Sybilant Squid

Would you believe one of my first exposures to Time Travel was the Magic School Bus? Purely to see the dinosaurs.

Wild how it went from scenic touring of prehistory to spy-v-spy and shonen battles. Half of the issues are because some dipshits keep trying to bring the Nazis back. It's embarrassing.

It is a trick of masters of the spacetime-folding martial arts to deplete their opponent's juice and corner them somewhere remote and isolated from their allies and resources. My personal favorite destination is REDACTED. It's good to learn your star charts across the ages for navigational purposes.

-H "I see myself surrounded by wealth and all-" *The rougish bard says with mismatched attire that couldn't even be considered fashion by this point*

Take your characters. We're going in RAW:

You find yourself in a gap between mirrors, in the bridge between the IS and the IS-NOT. You see the glimmer of the other around the corner, alongside yourselves.

Players: Who do you all see?

It takes a lot of willfull training and mindfulness to break from it, and even then, one can't let up. Still catch ourself doing it more than we'd like to admit.

You never really know a person's political beliefs until they open their mouth. And it's best not to assume that because you share one value, you share all of them. Also with the opposition, just because they share some values with each other, does not mean they completely agree. Exploit that.

Spiraled from there.

Fucker ordered an Aryan vessel and was disappointed it had brown skin.

I may believe in a watered-down version of eugenics, but we are not allies. My focus is on actual health metrics, not racial purity. Gene therapy and voluntary birth control with informed consent over forced sterilization and systemic eradication. We are not the same.

"Fuck around and find out" is the name of the game. Best part of having a time machine is having an instant out for political arguments. You can drag some jagoff wannabe Nazi back to WWII Germany and let them try to save it. If they're historically unimportant enough, you can even leave them there.

Be me: Making sure that everyone in my domain is happy, healthy, and enriched and oblivious to my intervention.

In games. Yes. In games.

But that's where planning ahead and reserves come from. Wealth can have the supply ahead of time. Also, it slipped our minds. You're going to forget to address it in the heat of the moment anyways. Stress does that to people.

Counterpoint, the rig needs to be onlined yesterday, and no amount of money will magically deliver the complex coolant to where it needs to be. Not when we're out of juice.

Reminded of the hidden poverty tax while performing maintenance on the rig. Inability to source optimal resources means impoverished need to spend additional resources. A dedicated coolant with anti-corrosive compounds would last longer, but water is cheap and accessible right now.

Time to engage in a little technonecromany!

When it comes to Time, it is anarchy out there. The Atlantean accords are as slim as they are because that is the minimum number of rules a society needs to not implode. The Societies are foundational to Futury, but to the greater cosmos, it's a blip in endless void. Fly safe. Fly free. Tempus fugit

Solid. Now here's a practical challenge. Selling it to corpo culture like it was their idea in the first place. The PR spin might have Marx rolling in his grave, but to have the people in power make the mistakes of their undoing would be poetic justice.

This is the challenge I'm talking about. How do we keep these systems from falling to the same people who've torn down every other attempt before?

Stop!

You don't need to sell me on the dismantling of the market-based economy. I'm already there.

You need to sell me on the post-market economy. Sell it to me like I'm a power hungry greedy mfer who hates everyone except myself who is born into this system. How don't they do what's been done b4

When dismantling a system, you'd best know what you are replacing it with. Too many revolutions have been cyclical because of this. To dismantle an unjust system can be good if the new system is an improvement over the old system. Elsewise history repeats itself yet again.

I'm tired boss.

Hey! Does anyone have any connections between the construction industry and the confection industry. Because there is a white house construction project thay could really use some sweetening in the foundation if you know what I mean.

Back to the observation deck! You can pet the cat after retrieving the paste!

Fuck off! Still waiting up for the paste! Can't run the rig dry!

Oi. Lad! Heat exchanger needs to be onlined yesterday. Break from the distraction and get it pasted.

I'm neither for or against government, but ai am firmly against dismantling a system ignorantly or using a system to perpetuate authority. If it is just, then let it be just. If it is unjust, then let it fall. It is all too easy to blame/destroy systems, when most systemic failure is human-caused.

That is the nature of free will. Capacity for kindness and cruelty. Pragmatism and dogmatism. One cannot police the thoughts of future children. Not without stealing agency from them at least.

If all humans were perfect, any system would be the perfect system. Any system must account for the faults of human nature or it is doomed to repeat the history of those before us. Even without profit incentives, greed will arise. Even when lovingly nurtured and cared, hate will stem from nowhere.

Capitalism is no perfect system, and we're all better off for its fall, but humanity did just fine building it from first principles. Dismantling it won't solve the underlying issues behind why it became so dominant, nor why its competitors failed.

The pacifists would need to be intolerated for being intolerant of intolerance against intolerance. I had to reread this five times, but yes, the math checks out. Surprisingly simple ethical equation there.