I Don't Know What You're Talking About...
If I am honest, I can count the amount of times I’ve spoken since this friendly debate started(Which is five sentences, with very carefully picked words) though I don’t think anyone’s noticed. I use ‘friendly’ very loosely because the two ponies I’m seated in between on this large stage are verbally going for each other’s throats.
To my right is Starstriker, the everypony’s golden colt, writer for The Canterlot Enquirer. If I had to find two good things to say about him, and trust me when I say that it took me at least a few days to find even that, it’s that…
One: He looks the part. Black coat. Blue mane. And a surprising amount of muscle bulk on his frame. At least for a unicorn. He’s handsome and has a smile that could turn the Frozen North into a massive lake. I can tell why his news columns are so popular. I bet his face moves units more than anything which would make sense considering the Enquirer is filled with some of the most ignorant horseapples I’ve ever read in my life.
Two: He knows his audience. Even as popular as he his, he writes the exact same drivel that every other hack at The Enquirer does yet he pieces it together in ways that, even I had to admit, make it entertaining while also remaining tactful so he doesn’t offend. Maybe he should do fiction books.
To my left is Prince Blueblood, who has been and still is rudely cutting off Starstriker every time he gets some steam going, with some argument only tangentially connected with the current subject.
I’m still wondering why he’s even here. When did this turn into some kind of high-class charity event? Then again in the short time since I met the prince, I quickly discovered he likes to hear himself talk...
...no matter how stupid he sounds, unfortunately. Probably here since the Princess owns the school.
Me? I’m the follower. The go-with-the-flow-er. I am the most inoffensive voice in all of Equestria. I play it more safe than even Starstriker and that’s saying a lot. My broadcasts are filtered. I avoid the buzzwords. I appeal to the one’s who can’t make up their minds up about me. I don’t stand on a soapbox, I avoid them. I am the voice of the evening news, The Setting Hour, on the radio.
As their background noise again get’s more heated, I look out into the crowd of young faces, trying not to flinch at the glare of the spotlights on us. I see the faces of the future staring back at me and the microphone on the table in front of me weighs down on my shoulders. Even now, this stupid pathetic excuse for a panel is being broadcast all over Equestria by radio. To think that not only the best and brightest of Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns have to slog through this mess but it’s now assaulting the ears of any who are listening on the air waves. To think that we, at least Starstriker and I, are allowing this nonsense to be shoveled anywhere but into a trashcan.
And do you know what’s worse? What really makes me weep for the future of Equestria? The students are drinking this stuff up. Quills are moving to take notes. Eyes are wide with awe. Smiles are on their faces. Functioning colts and fillies, almost independent mares and stallions, are taking this nonsense as gospel.
I pick up my glass of water and take a sip. As I do, my ears slowly tune back into the idiot fencing I’m currently sandwiched between.
“…-nd that’s why we should be supporting our local farmers with some kind of tax.”
Starstriker snorts. “We shouldn’t need to support them with government funds that could go to other things that are much more important.”
“Yet-”
“Since the question was given to me,” Starstriker stresses, he looks at the green stallion who had asked that question from the audience, “I think infrastructure takes precedence over agriculture. It can give ponies with talents in construction more work than simply repairing everything.”
It’s a good thing I clued in when I did because that’s when the moderator speaks to me. Note Taker, what do you think?”
I look at him. He’s all smiles and smugness. Probably thinks he caught me off guard. He almost did. In fact, Blueblood and Starstriker are also looking satisfied with themselves as their attention falls on me. Did I forget to mention I’m the only earth pony on stage?
I’m careful with my answer. “Well, I think that when you build a thing you cannot merely build that thing in isolation, but must repair the world around it, and within it, so that the larger world at that one place becomes more coherent, and more whole; and the thing which you make takes its place in the web of nature, as you make it.” I take a moment to enjoy the slightly bitter look from the moderator before I finish. “In short, they’re both right.”
“Okay.” The moderator says, before turning to the audience. “Next questio…”
He fades and goes pale in the exact same moment. Pretty amazing for a pony whiter than Blueblood. I see why pretty quickly.
Princess Celestia has just stepped up to the microphone. This is my first time seeing her so close and she is as every bit as beautiful as the pictures and paintings.
It’s now so quiet that you could hear a pin drop in the next county over. She smiles, her gaze scanning those of us on the stage before settling on me. My body warms up under those eyes, or maybe that’s just my imagination. “This is a question for you all,” she begins and her voice rings like a bell, “What makes Equestria the greatest country in the world?”
Okay, now it’s gotten quiet. Every single eye has gone from her to the stage. Starstriker speaks first and he’s sweating like a liar in court. “Opportunity.” I have to clench my jaw not to gag at how copy-paste safe that was. I almost really gag at the applause that follows it.
Blueblood looks so confident as he speaks. “Freedom and safety.”
Now every eye is on me again. “I have to agree with both of them, Freedom, opportunity, and safety.” The audience chuckles, there is only one pony who isn’t smiling. The Moderator. It’s clear he’s not happy.
I’m not just going to get the stink-eye from somepony and not call them out on it. “You don’t look satisfied.”
“All I’ve been hearing is you repeating what has already been said. I think everypony here deserves an actual answer from you.”
I’m not sure why I did what I did next. I think maybe that statement pushed me over the edge of verbal retardation I could take. I am done with the ego stroking condescending ponyfeathers. The ball is now in my court and I am playing for keeps.
“No. It’s not.” I state it clearly and it’s quiet enough in the room for everypony to hear. The audience gasps.
The Princess takes a step closer to the stage. “So you do mea-”
“Yes.” I cut Celestia off. Let me repeat this. I cut Princess Celestia off in the middle of her sentence and I’m not turned into a smudge on the floor. Though at this point I don’t even think I would have noticed if I had, I am just so ANGRY right now.
“You have about thirty minutes left of my time before I walk away to clear this...idiocy I’ve heard from my mind.” The audience and my fellow panelists gasp in unison. Again.
“So let me make myself clear to everypony gathered,” I turn to put the full weight of my glare on Starstriker. He withers rather quickly under it. “Opportunity? Are you joking? Cutiemarks are the most socially restrictive things second only to income. Have you ever met a pony with with a broom cutie mark that wanted to invent or one with a train cutie mark who wanted to get into politics? I have. They tried to get into the careers they want but the moment the pony in charge saw their mark they were sent away. Colts and fillies, so lovingly called ‘blank flanks’ have more opportunities than a full grown adult. So how about you wipe that look of minor devastation off your face, because it’s quite pathetic.”
When I look at Blueblood, he’s practically red in the face. Yeah, I probably won’t have a job by the time I get back home. “And you, you’re going to look into these student’s faces and say that we are so great for freedom? The Griffons have freedom, the Minotuar Tribes have freedom, the Buffalo have freedom. Of all the government systems in place around the world out of fifteen, twelve have the freedoms that we do and arguably even more than that. Oh, and safety? Don’t make me laugh. There is a supernatural disaster almost every six months. Nightmare Moon. Discord. Sombra. Tirek. Chrysalis. Who, in order, threatened eternal night, turn our world into his playground, enslaved and cursed an entire empire, nearly took everypony’s natural magic away, and took over Canterlot within hours. And let’s not forget about the creatures in the Everfree.”
I look the Princess right in the eye. I don’t know if she’s shocked or angry or ignoring me, and I don’t care. “So when you ask, your majesty, if Equestria is the greatest country in the world, I don’t know what the buck you’re talking about. Our only defense against these world ending horrors are five civilian, I say again, CIVILIAN mares and a newly crowned princess, none of whom are protected the way one should expect our only national defense should.”
I just recognize I’m pacing the stage now, microphone in hoof. I don’t know when I stood up and, again, nor do I care. “We’re last in Military spending which, considering the fact that the Changelings declared war on us, we need. We’re 5th in infrastructure, with only one reliable locomotive to our name. 7th in exports, and 10th in non-magical sciences.”
“We are only first in three things: Healthcare, education, and the longest standing political system in the world. We probably wouldn’t even be that if the Griffon kingdom’s massive economic decline hadn’t happened 50 years ago. Even the Zebra Savana’s have a railway system more efficient than ours.”
Finally, I sit back down and aim my most pointed glare at the moderator. “Enough for you?”
To Note Taker,
First, let me apologize for you're recent dismissal from Radio One, I was quite saddened to hear that my favorite News Anchor was off the air.Second, I thank you for you're honest words last week. I have asked that question to many different ponies, even to those in my own court who are aware of our issues, and I was never given an answer as plain as yours. Indeed you're statistics we're correct and criticisms valid, and I would have rather hear the truth from one of my ponies that to see it in a document. That means that not only are the citizens aware of the issues, it gives a more personal face and voice to them. That's why I invited you to speak at my school after all. Changes do need to be made for a better future, I am well aware and you're speech has made it so that these have come to light.
You have done a great service to this nation and I personally thank you.
From the office of Princess Celestia
P.S. I am commissioning a radio tower to be built in Canterlot. I could use an honest voice like yours to knock some sense into these nobles of mine. Would you be interested?