"'I think most human misery is due to well-meaning fanatics like [Stane].'"
-Time Patrol (Riverdale, NY, 2006), p. 42.
Dominic Flandry of the Terran Empire:
"'Idealism has killed a lot of people throughout history.'"
-Flandry's Legacy (Riverdale, NY, 2012), p. 169.
I agree with Flandry but not with Everard. Flandry rightly says that idealism has killed a lot of people but not that it has killed more people than any other factor. "Fanatics" like Stane respond to major injustices, in Stane's case to interplanetary wars, and, as lone fanatics, they wield only a small fraction of the destructive power that is routinely deployed by the governments that they oppose. This does not make Stane right but it does mean that he and his kind are not the authors of most human misery. That is there already.
3 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
I think I agree. A LONE fanatic like Stane is not likely to be able to do as much harm as a large number of "idealists" controlling a government. The worst harm done by the Jacobins, Communists, Nazis, etc., came after they came to power. Not before.
Sean
Sean,
On the other hand, Stane was trying to become a government.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
True, and the problem for Stane was that he was a foreigner with no roots or connections among the Anglo-Saxons who had invaded Britannia. That might have changed if agents of the Time Patrol had not intervened.
Sean
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