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tooterfish posted:I was referencing the full body covering. Because you said we weren't talking about the face covering. No I said I wasn't talking about JUST face-covering. That's what sets the burqa apart. It covers the entirety of face and body, as opposed to just face or just body. I mean you can extrapolate anything if you really want, but in terms of real-life parallels, he was digging from stuff already there. And it's not like Weber's subtle. When he wants to go after something, he doesn't do "Well if you extrapolate it looks kind of like this no no it's not the literal thing that I'm saying it is" he just copies and pastes the real-world equivilant in. See: Safehold, where the Church is just a very very thinly pastiched Catholic Church. EDIT: And to attach on to my previous post. Oh man, and then when Masada is defeated again a second time it's because Grayson had been slipping and relaxing its theocratic monarchy some so that it was more of a President + legislature deal, but clearly that had just brought in the Masadans again so when they are defeated, the current Protector depowers the 'legislature' and takes total power again. The power of monarchy is superior to democracy once more! Kchama fucked around with this message at 23:57 on Jul 10, 2019 |
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Jul 10, 2019 23:52
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Its kind of funny how much Weber loves monarchies, usually fascists love autocracy, obviously, but in most lovely Baen novels its because there are Hard Choices to make. Weber just seems to love the idea of inherited authority and every portrayal of even aristocratic councils like Manticore's upper house is insanely negative
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Jul 11, 2019 00:03
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Larry Parrish posted:Its kind of funny how much Weber loves monarchies, usually fascists love autocracy, obviously, but in most lovely Baen novels its because there are Hard Choices to make. Weber just seems to love the idea of inherited authority and every portrayal of even aristocratic councils like Manticore's upper house is insanely negative I think it's the idea that monarchies are the opposite of a bureaucracy. Legislatures, judges, and the like are all bureaucratic in his eyes. But a single person in absolute power has no bureaucracy in Weber's mind, so they can make pure, clear, untainted commands. It's funny because despite being an oppressive theocracy, Masada actually had more democracy than Grayson did, considering it had a similiar legislative-style council as Grayson, but they had actual power and the executive shared power with them instead of them being whooly subordinate.
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Jul 11, 2019 00:11
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tooterfish posted:If they were meant to be Muslims Weber did a bad job, because I thought they were Mormons. i think it's inevitable that people would read masadans as muslim caricatures, since muslim caricatures are so ubiquitous in the sub-genre now possibly this wasn't yet the case when The Honor of the Queen was written, since 9/11 hadn't happened yet, nor had even the east africa embassy bombings or WTC bombing #1 but in this day and age it is natural that people take them as space muslims rather than space mormons (which they are in their backstory) or space ultra-orthodox haredim (who the masadans clearly identify with even though they probably don't know anything about judaism, hence the name)
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Jul 11, 2019 00:24
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Kchama posted:I think it's the idea that monarchies are the opposite of a bureaucracy. Legislatures, judges, and the like are all bureaucratic in his eyes. But a single person in absolute power has no bureaucracy in Weber's mind, so they can make pure, clear, untainted commands. Yeah that's probably part of it. They think all kings are Alexander, even though obviously, assigning his subordinates and comrades conquered kingdoms as satrapys is in of itself a fairly sophisticated bureaucracy, just not the kind invented in early modern Europe or China
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Jul 11, 2019 00:26
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Despite Weber's disturbing lack of Muslim bashing, I take comfort in him calling the leaders of the evil entrenched bureaucracy the Mandarins. Very subtle. Edit: Pro click review of one of weber's novels: https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/full-slow-ahead-ralson-reads-honor-harrington-a-rising-thunder.9340/ SardonicTyrant fucked around with this message at 00:29 on Jul 11, 2019 |
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Jul 11, 2019 00:27
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PupsOfWar posted:i think it's inevitable that people would read masadans as muslim caricatures, since muslim caricatures are so ubiquitous in the sub-genre now This is very fair. Larry Parrish posted:Yeah that's probably part of it. They think all kings are Alexander, even though obviously, assigning his subordinates and comrades conquered kingdoms as satrapys is in of itself a fairly sophisticated bureaucracy, just not the kind invented in early modern Europe or China Yeah, this is super correct. He thinks its super simple when it's not. Does he think if the House of Commoners/Lords went away, there wouldn't be anybody to question Elizabeth? SardonicTyrant posted:Despite Weber's disturbing lack of Muslim bashing, I take comfort in him calling the leaders of the evil entrenched bureaucracy the Mandarins. Very subtle. Not racist at all, no-sir. Never mind that the entire thing about 'Mandarins' is that they were civil servants who were chosen after a very rigorous examination and weren't what Weber thought at all. Since hell, MILITARY OFFICERS were considered 'mandarins'.
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Jul 11, 2019 00:40
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SardonicTyrant posted:Despite Weber's disturbing lack of Muslim bashing, I take comfort in him calling the leaders of the evil entrenched bureaucracy the Mandarins. Very subtle. This thread has got pretty silly, it's obvious that a group named Masada are clearly old testament extremists possibly Mormons (Mormons did have a war against the us govt). There is no way a guy who called a character Rob S Pierre is devious enough to name an Islamic planet after a Jewish fortress. If they were Islamic they'd have the stupidest, simplest name possible. I haven't even read HH past the first few but Weber is consistent in his mediocrity
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Jul 11, 2019 00:52
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"don't read the bad book," says the thread screw you dad I do what I want 1633 and its sequel the Baltic War are in the mail and I am hoping Flint can restrain Weber long enough to write more cool Americans being bros with the Swedes
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Jul 11, 2019 01:01
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branedotorg posted:It's a pretty common slang term for bureaucrat/public servants in UK and Australian english, with obvious roots. I mean, I believe part of Mormonism is that they believe that Christ is the savior, yes? And that they just follow Young as their Pope. The Masadans explicitly believe that Christ is isn't the true savior and have their own prophet. Weber's neither, though. Also like, the root of the slang is the Chinese Mandarins, and they're a not-uncommon stereotype of 'evil bureaucracy in America. SardonicTyrant posted:Edit: Pro click review of one of weber's novels: https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/full-slow-ahead-ralson-reads-honor-harrington-a-rising-thunder.9340/ I didn't actually look at this until now but this is actually a full Let's Read and I kinda think someone should get onto one of these sometime, as these are always great. The Let's Read of Rising Thunder posted:Actually, wait a second. It makes perfect sense that the Solarians don't realize how important these wormholes are, because why the gently caress are they? Maybe I SHOULD read the new books. Kchama fucked around with this message at 01:07 on Jul 11, 2019 |
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Jul 11, 2019 01:05
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i think the only muslims i can remember in a weber book are the Caliphate of Zanzibar, one of the minor proxy nations in the anti-havenite manticoran alliance, basically the same as Grayson was before their magical shipbuilding powers activated we never learn anything about those guys other than that they're a Caliphate - i think they have one (1) guy as a PoV character for 3 or 4 pages in one of the middle books the most significant male character in Path of the Fury is ethnically arab but iirc nonreligious now that i think about it this is a weird anomaly among milSF and milFic authors PupsOfWar fucked around with this message at 01:28 on Jul 11, 2019 |
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Jul 11, 2019 01:24
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tooterfish posted:I was referencing the full body covering. Because you said we weren't talking about the face covering. Just like the classic Mormon invasions of Israel.
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Jul 11, 2019 01:59
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Drone Jett posted:Just like the classic Mormon invasions of Israel. Jim Baen's Ghost posted:You just got yourself a book deal son
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Jul 11, 2019 02:16
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Kchama posted:Maybe I SHOULD read the new books. As thread OP, I say Don't. You already have a weird battered wife syndrome thing going on over David Weber. Lock the door, change your phone number, call the cops, get a restraining order, read something loving else for gods sake. Read the Expanse books. Read the Lost Fleet. Read Aubrey–Maturin or the Sharpe books. Read the STEN Archives. Read that terrible "serial numbers etched off" MageWorld series. Read the tanky Ken MacLeod scifi books.
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Jul 11, 2019 03:16
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NoNostalgia4Grover posted:As thread OP, I say Don't. You already have a weird battered wife syndrome thing going on over David Weber. Lock the door, change your phone number, call the cops, get a restraining order, read something loving else for gods sake. Don't worry, I wasn't being serious. I was absolutely going to make someone else do it because I'm never ever going to read those drat things again. But I am finding it very amusing that Weber hosed up so hard that the reason why Manticore is so drat rich (all the trade in the universe going through its wormholes) doesn't make sense when the shortest trip through the Solarian League, where almost all the trade in the universe is apparently, is longer THROUGH the Manticore wormholes than the longest possible trip without the Manticorean wormhole. Also Manticore suspends all trade in the Solarian League region and it really doesn't do anything at all to the Manticorean economy, literally five seconds after their entire space infrastructure and the majority of their economy got blown up in a Mesan sneak attack.
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Jul 11, 2019 04:27
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Kchama posted:But I am finding it very amusing that Weber hosed up so hard that the reason why Manticore is so drat rich (all the trade in the universe going through its wormholes) doesn't make sense when the shortest trip through the Solarian League, where almost all the trade in the universe is apparently, is longer THROUGH the Manticore wormholes than the longest possible trip without the Manticorean wormhole. *puts on terminal nerd hat* the wormhole junctions that were described earlier in the series (Manticore and Erewhon) do make sense as things that would be really important for trade in the League. This is because the Manticore junction and the Erewhon each have a terminus real close together in another star nation, the never-described-but-surely-significant Phoenix Cluster.  The Manticore junction opens up Haven, Manticore itself, Silesia, Andermann, the never-described-but-apparently-significant Midgard Confederation, and various frontier zones to Solarian shipping. But even if all of these markets are so insignificant relative to the League that they are not worth trading with, the wormholes would be useful for intra-League shipping. A solarian merchant convoy can jump from Beowulf to Manticore to Phoenix to Erewhon, then jump back through Erewhon and be on the other side of the League with only minimal time spent in hyperspace. Just whatever time (probably a couple of days) it takes to hop between the two termini in Phoenix. The wormholes greatly shorten the trip between the league's interior and periphery, or even between different core worlds. This is an even bigger deal once the terminus in the Talbot cluster is discovered later on. The new, never-before-mentioned wormhole jumps introduced in the last books do seem superfluous to the League/Manticore conflict, which is what the Let's Read guy is calling out. But the original Manticore junction holds up as a really important thing. *takes off nerd hat* now, you may be asking yourself, "friend, why take the time to defend the logic of a thing in the bad book series known as honorverse? why in god's name would you write an effortpost about david weber's wormhole logistics?" well, I don't think it makes any difference in whether the books are good (since they are bad on plot, characterization, pacing, prose style, format, editing, ideology, theme, and pretty much everything else you can evaluate books on) i just feel it is a waste to nitpick weber on things like Wormhole Logistics, since he has probably spent 30 years thinking about them the way a model train enthusiast thinks about switching stations. and anyway, the wormhole network making sense just opens up other cans of worms for instance, it's bonkers that Grayson, not Erewhon, becomes the 2nd main partner in the alliance, since as described above Erewhon should be almost as economically powerful as Manticore. (also, why are these Asgard guys never a big deal?) PupsOfWar fucked around with this message at 05:41 on Jul 11, 2019 |
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Jul 11, 2019 05:35
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NoNostalgia4Grover posted:As thread OP, I say Don't. You already have a weird battered wife syndrome thing going on over David Weber. Lock the door, change your phone number, call the cops, get a restraining order, read something loving else for gods sake. im happy to spin the chamber and load up someone new if people are already burned out on weber chat did anyone ever read any of these things that i remember from when i was a pre-teen 
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Jul 11, 2019 05:54
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PupsOfWar posted:Snip Though it's insanely loving dumb that Manticore makes up the entire merchant fleet of the Solarian League. There's no way Manticore has enough ships for that if you count every ship in Manticore, no matter what kind, much less just merchants, and then Manticore be able to run merchant ships for also the rest of the universe. Also, I'm pretty sure that picture is fan-made completely and might not be the best to use for accuracy. I dunno if that's the case or not, but I thought it might be good to point out. I actually dunno if Weber has actually mapped things out or not. PupsOfWar posted:im happy to spin the chamber and load up someone new if people are already burned out on weber chat Sorry, I'm never gonna be burned out!! The embers burn forever!! Also, I have waited forever for people who don't worship Weber.
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Jul 11, 2019 08:33
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Space Butler posted:Veteran is 'humans at war with nanomachine aliens, but humans were the real bad guys all along'. I prefer it to Bastard legion, which is the mercenary slave company one. Which is in the same universe but 100 years later starring the veteran protagonist's great granddaughter for no adequately explained reason. I really liked veterans, thanks! It's like a not as good Richard Morgan ripping off an early Gibson (hacking the Gibson?) With aliens by 40k.
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Jul 11, 2019 10:37
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Kchama posted:While you bring up good points, I was mostly pointing out that the problem was that the later books establish that the main money-maker that Manticore has is the intra-League trade. And that this is also the main money-maker of the League, which is why Manticore not letting them use the wormholes supposedly cripples them, because it was the big shortcut through the League, but Weber flubbed it there. It's not the main money maker, it's a large mostly profitable trade, a large part of the issue would just be the shock to the system of having to get new suppliers. Like what would happen to the US economy if we stopped trading with China, now Manticore isn't considered nearly that level from my understanding but it's large enough it could cause a shock. Maybe better to say what if we suddenly had a 50% tariff on everything from China, it would shock the system pretty hard. Kchama posted:Though it's insanely loving dumb that Manticore makes up the entire merchant fleet of the Solarian League. There's no way Manticore has enough ships for that if you count every ship in Manticore, no matter what kind, much less just merchants, and then Manticore be able to run merchant ships for also the rest of the universe. It doesn't though.
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Jul 11, 2019 15:20
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NoNostalgia4Grover posted:Read the tanky Ken MacLeod scifi books. Umm I think you'll find Ken MacLeod's scifi dudes are explicitly Trotskyite 
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Jul 11, 2019 15:50
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feedmegin posted:Umm I think you'll find Ken MacLeod's scifi dudes are explicitly Trotskyite 100% right. Most people just lump Trotsky into the "tanky" zone anyway because socialism/communism is 100% the same thing in their minds. Ken MacLeod was an interesting writer once, now it's brainworms 25 hrs a day /8 days a week/366 days a year.
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Jul 11, 2019 16:03
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ShinsoBEAM! posted:It doesn't though. It doesn't for which part? I can buy that Weber hasn't super confirmed that not everyone in the universe uses Manticorean ships (and I'm not really feeling actually looking through a book for an exact quote to bolster my memory), but that's literally what he says in Rising Thunder when it comes to Solarian League. That Manticore's ships actually ARE the majority of SU's trade fleet, and that's why Manticore pulling out in trade ships fucks up their economy so hard. It straight up says that even if the Solarian League replaced every single ship that Manticore pulled out, the Solarian League's internal trade would still be permanently crippled without the Manticorean wormhole to shortcut, which while it might be handy likely wouldn't be the essential thing to trade in the Solarian League, considering half the League is far enough away from a wormhole that it's likely just as fast and less expensive to hoof it. "David Weber" posted:But it could, if its pigmy opponent happened to control the bulk of the shipping which carried that economy’s lifeblood. That quote being how Manticore could strangle the Solarian League internal trade by simply closing the wormholes and pulling out its trade ships. EDIT: By the way, sorry if my Honorchat is drowning out other book poo poo-talking or praising, but I'm having lots of fun arguing about it. Kchama fucked around with this message at 16:27 on Jul 11, 2019 |
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Jul 11, 2019 16:10
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Kchama posted:It doesn't for which part? I can buy that Weber hasn't super confirmed that not everyone in the universe uses Manticorean ships (and I'm not really feeling actually looking through a book for an exact quote to bolster my memory), but that's literally what he says in Rising Thunder when it comes to Solarian League. That Manticore's ships actually ARE the majority of SU's trade fleet, and that's why Manticore pulling out in trade ships fucks up their economy so hard. Damnit, I hate giving Kchama positive feedback on their Weber obsession, however..... I believe that Manticore + Grayson could definitely strangle the Solarian League internal trade on child-brides + kumquats via wormhole blockade and pulling out trade ships. Don't forget the War of 1812 and how England raided + seized neutral trading ships + their cargoes outside of English territory. Then remember the Honorverse Q-ship novel where Manticore totally wasn't doing the same exact thing (raiding neutral ships + seizing their cargoes) outside of Manticore territory(they were). And continued doing so for years after at industrial Manticorean scale. Anything that England has done historically is 100% Divine Right correct + legal in
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Jul 11, 2019 16:35
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NoNostalgia4Grover posted:Damnit, I hate giving Kchama positive feedback on their Weber obsession, however.....  The Rising Thunder sure makes me wonder what the hell I missed because every single Manticorean in the book so far is an arrogant preening rear end in a top hat and I constantly wonder if Weber got his notes backwards on who the villain and who the sympathetic person is in each scene. Like there's a scene where this Solarian League lady is talking to a Manticorean friend of hers, and his internal dialogue is how he was deeply offended that she treated him like a human being and wasn't an rear end in a top hat to him just on the basis of his ethnicity and he found it deeply demeaning and rude that an inferior Solarian Leaguer was being nice to someone she should think is inferior, and that's why she's a dumb arrogant (it's in their genes!) SOLLIE. And then when she vents that what Manticore is doing will literally ruin her and her family and they're going to die in a slum he just gives her a 'lop-sided grin' and laughs at her and tells her 'enjoy it' and leaves and he's suppose to be the HERO of the conversation.
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Jul 11, 2019 16:46
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One thing that never made sense to me is Manticore was settled by STL sleeper ships, and once they had arrived, wormholes and Alcubierre drives had been invented. So why didnt anyone just invade Manticore and take this supposedly very valuable system that has a ton of wormholes and three habitable planets? What, did weapons technology not evolve in 500 years so those ancient sleeper ships were competitive?
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Jul 11, 2019 17:06
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I've been reading the HH novels and holy poo poo theyre bad
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Jul 11, 2019 17:39
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shovelbum posted:I've been reading the HH novels and holy poo poo theyre bad Did you think we were joking when we warned you
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Jul 11, 2019 17:40
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:Did you think we were joking when we warned you I didn't see the thread until today, I knew they were bad in advance but now I'm 10 novels in to the adventures of the psychic cyborg genetic superman mary sue
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Jul 11, 2019 17:45
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shovelbum posted:I didn't see the thread until today, I knew they were bad in advance but now I'm 10 novels in to the adventures of the psychic cyborg genetic superman mary sue Don't forget the magic psychic space cat But yeah it's amazing how bad they are yet how consumable, like doritos that actively gave you heart attacks with every bag
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Jul 11, 2019 17:48
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:Don't forget the magic psychic space cat i dont want to tell my dad about them bc hes compulsively read every bad napoleonic war series after starting with hornblower and aubrey-maturin and if he sees these he will know hes reached the bottom of the barrel
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Jul 11, 2019 17:53
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shovelbum posted:I've been reading the HH novels and holy poo poo theyre bad Welcome friend. Stop reading the HH novels asap and check out the 2nd post in this thread for recommended mil-fiction + mil-scifi series/authors that aren't totally garbage. BTW, what's your favorite Honorverse WarCrime?
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Jul 11, 2019 17:55
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NoNostalgia4Grover posted:Welcome friend. the name rob s pierre probably presenting the peeps (who are a pretty interesting premise as a failed hypocritical "socialism in one country" kind of deal) as generic welfare queen parodies
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Jul 11, 2019 17:59
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PupsOfWar posted:im happy to spin the chamber and load up someone new if people are already burned out on weber chat Oh poo poo, I read the first like four or five of those before quitting. IIRC they're great examples of incompetent Hoorahism MilSF but thankfully free of the political poo poo that too many of these authors have. My memory of the best bits include: 1. A minor character that was killed off in one book showing up again two or three books later with no explanation, probably because the author forgot he got offed in a firefight. 2. The insistence that no matter how tactically stupid it would be, the Space Marines always inserted from orbit so that they came in over water because Marines.
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Jul 11, 2019 18:02
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shovelbum posted:i dont want to tell my dad about them bc hes compulsively read every bad napoleonic war series after starting with hornblower and aubrey-maturin and if he sees these he will know hes reached the bottom of the barrel
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Jul 11, 2019 18:03
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shovelbum posted:the name rob s pierre They're LITERALLY what Weber describes as 'America and it's welfare state' so of course they're generic welfare queen parodies.
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Jul 11, 2019 18:06
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Larry Parrish posted:One thing that never made sense to me is Manticore was settled by STL sleeper ships, and once they had arrived, wormholes and Alcubierre drives had been invented. So why didnt anyone just invade Manticore and take this supposedly very valuable system that has a ton of wormholes and three habitable planets? What, did weapons technology not evolve in 500 years so those ancient sleeper ships were competitive? Although lol at joining a sleeper ship for some rich rear end in a top hat who wants his own monarchy.
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Jul 11, 2019 18:15
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Kchama posted:They're LITERALLY what Weber describes as 'America and it's welfare state' so of course they're generic welfare queen parodies. yes theyre incredibly unreminiscent of america which makes it so funny, everything about them is p much the antithesis of america
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Jul 11, 2019 18:16
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tooterfish posted:You say Aubry-Maturin is bad one more time and you're getting exiled to loving Saint Helena. no no those ones are good, but theres a whole increasingly rotten barrel between them and hh
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Jul 11, 2019 18:17
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shovelbum posted:yes Yeah no kidding. He had to say that in response to people accusing them of being the USSR fused with Revolutionary France which I mean gosh I wonder why people would think that. So the plot of this book, Rising Thunder, involves how a bunch of Solarian League planets are independently building Super Podnaughts so as to rise up against the Solarian League, because apparently everyone has this technology except the Solarian League itself.
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Jul 11, 2019 18:29
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