Stormcloak Or Imperial, Which side are you on? Options

[King Of Beasts]

Welcome! Which side are you on? Are you a strong, patriotic Stormcloak? Or are you a loyal, sophisticated Imperial? What about a powerful Thalmor Mage? Do you believe Ulfric Stormcloak truly cares about the good people of Skyrim, and agree that the Empire has turned it's back on Skyrim and Talos, or do you believe that the Stormcloaks are just a bunch of rebels, under a false leader who cares about nobody but himself? Perhaps you're a Thalmor agent who's just going to sit back and enjoy the show?

Please no arguing, insulting, flaming, etc, etc. Debates are welcome as long as they don't get out of hand. In this thread you can pick what side you chose and explain why.

Thank You,
-KoB

I chose the Stormcloaks. Honestly, the empire turned their backs on all of Tamriel, and abandoning Talos made everything worse. I think Titus Mede is a complete coward. I don't think Uriel Septim would have surrendered to the Thalmor even if he was at the wrong end of a Thalmor blade. He'd want the empire to keep fighting.

Truthfully, I think Ulfric Stormcloak is a racist, self centered [censored], but he does have a good cause.

This post has been edited by King Of Beasts: Jan 12 2013, 03:56 AM

[Destri Melarg]

From the desk of Anduial, Arch Mage of the College of Winterhold, and Thalmor Emissary to Skyrim:

I have studied this debate with great interest, and your words have moved me to take up the quill in my people’s defense.

For those of you who believe in the cowardice of Titus Mede: I suppose that devotion such as yours is not swayed by the counter argument that, with the full might of the Imperial Legion at his disposal, your heroic seventh Septim met his cowardly end in the sewers under his own castle while fleeing the wrath of fanatics of a marginal cult. Nor would I suppose that you care to mention that, upon discovery of the Empress Caula Voria’s true nature, your esteemed Emperor chose accommodation over conflict. Not only did he remain married to her, but he stooped to using their own children as pawns in the machinations they leveled against each other behind the closed doors of the White Gold Palace.

His biographer, Rufus Hayn, describes your sainted Uriel as ‘grave, patient, and cautious.’ He also says that he had become ‘conservative and pessimistic.’ Now I will grant that this change in his demeanor can be directly attributed to his decade-long imprisonment in Oblivion, an ordeal which would have surely broken most mortals. But I will also submit to you that this version of Uriel VII would not have been likely to run around smiting his foes with Goldbrand ... as Titus Mede did in the Battle of the Red Ring. Be careful where you assign courage!

To those who champion the Redguard cause: Lady Arranelya’s single army, alone, cut off from re-supply or reinforcement by the shackles of the White Gold Concordant, still manages to hold out for FIVE years against the combined might of an entire country full of Crowns and Forebears, reinforced by an illegally assembled Imperial reserve. Yes, we signed the Second Treaty of Stros M’Kai, but that was because southern Hammerfell was in ruins, the Alik’r takes up most of the middle of the country, and nobody really cares about the Wrothgarians. That leaves Sentinel, and it wasn’t considered enough of a reward given the time and resources needed to maintain it.

Here is the crux of misunderstanding. Personally I despise the term ‘lesser races.‘ I would prefer the term ‘other races.’ Not because I adhere to some naive assertion that all the races are equal. They simply aren’t. An example: I have spent more than two human lifetimes devoted to the study of the arcane and martial arts, and I am still several centuries away from my physical prime. That means I am capable of achieving a proficiency in anything I choose to undertake beyond the grasp of any human or beast. By definition that makes the races of mer superior to the other races. Notice I said capable, not assured, and this brings me to my reason for despising ‘lesser races’ as a term. Even the so-called ‘lesser races’ have it within them to achieve the extraordinary. All races contain that spark of the divine, the problem is that the gift that was bequeathed to you was stolen from us!

Before You condemn us for what you believe are our opinions on the nature of the races, you must be willing to step outside your perception as Human, Argonian, or Khajiit and see things from our point of view. Can you do that? Despite the preponderance of evidence that suggests otherwise, I believe that you can. You revere Lorkhan because he lifted you from something worse than nothingness. Now, whether you call him Shor or Sep or Shezarr, he is the one that raised you from non-existence to something approaching the divine. He gave you mortality by stealing immortality from us. You were raised, and in the raising our existing divinity was sundered. This is not opinion . . . this is fact!

Is this so hard for you to grasp? By your own admission you believe that, given the proper circumstances, a mortal can be lifted into the pantheon of the divine. Is it so hard to reason that the reverse may also be true? Is it not possible for the divine to be sundered from its station to languish on the fields of Nirn? I know you believe this to be true because you will all acknowledge that this is exactly what happened to Shor/Sep/Shezzar/Lorkhan. Why is it that you insist that I must recognize the divinity of your mantled hero while you refuse to recognize mine? Who is truly intolerant in this situation?

Imagine yourselves as divine aspects of the Et’Ada, or Original Spirits. Imagine that the smallest particle lifted by the gentlest breeze caressing the Gray Maybe does not pass unnoticed. Now imagine that another spirit deceives you into using your divinity to create something that will serve only to validate its own existence. By the time the deception is known to you it is too late to stop it. Your divinity remains untouched, but your consciousness is ripped from that divinity and spawned anew under the yoke of mortality in this Mundas that you were deceived into creating. And as if that were not enough, the particle that you noticed but a moment before has been gifted with a portion of your divine spark. It now calls itself man, wears armor, wields weapons and magic, and proclaims itself your equal!

How would you, as the 'other races' react?