Anno Equestria: A Brief History of the Pony Nation

by Insert Pen Name

Old Hatreds*

Anno Equestria
A Brief History of the Pony Nation
A FiM fic by (Insert Pen Name)

Old Hatreds
AE5-72

Equestria has always been a land under siege. Throughout our history we have repelled Griffons, Changelings, and even the odd supernatural. But in the early years, the first critical threat Equestria faced came not from without, but from within.

As much as we value the ideals of harmony today, it would be naive to imagine that an entire national identity could be forged overnight solely from the personal epiphanies of a handful of ponies, however influential. Convincing the three races to abandon their tribal identities and to coexist after centuries of mutual distrust proved a challenging goal indeed. Ironically, the early success of the Equestrian nation made the problem only more difficult; the shared hardships of the the Exodus and the years that followed had been a grim equalizer among the disparate races, but as life eventually returned to normal and the races resumed their traditional symbiotic roles, tribal tensions reemerged, and the Equestrian dream was threatened almost as soon as it had begun.

Granted, in rural areas, where mixed-race communities were small and closely knit by necessity, racial conflict bordered on non-existent. In larger urban communities however, there was much less need for individual cooperation between the races, and the tribal mindset endured. Nowhere were tensions more pronounced than in the new capital of Canterlot. While the values of harmony and cosmopolitanism were much-espoused among the intellectual and ruling classes, the lower-class inhabitants of the city were another matter entirely. Ghettoisation was the norm, as groups of earth-ponies, unicorns, and pegasi alike laid claim to entire districts while forcing out all others. Tribal gangs thrived, race riots were frequent (though usually minor), and by AE50, it was clear to all but the most optimistic observer that a crisis was imminent.

The final straw came in the year AE67, in an event known as the Silverbirch Riots. According to official records, a mob of unicorns descended one night on the home of an earth-stallion named Silver Birch. Birch was an artisan of some local renown, and was recently engaged (with blessings) to the daughter of a prominent unicorn merchant. Such a union would have been radical by any standard of the day, but to the more tribal-minded unicorns, the notion of one of their own being wedded to a mere “mud-pony” was blasphemous to say the very least. Before the local guards could intervene, Birch and his two brothers had been murdered in the street, and his family home despoiled. The rioters were quickly rounded up and imprisoned, but the damage was done. The very next day, mobs of earth-ponies retaliated against the unicorn districts, leading to open violence in the streets. The fighting soon spread across the city, as earth-ponies, unicorns, and pegasi alike joined the fray over one grievance or another. Fires soon broke out in the besieged districts, but the riots continued unabated, and in many cases only intensified. Fire-brigades struggled to contain the blazes amid the fighting, and by the time the city guard was able to restore some semblance of order, much of Canterlot lay in ashes.

The aftermath of the Silverbirch Riots triggered a backlash of anti-racist sentiment in Canterlot. The original murderers of the Birch brothers were swiftly sentenced to life imprisonment, and large numbers of provocateurs were arrested in the days immediately following the riots. Most radical of all were the “Unity Measures” introduced by Parliament under the Second Triumvirate*. Guards were sent in to forcibly disperse the ghettoes, and their inhabitants were deported to other areas of the city to form deliberately mixed communities. Initial resistance to these measures was fierce, but most chose to cooperate, having already lost their homes in any event. In addition, the Triumvirate directly oversaw the rebuilding of Canterlot’s damaged districts, using mixed-racial labour crews to foster (or force) further cooperation between the disparate tribes. The government’s anti-racist doctrines soon spread to the main populace; those who still clung to their old hatreds faced near-ostrocision at the hooves of their more enlightened neighbours. The new movement even took on a spiritual element, as the city's clerics began to deliver tremendous public sermons, in which they extolled the virtues of harmony while practically demonizing the dangers of racism and tribal sentiment among the pony races. The message was clear; old hatreds would not be tolerated in the new Pony nation.

Eventually, life in Canterlot gradually settled back into peace and stability, and in AE72, Parliament promulgated the Unity Act, which formally outlawed any and all forms of cultural and social discrimination between the three pony races in Equestria**.

*Second Triumvirate (AE42-74): Smart Cookie, Lady Shimmerbeam, General Zephyr

**A common, spurious, misconception is that cloud cities such as Cloudsdale are in direct violation of the Unity Act because they are, by their very nature, uninhabitable to non-pegasi. This is not the case. Every pony in Equestria has the right to live and work in a cloud city, regardless of whether or not they are actually able to do so. It’s the principle that counts.

Comments

[djthomp]

It’s the principle that counts.

[BenRG]

1419975
Magic is a great leveller; unicorns powerful enough to perform the Cloudwalker Spell are known to visit Cloudsdale (Lyra was there to witness Rainbow Dash's second Rainboom) and they occasionally take Earth Ponies with them.

[Manual Control]

Hmm... I think your a fan of ZombieZephyr on youtube... But I could be wrong...

[CCC]

It’s the principle that counts.

Coming from a country which has laws similar to the Unity Act, I can say that a situation where people of other races can in theory live and work in one area but in practice are unable to is exactly what the more racist mind wants. For example, a nightclub that reserves the right to deny entry to anyone at which the bouncers just happen to deny entry to people of certain skin colours by what they will insist under oath is mere coincidence...