> **
> On 11/26/2011 10:55 AM, Peter Larsen wrote:
>
> > [[Cannibalism and Rape]] are expressed materially, but they are not
> primarily about the
> > material "benefit."
>
> They sure look like it to me.
>
Really? If there isn't a major spiritual component to it, then why do Ogres
eat people so much? I mean, if a big part of your culture is trying to be
secret, then eating other people is a kind of bad way to go about it,
assuming any other food is at hand. Unless, of course, you want to present
the urge to feed as more of a weakness than a strength -- that Ogres are
more or less addicted to the taste of human flesh, indulging when its
against their best interests.
> It would be easier for Ogres to just eat whatever meat
> > was convenient -- you get stabbed less often that way -- so presumably
> they
> > gain some sort of spiritual benefit from eating human flesh.
>
> And the Lanbrili don't get spiritual benefit from taking things that don't
> belong to them?
>
> Honestly, probably not. I think that Lanbril "cults" are barely cults at
all. Certainly, he doesn't seem to grant much in the way of interesting
magic to his followers, who rely more on skills and devices than cult
magic. I think Lanbril and other thief gods are probably more like
"spiritual gangsters" -- if you are a thief, you pray to them, offer them
"protection money" in the form of sacrifices, give them a "cut" and hope
they don't sell you out for a better deal. It's not worship; it's business.
I could, if forced, imagine a "holy thief" who steals to prove it can be
done and nothing is secure, but that isn't really the way that Lanbril is
written up (over-influenced, probably, by the cliche idea of a "thieves'
guild" popularized by a few writers in the 60s and imported wholesale into
D&D).
> > [Uz Cannibalism] clearly sanctioned by the
>
> > god/spirit, so I think that's covered by "my god says it's OK, and my god
> > isn't chaos, so this isn't chaos."
>
> Which is a rather unsatisfactory guidance for determining whether an
> unsavory act is chaotic or not. I don't think an unsavory act can be
> nonchaotic when a god permits it in special circumstances and be chaotic
> when its practiced with wild abandon. Either the action itself is
> intrinsically chaotic or it isn't.
>
> Well, you have a good point there. Although, looking at Uz: The Trolls of
Glorantha, "To kill an Uz, so as to eat it" is among the "crimes that merit
death or banishment," so one assumes that even Kaarg's Sons don't do so
lightly (it seems they eat mostly trollkin and the dead). So Uz may not be
a "cannibal culture" after all.
> > Since [Ogres]
>
> > seem to get their power from their crime/violation, I expect they have to
> > be human enough for it to be a crime.
> Do they? I don't see any evidence for their cannibalism sustaining
> their worship of Cacodemon. The only cannibal cult writeup that I say
> was the Hungry Ghosts in Tales #9 which was non-chaotic. In the
> Cacodemon writeup, cannibalism scarcely rates a mention. If cannibalism
> is a cosmic crime by definition, I do find it odd that there a more
> non-chaotic practitioners of cannibalism (the Saliligori of Vithela and
> the Pendali of Dawn Age Seshnela also spring to mind) than chaotic
> practitioners!
>
I can't say I am all that keen on Glorantha being crammed with cannibals. It's a pretty strong taboo in the real world, and, if every other culture eats its neighbors that's a) pretty weird and b) not very interesting. Is it possible that these are stories told by the neighbors of the "cannibals?"
> > I think they kind of have to [not eat Outlanders]-- the Morokanth's
> survival depends on it.
>
> Not really. Outlanders are not proper people like other Praxians and
> they are not Eiritha Beasts so the Survival Covenant doesn't apply to them.
>
> So the Survival Covenant, which, in large part, is about deciding what is
and is not appropriate food, would be all loophole-filled when it came to
Outlanders? Eating someone is a big deal; doing it idly for random food
is... really hard to imagine.
>
> > If
> > the other tribes decided the Morokanth were eating them, everyone would
> > gang up to kill them.
>
> But I didn't say anything about eating other Praxians, I spoke about
> eating outlanders who are _not_ from other tribes.
>
I dunno; you think other Praxians wouldn't use this as an excuse if it was available?
>
> > Also, wouldn't Waha turn his back on them if they violated his laws so?
> How is eating an outlander a violation of Waha's laws? It's not as if
> they are eating horses. Waha is not a wise legislator passing laws in
> the best interests of the ius gentium. His prohibitions are of a
> limited practical nature and that there will be obvious loopholes in his
> laws. These loopholes rarely get exploited due to the harshness of the
> wastes.
>
> Huh. I would think Waha's law would be more absolute and less
loop-hole-filled. "Don't eat this plant; eat that kind of animal."
Presumably, Waha laid down some sort of laws that define what separates a
person from an animal. Since the Praxians are not widely (even ever)
described as cannibals (outside of the human/herd person confusion) in any
of the texts that I can recall, I suspect that "person" probably involves
things like talking, using tools, etc. Killing Outlanders? Sure. Robbing
them? Fine. Eating them? I just don't see it, and what purpose is there in
making the Praxian Nomads even less pleasant than they already are? There's
plenty of unpleasantness in Glorantha; making people cannibals for no good
reason is kind of overkill.
Peter Larsen
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