Everyone hates the Seanchan but me?

[Magnetic Zero]

The city of V'saine (a major city in the AoL) hardly fits that description.

 

Thanks for the correction.

 

Because she leashed one of her sisters and brought her to Luthair, to live her life as a damane, with every intention to make additional a'dam, thus enabling him to leash more and more AS, until he was able to leash her as well.

 

And that means she can't have done it for both reasons because...?

[yoniy0]

And that means she can't have done it for both reasons because...?

Because trusting AS is a moot point if they're all leashed. I agree that she intended Luthair to trust HER, but to say the general populace should be expected to trust the majority of sisters simply because a few have been leashed? If anything, it demonstrates the 'proper way' to treat AS. Which, indeed, it has.

[Magnetic Zero]

Because trusting AS is a moot point if they're all leashed. I agree that she intended Luthair to trust HER, but to say the general populace should be expected to trust the majority of sisters simply because a few have been leashed? If anything, it demonstrates the 'proper way' to treat AS. Which, indeed, it has.

 

Fair enough. Obviously the leashed Aes Sedai are ones that are not to be trusted, and obviously the a'dam was meant to make Paendrag trust the Aes Sedai acting as sul'dam as Deain certainly meant to make more a'dam after showing the tool to Luthair. So, effectively, it was a method to get Paendrag to trust the Aes Sedai. Just because some Aes Sedai, those to be leashed according to whatever plan Deain had in mind, were not to be trusted doesn't mean her goal wasn't to also get Luthair to trust the Aes Sedai that she wanted him to trust. It was just unfortunate for her that he decided to not trust any of them since he had labeled them all Darkfriends.

 

So...yeah...

[didymos]

The place the Bore was actually Drilled at was in fact a tropical island, if memory serves.

 

I've gotten the impression that that's simply the location where the DO chose to concentrate his efforts once he was able to touch the Pattern. Evil Dark God's gotta have an HQ/Recruitment Office, right? As a result, it thinned there because he's inherently destructive to to the Pattern. I highly doubt the actual drilling was directed at any particular geographical (or even spatial) location at all, considering they were drilling through reality itself. Even though it's conceptualized as a single "hole", it basically altered the entire Pattern. Otherwise, the Bore couldn't be everywhere (which it is: there's no "probably" about it).

[Magnetic Zero]

I've gotten the impression that that's simply the location where the DO chose to concentrate his efforts once he was able to touch the Pattern. Evil Dark God's gotta have an HQ/Recruitment Office, right? As a result, it thinned there because he's inherently destructive to to the Pattern. I highly doubt the actual drilling was directed at any particular geographical (or even spatial) location at all, considering they were drilling through reality itself. Even though it's conceptualized as a single "hole", it basically altered the entire Pattern. Otherwise, the Bore couldn't be everywhere (which it is: there's no "probably" about it).

 

The thinning was a preexisting effect in the Pattern, not a result of the Dark One's influence upon release. That's how Mierin and Beidomon found what would become the Bore in the first place. Which I'm still trying to square that away with the fact that Sharom is where they drilled the hole, is where they discovered the Prison, but doesn't seem to be where Shayol Ghul (and by proxy what became known as the Bore) is geographically located.

[didymos]

The thinning was a preexisting effect in the Pattern, not a result of the Dark One's influence upon release. That's how Mierin and Beidomon found what would become the Bore in the first place

 

And where'd you get that from? It was never explained how they learned of the new "Source". Not by the books or RJ. This is as good as it gets:

 

She said she had discovered a new source for the Power.

 

OK. Thanks Shadow Rising.

[Magnetic Zero]

And where'd you get that from? It was never explained how they learned of the new "Source". Not by the books or RJ.

 

Logic? The Bore is located at a geographical point in space where the Pattern seems to be the thinnest. It is located there because that is the only place you can feel the Bore. As such, the Dark One's prison must have been a consequence of the discovery of this "thin" part of the Pattern, through which Mierin Eronaile and Beidomon could sense a power which did not seem to be divided into male and female halves.

 

If the thinness in the Pattern didn't exist prior to the drilling of the Bore, then Mierin and Beidomon would not have been able to sense the Dark One's prison.

 

Was it ever explicitly stated? No.

[Moon Sedai]

Personally, I think proper use of the binders (Oath Rods) on "channeling offenders" is a better solution. But given their options, it is natural that the a'dam-sul'dam-damane relationship arose in Seanchan, and it is hard to undo a convention. But even the use of binders isn't perfect. You would need enough of them to have them on hand to restrict channelers, but too many binders means it is easier to remove an oath. And this doesn't even factor in the White Tower's sacred cow view of the Oath Rod.

 

 

I think that might have been the original purpose on the binders. It's a much nicer punishment than severing (or is it, Galina?)

and it may be used in the future for channeling offenders, because Severing can be healed.

Really, though, most instances of severing-as-punishment, from what I understand, are followed with the death penalty. A humiliation before being put to death, and a way to avoid having the axeman channeled at to prevent him from doing his job.

What good is severing as a punishment if it can be Healed?

[Magnetic Zero]

I think that might have been the original purpose on the binders. It's a much nicer punishment than severing (or is it, Galina?)

and it may be used in the future for channeling offenders, because Severing can be healed.

Really, though, most instances of severing-as-punishment, from what I understand, are followed with the death penalty. A humiliation before being put to death, and a way to avoid having the axeman channeled at to prevent him from doing his job.

What good is severing as a punishment if it can be Healed?

 

It was the original purpose of the binders. It was a way to prevent channelers from using the Power to harm people. Semirhage went to the Shadow because she had a choice of either stopping her experiments on people and subject herself to the binder to never be allowed to experiment again or turn to the Shadow.

[didymos]

And where'd you get that from? It was never explained how they learned of the new "Source". Not by the books or RJ.

 

Logic?

 

Yeah, that only works out if your premises are all true.

 

The Bore is located at a geographical point in space where the Pattern seems to be the thinnest. It is located there because that is the only place you can feel the Bore.

 

Uh, no, on multiple counts. See, look:

 

In a way, this is like the Bore, which does not actually exist as Shayol Ghul. The Bore exists everywhere, but Shayol Ghul is the place where it can best be detected.

 

and:

Jordan: No, no, no. Because of the Bore and the fact that the Bore is best perceived, the Bore doesn't really exist in Shayol Ghul, the Bore exists everywhere, it's simply in Shayol Ghul where it can be perceived most easily. By the same token he has greater access to people at Shayol Ghul than he does elsewhere

 

What's more Shayol Ghul is not in the same place as the Sharom was, where the research and drilling were done (as previously established in this thread). So, um, why didn't they work at the future site of Shayol Ghul? LTT and the 100 Dead Men had to set the seals there, and the Choedan Kal were supposed to erect a barrier there, so why didn't the drill have to be there? Well, because the Bore isn't anywhere in particular and it didn't exist until they drilled it, that's why.

 

 

As such, the Dark One's prison must have been a consequence of the discovery of this "thin" part of the Pattern, through which Mierin Eronaile and Beidomon could sense a power which did not seem to be divided into male and female halves.

 

Nope. No "must have been". "Might have been", sure, but not "must".

 

If the thinness in the Pattern didn't exist prior to the drilling of the Bore, then Mierin and Beidomon would not have been able to sense the Dark One's prison.

 

Yeah, there's a problem with that (aside from arbitrarily deciding something was just plain impossible for AoL tech, something which we actually know very, very little about):

 

Q: What exactly is the Bore?

 

RJ: Well, it is at…No, I shouldn't say that. It is a thinness in the Pattern that you can feel the most at Shayol Ghul.

 

The Bore itself is the thinness. But if the thinness was pre-existing, then what the hell is the Bore? Just a smidge more thinness? Possible, sure, but we're off into pure speculation here, logical as it may be. And, it's also not the only logical possibility.

 

So what's up with Shayol Ghul and that detectability thing? Here's a clue:

Q: Was there any time when there was no Blight?

 

RJ: Oh, yes. The Blight is an artifact of the War of the Shadow and the Breaking. There was no Blight before the Bore was created, and the drilling of the Bore did not immediately create the Blight, but the Blight came into being after that.

 

Q: Was the Blight [mumble] from the Dark One, or one of the Forsaken?

 

RJ: From the Dark One. It is land that has been corrupted by the Dark One.

 

So, it took the DO a fair amount of time to create the Blight, whatever the mechanism. And Shayol Ghul is smack dab in the middle of it. We also know he has to make an effort to screw with the Pattern and do stuff like freeze the seasons, so it's reasonably likely it requires some voluntary effort to create the Blight. Especially when you consider that the Blight retreated and got vewy, vewy, quiet at pretty much the same time the Summer of Suck began. This goes back to my suspicion: that Shayol Ghul is simply where the DO chose to concentrate much of his effort. As the Bore is actually everywhere and nowhere in particular, and as we've seen that the DO is capable of affecting the entire world at once (Summer of Suck), there doesn't seem to be a compelling reason to assume that the "best detectability" isn't a result of him, basically, picking a spot and digging. It gave him a little pocket of reality that's essentially under his total dominion and that makes certain things easier for him. Like soul-snatching for instance, as quoted above.

 

But yes, general bad DO vibes could be responsible for the Blight, and he may have just been stuck with that location because the Pattern is just thinner there for some reason or other. I think the facts fit better with the "He did it on purpose" idea, but they aren't enough to clinch it or definitively rule the "thinness was already there" idea out.

 

Was it ever explicitly stated? No.

 

Nor was it clearly implied. And so it's not a fact, and useless as a premise from which to deduce other facts. It's just a decent idea with some interesting logical consequences that still requires some actual evidence. Same goes for my scenario. Until then the answer is "We don't know because we don't know enough."

[Magnetic Zero]

I see that a lot of the problems in communication here comes from the use of the term "the Bore."

 

When I said "the Bore is the geographical point..." I was referring to the cave in the mountain of Shayol Ghul which is typically referred to as "the Bore" by the Light and Shadow-alike. I was not referring to the hole in the Dark One's prison. When I said, "...the only place you can feel the Bore," I was referring to the hole in the Dark One's prison, which, as you said, is everywhere (which I also said as well, actually).

 

The same problem I have in communicating just which Bore I'm talking about (the place in Shayol Ghul or the actual hole in the Dark One's prison) is also evident in the quotes you provided from RJ. You can even see at one point, when asked what the Bore is, that he was originally going to define it as the geographical location.

 

Of course, that same quote does give me pause, I do admit. You are also right that I did leap from "might be" to "must be." Mea culpa.

[yoniy0]

\When I said "the Bore is the geographical point..." I was referring to the cave in the mountain of Shayol Ghul which is typically referred to as "the Bore" by the Light and Shadow-alike.

Actually, that's "the Pit of Doom".

[Magnetic Zero]

Hmm...you know. You just may be right. I'm going to be over here kicking myself in the face for forgetting that.

[Durinax]

seanchan are aight, I would like to see some sort of redemption opportunities for decendants of those who where made dacavole such as a 5 year period in the army and they would be normal citizens

[graendalzooescapee]

well, it's the utter alien-ness to the reader that really magnifies the faults of the seanchan, imho. i mean, didn't the Roman civ, amongst others, grow on the blood of slaves? yet, you see a lot less hate towards them, because your average western person relates to them a lot better.

The Romans had a fairly similar system of slavery with varying sentences for various crimes and manumission.

The Seanchan aren't particularly alien unless you're coming from a pre-conception of slavery=racism=Southern US plantation labour.

That's an attitude specific to US-readers, I suspect.

 

 

Romans did not have slavery as a punishment for crimes. Roman slaves were either prisoners of war or their descendants. And please, don't go saying that Roman slavery was somehow better than American slavery. Sure, they had manumission, but it really wasn't a rosy if-you're-good-you'll-be-free thing. An awful lot of the time, manumission was a self-serving decision by a master who didn't want to keep feeding an aging slave.

 

Roman slavery, American slavery, Seanchan slavery. It's all exploitation based on the dehumanization of part of the population.

[MierinWru]

They make some people da'covale (which is very different than being a slave) and put leashes on women they perceive as a threat to society because women who can channel have been threats to society.

 

They don't just "leash" them.

 

1) Channelers are POTENTIALLY dangerous. Like everybody who owns a gun is dangerous. Doesn't mean they should all be punished.

2) They don't just leash them. That would be like prison. No, they USE the channelers' horrible, hated abilities for their wars. So they force (!) potentially (!) dangerous people to kill others in the name of the Seanchan empress.

 

You have no issues with that? That's some pretty twisted and messed up morality the Seanchan have.

[Cut Strand]

They make some people da'covale (which is very different than being a slave) and put leashes on women they perceive as a threat to society because women who can channel have been threats to society.

 

They don't just "leash" them.

 

1) Channelers are POTENTIALLY dangerous. Like everybody who owns a gun is dangerous. Doesn't mean they should all be punished.

I can take your gun away though. Also, it is usually apparent if someone is carrying a gun (definitely if they are wielding it). It is hard to take away the ability to channel (and doing so is basically a slow death sentence most of the time).

2) They don't just leash them. That would be like prison. No, they USE the channelers' horrible, hated abilities for their wars. So they force (!) potentially (!) dangerous people to kill others in the name of the Seanchan empress.

So you favor government sponsored "time out" rather than government sponsored "do stuff for the nation"? The fact is most prisons in the world aren't working prisons. And those that do have working programs only have a small proportion contributing to society.

 

Unfortunately, to get the damane to be productive, they have to be broken.

 

You have no issues with that? That's some pretty twisted and messed up morality the Seanchan have.

Of course I have issues with it. But I don't think it is twisted. When something scares you, you can either run from it or try to control it (killing is a form of control).

 

I happen to believe that public shame is a better way to deal with crime than sending someone to prison for an extended "time out." There was a time when it was seen as a fair punishment to lock someone out in public and allow people to taunt and throw rotten food at them. Do you think there were many repeat offenders? It allowed someone to accept their punishment, then get back to work being (hopefully) productive.

 

I think it is really messed up to allow people to be born into being da'covale, but what is the alternative? Take the babies away from their da'covale parents to be raised by the state or other people? Or allow "free" children to be raised by da'covale parents? There just isn't a good way to handle the children of slaves. So should contraception be forced on them? It is just one of the many problems with any true slavery system.

 

But that doesn't change the fact that nearly every da'covale contributes to Seanchan society. The same can't be said for even ten percent of the prisoners in prisons in America.

 

Honestly, I think this topic needs to be tabled until we are allowed to discuss Towers of Midnight spoilers.

[Jblaylock]

I have no problem with the Seanchan. The spoils of war are just that: the spoils of war. If marath damane... I mean, Aes Sedai happen to be captured during war, well then they deserve to be controlled by one who will prevent them from demonstrating such weakness again.

 

Sorry... my inner Chosen is coming out.

 

[Ihasavowel]

 

 

Has anyone seen the movie The Gods Must Be Crazy? Summary of it (spoilers) is a coca-cola bottle falls into the midst of a bushman tribe (it is in Australia right?)...

The movie is South African, and the bushmen shown are the !Kung.

 

 

From memory, the Seanchan exist because Ishmael spoke in Hawkwing's ear. I do not think Ishmael did that because he thought it would make a pleasant form of government to live under.

 

I find your comments about owned people not being able to raise free people implausible. I doubt the Empress is doing her own wet nursing. I think if you were handed a list of everyone who "parented" Tuon in any meaningful sense, you will find few if any people on that list, who were not property when assigned to Tuon's care.

[Ozzie_aiel]

I don't hate the Seanchan Empire, I don't like some of their laws and customs, or the fact they believe the westlands should be theirs by right, but they are a stable government. They have bought law and order to Tarabon, united Altara for the first time in its history, stopped Whitecloak depradations in Amadacia. And for all their scheming, they appear to be, for the most part, noble and honourable.

 

They are exactly what the Westlands need, they just need to get rid of some of those stupid laws

[didymos]

From memory, the Seanchan exist because Ishmael spoke in Hawkwing's ear. I do not think Ishmael did that because he thought it would make a pleasant form of government to live under.

 

That was just planting the idea to send a fleet across the ocean. It removed an heir and helped ensure Hawkwing's empire fell apart once he died. Seanchan, the continent, was already there, as were most of the cultural practices and attitudes still current in the books' present. As RJ put it, the conquerors were absorbed by the natives to a large degree. Besides, you can hardly credit Ishy for the existence of something so complex and contingent and which the Prophecies of the Dragon apparently required.

 

I find your comments about owned people not being able to raise free people implausible. I doubt the Empress is doing her own wet nursing. I think if you were handed a list of everyone who "parented" Tuon in any meaningful sense, you will find few if any people on that list, who were not property when assigned to Tuon's care.

 

Selucia is the one who raised her (WH, CH 14). And, of course, she's da'covale.

[Ihasavowel]

That was just planting the idea to send a fleet across the ocean. It removed an heir and helped ensure Hawkwing's empire fell apart once he died. Seanchan, the continent, was already there, as were most of the cultural practices and attitudes still current in the books' present. As RJ put it, the conquerors were absorbed by the natives to a large degree. Besides, you can hardly credit Ishy for the existence of something so complex and contingent and which the Prophecies of the Dragon apparently required.

Ishy also introduced the antipathy to Aes Sedai that played a causal role in damane.

 

I am not giving Ismael credit as though this were the result of meticulous planning.

 

Subjugating a bunch of people, and reducing them legally and socially to the status of dangerous, owned, non-human, beasts, because one of the Forsaken convinced your father(/ancestor/rulers' [alleged] ancestors) that these kinds of people were universally darkfriends, is probably not going to be morally good, or even morally ambiguous, no matter how many native customs one adopts along with it, from the lands one is conquering (also, as a result of the intervention of one the Forsaken).

 

It looks like bad fruit, and additionally, it came from bad seeds, so there is a good chance that in fact it is bad fruit.

[Jagen Sedai]

I have to add, I seem to remember that many da'covale, at least the ones who wear the sheer robes, are chosen not because they were criminals, but because they were extremely good-looking.

 

Well, I don't remember if they happened to be good-looking criminals, but I can't remember da'covale being just made up of formal criminals.

 

As for the damane aspect, it is wrong yet of course to the Seanchan it is not. They know what Seanchan used to be like and when a solution presented itself, they took it--the a'dam. And human mentality being the way it is, if you're going to put someone on a leash, yes you're eventually going to regard them as less than human, and then treat them as such, too. It's a shame what the channelers have to go through, but it doesn't boggle my mind much--what does get to me though, is when a damane is freed and she goes crazy (exception being Alivia, of course). It is so ingrained in their culture they see nothing wrong with how they are treated, they just accept it as fact.

 

Anyway, Seanchan has it's ups-and-downs of how it operates. On one hand, you don't have people waring with each other [in Seanchan anyway]. Everyone knows their place but also know that they can rise in the ranks. That's neat, unless you are unfortunate enough to be a da'covale or damane. And Seanchan society is very dependent on them. It's too bad though, I hope Tuon actually passes something into law that make da'covale more like their eastern counterparts, the servants like in the Andor palace for example. That they are not property, and that they can be paid for their work, even if it is just a little pay.

 

But, the damane... I have a hard time believing they will disappear from Seanchan any time soon, even with the revelation on the sul'dam. If anything, this makes me think that they will try to create a'dam that don't require only sul'dam to operate them, but any woman. But, I think it would be nice for them to have better living conditions, at least. But I don't see them being unleashed [as a whole] any time soon.

It DOES seem ironic that the Seanchan use them for weapons, but the difference is that because the channeler is controlled, no one has to worry about the mess that was Seanchan before Artur's people came and "cleaned up." You need someone else to control them, and that someone else would be easier to murder, if needed, than the channeler herself.

 

Hm I think I rambled, sorry.

[Tom Sawyer]

What do you mean you don't have people warring with each other in Seanchan? The only thing we hear from the soldiers is about all the constant rebellions they've been putting down. Also, it really didn't take a hell of a lot for Semirhage to get the entire continent killing each other off. The descriptions of the place don't strike me as a very stable society, but one thinly held together by oppression and fear.

[Ihasavowel]

 

But, the damane... I have a hard time believing they will disappear from Seanchan any time soon, even with the revelation on the sul'dam. If anything, this makes me think that they will try to create a'dam that don't require only sul'dam to operate them, but any woman.

 

I do not think that would possible. The a'dam creates an involuntary link, so it has to be someone who can link, and that means someone who can channel.