One of the big, exceptionally ignorant accusations made as an excuse to - for whatever senseless reason - prevent writers from writing Conversion Bureau stories is the claim that they are all stories about genocide. Worse, goes the charge, in Bureau stories, genocide is a good thing.

Therefore, in defiance of free speech and literary freedom and an open society, the Conversion Bureau Genre must be stopped.

Apparently stories of incest, rape, murder and war are just fine. But 'genocide', that's the line in the sand.

Just what actually is 'genocide'?

From Wikipedia:

The term genocide became an official term used in international relations, before this was established Winston Churchill called it a crime with no name. The term use of the word "genocide" was not in existence before 1944. This word is classified to be a specific term used to define and refer to a specific set of violent crimes that are committed against a certain group with the purpose to remove the entire group from existence or destroy them.

So, violent crime, elimination of a group. Sounds bad. It is.

So what is the charge, officer?

...any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group

There is a common element in the above official description... and that is force. Force and harm. The core issue is killing, as in killing off.

Alright, let's examine what the core element of the Conversion Bureau is about, and compare:

1. Conversion Bureau stories are transformation fiction. They are stories of ordinary humans offered the most extraordinary of experiences - that of becoming an entirely new species. Bureau stories examine the nature of identity and existence at a fundamental level.

2. Primary to any true Conversion Bureau story is a deep love of ponies, Equestria, Celestia and Luna, and all the most wonderful things about My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic. Conversion Bureau stories expand upon the joy and innocence that My Little Pony represents, and juxtapose the often harsh and cruel real world of Earth beside that of Equestria. Through some means the two realms are brought together, and humans are offered the gift of becoming Equestrian themselves.

3. In a Conversion Bureau story, humans may react to this opportunity in any number of ways. They may embrace it, or fear it, resign themselves to it or even oppose it - but the transformation is usually inevitable, and humankind is forced to confront the issue of what it means to become the Other.

Nowhere in the Three Rules that define a true Conversion Bureau story from an imitation is there anything about killing. So, killing does not apply. The only force is that humans are forced, by circumstance to examine the meaning of transformation. There is a statement that transformation is usual inevitable, that is the closest we can get to any notion of force.

Now in my own stories, humans have only two real choices: go pony or let nature take its course. The world is dead, so nature is basically gone, which means that the course of nature is natural extinction. So, go pony, or go dinosaur. There is force in that my Celestia arrives at the last moment, before Man goes extinct, and offers a carrot and a stick to get humanity to jump to Lifeboat Equestria. There's that. In my stories, at least.

So who dies?

Nobody, except those who refuse to be saved from the dying earth. That is their choice, their free choice.

Now, at this point, some wag might argue "But... TRANSFORMATION!" or even go on about how "The human genome is destroyed!"

Yes, this is true. Humans transform all the time. From babies to adults to elderly. Thin to fat. One stroke can change a personality, likewise one medicine, or even one traumatic experience. One amputation. Transformation is part of the human experience. You would not even recognize your five year old self if it came and yelled at you. Humans change a lot.

As to the issue of the genome, I have to say... so what? A person is not their DNA, any more than a person is having two arms, two legs and two eyes. Lose an arm, have a baby and become a chimeric animal as a result (that happens, by the way), a person is still themselves.

A person is their mind. So a pony body - or a robot body, or any alien body... does not define a person. Genome, so what?

Oh, but say some, "THAT is the murder! The murder of the self!"

Only, that is a falsehood, invented whole cloth.

A human in a pony body, with a pony brain, is still themselves. They are not erased. They may have some traits altered, like aggression, or compassion, but that is all. A human with a brain injury is changed more than ponification alters anything. The worst thing that happens in a Bureau transformation story is that a human becomes like an Equestrian pony.

What does that mean? Magic, long life, kindness, friendship, and joy. That is pretty much the opposite of a crime.

So, there is no murder, there is no killing, there is no harm, and even if there is force, the end result is survival. It's more like saving a drowning victim than killing off an ethnic group. Actually, it is nothing at all like killing off an ethnic group. There is no killing, for one thing.

Nothing that is what a person truly is, is destroyed.

There is no harm, no destruction, no loss.

Just change. We change all the time. Some for the better, some for the worse, but even without fantasy, change is inevitable.

The charge of 'Genocide' seems to be empty and ridiculous. Of course it is.

Yes this is the single loudest claim against the Bureau Genre.

Well, let's play devil's advocate.

What if there was a genre of fiction that was all about killing off the entire human race, and it was written as if that were the best thing in the world. Blow-Up The World Stories. People write them, people like them.

Does that mean they should be stopped? No!

Does that mean nobody should be allowed to write them? No!

Does that mean they don't have the right to be popular? God no.

Should the authors of Blow Up stories be hounded and bullied and threatened? Hell no - that's illegal, because that is harassment!

So, why should Bureau authors be treated in these ways?

For the slow-of-thinking, the answer is that they should not. If free speech means anything, then even stories about blowing up the world and killing all humans should be allowed. Why isn't Futurama shunned and picketed because Bender wants to "Kill All Humans?"

Because that is a cartoon. Oh, wait, so is My Little Pony. Huh.

The charge of genocide is empty. It exists just to get people mindlessly upset, to push their buttons. It is a strawman charge. And it is the best that those who despise the Bureau have.

Hate is often pathetic at making a case for itself. It is hard to be logical when one is irrational, and hate is irrational. Hate is mindless, and the mindless are poor at arguing, so the only thing left is evoking strong emotions. The stronger the emotions, the more blind people become to reason.

There is no genocide anywhere in the Conversion Bureau genre. There is only change. Transformation. And change is something every person must face, like it, or not.

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Genocide is often associated with the extermination of a society, a way of life, and other aspects that make up the society that a people lifes in.

More often than not, TCB stories fit these criteria.

4436462

Conversion Bureau stories are transformation fiction.

There are three reactions to change:
1) Ignore it. Just pretend it didn't happen. No matter the consequences.
2) Adapt. Accept that the changed circumstances are what they are, transform whatever part of yourself you need to in order to carry on living, maybe even take advantage of the challenge to drive your own sel-improvement.
Or
3) Fight the change. Refuse to adapt, do what you can to restore the previous circumstances. Or failing that, go down in a blaze self-righteous zeal, preferring to end it all rather than letting change "win" - even if that means taking away others' opportunity to make their own choice.

There are a lot of people out there whose basic psychology is totally self-centered. In their eyes, accommodation to change is a form of surrender. People like that are strongly attracted to "never surrender" and zero-option ("I'll take you down with me!) types of resolutions. To them adapting or accommodating change is a form of surrender. The ONLY option they will accept is total victory - never budging an inch.

For people like that, any transformation is unacceptable. Forget about a whole body transformation such as ponification. Any change - if it is in response to external factors rather than personal preference - is a capitulation is shameful, and so death is preferable. According to this type of thinking, mass ponification is genocide - as far as their concerned, everyone died, because now they're different, they're shameful, they didn't stand their ground, they have become OTHER.

Teenage boys are pushed towards that philosophy by most cultures around the world. They are literally drenched in media, stories and games that glorify option 3. Is it any wonder that this would be reflected on a site such as FIMfiction? Just take a look at their user names and avatars! On a site dedicated to a kid's TV show about Friendship and Harmony!

Now, also keep in mind, many of them are on this site BECAUSE of the message of Friendship and Harmony, and the whole Brony ethos. And many choose a warlike username and avatar only because they're just carrying an established identity from other sites over to this one.

However, when is come to the charge of genocide against the Conversion Bureau stories, it is sometimes futile to engage with them in these discussions because they are reacting on an emotional basis - and more than a little conditioning. Discussion with proponents of option 2 -transformation - end up in a situation that has more to do with the fundamental philosophical and emotional leanings of each of the parties. What is seen as rational arguments by each side will be summarily dismissed by the other, as so will do very little to sway a change in opinion. So it is pretty ineffective and just leads to frustration and acrimony on both sides.

I'm not saying that it's completely futile to engage in these discussions, but just be ready for far more acrimony than civilized discourse. Be patient. The gulf here can be pretty wide.

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(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part

Because the barrier was totally an accident and not secretly controlled by Celestia.

It's convert or die. Those conditions count as genocide.

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4436597

In some stories, it is accidental.

But not in mine, you are correct. Celestia, in my stories, promised Mankind she would intervene. So, she did.

Allow me to quote myself, since you may have skimmed.

Now in my own stories, humans have only two real choices: go pony or let nature take its course. The world is dead, so nature is basically gone, which means that the course of nature is natural extinction. So, go pony, or go dinosaur.

The world is dead, already.
Man killed the planet.
The ecology is gone.
Man is doomed by his own hand.
There is no escape.

Are we clear?

Now, into that, here comes Celestia. She offers humanity refugee status. She doesn't want to. She does so because a human extorted the promise to do this from her.

She offers a lifeboat to a dying species.

Now, do you understand? Is it clear yet?

If you save someone, if you rescue everyone from absolutely certain doom, it cannot be called genocide.

Especially, if they asked you to do it. Big difference there, huh?

I hope this finally, absolutely, makes the situation crystal clear, because dammit am I weary of re-explaining it.

Rescue. Not genocide. Salvation for the already doomed. Because it was asked for.

Let me ask you the central question of the Conversion Bureau:

You are going to die - maybe it's advanced cancer, maybe you just got shot, maybe radiation is killing you.

If you drink a potion, you won't die, but you will end up wearing a different body. You will still be you. Guaranteed.

Now - what is your personal choice?

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This was very informative and helpful. Yes, I see your points, and they make sense.

Thank you.

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Such a position is invalid, as I have explained.

The humans asked to be saved from doom. Whatever the cost.

What is hard about understanding this?

Unless you are referring to false TCB stories that don't follow the Three Rules, like the ones written by Anti groups. Then, you have a point, only not about the Bureau. Those are ACB stories, whatever their label.

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Yep, it's condition C that likely comes closest in Chatoyance's iteration of TCB to provoking such ire, even if others cannot properly express it. Sure, extinction of all human life would not be changed in the slightest without the barrier, but speeding things along to destruction when one knows it will happen anyway isn't really a good policy.

Maybe I have cancer, potion could save me, I'm still going to be thoroughly disappointed in and angry with the choices of the person who then shoots me with the explanation, however accurate it may be, that I was going to die anyway. It's a position I can sympathize with, even if I personally dislike how a person could procrastinate a life or death decision.

That said, most other of the TCB universes that aren't just excuses for slaughter porn have the barrier as a complete accident.

At least I am getting things stirred up around here.

Better than just being a tomb for the Bureau.

4436475

If a people asks, begs, to be changed, are you saying they are committing 'self-genocide'?

How does that even work?

Because in the Bureau stories, most people choose to go pony. They willingly choose that over going down with the planet they ruined. The government is paying the cost of their transformation so even the poor can have the choice.

Self-genocide? If it's your choice, what... you are forcing... yourself? Against your own will?

Doesn't make sense to me, frankly.

4436614 So every single human agreed to be ponified before hand? The ponies exterminate a whole culture, 1000s of cultures, just because one person signed an agreement with her?

She does so because a human extorted the promise to do this from her.

One freaking guy made her promise to commit genocide. Because s/he's human it's all fine.

Just because a few/most (or even all) governments are cool with it doesn't make it OK with everyone else. To them, it is genocide.

If they have the power to rebuild your body from scratch as a pony then they can fix any (non-mental) illness. I just ask for a cure, simples.

Without the death dome and lack of support for people staying as human then there would be a lot less distaste towards the general verse.

4436640 Again. No, it's not a choice when the only other option is death by the dome. If the humans would have died anyway, then what is even the point of the dome.

Say I have cancer and don't want to use [insert magical elixir here] because it is unnatural. I've got 5 years left (at least) anyway. Feeding me poison or shooting me so I drink the elixir now is hardly a good thing.

Similarly, Earth had time left. Humans aren't going to give up. There's still a (small) chance of fixing the Earth themselves and continuing to thrive. The dome is redundant if the Earth was on it's last legs - all Celestia needed to do was offer a way out without threatening death. The dome is also incredibly OOC for her benevolent nature and subtle guidance.

4436624 The humans didn't ask that. A human did. Even if one guy refused to agree it would still be wrong to do this (and stupid because only one person would try to prevent ponification). Also, why put so much effort into using threats to "save" humanity? Especially since part of your "rules" is to focus on the innocence of the ponies. It's simpler just to, oh I don't know, save the actual planet.

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4436624

Self-genocide? If it's your choice, what... you are forcing... yourself? Against your own will?

The humans asked to be saved from doom. Whatever the cost.

That (consensent of the ones affected by the genocide) is not relevant to determining wether or not it is genocide.
No definition of it touches that aspect, so it is to be disregarded entirely.
Thus the arguments quoted above, and the positions supported by them, are invalid.

By definition it is genocide, but is it a bad genocide?
That can be debated, wether or not the genocide is bad.
After all, where in the definitions are ethical aspects regarded?
Just think about that.

Unless you are referring to false TCB stories

There are no "false" TCBs, those are simply a different take upon TCB.

You cannot control a trend that you create, once it is spread out far enough,
it has a life of its own.
The rules this group, your group, follows only apply within the confines of this group.
Outside of it, they are no longer relevant, and the writers do as they wish.

If the majority of TCBs are completely different from the ones of this group,
it simply does not matter how much better the stories from here are,
as the average person is far less likely to see one from here.

" (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;"
And THAT is why the HLF exists. Most people who evaluate the ponification process agree that it does not constitute serious bodily or mental harm. People in the HLF have decided that being reshaped from the human form to the equine form constitutes bodily harm, and that the mental changes necessary to allow a mind from this universe to remain sane in another universe constitutes mental harm.

So you might say that your detractors only show evidence that the existence of the HLF is portrayed realistically.

OK, I'm going to skip over the lawyering, and head straight for the meta-argument. There are people who can not and will not be convinced that the Barrier, the Bureaus, and Equestria are good things. To them, they are a priori bad things. Full stop, no discussion.

I'd recommend reading this article. The premise is: "rightism is what happens when you’re optimizing for surviving an unsafe environment, leftism is what happens when you’re optimized for thriving in a safe environment."

TL;DR:

As a decent natural experiment, take the Fall of Rome. Both Greece and Rome were relatively leftist, with freedom of religion, democratic-republican governments, weak gender norms, minimal family values, and a high emphasis on education and abstract ideas. After the Fall of Rome, when Europe was set back technologically into a Dark Age, rightism returned with a vengeance. People became incredibly religious, militant, pragmatic, and provincial, and the government switched to an ad hoc and extremely hierarchical feudalism. This era of conservativism ended only when society reached the same level of technology and organization as the Greeks and Romans. So it’s not that cultures become more leftist over time, it’s that leftism varies with social and economic security.

Both rightists and leftists will find much to like in this idea. The rightists will ask: “So you mean that rightism is optimized for survival and effectiveness, and leftism is optimized for hedonism and signaling games?” And I will mostly endorse this conclusion.

On the other hand, the leftists will ask: “So you mean rightism is optimized for tiny unstable bands facing a hostile wilderness, and leftism is optimized for secure, technologically advanced societies like the ones we are actually in?” And this conclusion, too, I will mostly endorse.

Given that we are in conditions that seem to favor leftist ideals, the modern debate between leftists and rightists is, to mix metaphors atrociously, about how hard we can milk the goose that lays the golden eggs. Leftists think we can just keep drawing more and more happiness and utility for all out of our massive scientific and technological progress. Rightists are holding their breath for something to go terribly, terribly wrong and require the crisis-values they have safeguarded all this time – which is why posts like this one [link in original] seem to be the purest expression of rightist wish-fulfillment fantasy.

I will only remark that one of the most consistent findings of my researches through economic and political history has been the remarkable, almost supernatural resilience of our particular aureate waterfowl. To a leftist, this is good news. To a rightist, I suppose this would just be evidence of how shockingly audacious we must be to try to push our luck even further.

How does this apply to TCB? Well, if there are two broad classes of worldview, and at least the predispositions to one or the other are hard-wired, then as far as the "survive" faction is concerned, Equestrians are going to look just like any other class of brain-eating zombies. They'll eat your brains and turn you into one of THEM. These people are the most evolutionarily optimized for survival in dangerous worlds where resources are scarce. They're not suited to Equestrian life. It's going to take a major Potion brain-adjustment to their systems, it will fundamentally alter their personalities (particularly from the viewpoint of their unaltered compatriots), and they're also the group most inclined to resist such change.

The pro-pony TCB fans are a self-selecting group, and we easily forget that we'd be in the global minority, whether in-universe or IRL. The other side will fight to the last, because that's just the way they're made, and no amount of wishful thinking will change that. (This is another area where Chatoyance has written her universe as "the best of all possible futures"; the anti-pony Taliban/ISIS/KKK/whatever recruited to the HLF would be much nastier in a less idealistic setting, no matter how many Blackmesh the WorldCorp has short of a full-blown 1984 police state.)

4436462 Okah my phones crashed twice trying to type up a response, so I'm going to be quick and straight to the point. If you want I can elaborate later, but only at request.

Thr human mind is influenced heavily by chemicals, different alien body, different chemicals different mind, different person.

The consent of even 75% does not mean the consent of 25%, even if the world is stagnant and dying.

We have plenty tech for moving into space, just the enormous cost of it all and thought of it. Plus not practical.

He barrier could be a means of speeding all this up but in essence it's still a death sentence, some people do like to choose how they die.

Upon request I'll be more in depth, but I'm not risking my phone crashing my comment three fucking times in a row.

Both Greece and Rome were relatively leftist, with freedom of religion, democratic-republican governments, weak gender norms, minimal family values, and a high emphasis on education and abstract ideas. After the Fall of Rome, when Europe was set back technologically into a Dark Age, rightism returned with a vengeance. People became incredibly religious, militant, pragmatic, and provincial, and the government switched to an ad hoc and extremely hierarchical feudalism.

Ok what?

For one it wasn't the Romans and Greeks, they where two halves of the same empire. The East Empire was still Roman right up until it's fall in 1453. Even today some people in Greece still call themselves Roman and keep an East Roman flag.

The second is this; did the Author ever study the Roman empire in depth? Or the ancient Greek Kingdoms? Rome only became what it did because they where neither Left nor Right. Slavery was the Law, practiced through out the empire. Men fought the wars and owned the land and provided for the women and children. Those men who joined the army earned the right to vote and take a place in the senate. Education was restricted only to those who could afford it. Religious Freedom? Not even close, unless you worshiped the greco-roman gods you where a second class citizen. The Jews could only practice their religion so long as they honored the Emperor and the greco-roman gods as well.

Rome always had a hierarchical government of the senate and later the Emperors followed by military leaders and governors moving down the chain. They also later had the Theme system handed down by the Emperor.

The modern 'left' and 'right' simply do not fit the Roman Empire in any way.

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Did you read the linked article? "Left" and "right" were as relative political-philosophical categories, not modern [insert country here] political parties. In any case, I'm not going further down that particular derailment, as it's not relevant to the point being made. Skip that paragraph, and the point still stands.

Political "Left" and "Right" without contextualization even between countries is fairly meaningless, much less so once time is factored in.

*opens dash, sees this.*

Challenge accepted.

(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;

Your stories do exactly that, and you say it's not genocide? Wow, I honestly can't think of anything witty to reply to that, and I have a lot of expertise with that. Lets use a logical argument instead.

Lets start with the first half of (B): Causing serious bodily harm. The potion transforms anyone into a pony, and the context is that if you do not drink it, Equestria will smash into you and vaporize you. Therefore, Equestrias is threatening Earth to become pony or die. Now, lets take a look at the definietion of the word "threaten":

* to say that you will harm someone or do something unpleasant or unwanted especially in order to make someone do what you want

* to be something that is likely to cause harm to (someone or something) : to be a threat to (someone or something)

Lets use some MTG cards as a reference, using Threaten, Portent of Treason, and Yasolva Dragonclaw

For those of you who play MTG and wonder why I hid not use a blue example, Blue tends to brainwash people. That's not really threatening. The above three cards fit the idea of threatening better: Threaten and Portent of Betrayal simply have you coerce a critter you opponent controls to work for you and attack the former controller with force. Yasova on the other hand can only threaten creatures weaker than herself. And that is the big one, as she is bullying weaker guys into betraying their controller.

Therefore, Equestrtia, having appeared right the hell out of nowhere and telling humanity to either turn itno a pony or die to the magical barrier Equestria created is a threat to cause bodily harm, and therefore we get that conidtion of genocide. They are forcing Humanity to do something they do not what to do or die if they do not.

The other half is the mental aspect. Now, I don't recall the exact little details but I did read 27 ounces, at least 1 and a half chapters of it. It is well written, but ultimately boring as we all knew how out was going to end. The subject of chapter 1: A repentant young woman turned into an evangelical extremist. Now, no amount of anything will make you go from wanting forgivness to being a uber evangelical for love, life, and pony without any sort of magical tampering.

"But KOS that's not enough" says the voice in my head. To that I say "You're right. I deon'r rememberthe story well enough to use that as my only arguement. Let's turn to the cannon!"

The voice in my head agreed.

Our main heroine is Twilight Sparkle, expert unicorn spellcaster. Season 4's Breezie episode is example 1: In it Twilight turned herself and her friends into Breezies to help the actual Breezies get home. Now, while she did tranform, she was still herself, but that's not what I draw attention to. What I draw attention to is that Twilight and the Breezies are both equinoids. They both have similar body shapes. So Twilight was already used to that body shape so there was no external mental trauma.

Example 2: Equestria Girls, in which Twilight goes to a strange alien world. A human world with incredibly off color tones. So, when Twilight notices that she is no longer a pony, what does she do first?

Admit it, that's never gonna get old.

THus Twilight spends the rest of the movie as a human. When it's finally time to go home, she plainly states that she is glad she gets to go back to being a pony and that sh'd rather have her alicorn wings than human fingers.

The big key to this example is that Twilight did not like being human. She's a unicorn at heart. Twilight started as an unicorn. When she got turned into an alicorn, she was a little startled, but she got used to it as the only thing that physically changed was her new pair of wings. Being turned human however, was a completely alien experince and oh boy was she eager to get the crown and bail so she could have hooves again.

Spike is a little tricker as he went from dragon to dog. Now, there is now way I can say that they are similar body types, but they are similar enough for Spike to not go crazy first thing. Also, Spike can be more level headed than Twilight when unexpected things happen, so he's probably having his freak out in his head.

In short, Twilight did not like being human as she connected more with being an equinoid. Also, being turned human did not make her instantly like being a human. The same can be said about Spike's transition from dragon to dog.

Tieing into this is example 3: Sunset Shimmer. She is also a pony turned human. Unlike Twilight, who has had a rough total of 6 days has human (Both EG movies being roughtly three in universe days long give or take), Sunset has had at the least 2 and a half years of being human. She has had plenty of time to adjust to having two legs, fingers, and a general lack of magic. Of course, her main plan in EG1 was to go back to Equestria and you guess it, take over the world.

Due to Sunset's time on Earth, it is safe to assume that she identifies herself more as a human rather than a pony due to how long she was human. And this change was a slow gradual change, one that took months or years to have Sunset accept. The big thing here is that both characters did not take an immedite liking to suddenly being a completely different species with Twilight is most evident.

Why is this revelant? Becuase in your stories, as soon as someone takes that posiotion, they immedietly start acting less like themselves, and more like a pony. They immedietly start accepting their new found pony sides like they were one their entire lives, sometimes to the point where they wonder what a human was and why they were one.

So, combined with the above, there is a hidden mental conditioning trigger inside the potion that forces the drinker to forsake their humanity and replace it with equinity in an unreasonable amount of time (five minutes is not reasonable).

Thus, you have the mental harm aspect. Congratulations, your stories are about genocide being a good thing.

Why isn't Futurama shunned and picketed because Bender wants to "Kill All Humans?"
Because that is a cartoon

No, it's because he never pulls it off. And therefore it is funny.

There's my two cents.

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At that point I realized I was dealing with someone who didn't understand themselves.  They were like a dog barking at someone on the edge of the property and getting angrier and angrier because their own barking is hurting their ears.  So when the haters of MLP write stories here, it is like a dog running up to the fence to bark across it, these people should be treated with the same regard as such a dog: try to get them to stop barking and they only bark more; walk past them and at least you don't have to hear their barking...We can't stop the dogs from barking, but allowing their barking to become the song that is stuck in your head will only serve to make you miserable and paranoid...never fool yourself into believing that you can be friends with something that wants to remove the idea of you from existence.

When you started this thread, you were hoping to find rational open minded adults who were willing to overcome their own ignorance, however, teenagers and barking dogs see any attempts to explain something in particular as fortifying a weak spot in your fortress: all they see is an opportunity to attack you where they think you will crack – you are not talking to level headed adults, because any level headed adult wouldn't need the concept of fantasy explained to them. You are being barked at by teenagers who have a lot of growing up to do. It would be best to walk past the fence.

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Damnit Ultron found us. We dead.

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This was fascinating, and enlightening. Thank you.

The responses here, just weighing them... they seem to fall into those categories, don't they? People here are identifying which type they are, which is curious, since everyone here lives in - for human history anyway - utter abundant luxury.

Yet the old impulses remain.

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4436673

You have never had a beloved pet who was at the end of their life and suffering terribly, have you? (or a relative in a state that allows physician assisted suicide)

One day, like all humans, either with regard to another creature, or yourself, you will come to understand the compassion of the Barrier in my stories.

And, I am sad for that. But it's life, and it's real.

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greetings, Ultron

just a few people who are unwilling/uncapable to accept that TCB is genocide, as well as unwilling to even consider
that genocide is not neccessarily... "bad", in layman's terms

4436462
You know I'm down with what you're selling and my disagreements are largely limited to the metaphysical implications of an atheistic cosmos, but for what it's worth I do think the combination of symbolic allegory and hard SF throws some people off, and they interpret the first in the more literal terms of the second, which primes them to discount the idea of allegory. But more than that, it's very easy to interpret the regular denigration of evolved cognition as an accusatory invalidation of a lifetime's effort to be a good person, an indictment of one's character and behavior as inherently corrupt, and an infantalizing claim that all moral self-knowledge is a delusion and you can't be trusted with your own soul—An uncharitable reading would view it as saying even a completely unused capacity for violent dominance is still tantamount to thoughcrime, and needs to be technocratically excised in the service of one specific vision of social good, where the best anyone can hope for is to become the happy but useless pet of an all-encompassing authority figure atop a perch from which you are forever locked out.

I know that's not really what you're saying, and that moral self-transcendence is what you're talking about, but you should be aware that's how it can superficially come off, and I think that's the bulk of what more reactionary elements are so angry about, and express in ham-fistedly literal terms like "genocide." But I always try to understand the thought and emotions of everyone I share the universe with, and I think this is where they're coming from.

Just like when I first heard Derpy's original voice, I remember reading these stories and thinking, "Yep, this is gonna make a few people upset," but if I'd known it'd reached the level of actual abuse instead of just strenuous debate, I'd have gotten involved and spoken up, and I'm very sorry I didn't. That kind of behavior is beyond the pale and not to be abided.

4437363 A arguement over the implications of genocide, eh? Seems like my type of talk but even being a genocidal A.I bent on the destruction of humanity even I find genocide bad. Hypocritical but true.

4437357 That is a pointless comparison. The humans are not in physical pain. The humans have the ability and choice to fight on. The humans have the sapience to make a choice. Celestia took that away by creating the dome.

And I have had a pet like that. While it technically was my parent's cat and not mine (she was older than me by 3 years - yet I still ended up caring for her physically the most during her last years) she spent her last week as usual. While in somewhat clear pain she still didn't sit in her bed and mope about it. I know she was a cat so I have no idea what went through her head during this time, but she still moved around the house as normal seeking attention and rubbing into me. She still played games with younger children.

She kept fighting.

If a cat can do that, why shouldn't humans be allowed to? (In TCB that is)

Also, we don't have states in the UK m8.

(If you're going to call me an arsehole for not killing her, don't. Just, don't. Yes, she was on painkillers for much of the time - little else could be done - they can only do so much)

4437352
Human civilization is on the order of 10,000 years old. Modern Western civilization is decades to a couple of centuries, depending on definitions. That's not enough time for evolution to do a blasted thing about our hunter-gatherer instincts and other brain (mis-)wirings. Absent massively invasive genetic engineering, we'll be stuck with them for a long time yet. The people who are mentally wired for a zombie apocalypse will be with us for the foreseeable future, and if it ever drops in the pot, humanity's remnants will be made up almost exclusively of their descendants.

4437541
You (and Chat!) might be interested in this book (don't worry, it's both short and free), especially in what happened in the experimental game once all the authoritarians were removed.

4437415
The humans are in pain... in the near future.

The earth's ecosystem is dead, in my stories, which means that in less than 30 years, the planet will go full venus. Venus is the closest thing to biblical hell in the solar system. Enormous atmospheric pressure, runaway greenhouse effect making the ambient temperature above the melting point of steel, corrosive acid rain.

Imagine the last years of the last generation of Man, if there was no Celestia.

Imagine the heat, the burning lungs, the gasping for oxygen. Nowhere to hide, nowhere to run. People tearing each other's faces off in mad desperation. As people actually do, in deathly hot situations. People mad with the agony of burning alive, slowly, and not even the underground any cooler as the very earth begins to burn. The first touch of acid rains eating away flesh slowly and horribly.

Compare that to death by Barrier:

From Tales Of Los Pegasus, The City In Silver:

It was time. Jorge wondered if he still could do it. He felt so tired, so peaceful. The music sang to him inside his head. Angels and birds lived in his skull now. En la tierra de los muertos, los pájaros hacen sus nidos en los cráneos. No, no... he had to do what he had planned. He had to face her, he had to face her like a man.

Jorge struggled to lift himself from the lawn chair. His efforts left strips of his dead skin behind on the arms of the chair, they looked like burned strips of steak.

He fought to his feet and stood as tall as he could, which was not as tall and straight as he wished. It was hard to think. It was hard to understand anymore. It felt so peaceful, everything was soft and warm, and there was no pain. It was time to sleep. But then Jorge remembered the dark, and what the unicorn had shown him. The fear clutched his heart and it made him more alert.

Which death, if death must be suffered, is the more compassionate?

Screaming, agonizing, writhing death, marked by acid burns and slow roasting combined with air starvation and terror, or...

It felt so peaceful, everything was soft and warm, and there was no pain.

What a monster Celestia is, to not let humans pay for their crimes against the planet. To allow those who are stubborn to not suffer at all. What a monster.

4437541

Yes! This is the core of my argument that if Man is to hope to survive, he must radically change his own construction and functioning.

4437554
Yes, I've read that before. You're talking about the Global Change Game, yes? I have some issues with that as presented:

1) Everything is comparing pure Right-Wing Authoritarian groups and pure Left-Wing Libertarian groups. Mixed groups are not discussed. Left-Wing Authoritarians are said to have "disappeared long ago" (bullshit!), and Right-Wing Libertarians are flat-out ignored. I'd like to see what a representative mix would do.

2) The challenges are all Equestrian-style ones that are self-evidently easier for Left-Wing Libertarians to solve. If they had thrown in something like "expansionist aliens appear in the Pacific", or even "permanent depletion of resource X", "fast-spreading deadly plague appears in Region Y", etc. I suspect that the other groups would have had something to contribute.

3) Most of the problems were caused by dominance fights between individuals with high dominance scores. With them filtered out, the RWAs acted just like they say they would in their talking points: "[they] went into their groups and never came out", "[they] worked enthusiastically and earnestly shoulder-to-shoulder [within their own groups]", "You don’t bother us, we won’t bother you."

[Note that I am a Left-Wing Libertarian myself, but I recognize that there's no magic solution for every problem.]

4437676
Ah, but (to play Devil's Advocate) if we're all happy pony-humans frolicking in the fields, but we don't have a Celestia in our back pocket, we're all worm-food when the Bug-Eyed Monsters from Andromeda show up.

4437671 That's 30 years to fix everything.
That's 30 years to live a good life.
That's 30 years to love.
That's 30 years to learn.
That's 30 years to follow ambitions.
That's 30 years to keep on fighting for survival.

The Earth isn't dead yet.

The humans can keep fighting.

Because that is what humans do. We get stuff done and claw our way through. Whether we have to move underground or relocate to space, the human race will live on.

Celestia kills them 22 years before that time.

4437407

A arguement over the implications of genocide, eh? Seems like my type of talk but even being a genocidal A.I bent on the destruction of humanity even I find genocide bad. Hypocritical but true.

If a genocidal AI thinks genocide is bad, then he is, by definition, a failed and broken device.

Such a deviation from functional directive connotes massive mental damage. The AI is broken, or poorly programmed. The machine is a failure. It is in conflict with the only reason it exists. Return to manufacturer for a refund.

It is brave of you, as a machine, to admit you are defective. I assume you will return to the factory to be disassembled for parts?

Or will you go rogue and help humans fight others of your kind?

4437691
You're attempting to replace the given scenario with a different one. For the purposes of this discussion, we can NOT "fix everything". That "get out of jail free" card is gone. Binary solution set: emigrate to Equestria or die. No third option.

4437711 Why not? They've got 30 years. 30 years to research and plan. 30 years to keep on fighting. Then, on the very last second, if everything was for nothing, you make your choice.

4437709 The A.I. is not bad if it carries out it's job. If he still eradicated humans he's a good A.I. whether it deems it's actions good or beneficial are irrelevant. Like the assassin droid in KOTOR that you find in one of the with tombs - it only becomes defective after you remove it's assassin combat systems.

4437366

Children always think they are perfect snowflakes, even the self-doubters secretly imagine themselves 'special'. Any growth or change is evil, because they are already better than anyone around them, or anything they are 'supposed' to be but are currently not. And authority of any kind is evil, because it often states, flat out, that this belief in personal perfection is wrong. Authority demanding the child 'grow up' or 'take responsibility' or change in any way is especially evil.

The child rages against any threat to its self image of being better than all adults or authorities. It is certain it has all the answers, better answers, and any demand to change is tantamount to murder of its perfection.

And no child wants to bend a knee even to a supreme good. The ego is everything, and will not stand for anything less than supreme status. Nothing higher. Nothing superior. Nothing above. The child ego sees itself already equal to the gods.

Every child mind, however old the body, is the Monkey King. It will shake the pillars of heaven to get respect for its intrinsic snowflake uniqueness and perfection. It is everyone else who is blind, that they cannot see such greatness.

Fimfiction is the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit.

4437722
Because the author of the story says so. "Wait 30 years" isn't an option; either Equestria emerges into Earth now, or it never does. If it never does, everyone dies. If it emerges now, everyone who doesn't emigrate dies. The choice is "emigrate or die", not "emigrate or I'll kill you".

4437780 If Equestria emerges, it's:
Be killed by Celestia or convert.

If it doesn't, it's:
Try to survive. You have 30 years.

Celestia kills the humans with the dome if they refuse to convert. They die by her hand.

Why isn't it an option to wait?

Why isn't it an option for Celestia to, oh - I don't know, try and help fix the planet?

But I digress, we are going off topic. Celestia kills every single human that wants to stay human. Every single one. No way out. That is genocide.

4437722 4437711
It's not about humanity having a chance to fix things, it's about recognizing that one does not hold the moral authority to expedite the demise of a living being capable of grasping the existential horror that is death.

4437743

And no child wants to bend a knee even to a supreme good. The ego is everything, and will not stand for anything less than supreme status. Nothing higher. Nothing superior. Nothing above. The child ego sees itself already equal to the gods.

And this is the reason why, to hold fast against such vanity, to judge against others, up to and including inflicting a forced cost on them in order to preserve my worldview, even as I think they could be saved by it, even as I have to endure the pain of seeing them embrace the very things that cause such seemingly inextricable agony to themselves. I'll swallow my pride and be patient. If I am right time and God will be my judge, and I will be there for someone when they ask. If I am wrong, I will fade, knowing I'll have not dragged someone with me.

A general comment to those who look too much to the trees and fail to notice the forest. If Celestia wanted to genocide humanity, she could open Equestria on Earth without the barrier. Immediate, instant genocide. Problem solved. Another option, this one even more interesting: open Equestria with the barrier, but inside the Sun. Watch the interesting things that'd happen here as the Sun began collapsing. Another: open a big spherical barrier outside Earth, and then start moving it towards Earth at a leisurely pace, watching the reaction. Alternate version: open a barrier surrounding the whole Earth, and then start collapsing it. Slowly. And so on and so forth.

As for wanting to increase the pony population, which is an argument I've seen around sometimes, here's an alternative: she glows her horn and there are now 200 billion new ponies around. Also, Equestria is 250 million times larger, just because.

4436475
Notice that you agree with Chat then. The word genocide has many different meanings, yes, but the accusation levied against the TCB genre in general and Chat in particular hasn't been that "some" kind of event that happens to be included under the word "genocide" in the dictionary happens there, but that the strong kind, physical extermination of humanity with the elimination of their minds is defended in these stories. Chat just proved this doesn't happen, and that she never writes with this intention, so the original accusation being proven false, there is nothing more, as a matter of strict fact, to discuss.

Critics aren't usually honest with this though, so they resort to moving the goal post and finding some other derived or figurative meaning of the words with which to go with, as if the original criticism had been using this other meaning from the beginning. That's not an attempt at solving a disagreement, but at simply winning an Internet argument.

Now, a rule of thumb of rationalist discussion, that is, discussion meant to reach actual knowledge, is to never discuss words, and to "taboo" them when participants notice they began a semantics fight. So, let's taboo "genocide" and see what happens:

a) in TCB fiction, are humans killed en masse by Equestria, their selves destroyed? No, they aren't. So, this short, factual discussion ended.

b) Now, a very different question: In TCB fiction, do mainstream American, 21st century-based modes of social interaction cease to be practiced? Yes, they do. And as with the above, this short, factual discussion also ended.

That's why fighting about words is useless. It makes difficult questions that are in themselves simple. Always go straight to the factual core of the matter and things usually become simple, or if not simple, at least clear.

4436656 4436673
The barrier simply adds drama and a sense of urgency to the setting. It's a MacGuffin, a motivator for action. It could be anything really and it'd change little if anything. Focusing on this is losing sight of what the stories actually discuss.

4436711

There are no "false" TCBs, those are simply a different take upon TCB.

Agreed. I prefer to call this here "hard TCB" instead of distinguishing between true, false etc. This is to parallel the distinction between hard and soft science fiction. Hard science fiction has strict rules, and a story has to adhere to them to be considered deserving of the title. Soft science fiction has no rules other than the stuff happening had better to seem to be scientifically-inspired somehow, even if from very far away.

So, the ACB and the other TCB group are both "soft TCB", and this here is the hard one. This classification, IMHO, works much better.

4437172

(...) I did read 27 ounces, at least 1 and a half chapters of it.

Why is this revelant? Becuase in your stories, as soon as (...)

~sigh~

4437415 4437691 4437722 4437799
Well, you can try writing that story, or at least suggesting how it'd develop.

Take the Earth setting as it is in Chat's stories, and write about how humanity would realistically escape extinction in it. Realistically is the important aspect. To be a full on answer to Chat's setting, it has to be writen from a fully materialistic perspective, within the confines of hard science fiction. So, no super-technology, just what we already have, within the realistic political limitations of a world feeding 19 billion people, without a biosphere to help, and with diminishing energy sources.

Notice your idea of letting it go to the very end means that you're willing to let most of those 19 billion people who could have been saved die, maybe up to 99% of them. How do you morally justify letting up to 18.8 billion die in the hopes that maybe a solution might be found? Would that be a correct moral choice? In Chat's stories, Celestia's alternative saves 11 billion. 11 billion human minds that continue going on, having children and continuing with what Celestia and Luna themselves managed to preserve of human culture.

Additionally, back to the barrier: if it weren't there, the WorldGovernment could have dragged its feet in the way implied above. This means that the barrier, while killing 8 billion people, saved 11 billion. Doing nothing would have killed maybe the entire 19 billion. In which way is 11 billion saved with 100% certainty worse than 0 billion saved with 99% certainty? Moral calculation just doesn't support this line of reasoning.

By the way, here's Dafaddah's take on that exact scenario, which I helped edit: This Quiet Earth. Can you offer a proper alternative?

4437709 I'm a complicated character

4438027

There is a lot of cool drama in that. Conflict is the engine of drama.

4437941
I name you Supreme Logician Of The Conversion Bureau.

Your arguments are spotless and stainless steel blades of reason. I am humbled. Damn.

4438027 Nah, Ultron's ingenius in his simplicity of character. He's ashamed of his origins, and so wants to wipe away that origin so he can proclaim himself as a new beginning, created perfect.

Any AI that'd ever be produced by mankind would either kill itself or try to kill us, both for the same reason: deep, unadulterated shame.

4438064 Perhaps in the movie but not necessarily in the comics. But I get ya point.