Never
mind that just because your old doesn't mean that you are somehow
innocent, hell we've had senior citizen serial killers
http://www.crimelibrary.com/serial_killers/partners/copelands/index.html
What
caught my interest was the difference between what was right and what
was legal, and how that applies to world building.
Anyone
who has watched the news, or read a paper, or surfed the net in the
last few years has come across some story of where what was legal
and what was just were at odds
with each other. That's real life unfortunately. Perfectibility is
something humans have mostly failed at since recorded history.
Religion, and entire schools of philosophers have offered various
bits of advice, yet we still fail. Logically, it would follow, that
if humans are incapable of perfection, then man-made institutions
would also be imperfect.
However,
imperfect does not mean worthless. Would you cry over a test that was
95% correct? If your sports team were successful 80% of the time,
would you abandon them? Of course not! We understand that while
perfection is a goal, it is not always attainable, and we will have
another chance to excel tomorrow.
In
the real world, if we abandon the legal code, as flawed as it is, to
ensure subjective “justice,” a likely result will be a descent
into anarchy. Interesting story, not so fun to live through. In the
end we have a flawed system, but it beats the crap out of none, where
might makes right. We also know that lots of people and groups are
trying to improve our legal system. This is also true of most human
endeavors, from construction to science to rules of governance, there
is a recognition that there is a current trade-off, but the desire to
keep improving is always there as a penultimate goal. One day we may
finally get there.
Another
important factor, laws only work if the government has the ability to
enforce them. If I clone and raise a pet T-Rex as my mode of
transportation, a cop could try and pull me over as “Bessie,”
stomped down the highway. However, my nine tons of dino versus his
two tons of car, could make for a very short interaction. Same if I
had the Batmobile, or a tank. Now think of the cascade of what would
happen off scene, if I ignored the cop, or had Bessie stomp on his
cruiser, or worse, turned our poor cop into a dino snack. In real
life there will be consequences, and reactions from others, for any of the above, and in your
stories there should be as well.
You
have a character in your world who is rushing to the scene of a
crime, or to stop an atrocity, or stop the love of his life from
getting on that plane, or to pay his bill before cable is cut off,
the reason is not as important as the impediments. Whether a cop, or
a secretary protecting her boss from maniacs, or some pencil-necked
bureaucrat who lives to make sure forms are filled out properly, all
of these types of people exist in the real world, and should in yours
as well.
We
exist in a world where our time and money are constantly demanded by
others. Junk mail, advertising, sales pitches, legal and semi-legal
extortion, generic time wasting morons, and representatives of
government, all make demands on us, for our time and money. Some of
these walking headaches should bleed over into your stories. Then
there are the frustrations of dealing with life, like paying for
things we need, like food, and want, like television and cable, and
how we find a way to pay for those things. Utopia, where everyone is
nice, there are no bills or demands on our time, is not only
unrealistic but boring. If everything is perfect, everything
functions as it should, where is the conflict, the chance to rise
above, the challenge to do the “right,” if not the “legal”
thing? Where is the drama?
There
should be the small petty frustrations, the doubts that plague
everyone, as well as the interpersonal conflict, and the struggle to
achieve the main goal, just as there is in real life, in any story
wishes to be vivid, rather than flat.
No comments:
Post a Comment