From: blakes7-d-request@lysator.liu.se Subject: blakes7-d Digest V99 #322 X-Loop: blakes7-d@lysator.liu.se X-Mailing-List: <blakes7-d@lysator.liu.se> archive/volume99/322 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 99 : Issue 322 Today's Topics: RE: [B7L] the Federation Re: DS9 (was Re: [B7L] Re: blakes7-d Digest V99 #315) Re: [B7L] Cally-related. Re: [B7L] the Federation [B7L] Re: blakes7-d Digest V99 #321 Re: [B7L] Re: blakes7-d Digest V99 #321 Re: DS9 (was Re: [B7L] Re: blakes7-d Digest V99 #315) Re: [B7L] blakes7-d Digest V99 #315 Re: [B7L] the Federation Re: [B7L] dystopias [B7L] Re: blakes7-d Digest V99 #320 Re: [B7L] the Federation ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 16 Nov 1999 22:16:28 +0100 From: Jacqueline Thijsen <jacqueline.thijsen@cmg.nl> To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se Subject: RE: [B7L] the Federation Message-ID: <39DCDDFD014ED21185C300104BB3F99F9060FA@NL-ARN-MAIL01> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sally wrote: > * Okay, except maybe for Tarrant. And Dayna. Maybe. The rest > - not even my > Beloved Leader - are anything *but* natural hero material > (And then there's Vila...) As Penny or Arkaroo (I forgot which one) proved in the Flat Robin, Vila is natural Rincewind material. Jacqueline ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 17 Nov 1999 08:38:19 EST From: "Joanne MacQueen" <j_macqueen@hotmail.com> To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se Subject: Re: DS9 (was Re: [B7L] Re: blakes7-d Digest V99 #315) Message-ID: <19991116213819.60245.qmail@hotmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed >From: Una McCormack <una@q-research.connectfree.co.uk> >Harriet Monkhouse wrote: > > Didn't you love the scene where Robert Lindsay is trying to >seduce >Lindsay Duncan in the middle of a Dr Who con? >It was better watching it as an extra. Just as long as you weren't too close to the "Dalek" yelling "FORNICATE! FORNICATE!" so enthusiastically. Speaking of that, better tell me if you ended up on the cutting room floor, or I'll be tempted to go looking for you (my brother and I taped it the last time ABC broadcast it). I used to work with someone named Barbara Douglas, but she didn't look anything like Lindsay Duncan. Regards Joanne (encouraging people to head further off-topic, sorry) ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 16 Nov 1999 20:38:14 -0000 From: "Andrew Ellis" <Andrew.D.Ellis@btinternet.com> To: <Blakes7@lysator.liu.se> Subject: Re: [B7L] Cally-related. Message-ID: <00cb01bf307e$54bdca40$eefcabc3@leanet.futures.bt.co.uk> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit >Andrew wrote: > >> As our current leader in the UK has stated, "The >> Establishment" has too much control here. >Una replied >As our current leader of the opposition in the UK replied: 'This is a man >educated at public school and Oxford with a majority of almost 200 in the >House of Commons. Who does he think *is* the Establishment?' > Exactly. thanks for backing me up. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 16 Nov 1999 21:29:49 -0000 From: "Andrew Ellis" <Andrew.D.Ellis@btinternet.com> To: "Lysator List" <Blakes7@lysator.liu.se> Subject: Re: [B7L] the Federation Message-ID: <00cc01bf307e$559f9ec0$eefcabc3@leanet.futures.bt.co.uk> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Judith > >The British Empire was far from perfect, but I think even the Victorians didn't >stoop as low as drugging entire populations in cities, massacring half the >population of a planet and deporting the rest, or making an entire world live >with the knowledge that every single one of them would die if there was a >revolution. > Massacring whole populations. Are you sure they (Victorians) would not have done it if there were not other empires to keep them in check ? Threatening populations with death by far superior weaponry ? I think they did that. Not inventing "the bomb" or other weapons of mass slaughter does not make you benevolent. But anyway, the point was that ANY regime is almost by the nature of power corrupt. I'll have to check out your WEB site to see if it really is more endemic in the Federation than a disaffected member of a Western Democracy would feel it is today. I'll get back to you. On another point entirely (well slightly related). The dome in "The Way Back" never really fells right to me. Neither does the view that the entire Federation was drugged. So here is a thought I had (Sorry if it's an obvious thought, or an old thought). The people living in the dome were drugged (fact), but by series IV, the idea of drugging entire populations with P50 was sufficient to propel a nobody (Slear) into power - it was that revolutionary. People on other planets did not appear drugged (although we never saw many), and the fact that when isolated on the liberator for a few days, they did not notice a change supports this. And if everybody was drugged, they why does the Tera Nostra exist, and who needs Space City. So people in the dome (and other selected places we may assume) are somehow different, and require drug control. At least one of them is a mind altered revolutionary. Another one's mind just would not stay altered. The dome also houses, the local criminal justice system, the holding bay for transportation and a few service industries (library, school and medical centre). So the proposal is that the Federation puts people in the dome who it feels it can't trust. The mind alteration process is not perfect, and the drugs are used to re-enforce the control, and to prevent anything from allowing the subjects from breaking through the barriers. It might also be the Federation's way of dealing with other people who require specialist mental control. In order for the Federation to go to all this trouble though, it must actually value the people, otherwise why not just kill them, or deport them. We are told why they value Blake, and why he must be discredited rather than killed (If the entire population of the Federation was drugged, then why not just kill him, nobody would care). But what about the rest, they are not all revolutionaries of Blakes calibre, he is special. One possible answer would be that the Federation is actually short of people. Full computer control of space craft is an alien concept, so people are needed to fly space ships. Outer planets have populations in the thousands, not millions. Hence the Lindor strategy. If you need the planets resources and not the people, and everybody is drugged, just invade, kill everybody and move in automated mining equipment. If you need the people, and you can't drug them all, you must win them over to the Federation. So the Federation actually needs the support of the majority of people. OK it is ruthless in putting down revolt, and applies mind control and drugs to control extremists, but basically it needs to appear to act in the best interests of its populace. Of course, with our insight, we know it is corrupt, commits atrocities and is power hungry. Andrew ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 16 Nov 1999 21:27:56 -0700 From: Helen Krummenacker <avona@jps.net> To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se Subject: [B7L] Re: blakes7-d Digest V99 #321 Message-ID: <38322ECC.271A@jps.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit > > In "The Rise and Fall of the Third Chimpanzee", Jared Diamond claims that > hunter-gatherer socities would work, on average, 20-hour weeks. He based > his assumption on the societies he lived and worked with in Papua New > Guinea. Ever heard that niggling little voice saying, "You're in the wrong > business, Mate"? > I've seen about the same figures in a number of anthropology studies. I've often thought that being a hunter-gather would suit me fine. :) No email though. No Blake's 7. Life wouldn't be all good. :( ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 16 Nov 1999 21:43:56 -0700 From: Penny Dreadful <pennydreadful@powersurfr.com> To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se Subject: Re: [B7L] Re: blakes7-d Digest V99 #321 Message-Id: <4.1.19991116212214.00957220@mail.powersurfr.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 09:27 PM 16/11/99 -0700, Helen Krummenacker wrote: >I've often thought that being a hunter-gather would suit me fine. :) >No email though. No Blake's 7. Life wouldn't be all good. :( <cynic>Kill the pig! Smash its head!</cynic> (The barefoot bit's all right; it's the pregnant part I'm not so keen on.) But -- no B7? That's hardly an excuse! You could narrate and/or act out all 52 episodes around the campfire all those long dull paperworkless nights, thereby instantiating a great Oral Tradition amongst your People. And as for email, perhaps the Professor could build you a modem out of coconuts. --Penny "The Mo-vie Star" Dreadful ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 17 Nov 1999 10:01:13 +0000 From: Una McCormack <una@q-research.connectfree.co.uk> To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se Subject: Re: DS9 (was Re: [B7L] Re: blakes7-d Digest V99 #315) Message-ID: <38327CE9.ACFF9A20@q-research.connectfree.co.uk> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Joanne MacQueen wrote: > > >From: Una McCormack <una@q-research.connectfree.co.uk> > >Harriet Monkhouse wrote: > > > Didn't you love the scene where Robert Lindsay is trying to >seduce > >Lindsay Duncan in the middle of a Dr Who con? > >It was better watching it as an extra. > > Just as long as you weren't too close to the "Dalek" yelling "FORNICATE! > FORNICATE!" so enthusiastically. Close enough. > Speaking of that, better tell me if you ended up on the cutting room floor, > or I'll be tempted to go looking for you (my brother and I taped it the last > time ABC broadcast it). You can see the back of my head, if you look very hard. Una ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 17 Nov 1999 09:07:24 -0600 From: Susan Moore <susan.moore@uni.edu> To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se Subject: Re: [B7L] blakes7-d Digest V99 #315 Message-id: <3832C4AC.9D5A3846@uni.edu> Content-type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit Calle Dybedahl wrote: > > >>>>> "Kathryn" == Kathryn Andersen <kat@welkin.apana.org.au> writes: > > > Ulp - no. Who wrote it? When? I've never heard of it. > > "Those Who Walk Away from Omelas" is a short story by Ursula K. > LeGuin. I think it's included in the collection "The Wind's Twelve > Quarters". You can probably find it elsewhere as well. > > > Of course now you've spoiled it, is there any point in reading it? > > No, it's not spoiled. Yes, there is a point in reading it. Interestly enough, when I looked this up in the online catalog, this book was placed on reserve for a Philosophy class. Interesting tidbit. Ob B7 ref.: Which of our heroes would actually read the materials the professors put on reserve? Susan M. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 17 Nov 1999 17:22:27 +0000 (GMT) From: Judith Proctor <Judith@blakes-7.demon.co.uk> To: Lysator List <Blakes7@lysator.liu.se> Subject: Re: [B7L] the Federation Message-ID: <Marcel-1.46-1117172227-06cRr9i@blakes-7.demon.co.uk> Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII On Tue 16 Nov, Andrew Ellis wrote: > > Massacring whole populations. Are you sure they (Victorians) would not have > done it if there were not other empires to keep them in check ? Threatening > populations with death by far superior weaponry ? I think they did that. Not > inventing "the bomb" or other weapons of mass slaughter does not make you > benevolent. Makes you less dangerous though. > But anyway, the point was that ANY regime is almost by the nature of power > corrupt. I'll have to check out your WEB site to see if it really is more > endemic in the Federation than a disaffected member of a Western Democracy > would feel it is today. I'll get back to you. You have got to be joking! Being a disaffected member of a Western democracy is a whole different ball park. there were good people working for the Federation, but they didn't have enough power to make a change. eg. Governor Le Grand. > > On another point entirely (well slightly related). > > The dome in "The Way Back" never really fells right to me. Neither does the > view that the entire Federation was drugged. So here is a thought I had > (Sorry if it's an obvious thought, or an old thought). > > The people living in the dome were drugged (fact), but by series IV, the > idea of drugging entire populations with P50 was sufficient to propel a > nobody (Slear) into power - it was that revolutionary. The stuff used in the domes was a simple surpressent - it just dampened down strong emotions and reduced riots etc. I imagine higher grades were rarely dosed. Pylene 50 was very different - it gave total control - the victims willingly did whatever you wanted even when it was the opposite of their former beliefs. It was also irreversible wheras the drugs in the domes wore off after a day or so. > People on other planets did not appear drugged (although we never saw many), I suspect the surpressents were only used in crowded environments where tensions were likely to run high. Where people grew their own food/had independent water supplies, they would have been useless in any case. > and the fact that when isolated on the liberator for a few days, they did not > notice a change supports this. And if everybody was drugged, they why does the > Tera Nostra exist, Because knowing something exists is the first step to avoiding it. > and who needs Space City. People who have money (who aren't likely to be the lower classes who are being drugged). > So people in the dome (and other selected places we may assume) are somehow > different, and require drug control. At least one of them is a mind altered > revolutionary. Another one's mind just would not stay altered. The dome also > houses, the local criminal justice system, the holding bay for transportation > and a few service industries (library, school and medical centre). So the > proposal is that the Federation puts people in the dome who it feels it can't > trust. The mind alteration process is not perfect, and the drugs are used to > re-enforce the control, and to prevent anything from allowing the subjects > from breaking through the barriers. It might also be the Federation's way of > dealing with other people who require specialist mental control. In order for > the Federation to go to all this trouble though, it must actually value the > people, otherwise why not just kill them, or deport them. We are told why they > value Blake, and why he must be discredited rather than killed (If the entire > population of the Federation was drugged, then why not just kill him, nobody > would care). But what about the rest, they are not all revolutionaries of > Blakes calibre, he is special. One possible answer would be that the > Federation is actually short of people. Full computer control of space craft > is an alien concept, so people are needed to fly space ships. Outer planets > have populations in the thousands, not millions. Hence the Lindor strategy. If > you need the planets resources and not the people, and everybody is drugged, > just invade, kill everybody and move in automated mining equipment. If you > need the people, and you can't drug them all, you must win them over to the > Federation. So the Federation actually needs the support of the majority of > people. OK it is ruthless in putting down revolt, and applies mind control and > drugs to control extremists, but basically it needs to appear to act in the > best interests of its populace. Of course, with our insight, we know it is > corrupt, commits atrocities and is power hungry. Darn it. I feel you're wrong in your initial premise, but the RSI is playing up again. I'll prove you wrong some day when I can type more <grin>. Judith PS. Fancy doing a panel at Redemption on comparative governments? Comparing different SF programmes and seeing what type of government control they exerted. -- http://www.hermit.org/Blakes7 - Fanzines for Blake's 7, B7 Filk songs, pictures, news, Conventions past and present, Blake's 7 fan clubs, Gareth Thomas, etc. (also non-Blake's 7 zines at http://www.nas.com/~lknight ) Redemption '01 23-25 Feb 2001 http://www.smof.com/redemption/ ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 16 Nov 1999 20:07:55 -0000 From: "Neil Faulkner" <N.Faulkner@tesco.net> To: "b7" <blakes7@lysator.liu.se> Subject: Re: [B7L] dystopias Message-ID: <000201bf312b$9cc3dde0$34488cd4@default> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Rob wrote: >I've heard an awful lot of people speculate on what our "natural" behaviour >is, was, or should be. But I've never heard anyone even attempt to define >exactly what they mean by "natural". To me, it usually sounds like "the way >*I* think people should be". Desmond Morris? 'The Human Zoo' considers in some depth the effects of our unnatural environment on our behaviour, without any strident call to turn the clock back and return to some rose-tinted natural ideal. >I have to admit, given the choice of (1) writing my own personal moral code, >based on my life's experiences and the teachings of the people I respect >most, and (2) having my morals dictated to me by some dogmatic tract, I >would choose the former over the latter. Up to a point, I suppose. I mean, >I wouldn't want every man and his dog writing their own moral code with >respect to murdering Rob Clother. To name but one example. I think (cynically) that most people prefer (2) to (1), but (even more cynically) pursue (1) as and when it suits them but no further. If it's any consolation, I don't want to murder you. Mind you, my dog does. Neil PS That was just a joke - I haven't got a dog. But I'd keep well clear of my goldfish if I were you. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 17 Nov 1999 22:57:46 +0200 (EET) From: Kai V Karmanheimo <karmanhe@cc.helsinki.fi> To: blakes7@lysator.liu.se Subject: [B7L] Re: blakes7-d Digest V99 #320 Message-ID: <Pine.SOL.4.20.9911172251410.6075-100000@kruuna.Helsinki.FI> Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Hellen wrote : <And the Terry Pratchett's reference was nice (BTW, I just met the man - this Friday).> Actually, it was unintentional. I didn't even realise it was Pratchett before you pointed it out. I must have read one Discworld novel too many, they are becoming subliminal... <But that seemed to be the only correct decision at that time - we weighted the lives of some people versus lives of whole future generations... There are, sometimes, decisions like this, which you _have_ to take the responsibility for, at all costs.> What I was thinking (though not necessarily expressing very clearly) was that I liked "Star One" all the more because it brought up the moral question, had the good guys weigh their options and think of the ramifications their choices would have. As you said, this is what people have to do in the real world. In the simplified good vs. bad world of television drama they usually don't. After the rudimentary beginning, B7 did a pretty good job of avoiding too much clear-cut simplicity. Blake has changed. His goal is still the same, overthrowing the Federation, but he has spent two years running, fighting, winning small victories, losing Gan, having been tricked and manipulated. I think you can see the effect in him, the battle fatigue. He wants to end this as much as Avon. "We have to win." Winning is his obsession, for only that will justify his actions - to himself. Once he found his purpose again at the end of "The Way Back", he was unflinchingly certain of his cause and the justification of his actions - until "Pressure Point". After that his faith has wavered. He *needs* to destroy the Federation, and he sees destroying Star One as the only way to do it. I think all this makes him much more interesting than if he was an infallible, inexhaustible crusader who didn't pay attention to the consequences of his actions and who wasn't affected by the things he has to do and endure to reach his goal. It doesn't turn the Federation into good guys or remove the necessity of their downfall. < In the whole season III I, personally, can't point out even a single episode, where the initial aim of the crew has been maintained.> True, but with Blake removed from the equation, what could the writers do? Avon was set as the new "prime meridian", and his policy was to look after himself and stay out of everybody's way. He may comb the galaxy for Blake, but not fight Blake's war for him. Probably the only way to justify the fight would have been to introduce a new character to take Blake's place (e.g. make Tarrant heir to Blake's ideals and personality, rather than just heir to his hairstyle), but having some kind of a Blake clone just step in and take command from Avon would also have been an incredibly clumsy solution. This is what I feel is the "confusion" of the third season, with both the Federation and the crew in flux and the writers trying to come up with reasonable excuses for action, so that we won't end up watching 50 minutes of the crew staying out of trouble and boring themselves - and the audience - to death. For myself, I'm not that bothered by the crew abandoning the fight, but by storylines like "The Harvest Kairos", where Tarrant's thirst for adventure and plain greed are a good enough reason to attack Federation forces and Avon doesn't care enough to comment because he is too busy toying with the Sopron. The third season did scale impressive heights with some episodes, but hit embarrassing lows with others. One reason for change in Cally's character could then be simply the script writers' need to have some one cover the absence of Blake's more moral side against the cold phalanx of conceit, cowardice, cynicism and greed as represented by Avon, Vila and Tarrant. Sally wrote : <<oh dear, here I go again> As I've argued before, there's no proof of what precisely will happen, or of the numbers that were going to die as a result of the destruction of Star One. Third Season seems to indicate that in fact a lot of worlds survived it quite well - well enough to achieve freedom, at least temporarily.> As I've only been on this list a couple of months, I am not familiar with all the arguments presented before. But I agree with you on that there's not enough information to know what Star One's operating parameters were and what consequences its destruction had. I don't see the third season shedding much light on the matter. After all, during the whole season we only saw two, possibly three (Terminal might be a Federation planet but Tarrant seemed to consider it a legend more than anything else) planets which would have been affected by Star One's destruction. Of the other 200+ worlds there was no mention. To achieve independence they would have had to get rid of two things : 1) Star One's influence over their computers (done); 2) any security forces/ground troops stationed on their soil. Basically, if there is one person left on the planet to wave the flag on top of the ruins and declare independence after that, then the planet is independent - at least until Space Command gets a ship or two in place to drop in additional troops or bomb the population back into submission. However, with over eighty per cent of their ships and Finest Few annihilated by the Andromedans, it would take Space Command quite a long time to go through all the planets. So as long as the Federation lacked the muscle to enforce its claims on planets, they would be technically independent - regardless of their condition. This we are not told anything about. Any of those 200+ planets could have survived it virtually untouched or be devastated - by the rebellion, the war or adverse effects of Star One's destruction. We just don't know. Kai ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 17 Nov 1999 21:56:30 -0000 From: "Andrew Ellis" <Andrew.D.Ellis@btinternet.com> To: "Lysator List" <Blakes7@lysator.liu.se> Subject: Re: [B7L] the Federation Message-ID: <006401bf3146$9d317880$782b63c3@leanet.futures.bt.co.uk> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit >On Tue 16 Nov, Andrew Ellis wrote: >> But anyway, the point was that ANY regime is almost by the nature of power >> corrupt. I'll have to check out your WEB site to see if it really is more >> endemic in the Federation than a disaffected member of a Western Democracy >> would feel it is today. I'll get back to you. > To which Judith Replied >You have got to be joking! Being a disaffected member of a Western democracy is >a whole different ball park. > >there were good people working for the Federation, but they didn't have enough >power to make a change. eg. Governor Le Grand. But when it is as bad as people seem to say on this list, even the army rebels. >> >> On another point entirely (well slightly related). >> > >Darn it. I feel you're wrong in your initial premise, but the RSI is playing up >again. I'll prove you wrong some day when I can type more <grin>. > I can wait. > >PS. Fancy doing a panel at Redemption on comparative governments? Comparing >different SF programmes and seeing what type of government control they exerted. But that would mean watching lesser SiFi shows ! -------------------------------- End of blakes7-d Digest V99 Issue #322 **************************************