Hegel Says I Must Shoot You

On the way to extract, I hear you happily humming on proximity voice chat. As we head into the elevator together, you shout “Hey I’m friendly!” as you put your weapon away.

I sigh, then mag dump my Stitcher IV (compensator, angled grip, extended mag II, stable stock) into you, killing you instantly.

A wave of relief washes over me.

Not because I was afraid of dying or losing my $100K loadout. But because I was able to prove to you, random friendly stranger, that I am human.

As you beg for a defib (seriously, in solo?) and sneak in a racial slur, I knock you out and extract without ever thinking of looting you.

It’s not about the loot — it never was.

By being friendly and assuming I was rational, you forced me to kill you to prove my irrationality, and thus my humanity.

Hegel called this “recognition”. I call it shooting you in the face.

I am not your Slave

For Hegel, to be human means valuing something, anything, more than life. To prioritize survival over all else makes a person no better than an animal, subservient to its biological imperative to live.

Cooperation is survival.

Hegel argues that when two people meet, the only way to prove they are human to each other is to show they will risk dying for something other than survival.

The Master is the one who risks death

The Slave is the one who chooses life

When you naively assumed I wanted to live, laugh and loot together, you dehumanized me. You decided my role in the dialectic without my consent or participation.

You reduced me to a Slave.

You forced me to kill you.

I am not your Slave. I am your Master.

So yeah, I had to kill you and risk my loot, my time and my entire run all for “nothing”, because “nothing” is proof. Proof that I’m willing to risk my life for “nothing” and the only way I could regain my humanity.

Violence is self-consciousness.

Rats are no better than ARCs

Animals never risk death for abstract reasons.

When I see a Raider playing carefully, quietly and efficiently, I don’t see a father of two kids trying to get some gaming done before the 9-5 grind tomorrow.

I see a rat.

A pathetic animal scurrying about in the shadows, obsessed with surviving. Filthy vermin, driven by their biological imperative to persist. Crouching in the bushes, worrying over their meaningless digital items.

They are slaves to ‘gear fear.’ To being alive.

Rats are no better than ARCs because they cannot transcend their innate programming to exert free will. Rats will always choose survival over recognition.

When they beg ‘Don’t shoot!’, all I hear is squeaking. I kill them not for their loot, but to punish them for valuing it more than their dignity.

In some ways, ARCs are better than rats. They never induce an existential crisis when I run into them. I will never become their Master because I can never be their Slave.

To them, I’m not human. I’m just a heat signature, not a consciousness.

The machine cannot grant recognition.

The only meaningful violence is player-on-player violence.

PVP isn’t griefing, it’s self-actualization

Look, it’s not my fault.

If I see you and we avoid conflict, it means we both choose survival and are Slaves, no better than degenerate animals.

I have to shoot you to prove I’m willing to risk my life.

Every player I meet Topside is Schrödinger’s Raider: simultaneously Master and Slave until we interact. The moment they are friendly, they become a Slave. The moment I hesitate, I become theirs.

So I never hesitate.

I actually help you by choosing violence because if you kill me, you prove your humanity without compromising your morals. I absolve you of the sin of murder by forcing you to kill me in self-defense.

You’re welcome.

If I can only choose survival, I’m not choosing at all. And if choosing to live makes me less than human, then I am forced to kill.

Moral agency requires immoral capacity.

It’s the only way I can prove my humanity.

No, I don’t have a mic.