06/13/22 – Yeah, Kinda Evil

Spacetrawler, audio version For the blind or visually impaired, June 13, 2022.

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It does seem a bit rash, but having been zapped unconscious and finding yourself awoken to having been brainwashed to take care of alien puppies… can cause some to feel unsettled by the situation.

19 Comments

  1. Coyoty

    I think the Stribs aren’t evil, just brain-damaged. Their brains probably have immature prefrontal cortexes, or the equivalent. They look like puppies, indicating they developed neoteny in their race, along with immaturity, possibly as an effect of trying to stop aging.

    1. Paul

      Oh no. The big eyes and small bodies … they’re space chihuahuas. Overly selected for appearance for generations until they become neurotic and psychotic.

      I can’t believe I didn’t see it before.

    2. Erhannis

      Of course, then you get into the question “what does it mean to be evil?” “They’re just doing evil things because that’s how their brains are” – well, that’s why people do things at all. What would the difference be between somebody like that and somebody who was “truly evil”?

      1. Prior Semblance

        I guess the difference is whether or not stopping them is for justice or for safety. It’s the difference between killing a serial killer vs putting down a dangerous bear.

        Also if it is a neurological issue then maybe you can convince them to fix the issue (rather than force the fix on them like what happened to tesfay)

  2. The Saprophyte

    Meanwhile as you’re discussing the matter, the old guy has already crossed the room. Don’t bother chasing after him or anything though. I’m sure he’s just wasting time hunting for a burlap sack.

  3. TB

    Interesting how an old guy threatening to deliberately murder Stribs is appalling, but a coyote who killed off an entire ship full by accident is hilarious.

    The borders of humor are a strange and mysterious place.

    1. Thorfinn

      Well, the old guy wants to murder the puppies who haven’t done anything (except produce a lot of poop), while the ones Ruddock accidentially killed were adults who had clearly shown what jerks they were. Indeed, with some of those it was really self-defence (or might have been if Ruddock had had any idea what he was doing).

  4. rws

    Still suspect that these are a small group of criminals, a cult. A real planetary species would be much more numerous, plus I can’t see them having a stable culture with sociopaths like these. Escaped inmates from an asylum.

  5. Night-Gaunt

    With evil, which is doing things without a natural need aka intelligence over nature only intelligent beings can perform evil and carnivores kill and eat their prey. Now the demarcation between intelligent decisions and instinct decisions to kill all offspring of the deposed king might get squiffy in discerning which is which. Dominance of the winner’s DNA has no known conscious components of lions. Nature has essentially worked it out in a logical fashion regardless of killing innocent cubs. Though no cognition was made to arrive at that decision.

    Now that seems like some deity made such a decision regarding “created life” in this scenario. Which fools them constantly. Appearance only while it is a reductive process in evolution of animals and plants trial and error till the trial is successful.

    Strib behavior we see from both ends, the mature adults and the babies. The ones in charge are callow youth before they reach physical maturity. Just like humans until they are trained or reach final maturity with a fully developed Frontal Lobe they are dangerous to everyone.

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