Cacique Caribe | 09 Sep 2017 7:36 a.m. PST |
Whatever the "Event" might be, a massive die off by famine will follow: "Survival was a moral as well as a physical struggle. A woman doctor wrote to a friend in June 1933 that she had not yet become a cannibal, but was 'not sure that I shall not be one by the time my letter reaches you.' The good people died first. Those who refused to steal or to prostitute themselves died. Those who gave food to others died. Those who refused to eat corpses died. Those who refused to kill their fellow man died. Parents who resisted cannibalism died before their children did." link link Depressing, isn't it? It almost reads like an episode of The Walking Dead, or your worst possible version of The Twilight Zone or The Outer Limits. Let's just say that the photos are absolutely horrific. So, if the game setting is 5-10 years after the "Event", your characters might very well find themselves in a very depopulated part of the globe. And pretty much stripped of everything remotely edible. And if a warlord wants to contain the man-made or natural famine (and subsequent plagues) to a specific geographical area, all he/she has to do is make people think that their meager rations will continue. The instinct to remain at home, close to everything familiar, is that strong, specially when people are given a choice. And then make them think that the shortages are because of hoarding by their own neighbors. But, by the time they realize what's up, they'll be too weak to leave their homes. Dan PS. The sadistic perpetrators of the Holodomor may have learned what to do to the Ukrainians (the bread basket of Europe) by paying close attention to what happened to their fellow Russians 10 years earlier: link
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14Bore | 09 Sep 2017 8:21 a.m. PST |
In a lot of ways TWD does a good representation of what it might be like, they had 1 group at least who turned out to be cannibals |
StoneMtnMinis | 09 Sep 2017 9:08 a.m. PST |
Thanks Dan for bringing another jewel in the "glorious crown" of progressive socialism out of obscurity. Unfortunately, one only has to move their eyes down south to see the same scenario being replayed in progressive socialist Venezeula today. But, since our media have deemed it unimportant most of us know nothing about it. Dies irae dies illa Solvet saeclum in favilla: Teste David cum Sybilla |
Cacique Caribe | 09 Sep 2017 9:19 a.m. PST |
Dave Same goes for the modern ignorance of the Armenian Holocaust*. It brings up too many uncomfortable questions. I think that everywhere in the world these days, the mainstream media and "the Party" are one in the same. After all, isn't the media always the voice of "the People"? So who can argue with the media without finding him/herself in opposition of "the People", right? :) Dan * All Americans of a certain age heard about it for decades then, suddenly, silence. Silence from the Western press and from Hollywood, and from most of academia. Allow the silence to linger long enough and everyone will wonder if it ever even happened. The same thing will happen with the Holodomor.
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lloydthegamer | 09 Sep 2017 9:49 a.m. PST |
No Turk living in Turkey would be stupid enough to speak out about the Armenian Holocaust, he knows that in today's political environment he would be in jail (if he's lucky) or shot. Living in a right wing dictatorship is no joy either. |
Cacique Caribe | 09 Sep 2017 9:56 a.m. PST |
"No Turk living in Turkey" Exactly. Those aren't the ones with the freedom to speak about it. Dan |
The Beast Rampant | 09 Sep 2017 11:20 a.m. PST |
It is galling that the acts of Nazi Germany have been allowed to overshadow the atrocities of Soviet Russia to such an extent. Many in America today are profoundly ignorant the true monster Stalin was, if they even recognize the name at all. |
StoneMtnMinis | 09 Sep 2017 12:46 p.m. PST |
> Living in a right wing dictatorship is no joy either.< Sorry, not a "right-wing" politiacl dictatorship, but a extreme "religious" dictatorship. Not the same thing. |
lloydthegamer | 09 Sep 2017 1:01 p.m. PST |
Stone: I don't think the current government of Turkey is religious, it is centered around the current strong man. Don't let the fact that Turkey is Islamic blind you to naked power politics, which is what is happening now in Turkey. So yes, "right wing political dictatorship" is the correct appellation. Beast: I understand what you are saying there about Stalin. He was a monster like Hitler. Both of these individuals show that evil lurks on both sides of the political spectrum. I think Stalin's evils were swept under the rug during WWII because he was on our side. Dan: Well at least we're speaking about it. |
StoneMtnMinis | 09 Sep 2017 1:26 p.m. PST |
When you institute saharia it is a "religious" dictatorship. Just because the current thug isn't a mullah doesn't mean it isn't "religious". Hitler and Stalin both leftist dictators who wanted to conquer the other. national solcialist party = nazi |
Cacique Caribe | 09 Sep 2017 1:27 p.m. PST |
Lloyd: "Dan: Well at least we're speaking about it." That's good enough for me, as long as we do focus on the Holodomor. Dan |
Zephyr1 | 09 Sep 2017 2:39 p.m. PST |
hmmm, if you're already forced into cannibalism, making units of troops coming to confiscate what food you have left 'disappear' is an interesting scenario. And allow you to go hunting your tormentors afterward (better armed now, of course… ;-) Dystopian governments of the future contemplating similar holodomors, beware! |
Cacique Caribe | 09 Sep 2017 2:42 p.m. PST |
Beware indeed! But only if the victims of Holodomor realize early on what is being done to them, and if they aren't too far gone from waiting and waiting for rations that never come. By the time a normal moral person finally succumbs to committing cannibalism, their brain is pretty much gone, on primal mode, and they don't have much left in the way of muscle mass or energy reserves to go very far or do anything but scavenge. A rifle will weigh a ton to them. That said, wasn't there a WW2 movie about a Japanese army that was leaving nothing and no one behind in the jungle villages they attacked? Dan |
Gwydion | 09 Sep 2017 3:58 p.m. PST |
Hitler and Stalin both leftist dictators who wanted to conquer the other. national solcialist party = nazi Hitler was neither a 'solcialist' nor a socialist despite the name of the party. National Socialism was based on Race Hatred and Corporatism, though not that coherently formulated. Neither was Stalin anything like as efficient at murdering civilians as Hitler, nor as psychotic in determining the need for warfare. Hitler's Nazi ideology needed and craved murder as an essential part of its being. Stalin subverted the essentially benign ideology of equality among human beings to fulfill his perverted dementia. Hitler's murders were part of his ideology, Stalin's were all his own psychopathic creation. |
Cacique Caribe | 09 Sep 2017 4:35 p.m. PST |
Sending people off to gulags to be worked, starved or beaten to death, or where escape meant death by exposure or hunters sounds pretty efficient to me. Millions went on those trains East. Besides, if someone sees me as an undesirable and is trying to kill me or mine, I don't much care if I'm a victim of their ideology or their psychosis*. They looked at other people as mere animals or insects, and they didn't just want to kill their subjects quickly and humanely. No, they delighted in coming up with various ways of making them suffer, emotionally and physically. A monster is a monster is a monster and, in my book, Hitler ranks third on that list when it comes to numbers and sheer callousness in the treatment of fellow citizens. And yet in the West people nowadays suddenly find it amusing when they see the face of one of those other monsters on someone's t-shirt. It's time to snap out of the coma. Dan * It would be like a deer debating over what a hunter was wearing: YouTube link |
The Beast Rampant | 10 Sep 2017 10:00 a.m. PST |
, CC. Neither was Stalin anything like as efficient at murdering civilians as Hitler The Nazis get top billing in the monster sideshow because they were the Henry Fords of genocide, and they formulated a supervillain persona that would have made Satan's image consultant proud. Just shooting tons of people in the back of the head and throwing them in a big ditch starts to look quaint by comparison. So since Hitler wins the blue ribbon, we just blow off the runners-up. Stalin subverted the essentially benign ideology of equality among human beings to fulfill his perverted dementia. That ideology only says 'benign' on the label. Show me where it's ever worked like it's advertised. It only takes someone down the like who decides it's good to be king, and the whole thing turns inside out. The system can never work, it's counter to human nature. |
Crazyivanov | 10 Sep 2017 12:34 p.m. PST |
Ok, now that the required "The Nazis were Right Wing, no they weren't yes they were" argument has derailed yet another discussion about Genocide, I think maybe it is time to talk Holodomor. This grand national crime was disgusting and in many ways colors the relations between the Russians and the post-Soviet Republics to this day. That so much willful blindness was shown by the Western World at the time can only be seen as willingness to allow the "Soviet Experiment" to continue and a discomfort with questioning the direction of what was the "Socialist Moment" of the World. Politics can be disgustingly blinding at times. PS. To loops back to Nazis vs Communists, both are "Left Wing" movements. Nearly every new movement of the post war era was, Fascism was an attempt to develop a socialist governing philosophy along national rather than internal lines. Understood this way( correctly), Stalinism was simply Fascism with Russian Principles (to paraphrase Chi-Com Terminology). |
Cacique Caribe | 10 Sep 2017 2:16 p.m. PST |
CrazyIvanov: "both are "Left Wing" movements. Nearly every new movement of the post war era was, Fascism was an attempt to develop a socialist governing philosophy along national rather than internal lines." Well … maybe that explains the convoluted pedigrees that Western academia formulated for each ideology around mid-century, to try to artificially distance themselves* from their political cousins. :) They are trying to make two species out of the exact same tribe of monsters, simply because some of the monsters prefer slightly different tools. Dan * And maybe that explains why only one side is vilified while the other side is overlooked it's greater sins. PS. Perhaps these old Cold War magazines weren't so completely paranoid as I thought after all: link |
Gwydion | 10 Sep 2017 2:37 p.m. PST |
Nazis were not 'Left Wing' – this is a myth perpetuated by people who fall for a literal reading of National 'Socialist' Party. You might as well call the old GDR democratic – after all it was what it said on the tin wasn't it? Nazism was a right wing racist ideology with little thought for economics – hence the general mess they made of it – where they did 'think' about it it was a corporatist melange of private companies and a despotic right wing government. No 'Socialism' about it. As for 'greater sins' : link but frankly who is counting? Both appalling. |
Cacique Caribe | 10 Sep 2017 3:07 p.m. PST |
Gwydion: "Both appalling." I couldn't agree with you more! There was little control of media access during the fall of Nazi Germany, so that explains the massive number of photos and films documenting the atrocities found. Plus it helped Stalin to make Hitler the worst one, even if they were just as evil. It helped divert attention from his equally savage treatment of his fellow citizens, and for many more decades than Hitler too. A victorious monster (Stalin) wrote much of the history about the losing monster (Hitler). In many cases we took their version of events without questioning the evidence. So this case is indeed a perfect example of history written by the victor. Dan |
Khusrau | 16 Sep 2017 12:14 p.m. PST |
Sorry, moved to comment. I don;t know when this 'well the Nazis were socialists' trope came into popular mythology, but it is fairly recent. They are the absolute paragon of right wing values. Things like the German Motherhood medals, the close intertwining of the state with big business (the military-industrial complex), ultra-nationalism – 'my country right or wrong' could have been written by Goebbels, militaristic, imperialist, imprisoned and executed communists and socialists in death camps. Sounds a lot more Pinochet than Che to me.. |
Part time gamer | 17 Sep 2017 3:51 p.m. PST |
The Beast Rampant The Nazis get top billing in the monster sideshow because they were the Henry Fords of genocide,.. Im pretty certain Mr. Ford (as would any "human" being) be less than pleased w/ the comparison. I must say, it seems to be an all but perfect analogy. Im unaware of this type of political behavior taken to such a level that could be compared too those carried out by NAZI Germany. Certainly not organized to the point IMHO that perhaps they should be considered as: "Acts of Inhumanity transformed into an Industrialized Process of cruelty and murder." A horribly effective one. While neither 'advertised' their crimes, it appears Stalin's attitude was far more along the lines of: "Find anyone that is or could become 'a threat' to his plans. They would then be killed and buried. Quickly, quietly then "move on to the next issue". The "Katyn Forrest" in Poland could, IMHO be considered a perfect example of Stalin's version of Hitler's "Final Solution", for political and social opposition. |
Cacique Caribe | 18 Sep 2017 1:17 a.m. PST |
I started watching "Child 44" and, in view of all the horrors I read just a few days ago that the Soviets inflicted for many decades on their own citizens (not just the Holodomors), just for a second I thought I was watching a comedy of the Soviet Union instead of a serious crime investigation drama. link It's weird how Hollywood's love affair today with most things Soviet really contrasts with how much they despise modern capitalist Russia. Weird. Dan PS. The line in the movie "there is no crime in Paradise" could easily become a caption for a meme about the USSR as a whole. |