shitposting rave 5: discount rejects from every genre

Mmhm. Superior firepower I'll give him-- he did have a mind for strategy, just look how big the Cybertronian Empire got before the Senate took over-- but divine intervention? Blessings from a shiny rock? Pfffft.

 

Not tonight, I think-- Dorian and I have been hunting down everything we can of the Old Gods based on a theory that was floated in an older text on the Evanuris, though one must take everything magisters say with a grain of salt. I haven't the background to say whether or not divine intervention exists for you, but it certainly wouldn't be the first time that a person with a canny mind has turned religion into another battlefield to claim victory over.

Unfortunately, it does always seem that the worst warlords have the cleverest minds, doesn't it?

 

Ford looks up at the mech priest, shaking his head. "Look, I don't question for a hot minute that you believe what you're saying. Maybe I even believe that most or even all of the people in your particular Temple held the views you hold. I'm just not sure I trust in the benevolence of the people who set it up that way, particularly if you do have hardliners who wanted everyone to have to live that way, and if leaving the temple would have limited your choices so severely. Religious groups with those teachings don't end up controlling that much power and money unless someone at the top lost sight of the poverty and humility part and got ambitious, and when you teach people to think of adults who need help as children under their care, some of them will decide they have the right and responsibility to make those people do what they think best. You really think that never happened anywhere, even if it wasn't in your particular Temple?"

 

Lissa thinks for a moment about this, while listening with half an ear to what Ford's saying. "I think the short version of what he's saying is that if you want people to see themselves and their own desires as an authority, that's actually more or less exactly what we believe, but we're not sure how that fits in with some of the things you're saying about your religion."

 

Yeah, I know. And I do try not to be like that, but... if it was easy for everyone, well... I reckon my life would've been very different.

Yeah. You've got a nice vision, Beacon, but... it feels like you're saying that it doesn't apply to you and all the other priests. That everyone else can be just plain human but you guys have to be superhuman.

 

I just want to point out here that priesthood was literally the only acceptable non-alt-related job available unless you got yourself declared alt-exempt and somehow managed to survive more than a few years. Yeah, leaving a temple limited your choices, because two choices is still more than one!

Also, have none of you ever heard of religious sects? I don't think anyone actually believed the version the Functionists pushed, but as long as your own personal belief seemed close enough to the official line a temple could stay open. Primus worship is most commonly hierarchical, yeah-- think that might have anything to do with the guy claiming leadership is his by divine favor might have anything to do with that?-- but even up in the Towers you could catch little threads of things like "every single one of us is divine, we were all one and we will all be one again". Grounder cities weren't really my thing-- [he flips his wings up, waves them to underscore his point--] but I can believe a temple pushing that line while staying nominally stratified enough to not be raided, shut down, and possibly destroyed by Sentinel's Enforcers.

 

"That's an excellent point," says Ford. He shrugs. "Sounds like a very hierarchical and limiting society overall, then."

"Oh, we've heard of them. Lissa came out of a really awful one, and they're all over the place where we live now. We haven't had great experiences with organised religion."

 

[dave nods. he's pretending to understand more than he actually does]
four million years is a longass time even for big basically immortal metal dudes right
i see more of the other guys in here though
which id say is weird because cmon dreamspace at least allow me to sample alien factions equally my delicate palate requires a finely tuned social balance
but i mean you dont see condy or one of the noirs in here or anything soooo

man i think trying is like
the point?
like if someones making an EFFORT not to be a big hairy asshole to other people and is genuinely trying then im gonna be cool with em
like i mean fuck im an asshole and my favorite people are assholes its just doing the best i can to not compulsively spew shit at other people
but if theyre doing an impression of two tightly clenched buttcheeks and dont care or refuse to acknowledge their rectal status then fuck them

 

"They wouldn't be the worst if they didn't." Ford shrugs.

 

Yeah, that´s sorta why we happened. -taps her tail tip against the decepticon badge on her chest- Fightin´ta be more th´n just what ya turn inta.

 

That was what 'twas like in the temple. But Beacon left the temple a long time ago... after it got destroyed.
-There's a small mech sitting there now. He's got four arms, antennae and a definite beetle shell on his back; he clicks absentmindedly after he's finished talking and uses his top pair of hands to groom his mouth in a way that would have made much more sense if he had the mandibles he has in altmode-

 

-Inquisitve hello chirp!-

 

-chirrup back! Curious, a little worried, and in a different dialect-
You're an insecticon aren't you?

 

Though if you wanted an unacceptable job, there were plenty of those. And you'd get the police beatings, potential empurata, and starvation for free besides! And goodness me, Primus forbid that you were a spare in a class of coldcons-- then you weren't even allowed an acceptable alt-related job.

[He makes a sour expression, then neatly drapes himself across a newly manifest chaise lounge with a drink in hand.]

 

[Yes, I am! Thunderwing is too! What are you?]

 

-chipchirp; his antennae twitch as he translates as best he can- Insectformer only. ...Cockroach.

 

Where´s your swarm? Do Cockroaches have swarms?

 

-Pillage chitters a quiet giggle- I guess my swarm is Beacon? -indicates him with his antennae-

 

Your mate? Everyone has such tiny swarms! -concernchirp- You have to be lonely!

 

Not usually? I was alone f'r- a long long time, I'm used t'it.