrote: > And while lyrical substance may have not been immediately apparent, > the musical sophistication relative to other rock songwriters started > quite early with the incorporation of cadences and embellishments > not usually found in the form. If you're interested in the relationship > of the Beatles to a background of 'serious' musical composition, you > might enjoy 'The Music of the Beatles', by Wilfrid Mellers, if you > haven't read it. It's out of print, but a good library might be able to > dig it up. I meant lyrical substance, knowing bugger all about music. Soundwise I prefer the Rolling Stones anyway. Neil "...Lennon got in the habit of issuing vague orders for the creation of evocative sounds (he once asked Martin to make a song sound like an orange)." ------------------------------ Date: 08 Feb 2000 10:56:19 +0100 From: Calle Dybedahl To: Lysator List Subject: [B7L] [Jerry Davies ] Blake's 7 Magazines Message-ID: <86og9svwzg.fsf@tezcatlipoca.algonet.se> Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="=-=-=" --=-=-= --=-=-= Content-Type: message/rfc822 Content-Disposition: inline X-From-Line: blakes7-request@lysator.liu.se Tue Feb 08 01:46:24 2000 Return-Path: Delivered-To: calle@tezcatlipoca.algonet.se Received: (qmail 29998 invoked from network); 8 Feb 2000 01:46:23 -0000 Received: from samantha.lysator.liu.se (list@130.236.254.202) by tezcatlipoca.algonet.se with SMTP; 8 Feb 2000 01:46:23 -0000 Received: by samantha.lysator.liu.se (8.9.3/8.9.3) id CAA22622 for calle@lysator.liu.se; Tue, 8 Feb 2000 02:46:24 +0100 (MET) Date: Tue, 8 Feb 2000 02:46:24 +0100 (MET) X-Envelope-From: blakes7-request@samantha.lysator.liu.se Tue Feb 8 02:46:13 2000 Received: by samantha.lysator.liu.se (8.9.3/8.9.3) id CAA22583 for blakes7@lysator.liu.se; Tue, 8 Feb 2000 02:46:12 +0100 (MET) X-Authentication-Warning: samantha.lysator.liu.se: list set sender to blakes7-d-request@lysator.liu.se using -f Received: from scrabble.freeuk.net (scrabble.freeuk.net [212.126.144.6]) by samantha.lysator.liu.se (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id CAA22568 for ; Tue, 8 Feb 2000 02:46:06 +0100 (MET) Received: from [212.126.149.140] (helo=clogmaster) by scrabble.freeuk.net with smtp (Exim 3.12 #1) id 12HzjA-0004Ml-00 for blakes7-d@lysator.liu.se; Tue, 08 Feb 2000 01:46:04 +0000 Old-Date: Tue, 8 Feb 2000 1:46:6 +0100 From: Jerry Davies Reply-To: jerry.davies@freeuk.com To: "blakes7-d@lysator.liu.se" Subject: Blake's 7 Magazines X-mailer: FoxMail 2.1 [en] Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Gnus-Mail-Source: file:/home/calle/Mailbox Message-Id: X-Diagnostic: Not on the accept list X-Diagnostic: Mail coming from a daemon, ignored X-Envelope-To: blakes7 Lines: 15 Xref: tezcatlipoca mail.misc:617 Greetings and sorry to intrude on the list. I've been sorting out some old stuff and came across some Blake's 7 magazines from the early eighties which were printed in the U.K. As far as I can tell, the set is complete (25 - including a summer special). Could anyone tell me if there is a demand for this sort of thing or do I just chuck them on the bonfire? Thanks Jerry --=-=-= -- Calle Dybedahl, Vasav. 82, S-177 52 Jaerfaella,SWEDEN | calle@lysator.liu.se "Just about anything can be done if you are demented enough." -- Christopher C. Petro, scary.devil.monastery --=-=-=-- ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 8 Feb 2000 07:25:07 -0000 From: "Neil Faulkner" To: "b7" Subject: Re: [B7L] Police Message-ID: <000201bf726b$ed05a320$e535fea9@neilfaulkner> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Julie wrote: > Assuming that peace officers are what we might otherwise understand to be > police officers, this seems to correspond to what we see of law enforcement > in the Federation, i.e. as far as I am aware there are is no distinction > between law enforcers and the military. > > Does this mean that all Federation citizens are subject to martial law? > To whom are they ultimately answerable? Well I guess the answer would be the > President but I wonder what the reporting structure is, through military > personnel or through the judiciary? There are two references to a police force in the series, both 4th Season. Dayna 'reminded' Plaxton of the time she'd reported a missing ground car to the police as stolen, and the General in Traitor referred to investigation of Practor's murder as a job for the police (and since he had already been told that Sleer had commandeered the investigation, we can infer that Servalan was posing as a police commissioner). Blake was appointed as an official law enforcement officer in the final episode. Reeve's rank of Investigator (in Sand) suggests he was a police officer (maybe one of Sleer's subordinates). The crew of the London carried standard troopers' sidearms, but wore dark blue rather than black uniforms. Presumably, then, they weren't troopers, but probably not police either (merchant navy, perhaps?) Par's remarks in Trial suggest an uneasy state of affairs between the Civil Administration (who would be the most likely candidate to have ultimate control of any civilian police force) and Space Command, the military wing of which Servalan was Supreme Commander. OTOH, the first episode had troopers scurrying around everywhere, and Sleer was usually accompanied by bog standard troopers too (albeit ones with silver bits on their overalls). Basically, this is yet another area where a coherent background rationale was underconsidered and underdeveloped. I think there should have been a separate civilian police force (possibly affiliated to Justice Department), identifiable for what it was, and it should have been the police rather than the military present at Blake's trial and guarding the prison cells on Earth. A possible explanation is that Earth at that time may indeed have been placed under martial law, what with the rising unrest alluded to by Bran Foster. The first two seasons taken as a whole do not suggest that the pre-War Federation is a military dictatorship, indeed it seems that the President and the Administration are having to work hard to keep the military under their thumb. Neil "...Lennon got in the habit of issuing vague orders for the creation of evocative sounds (he once asked Martin to make a song sound like an orange)." -------------------------------- End of blakes7-d Digest V00 Issue #37 *************************************