Light & Dark discourses - Information
Jul. 2nd, 2004 01:22 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sparkindarknessAs previously said, this is mainly my way of world building the faerie courts in the Light & Dark world. I still can't nail down each court and sum it up in a nice paragraph. Or a page. Or a book. But I can, or rather, Ilatheril and Sitharensor can, present the court's arguments on various issues. Hopefully when they've done a few of these I'll be able to navigate the courts without a nasty surprise biting me.
Anyway, this is the first of a two parter - their views on Information (which bleeds in a little to their views on freedom, but that will be covered later or broadly through most of the discourses). This will be paired later with the discourse on Justice.
The television buzzed like a trapped fly in one corner of the room. The modern technology seemed lost and alone in the archaic surroundings. A spill of the mundane among fantastic grandeur. Not for the first time, Sitharensor wondered at the worth of such things. Were a human’s senses so dulled that what was on the screen had a semblance of life for them? Did they not see how glaringly inadequate it was compared to even the most indifferent theatre? Or even a book or the radio - at least these mediums make no pretence that they can bring reality into the room, and instead manage to weave a sweet tapestry of life with evocative words alone - carrying more information in each sentence than passes every hour through these blaring pictures. Still, it found some appeal with his husband. Allowances had to be made. At least until he could find someone to adequate gild the wretched contrivance.
At present the mortal news was running past. On the whole, Sitharensor approved of this application, at least it had some semblance of practical use. At least with those news programmes that actually provided information rather than those which seemed to be a continuation of the pathetic attempt of sensationalist entertainment. He wondered idly whether humans actually believed such obviously contrived reporting.
“Looks like that paedophile is up for trial.” Ilatheril called the Seelie’s attention to the subject on the glowing screen. “They’re going to do a full report on it. Should be interesting.”
Sitharensor snorted, allowing his disapproval to ride openly on his face. It was taking time, but he was learning to lower his political mask when he and Ilatheril were in private. “A man’s life and a family’s suffering is paraded around the country for an audience’s perverse amusement. I like it not.”
“Hey! This is news, this is important. People need to know about these things.” Ilatheril flared, an edge on his voice. Sitharensor regarded him curiously before answering.
“Know what things? Who he is? Why? So they can practice a nationwide ritual of hate? Which, I might add, is an interesting interpretation on the quaint mortal concept of innocent until proven guilty. Who the family of the lost children are? Why? So they can intrude on their grief? So they can offer empty condolences and meaningless sympathy during a time of intensely personal suffering. To highlight the problems of crime in the country? Why? To increase the people’s already rampant paranoia to the point where they can all gather wailing out why something isn’t being done? No, this is not knowledge people need to know. This is what they want to know.”
“They have a right to know.” The edge in Ilatheril’s hardened, becoming flat and unyielding.
“Why? What right do they have to indulge their voyeuristic urge for some associated excitement at hearing of another’s suffering? What is this right that is so compelling that it overrules a family’s grief and a man’s right to justice?”
“Information should be free. Information must be known, it must be available. That is pre-eminent, above all. People need to know!” Ilatheril’s voice held a deep echo of a growl. A tiny part of the involuntary rumbling of an angered Sidhe. Sitharensor raised his eyebrows in surprise.
“What needs to be free? Information isn’t a thing. It has neither form nor life nor spirit. It is not a creature that pines in captivity. I ask again - why do they need to know? Why is gossip more important than justice and pain?”
“Because it is the foundations on which all freedom is built! No-one, fae or mortal, can ever claim to be truly free unless they are informed. Show me knowledge withheld and I will show you a people enslaved! Look at mortal politics. How does a king rule? By divine right, by being blessed by god, by a stagnant order that keeps any information reaching the masses. By refusing to allow the masses to know just how powerful they are, just how vulnerable their leaders are. On a bed of ignorance he raises up his throne, with chains of censorship he binds his people!”
“Even the Seelie know that monarchies have...”
Ilatheril cut in, his growl easily cutting over the Seelie’s protestations. “Ended? Fallen out of fashion? Then look at that most modern and lauded societies - the democracy. The politician peddles lies and half truths every day of his career. No information passes from his fingers unless it has been doctored, manipulated, bent, twisted and tortured until the truth screams out within a form that barely even resembles what it once was. The leader rules by right of his people, but the people know nothing but what the leader deems is fit for their ears - and their ears hear how wonderful he is, what great things he’s achieved. Lies build upon lies, censorship piles on the free voices and the politician wields them both to cement his power. It is the will of the people that controls the government. But it is the power of information that controls the people’s will.” He gave Sitharensor a withering look. “And if that information is not free, then neither is the will. If the will is not will, we have slavery.”
Sitharensor inclined his head, slowly. “This is important to you.” It was a statement, not a question.
“It is freedom.” Ilatheril looked at the Seelie. Whatever he looked for, he didn’t see it. “I don’t know how you cannot see it. It’s freedom! That should say all that I have to say about how important it is! It’s freedom.”
“Yes, I see that it is freedom. I do not dispute it, but nor do I hold it as pre-eminent.” Ilatheril gave the Seelie a shocked look, but Sitharensor raised a hand to forestall comment. “There are things more important even than freedom. That family’s pain and suffering is more important than the freedom others may garner from intruding on it. That man’s right to justice is more important than the people’s freedom to hear the charges levelled against him. Freedom is important, but it is not all there is to life.”
“It is the foundation on which all true life should be based. Without freedom, we are not even alive, not truly. We are puppets, playthings. Toys.”
“Then grieve, Unseelie, for nothing lives. Nothing is free. Because wise minds recognise that freedom is a pleasant concept but an unwise obsession. True freedom is built on knowledge, but wise minds know that no-one can know everything.”
“But everyone should be free to know what they want and need. If the information is suppressed or not available, then people are not free to obtain it. They are not free to be free.” His voice was actually grieved, as if speaking of a terrible act more akin to a tragic crime than lack of information.
“No. There are some things that cannot be known. A person has a right to keep their life private, a right not to have every minor dishonour dragged out and exposed to his shame. A right not to be judged for his every action - a right to be their own judge of their honour and standing, not be subjected to the informal court of public opinion for every perceived smirch on his good name.”
Ilatheril snorted. “You would prefer the illusion of honour to actual knowledge that a person is good and trustworthy.”
Sitharensor’s face hardened, his mask coming up without a conscious thought. “If I needed to know everyone’s actions in order to trust someone then I am showing no trust at all, and compounding my unfounded suspicion with implications that the subject has no honour. No, people deserve better than to have their private lives lifted for anyone to scrutinise. There is the freedom of which you prate, Ilatheril - the freedom to live your life without fear of your peers disapproval.”
Ilatheril choked in outrage. “That is not freedom, Seelie! Let people disapprove - those who are free care not for the disapproval of anyone - peers or otherwise. The need for privacy is a myth created by those to afraid too grasp true freedom. They do not allow shame and the condemning tongue to stay their actions - even if that is only to keep their actions behind closed doors like some hidden guilty secret. the free know no guilt or shame.”
Sitharensor narrowed his eyes, a slight shine reaching the purple irises another sure sine of an angered Sidhe. “And surely, in accepting this, you accept that people are not free to be private?”
Ilatheril hissed, words squeezing between his teeth. “Yes. Because if they are not willing to accept full freedom, they have no right to impede the freedom of those who do. They have the freedom to be as private as they are capable of being, but should not accept society and the free populace to aid them in their secrecy.”
Sitharensor paused. Several seconds passed as Ilatheril regained his composure and Sitharensor gathered his thoughts. “I hear your words, but neither agree with them nor truly understand them. You hold freedom as this grand jewel. I can accept this, but cannot place it above the other jewels that exist - the jewels of life and justice, of honour and happiness. I see the light of freedom, but it does not blind me to the other lights that shine just as brightly.” Ilatheril snorted contemptuously. His face making it clear just what he thought of these other jewels. “Nor does it make me forget the metal that holds them together. The gold of practicality, without which all the jewels are less.”
“And what is this gold that you would layer over the jewel of freedom and dim it’s shine?”
“You would have everyone able to know everything. But there are some things that cannot be known, not merely those that violate other’s lives and destroy futures.” He paused to sharpen his glarer at the Unseelie. Ilatheril didn’t flinch, but his low rumbling growl rose to the edge of mortal hearing. “Some knowledge is simply too dangerous to know, too easily abused by people...”
Ilatheril rode over the speech. “An easy excuse, and an old one. It’s not better now than when it was first raised. The common people are not good enough to know this, they aren’t wise enough, sensible enough enlightened enough. And as long as we keep them ignorant they never will be. The mortals used it to deny vast groups of people the vote - women, people who didn't have a certain skin tone, and even freedom. They used it to justify colonisation and enslavement. That some people weren’t enlightened enough to rule, that they weren’t capable of managing themselves or knowing important facts. Spare me the elitist ‘you’re not ready speech’ it was poor when it was first made and it hasn’t aged well.”
Sitharensor let him finish, but barely had the echoes died before he replied, his eyes boring like drills. “A leader must keep some things secret. A leader cannot rule under constant scrutiny of his every thought and action. The people must trust him at least a little to do what must be done. they must trust to his honour that he will make the right choices, for if he must explain and debate every choice he must make, he will never make any.”
“This is the ‘you’re not ready’ speech all over again. That people aren’t capable of knowing things, of ruling themselves, so they have to be managed. The common people don’t know enough...”
Sitharensor raised his voice over the Unseelie’s growl, resisting his own urge. “They don’t know enough! Even with the freedom to gain what facts they may - look at the humans! How many people believe that watching a programme like this,” the Seelie gestured impatiently at the news programme still playing in front of them, “makes them informed? How many never do a thing but watch these programmes, sometimes not more than once a week? And you wish to hand out vital secrets to these ignorant fools, hand them the tools with which to hinder and unbalance decisions about which they know virtually nothing?”
“Yes! Because without access to that information, they can never be more than ignorant masses. Without those secrets available, they can never choose their own fate. They will ever be slaves to the whims of those who say ‘trust us, it’s too important for us to tell you, but we’ll make the right decisions.’ They will never be free! You see it all the time, rulers using the cloak of ‘importance’ and ‘ignorance’ to hold their people subservient. Among the humans and the fae!”
“Nay, the fae...”
“Are a perfect example!” Ilatheril cut in, the growl riding higher in his impassioned tones. “Why do the Sidhe rule? Why do we control? Ignorance! Because the other fae think we are gods, because they do not know what powers we hold, because they think we are the wisest, the cleverest, that we have never made a mistake and have never lead them wrong. They believe in the lie of our perfection, and we hold back every piece of information that may dispel that myth and thus they are enslaved to our will! And thus even those who wish to be more than mere ignorant masses have no recourse with which to do so!”
“And rightly so! The Sidhe have better things to do than to placate every wailing Goblin and whining Nocker. How could we rule if we must answer ever Boggun’s question and every Sprite’s query? How could we reign without the Trolls’ trust and the Dryad’s obedience? We rule them because we are capable of ruling them - because we have the power, the honour, the magic and the knowledge to rule them.”
“Lord and Lady, Sitharensor, we are not gods!”
“No,” Sitharensor answered with leaden finality. “We are not gods. But we are the closest thing this world has to manifest deities. We are the best there is, poor though we may be at times. And with the obstacles freedom of information would throw at us we would only be poorer.”
Ilatheril shook his head. “You underestimate the other fae. And the value of freedom.”
“And you overestimate the basic nature of people - both human and faerie. And degrade the other brilliant gems we have in the world.”
There was a long silence, broken only by the music that marked the closing credits of the news. Without a word Ilatheril flipped the channel to show a group of young humans torturing some horrendous sounds out of alleged musical instruments. Sitharensor was quick to voice his protest as the Unseelie’s finger found the volume button. Before long, both were locked in an epic, but amicable debate, on the merits of the music in comparison to tortured members of the animal kingdom.
Anyway, this is the first of a two parter - their views on Information (which bleeds in a little to their views on freedom, but that will be covered later or broadly through most of the discourses). This will be paired later with the discourse on Justice.
The television buzzed like a trapped fly in one corner of the room. The modern technology seemed lost and alone in the archaic surroundings. A spill of the mundane among fantastic grandeur. Not for the first time, Sitharensor wondered at the worth of such things. Were a human’s senses so dulled that what was on the screen had a semblance of life for them? Did they not see how glaringly inadequate it was compared to even the most indifferent theatre? Or even a book or the radio - at least these mediums make no pretence that they can bring reality into the room, and instead manage to weave a sweet tapestry of life with evocative words alone - carrying more information in each sentence than passes every hour through these blaring pictures. Still, it found some appeal with his husband. Allowances had to be made. At least until he could find someone to adequate gild the wretched contrivance.
At present the mortal news was running past. On the whole, Sitharensor approved of this application, at least it had some semblance of practical use. At least with those news programmes that actually provided information rather than those which seemed to be a continuation of the pathetic attempt of sensationalist entertainment. He wondered idly whether humans actually believed such obviously contrived reporting.
“Looks like that paedophile is up for trial.” Ilatheril called the Seelie’s attention to the subject on the glowing screen. “They’re going to do a full report on it. Should be interesting.”
Sitharensor snorted, allowing his disapproval to ride openly on his face. It was taking time, but he was learning to lower his political mask when he and Ilatheril were in private. “A man’s life and a family’s suffering is paraded around the country for an audience’s perverse amusement. I like it not.”
“Hey! This is news, this is important. People need to know about these things.” Ilatheril flared, an edge on his voice. Sitharensor regarded him curiously before answering.
“Know what things? Who he is? Why? So they can practice a nationwide ritual of hate? Which, I might add, is an interesting interpretation on the quaint mortal concept of innocent until proven guilty. Who the family of the lost children are? Why? So they can intrude on their grief? So they can offer empty condolences and meaningless sympathy during a time of intensely personal suffering. To highlight the problems of crime in the country? Why? To increase the people’s already rampant paranoia to the point where they can all gather wailing out why something isn’t being done? No, this is not knowledge people need to know. This is what they want to know.”
“They have a right to know.” The edge in Ilatheril’s hardened, becoming flat and unyielding.
“Why? What right do they have to indulge their voyeuristic urge for some associated excitement at hearing of another’s suffering? What is this right that is so compelling that it overrules a family’s grief and a man’s right to justice?”
“Information should be free. Information must be known, it must be available. That is pre-eminent, above all. People need to know!” Ilatheril’s voice held a deep echo of a growl. A tiny part of the involuntary rumbling of an angered Sidhe. Sitharensor raised his eyebrows in surprise.
“What needs to be free? Information isn’t a thing. It has neither form nor life nor spirit. It is not a creature that pines in captivity. I ask again - why do they need to know? Why is gossip more important than justice and pain?”
“Because it is the foundations on which all freedom is built! No-one, fae or mortal, can ever claim to be truly free unless they are informed. Show me knowledge withheld and I will show you a people enslaved! Look at mortal politics. How does a king rule? By divine right, by being blessed by god, by a stagnant order that keeps any information reaching the masses. By refusing to allow the masses to know just how powerful they are, just how vulnerable their leaders are. On a bed of ignorance he raises up his throne, with chains of censorship he binds his people!”
“Even the Seelie know that monarchies have...”
Ilatheril cut in, his growl easily cutting over the Seelie’s protestations. “Ended? Fallen out of fashion? Then look at that most modern and lauded societies - the democracy. The politician peddles lies and half truths every day of his career. No information passes from his fingers unless it has been doctored, manipulated, bent, twisted and tortured until the truth screams out within a form that barely even resembles what it once was. The leader rules by right of his people, but the people know nothing but what the leader deems is fit for their ears - and their ears hear how wonderful he is, what great things he’s achieved. Lies build upon lies, censorship piles on the free voices and the politician wields them both to cement his power. It is the will of the people that controls the government. But it is the power of information that controls the people’s will.” He gave Sitharensor a withering look. “And if that information is not free, then neither is the will. If the will is not will, we have slavery.”
Sitharensor inclined his head, slowly. “This is important to you.” It was a statement, not a question.
“It is freedom.” Ilatheril looked at the Seelie. Whatever he looked for, he didn’t see it. “I don’t know how you cannot see it. It’s freedom! That should say all that I have to say about how important it is! It’s freedom.”
“Yes, I see that it is freedom. I do not dispute it, but nor do I hold it as pre-eminent.” Ilatheril gave the Seelie a shocked look, but Sitharensor raised a hand to forestall comment. “There are things more important even than freedom. That family’s pain and suffering is more important than the freedom others may garner from intruding on it. That man’s right to justice is more important than the people’s freedom to hear the charges levelled against him. Freedom is important, but it is not all there is to life.”
“It is the foundation on which all true life should be based. Without freedom, we are not even alive, not truly. We are puppets, playthings. Toys.”
“Then grieve, Unseelie, for nothing lives. Nothing is free. Because wise minds recognise that freedom is a pleasant concept but an unwise obsession. True freedom is built on knowledge, but wise minds know that no-one can know everything.”
“But everyone should be free to know what they want and need. If the information is suppressed or not available, then people are not free to obtain it. They are not free to be free.” His voice was actually grieved, as if speaking of a terrible act more akin to a tragic crime than lack of information.
“No. There are some things that cannot be known. A person has a right to keep their life private, a right not to have every minor dishonour dragged out and exposed to his shame. A right not to be judged for his every action - a right to be their own judge of their honour and standing, not be subjected to the informal court of public opinion for every perceived smirch on his good name.”
Ilatheril snorted. “You would prefer the illusion of honour to actual knowledge that a person is good and trustworthy.”
Sitharensor’s face hardened, his mask coming up without a conscious thought. “If I needed to know everyone’s actions in order to trust someone then I am showing no trust at all, and compounding my unfounded suspicion with implications that the subject has no honour. No, people deserve better than to have their private lives lifted for anyone to scrutinise. There is the freedom of which you prate, Ilatheril - the freedom to live your life without fear of your peers disapproval.”
Ilatheril choked in outrage. “That is not freedom, Seelie! Let people disapprove - those who are free care not for the disapproval of anyone - peers or otherwise. The need for privacy is a myth created by those to afraid too grasp true freedom. They do not allow shame and the condemning tongue to stay their actions - even if that is only to keep their actions behind closed doors like some hidden guilty secret. the free know no guilt or shame.”
Sitharensor narrowed his eyes, a slight shine reaching the purple irises another sure sine of an angered Sidhe. “And surely, in accepting this, you accept that people are not free to be private?”
Ilatheril hissed, words squeezing between his teeth. “Yes. Because if they are not willing to accept full freedom, they have no right to impede the freedom of those who do. They have the freedom to be as private as they are capable of being, but should not accept society and the free populace to aid them in their secrecy.”
Sitharensor paused. Several seconds passed as Ilatheril regained his composure and Sitharensor gathered his thoughts. “I hear your words, but neither agree with them nor truly understand them. You hold freedom as this grand jewel. I can accept this, but cannot place it above the other jewels that exist - the jewels of life and justice, of honour and happiness. I see the light of freedom, but it does not blind me to the other lights that shine just as brightly.” Ilatheril snorted contemptuously. His face making it clear just what he thought of these other jewels. “Nor does it make me forget the metal that holds them together. The gold of practicality, without which all the jewels are less.”
“And what is this gold that you would layer over the jewel of freedom and dim it’s shine?”
“You would have everyone able to know everything. But there are some things that cannot be known, not merely those that violate other’s lives and destroy futures.” He paused to sharpen his glarer at the Unseelie. Ilatheril didn’t flinch, but his low rumbling growl rose to the edge of mortal hearing. “Some knowledge is simply too dangerous to know, too easily abused by people...”
Ilatheril rode over the speech. “An easy excuse, and an old one. It’s not better now than when it was first raised. The common people are not good enough to know this, they aren’t wise enough, sensible enough enlightened enough. And as long as we keep them ignorant they never will be. The mortals used it to deny vast groups of people the vote - women, people who didn't have a certain skin tone, and even freedom. They used it to justify colonisation and enslavement. That some people weren’t enlightened enough to rule, that they weren’t capable of managing themselves or knowing important facts. Spare me the elitist ‘you’re not ready speech’ it was poor when it was first made and it hasn’t aged well.”
Sitharensor let him finish, but barely had the echoes died before he replied, his eyes boring like drills. “A leader must keep some things secret. A leader cannot rule under constant scrutiny of his every thought and action. The people must trust him at least a little to do what must be done. they must trust to his honour that he will make the right choices, for if he must explain and debate every choice he must make, he will never make any.”
“This is the ‘you’re not ready’ speech all over again. That people aren’t capable of knowing things, of ruling themselves, so they have to be managed. The common people don’t know enough...”
Sitharensor raised his voice over the Unseelie’s growl, resisting his own urge. “They don’t know enough! Even with the freedom to gain what facts they may - look at the humans! How many people believe that watching a programme like this,” the Seelie gestured impatiently at the news programme still playing in front of them, “makes them informed? How many never do a thing but watch these programmes, sometimes not more than once a week? And you wish to hand out vital secrets to these ignorant fools, hand them the tools with which to hinder and unbalance decisions about which they know virtually nothing?”
“Yes! Because without access to that information, they can never be more than ignorant masses. Without those secrets available, they can never choose their own fate. They will ever be slaves to the whims of those who say ‘trust us, it’s too important for us to tell you, but we’ll make the right decisions.’ They will never be free! You see it all the time, rulers using the cloak of ‘importance’ and ‘ignorance’ to hold their people subservient. Among the humans and the fae!”
“Nay, the fae...”
“Are a perfect example!” Ilatheril cut in, the growl riding higher in his impassioned tones. “Why do the Sidhe rule? Why do we control? Ignorance! Because the other fae think we are gods, because they do not know what powers we hold, because they think we are the wisest, the cleverest, that we have never made a mistake and have never lead them wrong. They believe in the lie of our perfection, and we hold back every piece of information that may dispel that myth and thus they are enslaved to our will! And thus even those who wish to be more than mere ignorant masses have no recourse with which to do so!”
“And rightly so! The Sidhe have better things to do than to placate every wailing Goblin and whining Nocker. How could we rule if we must answer ever Boggun’s question and every Sprite’s query? How could we reign without the Trolls’ trust and the Dryad’s obedience? We rule them because we are capable of ruling them - because we have the power, the honour, the magic and the knowledge to rule them.”
“Lord and Lady, Sitharensor, we are not gods!”
“No,” Sitharensor answered with leaden finality. “We are not gods. But we are the closest thing this world has to manifest deities. We are the best there is, poor though we may be at times. And with the obstacles freedom of information would throw at us we would only be poorer.”
Ilatheril shook his head. “You underestimate the other fae. And the value of freedom.”
“And you overestimate the basic nature of people - both human and faerie. And degrade the other brilliant gems we have in the world.”
There was a long silence, broken only by the music that marked the closing credits of the news. Without a word Ilatheril flipped the channel to show a group of young humans torturing some horrendous sounds out of alleged musical instruments. Sitharensor was quick to voice his protest as the Unseelie’s finger found the volume button. Before long, both were locked in an epic, but amicable debate, on the merits of the music in comparison to tortured members of the animal kingdom.