My Fellow Londoners,
The election has arrived once more and with it a choice that will surely change London by a magnitude not seen since The Fall. Three futures stand before us, and while they may all seem bleak; one is a shining beacon compared to the alternatives. I am no friend of the anarchist, but I am the enemy of monster and devil, the enemies of us all, the very same enemies standing for election. The princess may appear fair and elegant, but make no mistake about it; her façade is only skin deep. “Make London Magnificent For Me” what a fitting slogan, it is her, and only her, that this London will be magnificent for! I have seen how she treats her own family in the pursuit of “beauty”; I shudder to think how she might treat us all given the power she seeks, how she might treat you. I have seen the anarchist do many despicable things, never have I seen them consume others. But at least the Princess can be trusted to care for London in its appearance, not so of the so-called “Mr. Slowcake”. Tell me, have you ever seen Mr. Slowcake, heard him speak, been so lucky as to meet the mysterious fellow? If you’ve ever met a devil, then I am afraid that you have. Mr. Slowcake and his “book” are nothing but a front, by which the devils can pick out the more valuable souls, so that they may be sent to the “proper station”. Let me assure you, to the devil the only proper station for our souls is Moloch Street. I quiver to think of devil meritocracy being the rule of law, but I am terrified thinking of what the devils might do should they take London, what they might do to us all: The Iron Republic is a short boat ride away should you wish to find out how that could end. Which leaves us with the ever jovial contrarian; is he a known associate of the anarchists? Yes. Did he run an opposite manifesto not two years ago? Yes. But does he care for London, is he a man of intellect that will look out for us all against the ever powerful Masters in the bizarre, the monstrous newlyweds in the palace, and the ravenous devils on your doorstep? Yes! The Contrarian is many things, not all of it good, but he is of flesh and blood like you and I. His is the only future before us that holds any hope. My Fellow Londoners I implore you; when the time comes, Pull Yourselves Together!
Yours Most Truly,
H.W.
The Contrarian is naught but a charlatan; his only passion is pontificating endlessly on subjects that do not matter in the least. Tell me, is this who you would want in charge of this city?
Why do you slander Mr. Slowcake so? Perhaps his existance is dubious, I will admit. But every candidate has their flaws; and we live in the Neath, populated by thinks which Are Not, things which would be better not, and things which everyone thinks aren’t. When has nonexistance stopped anyone from achieving great things? Certainly I can assure you it will have no impact on his efficient governing - I bring his outstanding record in public service, namely the impeccable upkeep of his namesake Exceptionals over the years, as direct proof of his competence and dedication. Moreover, you make it sound like being associated with Hell is some grave transgression; I say, devils have been part of our city for so many years, and have only brought improvement and advancement to our fair city! What have you against them? Are you perchance a supporter of that rabble-rouser nuthead of Southwark? And look at the goals, the very core of his campaign - Slowcake wishes to establish a true meritocracy, to unshackle our society from its old-fashioned ways that oppress and limit its citizen. Tell me, who of the other candidates claims to aspire to such an admirable goal?
And what baseless accusations you level against the Princess! A member of the Royal Family - the very own daughter of our beloved Empress - and you have the gall to say such things! Look around you - London is wilting; where is its former glory? Where is its fashion, its soul? Stolen by the devils, perchance, who crawl all over our beloved city like maggots, bringing fire and brass with them to tarnish it. The Princess merely wishes to rightfully restore what was lost - what has, dare I say it in this day and age, been stolen; I can scarce imagine a nobler goal, or a campaign that would better demonstrate a candidate’s love and passion for the city they would govern. Even the high society of today, the aristocracy, the wealthy and noble, have to deal with the ever-present threat of violence and crime; with the squalor that permeates every street; with the grubby urchins, the tomb-colonists, and all manner of other unsightly and unbecoming things. Is this really the kind of life even the very best of our city must aspire to? I say, no! We can do better, we can make our city resplendant, bring back the glory of the Crown - and only one candidate will do so!
Strange it is, Mr. Dudebro, that you would defend the devils who crawl across London in one breath, and then lay the blame of London’s folly at their feet with the next. While it is true that there are a variety of things which Are Not within the Neath, I would not vote any of them into office over our fair city, and that includes "Mr. Slowcake," who is naught but a front for those who would harvest our souls. Our souls, good sir!
Have you ever seen one who has been left without their soul? I’ve met several. They move, but without motivation. They smile, but without emotion. It is a lifeless and depressed existence that they live, and the creatures who keep track of our "notability" in order to rank which souls they seek to harvest would now try to reorganize our entire social structure in order to better suit their diabolical schemes.
And yet, they are hardly the primary source of our city’s troubles, as you claim. Worse than the devils who seek to steal our souls are the societal elite who would demolish buildings in Spite in order to build useless monuments and hold art exhibits that merely hide the sufferings of the poor and downtrodden, rather than aid them. I speak, of course, of The Captivating Princess, an utter narcissist who would treat her term as mayor like a personal vacation, blowing our treasury on parties for herself and her rich friends while the poor starve, who would destroy the homes of the poor so she can continue to pretend that they don’t exist, who would abandon the needs of our city the moment they become inconvenient for her. Even Mr. Slowcake would be a better mayor than her, and "he" doesn’t even exist!
Our friend H.W. speaks the truth, of both "Mr. Slowcake" and The Captivating Princess. If we wish to avoid certain disaster, there is only one clear choice. The Jovial Contrarian is a flawed candidate, it’s true. His stance on, quite literally, every possible issue has been… lacking in consistency, to say the least. But there’s nothing in all the stars that he could do to cause more damage to our city than the forces of Hell (Hell, my good sir!) and a self-obsessed monster worse than any devil. I’d rather have an inconsistent mayor who seeks to discover genuine truth through arguing multiple stances than one who would treat us as either differently-ranked sections on a diner’s menu or as their own personal plaything. He’s the best chance we have.
edited by Rhode Wardwado on 6/21/2018
My dear, how many of the soulless do you wager you’ve seen? Can you be certain that for each pair of dead eyes you’ve met, each listless breath beside you in the queue, there were not ten, twenty, a hundred more who passed you by unnoticed? While some of us do entertain a certain melancholy, or feel our passions dulled, an educated man such as yourself must know that in most cases the effect is hardly noticeable. And indeed, would it not be reasonable to observe that the intensity of the reaction varies with the temperament of the subject? Would it be so strange that those who hold most tightly to the familiar would be most affected when cut free from their burdens?
[li]
[quote=Gul al-Ahlaam]
My dear, how many of the soulless do you wager you’ve seen? Can you be certain that for each pair of dead eyes you’ve met, each listless breath beside you in the queue, there were not ten, twenty, a hundred more who passed you by unnoticed? While some of us do entertain a certain melancholy, or feel our passions dulled, an educated man such as yourself must know that in most cases the effect is hardly noticeable. And indeed, would it not be reasonable to observe that the intensity of the reaction varies with the temperament of the subject? Would it be so strange that those who hold most tightly to the familiar would be most affected when cut free from their burdens?
[li][/quote]
If you’re acknowledging being soulless, then I will admit with complete honesty that you’re the first I’ve spoken with who hasn’t reported to me an overwhelmingly negative reaction to the experience. I’m a bit intrigued, and would be interested in further correspondence on the topic another day, if you’re willing. But for now, my focus remains on doing everything I can to keep our city from falling into the hands of devils or other, less obvious kinds of monsters. And I still firmly believe that out of all three candidates, the Contrarian is the only one who even comes close to having our best interests at heart.
[/li]
Ahem.
While this open letter is a welcome addition to our public discourse and a fitting call to arms for one of London’s great rhetors and thinkers, it displays an unstated and potentially dangerous reactionary bias against the new cosmopolitan community within our city. In the democratic process, the citizenry is anticipated to vote according to what they perceive as their best interest. To argue that the Jovial Contrarian alone, because of his humanity, serves the interests of London is to imply that the state of inhumanity itself precludes the possibility of improving the status of London and its people.
This is the line of reasoning used to justify murdering Rubbery Men in the streets, and what fanned the flames of war three decades ago.
I have no doubt that this was not the intent of the letter, but I nonetheless posit that we must learn to let go of these prejudices and allow ourselves to evaluate the candidates solely by their policies and their personality (or lack thereof). Humans, devils, and monsters alike pursue their own interests. It is not impossible for the interests of London and the interests of these devils and monsters to align.
The Captivating Princess may be a ruthless, cruel, spoiled monster of a princess, but her platform is dedicated to making a more beautiful London. Public art can bring together communities. It can inspire new generations and improve quality of life. It can even offer opportunities for struggling artists to rise up economically - it is well-known that royal or noble patronage can bring even the lowest of the low to the heights of society. With the Princess as the sole judge, however, and understanding her history of censoring the press and blatant disregard for separation of powers and basic human dignity, I would hate to allow her into Blythenhale, but she receives support even in Spite in spite of her being a monster because her interests are not inherently at odds with those of London.
The devils behind Mr. Slowcake are very much the same. While the devils bear some responsibility for the tragedies of the soul trade, one cannot confuse the actions of spirifers with those of devils. It is the spirifers who steal from the poor, the needy, and the hungry, cheating them of their soul for a day’s worth of bread. Devils permit this atrocity to continue because they benefit, but are we not the same for partaking in the economic system of a fundamentally broken society? Every Echo in the city has been dirtied with blood, crime, and death. Every piece of Rostygold donated to the church or constabulary very likely entered circulation by way of violence. We are the engine by which this economy runs, just as the devils are the engines by which the soul trade runs. We cannot blame them for acting in their own interest; we can only consider how to align our interests with theirs.
Enter Mr. Slowcake.
The progression of souls is quite clear. Souls carry a piece of us with them, and they are valued accordingly. While some collectors may find exceptional common souls to be, like mother-of-pearl, beautiful in their own right as the beginning of something great, it is clear that the value of the soul increases as it grows ever more brilliant. To maximize the value of a harvest, the devils would ideally seek to elevate their quarry to brilliance. Slowcake’s Exceptionals offers a way for devils to identify already valuable individuals, but the meritocracy they seek now offers opportunities to rise to brilliance: to grow the pie, if you will, when considering the collective value of London’s souls. The interests of the devils then may align with our own. There are prices to pay, though: the executive power the Mayor would wield in restructuring society, redistributing property, and nationalizing entire areas of the city offers a substantial risk (even more so than risking the blurring of the line between the Crown and the commons), especially in the absence of a written constitution delineating the distribution of rights and powers.
For the Contrarian, there is no reason to not question his policies and allegiances in the same manner. He still pursues revolution with his policies, but a softer one: by removing the constabulary from the influence of the Ministry of Public Decency, the capability of the Masters to suppress seditionary and revolutionary texts in significantly diminished. I am no enemy of the revolution but bear in mind that law and order are not one and the same.
In summary, democracy means voting in accordance with one’s principles and vested interests. There is no reason to assume that a lack of humanity in a candidate prevents it from acting in accordance with those principles and interests. I suspect that I will ally myself with the Contrarian in this coming election - and it is in that spirit that I dedicate this argument against my own candidate - but it will not be because the Contrarian alone is truly human or because I believe neither of the other candidates aligns with our interests, but because I believe the Contrarian’s policies to offer the greatest net positive benefit for our society.
If it helps, I believe the Contrarian would commend your argument to downplay a potential advantage towards his campaign to set moral reasoning first, then endorsing him in the same breath. It follows suit that an argument need not be straightforward to hit its mark.
I would also approve of your point, what with having argued for the humanization of the Neath’s various species for some time now. We have seen just as much humanity in so-called monsters as we have in ourselves. Devils are notorious for crafted personas and heartbreaking lies for the prize of a person’s soul. Yet still, we have seen genuine emotion from time to time in our infernal neighbors, and even they give true heart to matters of politics. I believe that, while many of the Embassy are a ruthless lot no better than the wayward criminal, there remain few among them that hold a genuine interest in the change of modern society. And what is there to say for humans who have forgone our species? Are we to question the sincerity of every soulless, or measure the fiber of those close to Rubbery sympathies? Must we check the bloodline of every urchin, or scrape the scalp of every citizen for a mask? Human or not, they are still people that matter as much as you or me.
Where my stance remains in the Contrarian’s favor is the definition of "monster" relying on the metaphorical rather than the physical. Though I do not deny the humanity of devils and their passion for revolution, I do not trust Hell’s government and their plans for the average citizen. Hunts in the Forgotten Quarter, the profit of souls from ill-treated humans, and the meddling of affairs as a playful game, all are proof of the organization’s callousness to London’s well-being. I may give the benefit of doubt to a few, but it would be foolish to place full trust in Mr Slowcake’s campaign as though they had only the purest of intentions. Unless next week’s digging shows candidate (whose legality as such is questionable at best) has pried themselves from Hell’s influence, I would not place faith in them. Need I clarify on the evils of the Princess? She’s the star of individuals wishing to throw their lot in with the most heinous and chaotic campaign. Crimes against citizenry and human health are enough to sully her name, leaving her only for those who hold out hope for some benefit from her so-called "plan" or the voters that willingly accept her evils for the sake of fun. Is there any surprise that the Jovial Contrarian’s revolutionary ties are less of a concern when compared to other candidates’ skeletons? Revolutionaries are a mixed lot with a wide range in members from the righteous to the horrid, but out of any revolutionary, the Contrarian is the most moderate. A distaste for the faction’s darker intentions, a respect for the democratic process in favor of chaos or order alike, and a heckler of every side make him more restrained than any other member. I will not say everyone must love his argumentative nature, nor that they must approve of his flip in politics to reform the social order present rather than uproot it. All I ask is that you question if he is really the greater evil amongst a city of true monsters.