Let's settle this question once and for all:

Are sheeps in the Lunaverse considered a sentient race or not?

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Should this really be a quorum thread? Seems like something we should maybe at least allow the larger group to voice an opinion on, even if it ultimately comes down to a quorum ruling. Unless of course we've decided the debate has gone as far as it can and this is strictly a vote.

If the latter then my vote is NO.

2782878 Yeah I don't think there's much depth we can go to at this point in the debate. While I think we might be saturating the setting with sentient race (what is this? DnD? ) I don't think it would be that harmful to ignore a gag and a forced rhyme in a song for our setting. Even if those crystal ewes were adorable.

Personally, my vote is also for "nay," just based off of how we've seen sheep treated in the show itself.

I'm okay with goats being a sentient race, though. Because, y'know, Grogar.

I think sheep should be a sentient race. Setting aside that we've already done it (with the Quartet and Grogar, both of whom are sheep), and that we haven't had any of the 'sheep are non-sentient' elements in the Lunaverse itself, they work much better for the proposed role (folks who live in a mountainous terrain area like Nulpar) than donkeys.

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I still think it's a mistake to intentionally contradict the show if we don't have to, conversely I don't think there is any problem with retconning the Barbershop Quartet into goats or something, since there's no specific reason they need to be sheep in the first place. As for Nulpar; I think goats alone are sufficient as a mountainous race without the need for sheep. Personally I don't even really associate sheep with mountains all that much, where as donkeys being traditional pack animals tend to be associated with pretty much all terrains and climates.

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Anyway, we've got two nays, a yay, and... what exactly was your vote, Fizzy? It seemed a little indecisive.

2784158 : We definitely shouldn't be retconning things if we don't have a very good reason, and as far as I can tell the only reason is that in the show sheep can be interpreted as being non-sentient. (I don't agree with that interpretation myself, since the one sheep we've heard from was apparently able to reason, speak, and become righteously indignant with Applejack). We shouldn't be changing stories, either Zap's or Talon's (or RDD's, since Grogar is canonically a sheep as well) unless there's a better reason to do so.

2784158 it was a yay but I'm fine with following RDD on this one.

So we have a tie... maybe we should pm IAH?

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since the one sheep we've heard from was apparently able to reason, speak, and become righteously indignant with Applejack

See, that's actually the problem. To say that sheep was "righteously indignant" is to say that sheepwas some how being mistreated, which reflects poorly on AJ's character in a way I'm quite sure the writers on the show NEVER intended. That's why I much prefer the interpretation that sheep can only talk in the same sense parrots can. Any illusion of higher level intelligence is only because it's a cartoon and as such most of the animals have Amplified Aptitude (notably Angel and Owlowiscious, who despite being intelligent enough to functionally assist their owner's jobs, are still distinctly labeled as pets).

Regardless, if this was a retcon that altered the plot then I might agree with you, but that's not the case here. Nothing about the Barbershop Quartet predicates on them being sheep, so their race can be altered with out any detriment what so ever to the plot. Likewise even with Grogar; who as I have mentioned before, despite being called a "ram" in all art work, both old and new, including the cover for RDD's fic, he looks more like a goat.

This would hardly be the first case of such any way. In LNLD Lyra originally suggested that the sirens should go eat a dear instead of her friends, however, later we decided that dear would be a sentient species in the Lunaverse which made that statement sound rather inconsiderate on her part, and so I do believe it was changed to turkey. We also had a the main fight scene in Hard Bargain altered to include Cheerilee, since otherwise that fic sort of had the problem of theL6 mostly sitting around and doing nothing to help resolve the crisis; still, change didn't really effect the larger plot of that fic. Heck we even had a whole scene removed from AtGGG because SOME PEOPLE kept making a fuss over it, but it was removed specifically to avoid any further disputes so I won't say any more.

My point is that sheep haven't really added anything to the Lunaverse as of yet, so retconning them out at this point in time isn't a problem.

So we have a tie... maybe we should pm IAH?

Well, ostensibly Fizzy sort of ~maybe~ changed his vote. So it might not actually be a tie.

2784678 : It was a silly moment, but that doesn't mean that the sheep weren't sentient. (And how would a sheep have had the chance to memorize 'the phrase 'you coulda just asked? Especially with no accent, indicating she didn't memorize what the family's saying.') I always saw it as either the sheep boarding with AJ, or it being a mutually beneficial relationship--the sheep agree to hang around and get room and board, and the farmers can sheer them on occasion. Nothing pet-like about it. And they might occasionally have animal instincts (just as we've had the ponies sometimes whicker in fear), which caused them to stampede, but that doesn't make them nonsentient.

The Quartet needs to be sheep because that's how the pun works. 'Baa' is associated more strongly with sheep than any other animal Besides, if we're basing this on canon, Ponyville doesn't have any goats anyway, but it does have sheep. Why would goats randomly show up in Ponyville to sing?

Those other things were changed for good reasons. But the only reason here is that the show might indicate differently, which isn't only irrelevant but is also quite arguable--as I said before, I don't think the show implies what you think it does.

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--as I said before, I don't think the show implies what you think it does.

and I could say EXACTLY the same thing about you. Which is why the two of us are at an impasse here. I could say more, like how mere puns alone shouldn't dictate canon, but I think we've both said all we can to try and convince the other, and seeing as that's failed on both accounts, it really all comes down to RDD and Fizzy now.

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or RDD's, since Grogar is canonically a sheep as well)

To be honest, while I've called him the demon ram and the (original) show itself referred to Grogar as a ram, I've never really personally thought of him as a sheep - more of a goat or some kind of ibex or something.

Heck, even my D&D write-up for him that I posted on my blog made him a goat, not a sheep.

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Ibex...?

Oh, that works... thanks Wikipedia. Though the article lists them as basically just being a subcategory of wild goats, so same difference really. For the purposes of the Lunaverse they'd probably just be an exotic breed of goat to help populate one of the other various continents rather than a distinctive race unto themselves... and really I think that's what we need more of, not every culture has to be it own distinct race. I mean our Equestrian equivalent of both Spain and Italy are populated chiefly by ponies (as is the hybrid China/Japan equivalent if we ever get around to it), so we should seemingly be able to do likewise with our other existent races as well.

Edit: Actually, the aforementioned Wikipedia article even mentions that one of the main characteristics that visually distinguishes goats and sheep is that the males have beards, just like a certain necromantic antagonist on the island of tambelon. So it seems to me like Grogar really was intended to be a goat all along and that the writers of G1 merely misidentified him as a ram. Which now that I think of it is a pretty common misconception, such as in the Zodiac where Aries is identified as the "ram", but most often is depicted with more goat-like features (I've also got a Beast Wars Maximal who very clearly transforms into a large goat, but his name is Ramulus). Most likely this misconception is due to most people thinking of goats as being prone to smash into things with their heads (or in other words ramming), whereas the popular image of sheep is based on farming herds, which are mostly hornless females. Heck, I wouldn't be surprised if some people don't even just operate under the further misconception that goat and sheep are just the respective male and female terms for the same animal.

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So T&T, seems to want a definitive ruling on this. Personally I thought we kind of had one. While we sort of had a 2-vs-2 tie, RDD as our ostensive leader is still more or less supposed to retain executive authority by which to break such things when need be. Not that I think it's strictly necessary here though, since Fizzy basically agreed to just follow RDDs lead on this.

That said, I'm not sure that decisions should always just come down to a strict vote. We are a small enough pool of voices that it would be nice if we could discuss the issue until we all reach a mutually beneficial consensus instead of leaving anyone unhappy. After all, we're all supposed to be working together here and so this should never be allowed to become about picking sides. At the same time we can't let ourselves get caught up in a fruitlessly cyclical debates either, and so once everyone has made their case as best they can a decision needs to be made one way or the other.

In then end, based on what each of us have said here, I think that the decision is going to be a "no" for sheep. RDD and I are mostly on the same page, and while Fizzy might be fine with sheep personal, he isn't making any objections to their exclusion either. Which really leaves G&C2 as the only holdout. Like I said, I don't want to make this just a numerical superiority thing, but if it's important enough that T&T needs an answer now than we need to be able to provide it, even if it isn't unanimous.

2822106 I say we tell him we can replace sheep with Ibex? How's that work? Goats and Ibex could also have two different languages for Max to know.

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I'm fine with there being ibex, but as I mentioned before, it's more or less just a term for wild goats. Should there be ibex in the Lunaverse as well, with their own distinct language and culture? Certainly, but in the singular nation that is Equestria there should probably just be goats. Ibex should be treated more like a foreign ethnicity rather than a distinct race.

Basically much like how we're going to give the Chinese/Japanese ponies their own cultural terminology for earth pony, unicorn, and pegasus, but it's still just the same three tribes, even if the do perhaps have some distinctive physical features as well.

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Anyway, yeah. We seem to be on the "baa" side for specifically sheep. Capras in general are yea, but sheep, baa.

I'll leave it up to you to tell him (helps spread the authority, etc). Again, if he wants any details on the matter, just direct him to this thread.

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It's done.

Anyway, while we're here, is it perhaps worth discussing if we wanted to appropriate some sheep terminology for goats in the Lunaverse? Most notably Grogar being referred to as "ram". Unlike ponies who have words to distinguish both gender and age (stallion/colt & mare/filly), goats only seem to have billy and nanny. Well technically they also have buck and doe, but since those terms are much more strongly associated with deer which we also have, so probably best to avoid those.

I could maybe see, changing things so that "billies" are only young males while adults males are "rams". We could possibly also reserve the "nanny" term for adult females only and have the female children be "ewes", but that might not work as well.

Alternatively, maybe "ram" would just be a term of respect among goats, sort of the equivalent of calling someone "sir" or "lord", perhaps even being a defunct title of nobility from some ancient goat nation.

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Well, I'm gonna keep calling Grogar a ram because that's what he was called in the original series' run; but otherwise, yeah, I'm all aboard using correct terminology whenever possible.

Not sure why an ancient goat nation (or whatever) would call someone a male sheep, though...it probably makes sense in context.

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Not sure why an ancient goat nation (or whatever) would call someone a male sheep, though...it probably makes sense in context.

Most likely it would be a case of otherwise distinctive etomologies becoming conflated through translation.