General Discussion

I've always been bothered by rly "black and white" mindsets when it comes to morality and how the world works (and there have been plenty of other discussions abt the problematic implications of the specific "light vs dark" debate in relation to imperialism etc. etc. so I'll leave that as it is), but the one specific dichotomy that ALWAYS gets under my skin is anything relating to life/death (or, as FR here puts it, nature/plague).
this may have more to do w/ me growing into a very environmentally-conscious mindset, but it's just rly silly (and downright insulting) to think of death/decay as inherently "bad" and life/growth as inherently "good". I mean, what is life w/o death, or growth w/o decay? they're, essentially, opposite sides of the same coin. matter is neither created nor destroyed (as far as basic molecular science goes), thus any creation or destruction is simply a change from one state of being to another, so it's just so silly to me when people try to apply some kinda morality to that??? ANYTHING in excess can be a bad thing (think of what so often causes dead zones-- eutrophication!), there simply aren't ethical implications to the natural processes of life and death???

and honestly, this isn't a dig at FR at all (I actually think they did a good job at figuring out flights that would work well both on their own and as rivals to other specific flights, particularly in dominance), but just /in general/ I HATE it when life and death are pitted against one another. like, one piece of media that srsly bothered me was that one movie a few years back, Epic. it wasn't all that popular, so I don't doubt that not a lot of people have seen it, but it just pushed that whole, "GROWTH OF NATURE IS GOOD AND PURE, ROT AND DECAY IS BAD AND EVIL" thing SOOO much, I was honestly yelling the whole time, like, "WELL WHO'S GONNA ROT AWAY ALL YOUR DEAD CARCASSES, HUH?? DO U ALL PLAN ON LIVING AMONG THE DEAD BODIES OF UR LOVED ONES FOREVER?? WHAT ABOUT LAND MANAGEMENT, HOW DO U PLAN ON KEEPING YOUR POPULATIONS IN CHECK???"

/HUFFHUFF/ IDK LONG RANT, I just want to know if I'm the only one that gets so riled up abt this, aha

AND how do you plan on fertilizing the plants so that new life can grow.

Yes, I have always felt the same way. There is a beauty in death and a tragedy in life, but we never seem to look at that side of things. I understand why we don't, because we don't want ourselves or those we love to be towards the death and decay side of things, but still, to deny completely how they are both so necessary and interconnected... it irritates me, yes.

I'm one of those people that can see the beauty in both life and death.

Not to sound morbid or anything, but death to me isn't even scary. Not that I ever want myself or family members to die, but how I die is what worries me more. Obviously, I don't want to die early or in pain. But death itself is not painful - it's just the end. And sadly, for many people that are in pain it can sometimes be a blessing when that time comes. "Death" is always painted as some horrible thing when it's really not.

Personally, being in Nature, I love Plague and it'd be my second choice as far as flights go. Our ties with our sister flight just makes things so much more interesting from a lore perspective. We might have our sibling rivalries but it's all in good fun .. Plague is just the other side of the coin, as death and decay is a part of life too. Disease and decay need life to spread and thrive, just like life needs decay to thrive & grow new life.

Not to mention the earth would be a pretty hectic thing if nothing died. It's all about balance.

Sorry I ramble >.>

Yes, precisely!

Death isn't the antithesis of life, it's another part. An integral part. I don't see death as a bad thing. I get worried, sometimes, about it, because it's like this big unexplored thing that could be anything from cessation of existence to reincarnation to something in between, but there's no point to raging against death when it's something natural and necessary. : )

I've found that if you kind of wipe away your preconceived notions of what's 'good' and 'bad,' things like litter and decay can be just as beautiful as a flower. Not that I'm advocating that we throw our paper cups and plastic forks on the ground willy-nilly, of course. : P

@Dragimal

I can't really argue any of your points here, because I agree, but I just wanna say Epic was a terrible movie. Roald Dahl wrote a short story with very similar plot elements except it was like x1000000 times better, and I'm pretty sure they were ripping off of it.

Literally as soon as I saw the fairies riding on hummingbirds in the commercials I was like 'grr I smell uncredited influence from a much superior work.'

I think people think like that because everyone is so scared of death. I think it's very difficult for people to see it as good, even though it's necessary for balance in our environment. People should try to accept death, but I know that I have trouble seeing death as anything but horribly frightening and inevitable, even though I understand that the cycle of life and death is a miraculous thing.

we were put on this world to grow and die

untill the discover a *long life* potion... all i see is a short life on a half torn stick ready to snap when the time is right..

haha, it's cool to see I'm not the only one bothered! whenever I bring this up w/ my friends, they don't seem as bothered by it; like they just accept this sorta mindset. I'm glad to see some like-minded peeps!

@Asynchronous that too! how else would our lovely seedlings get their nutrients but thru our own flesh and blood?

@Lupen no worries abt the ramble, I totally feel ya! balance is a RLLLY big principle in my personal spiritual beliefs, so to see people disregard a very integral part of the process of life just grinds my gears. I only wish our Glademother and Plaguesister (is that what we Gladelings call Plaguebringer?) got along better-- they could create (and destroy) lovely things together, surely~

@ocularoracle honestly, that's one of the interesting things abt death, to me-- we just don't know! the 'end', as it were, could be anything at all, and it's rather exciting to think abt! what's that one quote, "to die would be an awfully big adventure," that's abt how I look at death. sure, I fear pain, and complications surrounding my death, but death itself... idk, it just seems like a new journey!

@Lesley oh, I had no idea! what was the name of the story?

@Kuhli I'm definitely w/ ya on immortality, Kuhli. I remember feeling horrified reading Tuck Everlasting back in middle school... /shivers/ what a horrible fate, to live forever...

@Dragimal You know, I'd have to look it up to be sure. It was in an anthology of his works I read when I was a kid along with several other short stories. I do remember that it referenced the Vermicious K'nid thing from Wily Wonka, though, oddly enough. It was about a boy who goes against the warnings of his mother to not venture into the forest and when he does he meets a race of fairies who ride on the backs of small birds. They teach him how to ride birds too, but over time he gets too big for all the birds except a swan, and he and the swan go on adventures.

It was an odd one for Roald Dahl for sure, the tone was completely different then the rest of his works. It was dead serious (even the Vermicious K'nid thing), sombre, and kind of sad at the end, but it was also sweet and clean as a whistle moral-wise.