video, un: revolution

[idealisme]

What would you die for?


[There's no preamble. Enjolras is not in the mood to set the scene. He's been thinking and gotten nowhere so he wants the input of others. Over his shoulder it's apparent his room a shambles, a young man living alone with his mind on things other than housekeeping.]

For myself there's a cause that I've given all my life to. It's the highest ideal I can imagine. I know that is not a usual thing. Life is precious; until I woke up here I'd have said that death precluded any second chances at it. But that's beside the point.

I ask because I thought I others shared my opinions. It is rational to give your life only for the most important ideal. Sacrificing yourself for just anything- to get any item or even for another person... [His lips pinch together in thought, his eyes look distant for a moment.] I have not been able to reconcile it.

[A quick sigh escapes him, frustrated.]

I would appreciate your sincere answers and insights. Thank you.

Comments

[baldesion]

So you believe it is rational to sacrifice your life?

[He said it, not her. Physical Krile has her eyebrows raised and a thinking posture on, not that he can really see that.]

[idealisme]

Not always. Often it is better to use the life you have to seek your goals. But there are times when the need is great, and a man's life is really nothing at all next to that.

[baldesion]

Well, at least that's better than what you said at first. But if you're looking at losing your life as a probable solution in the line of possible ones, you're probably going about something the wrong way.

[Not in this world, mayhap, but in all the other ones she's lived in (exactly one) or heard about.]

After all, if you're set on dying, you're not likely to accomplish anything useful afterward.

[idealisme]

[Considering this:] Generally I would agree.

And yet there are some circumstances where death may be reasonably expected. There, it is best to work so as to put it off as long as possible.

[baldesion]

Expected, aye, but you've the right of it on trying to put it off. While I do believe there are things worth dying for, I cannot agree that it ought to be someone's goal. If it's valuable enough to give your life, then it's quite worthy of living for instead.

[No matter how dangerous or demanding the situation may prove.]

[idealisme]

And if that goal is change? If that goal is resisted by those with force? I fought against a monarch and his armies. Others have done the same before me and died as I did, in the hopes that if we failed others would be moved by our deaths.

[baldesion]

[But what change can you possibly foster if you die in its nascence? Krile is already crafting her argument when he says the last bit.]

Wait. You did die?

[There are others among the stasis pods who she knows for certain were dead whence they came, but he seemed more like the sort who...well, who waved the flag of dying for the cause because he hadn't quite grasped what it meant.]

For what?

[It isn't as exasperated as it seems. Also, he sort of answered it already.]

I mean, you said you fought a monarch and his armies, but what was it you tried to achieve?

[idealisme]

[Enjolras nods, as if to show he's heard the quesiton, even thought it takes a moment for him to actually answer.] Before I was born there was a revolution in my country. They overthrew the king and instituted a Republic. Matters then occured by which a dictator took power, and in time Royalists seized power once more and returned another king to the throne.

My friends and I were a part of a movement that hoped to spark a second revolution, to remove the king again and bring about the return of the Republic. We failed.

[That seems a good enough summary.]