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sebmojo posted:putting aside the resurrection (just yada yada the ten billion angry ghosts), he is absolutely pursuing a genocidal 10,000 year long war of conquest that murders planets. he could stop at any time. I think it's clear that he can't. He can only keep up appearances but his rage is now unbounded.
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Dec 14, 2023 00:15
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Yeah, I would argue it's pretty clear that Dad-joke John is a very thin veneer over a 10,000 year old inhuman monster, it's just he's pretending really, really hard that it isn't — the only thing I would question is whether he's also trying to fool himself. (Broad spoilers tagged in case there are new readers on the new page)
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Dec 14, 2023 00:26
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I've reached the epilogue of the Harrow audiobook and it sets up Nona better than I remembered. I have some thoughts about how it's all going to end, probably don't read unless you've finished Nona: I think John is the villain who will be defeated by the end of the series. He sits on the throne of a decaying empire that can't sustain itself because it's built on death magic (thanergy) rather than life magic (thalergy). It's literally impossible for his civilization to grow because they're a 9 house death cult who worship necromancy, and necromancers are weak and pathetic except for their magic. His whole death-based empire is entropy, falling apart - like trying to find a decent rapier in the ninth house but it's actually all of them. He couldn't even recruit new lyctors to replace the ones he was losing, he had 5 at the beginning of Harrow but by the time Nona starts he is down to just Ianthe (who is an infant in lyctor terms). I think Blood of Eden seeing the houses as "loving zombies" is 100% accurate and the only way John has kept his empire going has been war/conquest/dominion of non-zombiefied planets. His "perfect lyctorhood" with Alecto will have to be investigated, his ties to Dominicus are strange. He might be some sort of solar system class revenant who is bound to Dominicus, and that's why Mercymorn disintegrating his human form wasn't enough to kill him.
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Dec 14, 2023 00:35
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cptn_dr posted:Yeah, I would argue it's pretty clear that Dad-joke John is a very thin veneer over a 10,000 year old inhuman monster, it's just he's pretending really, really hard that it isn't — the only thing I would question is whether he's also trying to fool himself. That's a good way to put it. This is a tragedy, after all. He got what he wanted, but it was more than he bargained for. I find him to be very human (pre-Resurrection), and very much no longer human afterwards.
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Dec 14, 2023 00:42
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More like 4.1 than 5
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Dec 14, 2023 01:54
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mdemone posted:Nonagesimus. It's right in Harrow's loving name. Goddamnit.
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Dec 14, 2023 02:02
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mllaneza posted:Goddamnit. Thank you. I know that I'm not alone.
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Dec 14, 2023 02:45
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Mad Hamish posted:I don't think that dinner party was fun for anyone except the reader. Trying to have one doesn't mean succeeding.
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Dec 14, 2023 02:51
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Please, John isn't even half a Muad'Dib in terms of galactic genocide.
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Dec 14, 2023 03:41
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MonsieurChoc posted:Please, John isn't even half a Muad'Dib in terms of galactic genocide. I'm only counting earth, I'm sure he didn't sit on his hands in the following ten thousand years
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Dec 14, 2023 04:09
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I'm imagining a Garfield strip, but instead of having eaten all the lasagna, Jon Arbuckle is comically upset that Jod mass murdered AGAIN. Gideon plays Otis.
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Dec 14, 2023 05:06
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MonsieurChoc posted:Please, John isn't even half a Muad'Dib in terms of galactic genocide. "I see a war, in my name" I think Muir is driving toward a lot of the same focus points as Herbert was.
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Dec 14, 2023 05:57
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My Dune analogy for John is "Leto II if he floated up from the chasm, declared "*I* am the Golden Path", and incinerated Siona and Duncan on the spot (plus all Tleilaxu propaganda about his sexual proclivities was spot on)".
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Dec 14, 2023 15:51
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John is a human being trying to be god. He just sucks at it, because human beings can’t be god, no matter how much power they accumulate. This is a pretty straightforward reading in my mind — being strong enough to quash any dissent doesn’t give you any moral authority, and indeed, John is morally bankrupt, because it’s the only justification he’s got. John’s primary motivation is that he wants things to be easy. He’ll act like a normal, overwhelmed guy if that makes things easier, and he’ll act like unknowable, almighty God if that makes things easier, but it’s foolish to believe either one is real. We’re dealing with a person who would lie to you about the time of day if it made him feel better for ten seconds.
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Dec 15, 2023 17:47
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On the other hand John has the strength to just make his immorality the new standard, but his preconcieved notions and trying to be "liked" by his cult means he only goes halfway in on the commitment. John however is too lazy and spineless for that sort of societal change.bravesword posted:John’s primary motivation is that he wants things to be easy. He’ll act like a normal, overwhelmed guy if that makes things easier, and he’ll act like unknowable, almighty God if that makes things easier, but it’s foolish to believe either one is real. We’re dealing with a person who would lie to you about the time of day if it made him feel better for ten seconds.
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Dec 15, 2023 17:54
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bravesword posted:John is a human being trying to be god. He just sucks at it, because human beings can’t be god, no matter how much power they accumulate. This is a pretty straightforward reading in my mind — being strong enough to quash any dissent doesn’t give you any moral authority, and indeed, John is morally bankrupt, because it’s the only justification he’s got. "Absolute power corrupts absolutely," applies to previously corrupted souls, too.
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Dec 15, 2023 17:55
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bravesword posted:John’s primary motivation is that he wants things to be easy. he's just like me fr fr
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Dec 16, 2023 00:03
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bravesword posted:— being strong enough to quash any dissent doesn’t give you any moral authority, and indeed, John is morally bankrupt, because it’s the only justification he’s got. That was well put
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Dec 16, 2023 00:04
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bravesword posted:John is a human being trying to be god. He just sucks at it, because human beings can’t be god, no matter how much power they accumulate. This is a pretty straightforward reading in my mind — being strong enough to quash any dissent doesn’t give you any moral authority, and indeed, John is morally bankrupt, because it’s the only justification he’s got. On the other hand, John is directly comparable to the Biblical god and his cults like the cults that formed around it. Both of them cleansed an Earth they thought was too full of sin, and let live only the people they deemed innocent enough. Both of them have the faithful martyr themselves in their name. The old testament god especially is consumed with vengeance like John is, smiting peoples and cities, and his chosen people are commanded to go on an exodus, or to go to war, just as the necromancers must move from planet to planet, just as they must war. The new testament god collected apostles around him, and like the lyctors, they pretty much all were executed in his service. This is an all-powerful god. Could he not have saved Matthias from burning? Could he not have saved Peter and Paul from crucifixion? John doesn't really need to run from the resurrection beasts; did the apostles really need to die in such gruesome ways? The books are a way to reflect on what Christianity says about itself, but removed from the context of religion where it may be harder to examine. But there are far too many parallels to scripture for John to simply just be a portrait of man's inability to this wield power.
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Dec 16, 2023 01:00
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Uranium Phoenix posted:(Harrow spoilers and Bible spoilers ahead) *claps happily* Yes! Yes!
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Dec 16, 2023 01:02
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YHWH never ate peanuts in a meeting, though.
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Dec 16, 2023 01:11
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Rogue AI Goddess posted:YHWH never ate peanuts in a meeting, though. The New Testament was the barest "human-like" gloss on the Old Testament, as retroactively told by people who hadn't been there. Sounds about right.
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Dec 16, 2023 01:35
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StumblyWumbly posted:I'm imagining a Garfield strip, but instead of having eaten all the lasagna, Jon Arbuckle is comically upset that Jod mass murdered AGAIN. Gideon plays
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Dec 16, 2023 01:39
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Rogue AI Goddess posted:YHWH never ate peanuts in a meeting, though. Once... Very quietly...
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Dec 16, 2023 02:05
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My point, as always, is that humanity deserved to be destroyed in service of the biosphere, but John did not understand what that would entail, and he didn't know an RB from an Arab.
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Dec 16, 2023 02:07
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I mean, the peanuts are not really the issue, unless he only brought enough peanuts for himself, in which case that's an excuse for titanomachy right there.
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Dec 16, 2023 02:08
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mdemone posted:The New Testament was the barest "human-like" gloss on the Old Testament, as retroactively told by people who hadn't been there. You also invoked the Book of Job as an excuse for why Jod can't be judged, but the problem is that he undermines that comparison himself. God has a long litany of "you cannot comprehend the immensity of what I do" but a huge chunk of Nona is Jod explicitly trying to get someone to understand. To comprehend. He fails to measure up to God in Job and shows his mere flawed humanity. And he even admits to it when he talks about how he can't consume Earth's soul, that there's something bigger than him and he's stealing and misusing its power.
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Dec 16, 2023 02:35
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disposablewords posted:You also invoked the Book of Job as an excuse for why Jod can't be judged, but the problem is that he undermines that comparison himself. God has a long litany of "you cannot comprehend the immensity of what I do" but a huge chunk of Nona is Jod explicitly trying to get someone to understand. To comprehend. He fails to measure up to God in Job and shows his mere flawed humanity. And he even admits to it when he talks about how he can't consume Earth's soul, that there's something bigger than him and he's stealing and misusing its power. Totally agree. Which is why he's such a god damned great character. He is not Jehovah, as much as he'd like to be. Edit: to be clear I am a strong atheist and a voluntary human extinction believer. I sounded a little evangelical there for a minute mdemone fucked around with this message at 02:43 on Dec 16, 2023 |
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Dec 16, 2023 02:41
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It's okay; we can tell you're 17 years old.
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Dec 16, 2023 03:05
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Rand Brittain posted:It's okay; we can tell you're 17 years old. 
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Dec 16, 2023 03:08
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Uranium Phoenix posted:But there are far too many parallels to scripture for John to simply just be a portrait of man's inability to this wield power. Perhaps, but the biblical god is more of an idea, whereas John is very obviously a person. In order for him to truly be a manner of being that is beyond the understanding or judgment of humanity, he would have to shed aspects of himself that he clearly can’t do. He’s not omnipotent, he’s not omniscient, he’s not omnipresent, and he’s certainly not omnibenevolent. He’s a human who has managed to circumvent some of the restrictions of baseline humanity. Jesus Christ is maybe a closer parallel… but he’s a Jesus who used his godly nature to topple the Roman Empire and ascend the throne of worldly power himself rather than one who martyred himself for the good of humanity.
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Dec 16, 2023 03:34
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As someone who does believe in the God of the Torah (though not so much the Christian stuff), this is an interesting discussion. Job, especially, is probably one of my favourite books of the Bible - certainly as a whole a profound and difficult text - precisely because it deals with the notion that maybe good things happen to bad people and that isn't something that can be justified in terms that we can understand. You can call it a mystery or you can call it a crack in the skein of the world, but whatever it is, we can't grasp it. I don't really hold with this notion that the God of the Tanakh is categorically more vengeance-filled: after all, there's no lake of eternal fire in there. But I think it is true that John is most like the Gnostic view of that being: he's a very classic demiurge in a lot of ways, even down to the fact that he created, in a sense, much of the material world of the characters: but that world is false and flawed, and in his jealousy he guards wisdom - gnosis - from those that would seek it. It's pretty notable after Nona that we actually don't have a clue where necromancy comes from, what the true nature of things is - it's all still shadow and shallow, for all its wonders.
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Dec 16, 2023 04:40
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Just got to the point in that Homestuck made this world podcast where we got to the troll world. Which involves beings who go out on an endless expansionary war of conquest with a heavily striated caste system at home. You don't say.
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Dec 16, 2023 21:01
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jod isn't the christian god. he's a greek god: powerful but not omnipotent, vain, arrogant, petty, capricious. i don't know anything about religion or mythology
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Dec 16, 2023 23:19
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Fucks everything that moves, checks out.
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Dec 16, 2023 23:31
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mdemone posted:Nonagesimus. It's right in Harrow's loving name. mother fucker edit: nona spoiler
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Dec 17, 2023 04:09
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mdemone posted:Nonagesimus. It's right in Harrow's loving name. Isn't this literally why they gave her the name? they know she's Harrow's body, but they don't know whether its Harrow or Gideon in there, hence all the loving about with bones and swords
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Dec 17, 2023 11:47
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Yeah it's barely a spoiler imo
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Dec 17, 2023 12:34
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The explicit explanation given early in the book is: "Nona did not know either of her real possible names. Palamedes said not to lead her unnecessarily. One of the reasons they had called her Nona was that the first thing she had said, when they saved her and brought her here, was No, no. Nono became Nona, and Nona meant Nine, and nine was an important number." But yeah, that's one of the reasons, and it's not hard to guess the other one that they aren't telling her.
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Dec 17, 2023 12:48
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silvergoose posted:Just got to the point in that Homestuck made this world podcast where we got to the troll world. Lol wait until you get to their weird cult who paint their faces caste.
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Dec 17, 2023 13:24
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