R Scott Bakker's :The Great Ordeal (spoilers)

[themerchant]

He assumes the reader is male. Which was then re-stated as he writes for men.

 

[Hello World]

3 minutes ago, themerchant said:

Scotland, 4 out of the 6 leaders. Best of a bad lot is probably the best way to describe next this parliament will be more legislation coming. The political leaders are. sorry if it came across the population was.

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/apr/05/tartan-rainbow-why-great-to-be-gay-in-scotland-lgbt-rights-kezia-dugdale

Oh nevermind, I thought you meant the majority of the country's population is LGBT.

[Bastard of Godsgrace]

Well, the theory that Dunyain women were axlotl tanks was often mentioned at this board, so it hardly comes as a surprise. Heck, I also suspected it may be true, even if I didn't like it very much. Also many posters agreed Dunyain were purely evil, even if I still hoped for more ambiguous portrayal. It is somewhat disappointing, but I still wonder where Bakker will go with it. I also agree it makes Dunyain far more alike the Consult than most of us suspected, so it does seem strange the Consult decided to destroy them instead recruiting them.

[Udat]

As someone who has browsed these forms for years, I can honestly say that the discussion about the books, its characters, its metaphysics and story is very insightful and great reading. 

However, it seems to me that every thread always seems to devolve into what is now starting to happen. And after 6/7 years I can honestly say that it's just a slightly different version of the same argument. 

However, I just don't understand the point of it. We all have our opinions, and we don't have to agree with one another. 

I guess I'm just saying, can't we just discuss the books? At this point, all this stuff just seem like "ah, this again".

Talk about being ruled by what come before, HA!

 

[Hello World]

@bastard How are they pure evil again?

[themerchant]

1 minute ago, Hello World said:

How are they pure evil again?

Cause Judging Eye say so!

[Kalbear]

15 minutes ago, themerchant said:

You're talking about unidentified readers and listing their sexual fantasies.

" but again it doesn't horrify the loyal anti cuck MRA audience if you can't picture being forced to have sex with fat women. "

 

How is this about their fantasies? It's not. It's about what scares certain kinds of men. And that's sort of the point. 

This is extrapolation, but it's not an attack on Bakker or anyone here. It's a guess as to why the choices were made. To whit:

1. Assume men's desires are largely biological in nature.
2. If 1 is true, assume that some of the most horrific imagery to said men would be to procreate with someone failing a fitness function/be alien to typical desires
3. Put said imagery in book and make it a logical outcome of point 1.

It's good to hear that it may be a US cultural thing, though I suspect it isn't exactly - just that it's a lot noisier here.

Quote

 

However, it seems to me that every thread always seems to devolve into what is now starting to happen. And after 6/7 years I can honestly say that it's just a slightly different version of the same argument. 

However, I just don't understand the point of it. We all have our opinions, and we don't have to agree with one another. 

I guess I'm just saying, can't we just discuss the books? At this point, all this stuff just seem like "ah, this again".

 

You can do whatever you like here provided you continue with the rules of the board. That being said, when the author himself says that his goal of the books is to lay bare male sexuality and criticize it, how is talking about that not talking about the books? This is the argument I've never understood - why is it okay to talk about the metaphysics of the world and why dragons don't have chorae but not talk about the intended themes of the book? 

[JGP]

Agreed, and since I've missed several years of it-- most of this stuff is news to me.

[Kalbear]

Also thought this was funny - when trying to find who ended up first hypothesizing the axlotl tank idea (first reference I can find is from someone named @Rhadamanth back in 2010) I ended up google image searching Axolotl Dunyain...and got this image.

Behold your whale mother! Don't you want to fuck that?

[unJon]

8 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

You can do whatever you like here provided you continue with the rules of the board. That being said, when the author himself says that his goal of the books is to lay bare male sexuality and criticize it, how is talking about that not talking about the books? This is the argument I've never understood - why is it okay to talk about the metaphysics of the world and why dragons don't have chorae but not talk about the intended themes of the book?

But you know the answer to this, Esmi. 

[themerchant]

1 minute ago, Kalbear said:

How is this about their fantasies? It's not. It's about what scares certain kinds of men. And that's sort of the point. 

This is extrapolation, but it's not an attack on Bakker or anyone here. It's a guess as to why the choices were made. To whit:

1. Assume men's desires are largely biological in nature.
2. If 1 is true, assume that some of the most horrific imagery to said men would be to procreate with someone failing a fitness function/be alien to typical desires
3. Put said imagery in book and make it a logical outcome of point 1.

It's good to hear that it may be a US cultural thing, though I suspect it isn't exactly - just that it's a lot noisier here.

 

I meant preferences not fantasies, apologies. You were talking about a " loyal anti cuck MRA audience " (readers). That's the part I was referring to. A specific unidentified audience that had homogeneous sexual fears/preferences, that were different from other groups. 

I now understand your point better. Cheers for the clarification.

We also don't have the same super-vocal "Social Justice" movement as well. I suspect they might feed into each other.

In Scotland the same thing will probably just manifest differently, I doubt there is much difference. We have a lot of guys with huge attitude problems, fortunately it seems to be the older generations.

[Kalbear]

4 minutes ago, JEORDHl said:

Agreed, and since I've missed several years of it-- most of this stuff is news to me.

Oh right, wanted to get back to you on the other point.

Another theory based on the short story about the Nonmen surfaced a while back and I think was eaten by the board's great purge. The theory goes that the Inchorois didn't kill all the nonmen females when they gave the men immortality. What they did, instead, was cause the nonmen females to no longer be able to give birth to nonmen children. When they gave birth, the children weren't theirs - they were some kind of abomination, or some kind of genetic programmed inchoroi, or something like that. 

And so the nonmen males killed all their women, rather than be forced to raise the monstrosities. 

The specific passage that makes this kind of clear is this:

Quote

That is the sole curse of the Ishroi, she hisses. He is sack, a net bound about furious, ice-cold fish, each part of him thrashing, fleeing, and he howls realizing, for the first time in ten thousand years comprehending, that he is a thing of meat, that he is of the self-same flesh, the very thing that nourishes him, boar-squealing, bloody and alive. To only hope they had fathered their sons! 

As well as - why would the nonman kill his pregnant daughter? We had been told that it killed their women, but we have him remembering pushing his pregnant daughter off a cliff. She isn't dead. She isn't monstrous. She's pleading for her life. But he kills her. 

Thus the other part of the scary idea - the idea that being cuckolded is the Worst Thing Imaginable. And the obvious extension of said idea - namely, if being cuckolded is the worst thing imaginable obviously if something happened such that you would not be able to have any kids of your own, you would make sure that it never happened again - by killing every wife and daughter you have.

Again, the logic isn't hard here and makes sense.

1. Assume that for some people being cuckolded is one of the worst things ever that could possibly be done to you. (the absurdity of this statement is not questioned here).
2. Make a situation happens such that everyone is cuckolded.
3. Show consequences of #2 happening with #1 as the moral decider.

[Udat]

So, 

I believe it was Akka that stated that there was only "scant thousands" of Nonmen left right. Out of those, all are not Quya and not Erractics. 

I guess I'm just wondering what number of Quya the Consult have at their disposal. Any number that they have must not be large so to lose any at Ishual must have been a blow in some way. 

Moreso, the Dunyain were able to negate them relatively quickly given that they never encountered them before. Makes me think of what plans Kellhus has cooked up regarding them being that he had 20 years plan it out. 

[themerchant]

I jokingly asked in another forum, who has done the more culling. The Dunyain at Ishual or the actual scalpers and Great Ordeal. They probably lured a fair few Sorcerers to their death before the consult just zerged them. Which is better than any number of sranc i guess.

[JGP]

4 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Oh right, wanted to get back to you on the other point.

Another theory based on the short story about the Nonmen surfaced a while back and I think was eaten by the board's great purge. The theory goes that the Inchorois didn't kill all the nonmen females when they gave the men immortality. What they did, instead, was cause the nonmen females to no longer be able to give birth to nonmen children. When they gave birth, the children weren't theirs - they were some kind of abomination, or some kind of genetic programmed inchoroi, or something like that. 

And so the nonmen males killed all their women, rather than be forced to raise the monstrosities. 

Again, the logic isn't hard here and makes sense.

1. Assume that for some people being cuckolded is one of the worst things ever that could possibly be done to you. (the absurdity of this statement is not questioned here).
2. Make a situation happens such that everyone is cuckolded.
3. Show consequences of #2 happening with #1 as the moral decider.

So the womb plague wasn't just a broad band infertility as I'd assumed. For one so unflinching [Bakker] it definitely harkens back to your point about him not committing to his stated intent, re: emotional impact of sympathetic Whale Mothers. Like, if Bakker is truly trying to cast an ugly light on 'teh horror!' of being cuckolded, wouldn't the point have more impact if the non-Nonmen children weren't abominable?   

[Udat]

8 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Oh right, wanted to get back to you on the other point.

Another theory based on the short story about the Nonmen surfaced a while back and I think was eaten by the board's great purge. The theory goes that the Inchorois didn't kill all the nonmen females when they gave the men immortality. What they did, instead, was cause the nonmen females to no longer be able to give birth to nonmen children. When they gave birth, the children weren't theirs - they were some kind of abomination, or some kind of genetic programmed inchoroi, or something like that. 

And so the nonmen males killed all their women, rather than be forced to raise the monstrosities. 

The specific passage that makes this kind of clear is this:

As well as - why would the nonman kill his pregnant daughter? We had been told that it killed their women, but we have him remembering pushing his pregnant daughter off a cliff. She isn't dead. She isn't monstrous. She's pleading for her life. But he kills her. 

Thus the other part of the scary idea - the idea that being cuckolded is the Worst Thing Imaginable. And the obvious extension of said idea - namely, if being cuckolded is the worst thing imaginable obviously if something happened such that you would not be able to have any kids of your own, you would make sure that it never happened again - by killing every wife and daughter you have.

Again, the logic isn't hard here and makes sense.

1. Assume that for some people being cuckolded is one of the worst things ever that could possibly be done to you. (the absurdity of this statement is not questioned here).
2. Make a situation happens such that everyone is cuckolded.
3. Show consequences of #2 happening with #1 as the moral decider.

Kal,

I think you might be on to something. I remember Bakker stating awhile back somewhere something along the lines of how "before modern technology, men greatest fear was that their children may not be their own". And how paternity laws are not caught up with that yet. 

[Bastard of Godsgrace]

35 minutes ago, Hello World said:

@bastard How are they pure evil again?

Well, not going into discussion about the definition of evil, they surely are portrayed as such. They don't even have the Consult justification since they don't believe they are damend. Also the mention that Kellhus, a Dunyain, is now ruling the world, strongly suggest his intentions are malevolent, Unless Akka is wrong, of course.

 

[.H.]

Well, apologizes to link to another board, but if someone wants to read 4 Revelations, I would say my color-coded version, while not perfect, is a good deal easier to follow: http://www.second-apocalypse.com/index.php?topic=460.msg21511#msg21511

[Hello World]

Nvm. Posting on my phone is daunting.

[Udat]

5 minutes ago, themerchant said:

I jokingly asked in another forum, who has done the more culling. The Dunyain at Ishual or the actual scalpers and Great Ordeal. They probably lured a fair few Sorcerers to their death before the consult just zerged them. Which is better than any number of sranc i guess.

@themerchant 

It kind of reminds me of how the Dwarves war with Orcs in LoTR later on helped the forces of Men during the War For the Ring. They cleared out the mountains of Orcs so there were fewer of them for Sauron to use.