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With This Ring (Young Justice SI) (Thread Fourteen)

Discussion in 'Creative Writing' started by Mr Zoat, Jan 27, 2019.

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  1. Cuchulin

    Cuchulin Versed in the lewd.

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    The Accords were a good idea, what was actually in them and what they actually did was beyond stupid especially in a Super Hero Universe as they would have required a group of mostly AMERICANS to get permission from the UN before they did anything. A better idea is to let them get permission after the fact via after action reviews, because a Alien invasion or a killer robot trying to end life on earth isn't going to wait for 'mother may I'. Also the entire thing in the MCU was based on Tony's egocentric guilt trip over Ultron and him STILL not learning that just because he is always the smartest man in any room he is in... doesn't make him the wisest or give him the right to make decisions for other people.
     
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  2. Pinklestia

    Pinklestia Well worn.

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    I would complain on how this idiot was able to build an Empire so big but then... real life is full of real life examples of people like him.

    So are the GLs and like a dozen other civilisations and they usually do nothing but stay in their own little corner of the universe instead of sharing the tech.

    Well the GLs like to be the police of the universe but besides that?

    Meh.
     
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  3. Darko

    Darko Connoisseur.

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    Yeah if you want Tony to help you fix something or make you a time machine from a can of soda then he's your guy, but for everything else...ehh.

    His decision to support the Accords wasn't even guided by logic in the movies, rather because a grieving mother blamed him for her sons death, despite the fact that thousands, if not millions, more would have died if they had done nothing.

    This was basically the catalyst that made him support the Accords, on top of his daddy issues, abandonment issues, drinking issues, the untreated PTSD from his kidnapping and nearly dying when NY was invaded and his guilt over Ultron.

    Tony is a brilliant man when it comes to science and tech, but that's about the only areas where he is brilliant in.

    Really hope that if MCU Paul meets Tony he gets him some seriously needed therapy.

    Ohoh, yes.
     
  4. Pinklestia

    Pinklestia Well worn.

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  5. Handlewithcare

    Handlewithcare Versed in the lewd.

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    Absolutely, Ross needed to go. Instead Cap practically proved his arguments of the Avengers being out of control.

    SHIELD is another argument for the accords. People playing world police with alien tech and superpowers an no public oversight. And they constantly screw up. Especially in the series.

    And why did thecri inal get the chance to blow him up? Because he said "Bucky" to Cap. Making him freeze.

    Wanda getting blamed was ridiculous, true. And Cap never said anything,iirc, letting her get blamed.

    Him and Banner. And again, Ultron activated the moment they left the room. Highly suspicious.

    But yeah, there should have laws in place for "poking alien stuff", another good points for the accords.

    And if SHIELD would have had public UN oversight that might not have happened.

    So americans can just go and do whatever in ither countries?

    Making decisions for other people is pretty much a superhero job description. Also what Cap literally wanted. " The best hands are our own" and all that.

    Who in that room was wiser than Tony?
     
  6. Darko

    Darko Connoisseur.

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    HYDRA basically infiltrated more than just SHIELD, so any oversight the UN gives them would be pointless as the ones doing the oversight could be HYDRA agents.
     
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  7. Cuchulin

    Cuchulin Versed in the lewd.

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    No, the UN also doesn't get to tell Captain Britain or Red Guardian what to do either, at least not before hand. That is because it's not only a question of things like sovereignty but that the UN makes up it's mind so slowly that even snails comment on how slow it is. The entire point of the Avengers is to take swift action against overwhelming threats.

    Wiser than Tony? Cap, Thor, Natasha, Clint and Wanda. Point is Tony was on another of his 'I am Tony Stark, smartest man in history and there for knows better than anyone about everything' kicks. The exact same thing that created Ultron in the first place.
    He presented the accords to everyone as a done deal and 'my way or the highway' thing to the TEAM. Caps point was OUR hands, not the man who had cause more problems than everyone else combined with his blind confidence in his own IQ or having them wait around to be told what to do by the UN or the American government.
     
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  8. Idkusername

    Idkusername Versed in the lewd.

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    Either HYDRA has been revealed and the threat is resolved, or the Avengers aren't aware of them and shouldn't favtor into the decision at all (it's the former, if I remember correctly).
     
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  9. Darko

    Darko Connoisseur.

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    There may be some of their agents left that can still influence governments, plus the corruption that they spread would make people reluctant to trust them.
     
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  10. TheMidnightRook

    TheMidnightRook Well worn.

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    Technically, the way it's phrased...
    ...they'd be able to take action without UN permission as long as it was cleared by the local government. Or without permission at all as long as it were in their own country. Though it also means that action could be approved unilaterally by the UN without bothering to ask the local government.

    For me, the really concerning part is:
    Complete dealbreaker.
     
  11. Ace Dreamer

    Ace Dreamer Questioning The Nature of our Realities

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    The Accords, the Civil War, the Fifty States Initiative.

    The MCU was basically recycling what was seen by Marvel as the successful Civil War from the comics. And, that was a 'get the heroes to fight each other' chunk of stories, with some rather blatant messing with characters (particularly Iron Man). So, the explosion destroying the town is transformed by MCU into Scarlet Witch actions.

    A lot of this is about secret identities, and power, the whole registering and controlling of those with super powers bit. Who do you trust to hold such information, and be confident they wont misuse it? This is an information management issue. The answer 'have a central database', with no access/total access permission logic, is really, really, stupid.

    One suggestion I found interesting is the real-world logic of revealing the identities of Special Forces members. Who is in what group is apparently not held in a central database, it's only known locally. It might be backed-up, encrypted, somewhere, with multiple keys so you need several to cooperate and unlock it, and that it's been unlocked, and for what exact reason, is recorded. But, we don't get told about that.

    On the power side of things, what does 'enhanced' mean? Reminds me, a bit, about the black-belt martial artists needing to register their hands as 'deadly weapons' fun-and-games...
     
  12. Handlewithcare

    Handlewithcare Versed in the lewd.

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    The guy wo never fnished bootcamp and is 80 years out of date, the guy who almost started a war over a hissyfit, Nat agreed with Tony, Clint wise? And Wanda joined Hydra willingly. Yup. Totally wiser and more experienced than the guy leading a successfull fortune 500 for decades, playing politics and being a genius.

    And it's weird how it's all about Tony's ego when it was over a hundred countries that decdied this. Stark is powerful but not that powerful. Tony and Nat said it: it will happen anyway. Let's try to steer.

    Given Cap's actions it's clear it was his ego that was the problem. Unwilling to talk or listen, attacks people when they disagree, lies about murder to get his way...
     
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  13. Darko

    Darko Connoisseur.

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    Cap probably received training after he was allowed to be deployed on the field, plus with the enhanced intelligence provided by the serum he would have aced it, and while the world has progressed technologically since he was frozen some attitudes still remain even in today's world that were alive during his time, like committing actions that seem sensible at first to the people deciding to commit them, but may do more harm than good in the long run.
    Cap has also been unfrozen for several years and while he may not know some things it would be stupid to think he hasn't learnt anything about how the modern world works.

    Thor actually got over his issues, Tony not so much.

    Tony actually didn't run Stark Industries all that much, Obadiah and Pepper did that, while he focused on inventing things, and drinking, and partying.

    He also didn't so much as play politics as he didn't exactly have the patience for that and just preferred to throw his money around and used his fame as Iron Man after the reveal to get his way, not all that great acts of political cunning.

    Tony is a tech genius, he is extremely good with technology.

    Just because someone is a genius in a certain field doesn't mean that they are a genius in all fields, hell they may be even utterly incompetent in other fields.

    High intellect doesn't equate wisdom, and due to all of Tony's untreated emotional problems he may have trouble learning from his mistakes and is prone to letting his traumas influence his thinking to a great degree. He let his guilt influence his decision to support the Accords because that woman blamed him for the death of her son.

    The rest, while some of them may have their own issues, aren't a therapists wet dream of emotional baggage and problems.
     
    Last edited: May 29, 2020
  14. Rebu

    Rebu hey, little Anna, you're the one

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    Huh? Plenty of people at the time argued that Tony was right. In fact, people praised the Russos for giving him a stronger position than the one in the comics, where Team Reg got authoritarian and tyrannical in a hurry. They tried to arrest Cap for not enforcing the SHRA before it was even in effect.

    Ross put Sokovia and Lagos up on the screen. Wanda looked away, distressed. Steve asked Ross to move on.

    Not to mention the dealbreaker during his discussion with Tony was Tony confining Wanda.

    The World Security Council in Avengers was led by a HYDRAnt. Who says the UN is any better? The Avengers are best as a Rapid Reaction Task Force, like Team RAINBOW.

    And one word I would never use to describe the UN is "rapid".

    If HYDRA infiltrated shield, they could infiltrate anyone. Cap specifically points out how the government could keep them from responding. Or point them at the wrong people.

    We saw some in Ant-Man. And even more in AOS.

    You mean the guy who basically let his secretary and dad's pal run the company?

    Nat agreed with Tony, then changed her mind. Clint's real superpower isn't marksmanship, it's perception and awareness. On every level. The first thing we see him do in Avengers is point out something some of the smartest and most paranoid people on Earth haven't though about the Tesseract research.

    He's also shown himself to be consistently stable, well-adjusted, and intelligent, barring occasional things like mind control and grief from semicide.
     
  15. Darko

    Darko Connoisseur.

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    Even if most of HYDRAs agents were removed from their positions they've still had decades to corrupt the organizations to the point cleaning them up would most likely take decades.
     
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  16. Idkusername

    Idkusername Versed in the lewd.

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    Look, this is spiralling out of control. We can continue if Mr Zoat gives the OK, or one of us can make a separate thread for this.
     
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  17. Kalem_Lee

    Kalem_Lee Well worn.

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    To go back to WtR, Paul is handling well enough as...Overseer? Mediator?

    There's no need to do more imo until prompted.
     
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  18. Cuchulin

    Cuchulin Versed in the lewd.

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    Agreed, part of Civil War was Tony making basically the same mistake he and Banner made in Age of Ultron in ignoring what others had to say or might say in favor of his own judgement. The very thing the lead to Ultron being created in the first place, that resulted in him being kidnapped, that created the AIM and so on.
     
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  19. Ardy

    Ardy I trust you know where the happy button is?

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    Well, the governments of nearly every nation on the planet and Tony. But don’t worry, they all forgave the international terrorists because LOOK ALIENS!
     
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  20. Stsword

    Stsword Versed in the lewd.

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    Yes, Darko, that was the point of the conversation, discussing how Zoat might want to lower their impressiveness to explain why cosmic conflicts like the Reach and Apokalips are things beyond "The Cooperative didn't consider them worth the effort."

    Although in this fic it would be perfectly in theme for Paul to find out that in fact Icon's people could have crushed the Reach and Apokalips in an afternoon but were too busy doing important things like naval gazing.
     
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  21. Darko

    Darko Connoisseur.

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    After said terrorists helped fight those aliens that were killing a shit on of innocent people.

    Oh and the fact that they had a pretty good track record of saving the world before the Accords fiasco could have also greatly helped them.
     
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  22. Cuchulin

    Cuchulin Versed in the lewd.

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    First off one mans terrorist is another mans freedom fighter, Caps team were turned into "terrorist" because they objected to a horrible law that was there to knee cap there ability to deal with things like Alien invasions or HYDRA or Ultron. Second those "terrorists" spent most of their time on the run hunting down and taking out the remnants of Hydra. Third we weren't talking about the governments of the world so much as Tony who decided for everyone on the team that they should accept and would accept being bound by that horrible law because HE fucked up, not because he talked to anyone else before hand or because the team as a group made a mistake but because he and Banner decided to ignore Thor's advice as well as the teams agreement that they shouldn't mess with the Mind Stone in any way. So in the end it was about Tony working to holding every one accountable for HIS hubris and HIS epic fuck up in creating Ultron.
     
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  23. Threadmarks: Low Politics (part 10)
    Mr Zoat

    Mr Zoat Dedicated ragequitter

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    7th April
    17:57 GMT +2


    "I know you like to pretend-"

    "… second stage, undercutting and displacing local suppliers, aided by the socio-political instability…"

    Mister Luthor has recovered somewhat, but now… He's getting a better idea of what he's hearing.

    "-that you're not a supervillain-"

    "…leveraging our privileged position to fully monetise the opportunities provided…"

    And praise be to Ploutos, I don't think he likes it. I think he's actually disgusted by it. That someone like this can succeed as a trade-prince.

    "-but if you wanted to-"

    "…seventh stage, welcomed with open arms by local stakeholders due to the collapse…"

    Or I could just be projecting, there.

    "-take over the ClusterCorp-"

    "… a new chapter in the history of both Earth and the ClusterCorp-. Though at that point those two will be the same."

    "-I'd totally help."

    "Your confidence is appreciated."

    Lord-Lantern Comic King turns to face us, throwing his arms up in exultation!

    "Any questions?!"

    "Just.. one. I was going over the briefing material which L-Ron gave me, and I couldn't help but notice that some of your.. business tactics are.. awfully similar to those employed by the Reach. Now, as I'm sure you're aware-."

    He points at me with his right hand!

    "Copyright strike!"



    "I'm-? I'm sorry?"

    "Huh." He looks at his right hand. "I thought that was how people on Earth stopped each other talking about subjects they didn't want them to. Perhaps it only works for natives."

    "Um. That's not-."

    "Though there may be some superficial similarities between the Holy Writ of the Rrrrrrr and the business plans of ClusterCorp, but if so then it is merely an example of convergent evolution as plans are darwinistically trialled and either continued or discarded. Naturally, this has resulted in a degree of similarity, considering that our objectives are often similar, at least in the initial phases, but the Rrrrrrr-."

    "I'm sorry, what was that?"

    "A degree of similarity between, considering that our objectives and theirs are-."

    "Whose?"

    "Our… Competitors, and-."

    "And who are they? What are they called? The… Reach?"

    "The R-. The R-. The Rrrrrrr-."

    Mister Luthor shakes his head.

    "I don't really think-"

    "-rrrrrr-."

    "-we need to hear him pronounce-"

    "-rrrrrrrrrr-"

    "-the word 'Reach'. Though I can recommend a good voice coach-"

    "-rrrrrrrrrr-"

    "-if you think that it would help."

    The meeting room door opens and L-Ron flies in at speed, a small cylinder deploying from his chassis!

    "M'lord! Your inhaler!"

    "-rrrrrrrrrr-" Manga Khan grabs the cylinder and plugs it into a port in the side of his helmet. There's a gasping noise as the cylinder crumples. "-reach. Reach. Reach. Thank you, L-Ron."

    "You're welcome, sir."

    Mister Luthor and I share a glance. I hadn't realised that Manga Khan's species could have speech impediments.

    "So." Manga Khan slams his hands down on the table. "What say you?"

    "I think that some of the local governments may take issue with some of those steps."

    "Of course! Competition is a vital part of the capitalist experience!"

    "Yes, good. Um. Well, I agree that competition is vital to spur progress. I'm not sure that you're correctly modelling legislative impacts and -frankly- social panic and human ingroup-outgroup psychology. But I do have contacts amongst your target marketisation groups and can arrange meetings with potential suppliers."

    Mister Luthor nods.

    "I… Was planning to offer my services as a go-between for your negotiations with the United Nations, but your business plan-" And this time I do see him swallow his distaste. "-appears to involve you bypassing them entirely. Is that your opening position, or are you truly committed to it?"

    "What works is what works. I, Lord-Lantern Manga Khan, and through me ClusterCorp, have no interest in appeasing market-oppressors! Any group who wishes to persuade me to do business with them would be wise to make me a convincing offer!"

    "M'lord, you're shouting again."

    Manga Khan stiffens slightly, then raises his arms to shoulder height and makes an.. odd crackling noise as he slowly lowers them back down again.

    "And done. Perfectly calm. Perfectly rational."

    "Am I to understand that you will only comply with local laws if those laws provide you with a greater advantage than you could get by operating outside of them?"

    Manga Khan waves his right hand, and… Dozens-. Hundreds of messages begin playing, accompanied by holographic representations of the sound wave. They appear to be… People seeking to buy or sell various objects or services. Some are.. purely speculative, and some are offering things which are quite illegal.

    "I have the high ground. The racket is in my court, and I am ideally placed to kick it out of the parking lot. Seventeen minor governments have already purchased non-interference contracts. Two more have entered negotiations to rent our surface-to-space lift capacity. And that is ignoring the thousands offering to pay to see us ungarbed."

    Mister Luthor's eyes dip for a second. Big countries probably haven't started making overt moves yet, but ClusterCorp has no investment in the Earth's current power balance. Building a satellite is relatively cheap. If countries other than the US could make observation satellite networks… That's an… Interesting leveller.

    "As a member of a species that doesn't reproduce sexually, that latter request puzzles me, but a merchant like myself is obliged only to satisfy the demands of the client-base. Lex Luthor, you said that you had an offer for me?"
     
    Last edited: Jun 12, 2020
  24. Cherico

    Cherico Connoisseur.

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    this right here is why you keep lex Luthor alive, its time for him to save the human race.
     
  25. RichardWhereat

    RichardWhereat Aia airëa Fëanáro.

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    Yes. Lex does have an offer. 20 quid to see him slowly ungarb.
     
  26. Citizen

    Citizen Well worn.

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    How much karma is Mr. Luthor paying off right now?
     
  27. Rebu

    Rebu hey, little Anna, you're the one

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    Ah, yes.

    The Internet.

    (looks at current location)

    Oh, right.
     
  28. Handlewithcare

    Handlewithcare Versed in the lewd.

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    At least three.



    Yup, as predicted. He's a massive, capitalist threat.

    New theory: Dox has realised that Earth's fractured government is a threat to everyone and sent Khan as a almost-harmless stress-test to show them these issues.

    Or to distract Paul while he does something, again, he does not agree with.

    Or to get rid of Khan in a way that does not lower his social standing in the Corps by making him appear tyranical.

    Or, knowing Dox, all of the above and a few things more.
     
  29. Darko

    Darko Connoisseur.

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    Considering the fact that Earth seems to produce advanced tech that doesn't make sense and the world is fractured into hundreds of governments there may be a risk that if they go to the stars then they'll bring their problems with them.

    So the first theory may hold some truth to it.
     
  30. w34v3r

    w34v3r Versed in the lewd.

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    Yeah the longer this goes on the more annoyed I am that the Earth governments fobbed this off on Paul instead of doing their fucking jobs.
     
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