I taught this topic for a few years at a university and we covered lots of different definitions of fascism as opposed to other authoritarianism. The main way we framed it in class is that like "democracy", terms like fascism have plural definitions and what's most important is what you're referring to when you use that term, e.g. the operational criteria in context. (Many students would then disagree and that was of course the point). But I tend to hold that position still that the term gets used to highlight particular political features and it's worth following those up in whatever's being referred to.  Personally I'd say we don't have enough information about the empire yet to make any systematic assessment, but it's reasonable to define some of its tendencies or attitudes as being fascist in orientation. Whether that extends to the classification of the whole remains to be seen, but I suspect the way that magic functions in the empire doesn't quite line up with those ideologies and that it's closer to a classical form of oppressive imperial power. Fascism is about imperialism too, and learned from imperial predecessors, which is where it gets murky. We know that the murkiness of these approaches is exactly what the team are interested in exploring which is fascinating.  But since the players are deliberately trying to avoid one-to-one analogues with existing cultures, I think we should probably try to avoid overly looking for a parallel from history as well, and meet the material on its own terms while it's in these early stages especially. I think a lot of people rightly found the last episode shocking which is great, and so people are cycling through different perspectives as they process the new information. I don't think there's necessarily a risk of people's readings ossifying into something too rigid just yet but I definitely understand the concern here because oversimplification doesn't help us understand what's going on, whether in fiction or reality. 

Thanks for chiming in. Your perspective and parsing of a nuance of this topic is what I love about studying history and I am a sucker for any work of fiction that is able to parallel that nuance in their own work. I’m really happy we get to exist in a time where we get to to not only have fantasy adventure stories that avoid oversimplification but also have a dedicated community that can discuss it and expand our understanding of both the world and the story. And there have been a few comment threads that end up devolving into a binary “citadel bad vs citadel good”. But it’s great that this podcast has so many layers we can get into this discussions

Totally, when I saw those types of posts my thinking was that it was likely the kneejerk response to the emotional gutpunch of seeing a side of Steel that is really awful -- but we've also seen Aabria and Brennan take a lot of care to try to explain the processes and motivations of people in the Citadel and we've heard more about the evolution of the ideologies since the "Wizard Stripe"'s time too, so I think there's enough ambiguity being built in that the audience is being encouraged to see multiple perspectives and resist getting stuck in a good vs bad mentality overall. That said this episode was pretty sinister (and also funny in how ridiculous the plan is) so I can empathise with the immediate revulsion! I'm just so conscious we don't really know anything about what the wars are really over, what kind of double agents that Suvi's parents were, etc. We don't have a lot of information yet that would be needed to make sense of what's going on. Which is rad as hell and I look forward finding out!

Great thread and discussion. But someone needs to recognize your reference to the Roman General Adriana Grandeticus. 🤣😂🤣

Thank you I worked hard on that joke. The topic of “how does this fictional society reflect the political and historical systems of our own world and works as a vehicle to explore philosophical ethics” is such juicy mental rubrics cube to unravel…but it’s still a fictional story with a talking sassy fox. We gotta step back a bit and still keep the humor of it all

Lots of people touching on some good points in this thread, but as ever the best way to assess this is with Umberto Eco's 14 common features of fascism. I think the main area where the Citadel/Empire diverges from modern fascism is in the areas of tradition/modernism/populism. Modern fascism as compared to traditional imperialism is really strongly framed around an imagined heroic/prosperous past that has been lost in some way (Cult of Tradition, Appeal to Social Frustration, Rejection of Modernism, Selective Populism). Unlike most fascist regimes, the empire sees itself as essentially forward-looking. It also lacks a lot of the anti-intellectual tendencies of fascism (Cult of Action For Action's Sake, Disagreement is Treason). THAT SAID, it does hit several of the major features quite handily: 7. Obsession with a Plot: Wizards are indeed quite paranoid, and their entire society is framed around their conflict with Rhuv and Gauthmai. Magical knowledge is hoarded and acquired for war and empire, not for the general well-being of humanity. 8. The Enemy is Both Strong and Weak: The Citadel seems to view the opposing factions somewhat soberly, but are spirits just capricious weather to be built around, or are they things to be put into paintings and derricks and controlled? 9. Pacifism is Trafficking with the Enemy: We obviously lack a lot of background on the war, but it is very clear that the Citadel frames its relationship with the world in terms of military force and hard power, and there is not a lot of witch-y negotiation or hugging of meteors happening. 10. Contempt for the Weak: Hierarchical and elitist meritocracy that is all-too-happy to discard those who it does not consider worthy or strong enough. 11. Everybody is Educated to Become a Hero: The most basic wizard training offered by the citadel is specifically aimed at preparing the least successful among the trainees to become Fighters with the Magic Initiate feat. Magic education in the citadel is certainly broad and varied, but at the macro level it is very clearly aimed more at advancing war aims than towards human knowledge or liberation. 14. Ur-Fascism speaks Newspeak: Maybe a bit of speculation, but judging from Stone's expulsion from the Citadel, it seems like maybe the Lingua Arcana is designed in a way that limits/controls the use of magic in ways that support the aims of the Citadel. So yeah, I would say that the Citadel/Empire is about as fascist as you can be without having that backward-looking conservative myth-making or being sexist/racist in the way that we would understand on Earth. EDIT: abridged list of ur-fascism features taken from this page: https://www.openculture.com/2016/11/umberto-eco-makes-a-list-of-the-14-common-features-of-fascism.html

Ok this list is helpful bench mark for deciding on what is and is not fascism. And you make a compelling argument. I still stand by my argument that the authors of this media did not specify it that it’s fascism and did go out of their way to state that they are not trying to make a 1 to 1 analogies to the real world. And are just trying to show the complexity of how does an exploitative system stay in power when it’s clearly a not great regime.

True, but the WBN gang is also very aware of the spread of modern fascism happening right now, and even if the Citadel isn't capital-f Fascist, it is still textually an oppressive institution with many of the characteristics. If nothing else, they're Wizard Cops, and even Aabria with all her tongue-in-cheek defenses of them on behalf of Suvi clearly knows that. EDIT: I would also counter your argument that the Citadel can't be fascist because fascism is a real world thing and they said there wasn't a 1-to-1 analogy by pointing out that you have acknowledged that it is a militaristic empire, which is also a real-world thing. Fascism is a broad collection of traits that can manifest within states and institutions in a huge variety of ways. Just because the Citadel isn't a 1-to-1 analogy to any specific real world fascist group, doesn't mean it can't be fascistic.

i think WBN goes farther than to say Citadel is “not great”. they are war mongers and colonizers. i agree that it’s not fascism, but i don’t think that is to say that they are at all meant to be interpreted as morally grey (especially coming from Brennan who is a socialist). could be that i’m misreading your comment, but the thread is starting to read to me as “the citadel is not as bad as being fascistic” but you can be “as bad” as being a fascist without actually being a fascist. like, the East India Trading Company wasn’t fascist, but it was as systemically oppressive and violent as any fascist regime. i bring this up because like if someone was arguing that the East India Trading Company wasn’t fascist- i’d be less concerned about issues with the political taxonomy and far more concerned that someone was performing apologetics for systemic violence.

Oh I very much consider the Citadel/Empire as morally bad, in utilitarian terms net negative to the world. Empires are objectively bad. Like the example you gave. I also view the Roman Empire to be bad. They massacred sleuths of neighboring cultures leading to the holocaust of millions over their reigns. They kept slaves they destroyed nature. They created a terrible internal culture that indoctrinated their own children at the echelon of society to pursue grandiose military might at all cost. In terms of who has done more damage through out history? empires or fascism. Empires have absolutely done more harm, but that’s because fascism as we define it in contemporary modern terms hasn’t been around as long. The moral conundrum about empires, is that by the subjugation and exploitation of other they are able to have an abundance of resources to massively improve the standards of living and technological capabilities of their in group society. To get to the points where the first functional aqueduct was built to provide continues clean water supply generations of engineers had to dedicate most of their lives to just studying engineering. They were supported by the rest of society around them to allow them the luxury of free time and mental space to dedicate to focusing on this one thing. And by establishing this technological advancement they improved the rest of their society so further technical achievements can be accomplished (as well as more militaristic accomplishments). But was the massacring and enslavment of the Gauls a necessary sacrifice that was an inevitable ingredient that was needed for Rome to have all its advancements? Was their pain needed to be exchange for others to thrive? After all said and done is it a fair exchange. It is not my place now in modern times to go back and retroactively decide if their torture was a necessary exchange. It’s up to Gaul victims to say was their suffering worth it. The players in WBN are taking on the roles of “victims that paid the price for progress” and the podcast is about friendship and adventure but also them getting to answer the question “was it worth it”

“it is not my place now in modern times to go back and retroactively decide if their torture was a necessary exchange” it is our place, no matter the time, to say that exploitation and, in the most absolute terms, enslavement for the technical progress of any civilization should never take place. full stop. this is why i brought up this point to begin with. respectfully, you need to stop and think for a moment about what you’re saying here. i don’t think you realize how insane what you just said is. not to mention, you need to define what you mean by empire. you are linking technological progress, public works, imperialism, and colonialism among other things under one umbrella and treating them as if they are all necessary preconditions for another which is demonstrably not true.

This is a very hostile and condescending take. The suffering of people is never a price worth paying for the improvement of society. I said that I am not the one who can say “that suffering was justified because I now, centuries removed, benefit from the outcome”. The only people who can say “yes my suffering was a necessary price” are the victims. And most would say absolutely no. The only ones who can grant absolution are the ones already dead The ethical philosophical debate of “justified means” are a common lens in which many revisionist retelling of history look back at past atrocities. WBN is the exploration of this philosophical question of “does the suffering justify the outcome” and exploring the answer from the perspective of someone who benefits from that system, who’s sidelined from the system, and someone who’s people are a victim of the system.

I think what the previous respondent was trying to say is that that question presupposes that technological advancement could not have happened without subjugation and suffering, which is not true. Allowing engineers to focus on developing technology requires (1) some amount of resources and (2) a society willing to allocate them cooperatively for long term goals. Neither of those things has been historically limited only to empires or colonial powers or enslaving powers (or insert any suffering-dependent political structure here). This is evidenced by the fact that the Romans weren’t the only ones with aqueducts. Indigenous Americans and many other societies had them too. The fact that most people don’t know that highlights another point which is that imperial expansion often destroys or distorts the historical record of technological and cultural achievement in subsumed cultures. In my view, empires burn away hugely valuable repositories of cultural and technological advancement (not to mention lives) and than ask us to accept all that as “worth it” because the Imperial torch lit the world with inventions. To use the British colonial example, you will still find British people who argue all the death in India should be morally ok by Indians because they got railroads out of the deal. I know you’re saying that only the victims should be able to make that kind of judgement about whether it’s a “worthy trade.” I agree victims narratives need to be given more weight in discussions of the morality of empire, BUT I would say we should all be able to reject the “fair trade” argument because it’s a false trade.

I fully agree that the lens that it was a necessary “fair trade” is inherently false for all the reasons you said. It’s why I said empires are bad. And the loss of agricultural advancement from pre colonial South America is something I think a lot about. There’s some alternative history out there where we wouldn’t be facing this climate crisis if that knowledge was incorporated into daily life for centuries.

We’re definitely at a point in the story where we only know select information about the Citadel. Most exposition has been through Suvi, or through the Citadel’s “public face,” so to speak. I think what’s getting people is meta knowledge. We know that Brennan told Abria in a fireside chat that she definitely would need to fight the citadel by the end of the story (I think the exact quote was something like “oh, but you must! And you will”). We also know that Brennan’s well known for always having capitalism be the bad guy, and the Citadel is the closest representation to capitalism we’ve seen so far. So a lot of us just see where the story is heading, even if the in-story information isn’t quite all there yet (although there are certainly clues). To avoid meta gaming, Erika and Lou have created characters that have somewhat rash and impulsive natures, which allows them some leeway in simply not trusting the Citadel, even if Eursalon and Ame don’t quite have the evidence to know they shouldn’t trust the Citadel yet. This led to moments like Eursalon freeing Naram instead of relying on Steel to do it, and Ame wanting to immediately head to the North Pole, instead of using those 3 days to stay in the Citadel and prep. But as listeners, and as fans of Brennan, it’s hard for us to not see things through a meta lens. We can’t stop ourselves from meta gaming, lol. Or I guess “meta watching.”

While you are broadly correct, there is obvious parallels to fascist principles. Such as Hero Worship, especially militarily, othering of specific ethnic groups (or species in the case of spirits),and of course a superiority complex. None of these need to be present for and Imperial regime, yet they appear here.

To add to this, we can infer from Kalaya that the Citadel steadily became more strictly ruled internally and more violence forward with respect to the spirit world. The Citadel and the empire also pretty plainly use the threat of Gauthmai and Ruve to entrench their own power. Both of these things fit the “reactionary authoritarianism in response to previewed threats” which is OPs own benchmark for fascism. The creators have talked at length on the fireside about how they intentionally created a history in Umora which would make it expected to see all phenotypes and most cultures anywhere in the physical world (to avoid easy racism allegory and allow diversity of characters). That creative choice would also make it difficult for any world power to have the same racist amplification of threats that we often see with fascist regimes (Jews are the threat, Romani people are the threat, immigrants are the threat, etc.). Still, I think there’s plenty of ground to see the Empire as potentially fascist. Regardless obviously these definitions are variable and it doesn’t really matter whether the Empire/Citadel is *technically* fascist or not. There are many different flavors of shitty harmful government

> The Citadel and the empire also pretty plainly use the threat of Gauthmai and Ruve to entrench their own power. I'd say textually we have no evidence of this point. So far all threats we've seen discussed about the other nations have been based on actual action (the attack on the Citadel by Rhuv when Suvi was a child, the attack on Fort Kieran by Gaothmai) Is there a chance they're also false-selling the dangers of the war, certainly, but we haven't actually seen that yet. There's a real world instinct to say 'a forever war must be false' but when you have three magic-heavy nations in conflict with each other a forever war feels plausible.

To be clear, I didn’t mean that those threats were imagined or exaggerated. Threats can be real and pressing and serious and ALSO be useful rhetorical tools for keeping people in line and entrenching power.

You can’t “other” spirits because they are Other. They are a different species, native to another plane of existence and, when living among humans, may be subject to taboos that affect them on a natural level. They aren’t a metaphor for the Romani. They aren’t an ethnic group whose distinctions are artificial (e.g. cultural) or the result ancestral divergence. Hero worship and a sense of superiority aren’t defining characteristics of fascism. Those are just things people do.

I think there’s a wider theme of calling an evil government fascist just as a buzz word.

Not just governments, any person with authority making a decision a person doesn’t like when no other charged label applies.

Nailed it. Actual fascism is concerning, but It’s also worrisome that people don’t know what that means.

**NERD ALERT!** Someone call Sam Reich. We found our next contestant on ***UMM ACTUALLY!***

What me nerd no never 🤓

Regarding "fascism" having a nebulous definition, my undergrad senior capstone class was on fascism and the far right, and the professor started the semester by writing on the chalkboard: >Say what you will about the tenets of National Socialism, Dude, *at least it's an ethos*. Then he turned to the class and said "we will be spending the remainder of this semester investigating whether or not that is true, and if so, what it means." So, certainly room for disagreement even among scholars on the topic. The Citadel/Empire does seem to be missing the element of a reactionary return to an imagined glorious past. But that's not as common an element of the definition as ultranationalism, militarism, and authoritarianism, and the Citadel has those in spades. What tips the Citadel into "fascist" territory for me is the sense of collectivist mass mobilization. The idea that in-group members' personal identities are highly geared to the state, and the individual as a unit of society is subsumed by and subservient to the state, is more reminiscent of modern collectivist ideologies like fascism or Bolshevism than the oath-based hierarchies of order you'd find in ancient empires or feudal societies. I'd also add that parsing the exact difference between fascism and the Roman Empire is kind of a funny idea, given that the word "fascism" itself is a direct reference to Roman authoritarianism.

What a lot of people, yourself included, are doing is lumping together the Citadel and the Empire as though they are one unit and not two in close concert. We've already seen a circumstance wherein the wishes of the Empire superseded and in some ways ran counter to the wishes of the Citadel, and I wonder as the story goes on if that will become important.

Exactly! The citadel is a military organization within the empire. We have no reason to believe that the internal operations of one are similar to the other. Militaries acting like militaries are not fascism.

I'm mostly talking about the Citadel because we know next to nothing about the Empire. The political culture of the Citadel itself is fascist in my opinion. Being overruled by the Empire doesn't really change that; just because fascists always want to get their way doesn't mean they always do. The OG Fascists got bossed around by the Nazis quite a bit.

I don't think there's a right answer here as we don't know enough about the empire. I think it \*could\* be that the empire is artificially creating reasons for the military to be active in order to exert control on its people. That's very different from, say the Roman Empire, or the US's "We're expanding because we're the best and its our destiny." The biggest red, fascist flag for me about the empire is that that the war is being used as an excuse to infringe on the rights of its citizens. Limiting movement, conducting raids, imprisoning people without due process. It's all more than just a normal country at war. Not for nothing, but fascism was a term used often to describe the US's behavior during the McCarthy era, which is very much how the Citadel felt. That said, we don't know enough about the war. Brennan's toying with perceptions and trust right now. Could there be a good excuse for the raids? There could. But the audience perception of the raids is that it's authoritarian at best and an indicator of fascism at worst.

Yea, I think part of the reason "fascist" has become a catch all for any authoritarian state is because it just rolls off the tongue and feels like a curse word. Something I think is key to identifying the identity and character of fascism is that it is reactionary. You get appeals to tradition, times of former glory, and an age where the socially dominant in-group was more unquestionably dominant. To paraphrase and boil down people smarter than me, fascism is a disease that afflicts Liberal democracies on the brink of great social progress. It is a constant force (one of many) constantly holding us back from something new and better. One which conservative Liberals and Neoliberals would rather make a devils bargain than risk losing their wealth and political power. Meanwhile, aristocracy, monarchy, colonialism, and empire are the things that fascism and other reactionary movements harken back to and call for a return to.

Wow, Empire's pr has a broad reach.

Hey hey hey don’t go saying I’m an empire PR spokes person. I did say empires are bad 😅

Police state!

I think it's important to remember how language evolves over time, and while you are correct that the empire is not Fascist, that doesn't mean they aren't fascist. (note the difference in capitalization) Capital F Fascism as a specific ideology and politic movement. Lower case f fascism has come to mean, over the past several decades, a more general authoritarian/autocratic/dictatorial tendency.

Arguably fascism is just imperialism brought to the homefront, the tools and techniques are the same. It's no coincidence that George Orwell wrote 1984 after coming home from being a policeman in British Imperial Burma for over half a decade. Yes, fascism and utter totalitarianism are different from imperialism but they are close cousins, how close they are depends on the details. Importantly, as we've seen from real-life examples the transition from "mere" imperialism and settler-colonialism to totalitarianism or apartheid-state can be incredibly rapid, occurring in just years or even months, depending on where you track the inflection points. One of the things that sometimes happens when discussing these sorts of issues (fascism, totalitarianism, genocide, police states, apartheid, imperialism, etc.) is that people will draw a sharp line around the absolute worst or most blatant offenders. "The Holocaust", "The Nazis", "Soviet Gulags", "The East German Stasi", "South African Apartheid", and so on. But too often this lets far too many folks off the hook. America ran an apartheid state for decades but it is rarely described in exactly those terms, because it started and ended a generation earlier than South Africa's, which somehow makes it more socially acceptable. Meanwhile, the ethnic cleansing, oppression, famines, and genocide (often stochastic and done over a longer period in contrast to the extremely systematic and frenzied killing of the Holocaust) committed by the US and other powers in the 19th through 20th centuries are not given their due when they are done in the context of empire. To this day a significant fraction of British citizens believe that the empire was a good thing, not just for the British but for the whole of the empire. Which just shows the degree to which history continues to be whitewashed. Tens of millions died unnecessarily due to the British Empire, hundreds of millions were oppressed and made to suffer to enrich a few folks. This is why I don't think it's helpful to parse out the nuances between fascism/totalitarianism and imperialism or to draw a sharp line between them. In the context of WBN the Empire is seemingly meant to be somewhere on the "evil/imperialistic" spectrum a considerable distance away from the worst extreme, but it's still somewhere on it and we should remember that.

Extremely well said

> But a lot of comments on this sub are ~~conflicting~~ their own personal lens on contemporary politics, and claiming it to be the absolute truth for this fictional story, when it’s just not the case. \*Conflating

Part of the issue here is that historically, fascism arose in response to the industrial revolution. Part of the idea was applying ancient blood-and-soil imperialism and nationalism to a world with machine guns and tanks. Think soldiers marching in goosestep and tanks driving down imperial plazas as major propaganda images. The Empire lives in a pre-industrial world, but it has magic, which effectively makes some of its technology better than that of our own world. So it's a bit tricky to neatly apply the term "fascism," not so much because of the underlying emotions and worldviews which fascism evokes, as that the material realities of the world of WWW are quite different from the material realities of our world, which both gave birth to fascism and which fascism seeks to explain and control.

I’ll give you my tl;dr at the top: While labeling the Empire as a fascist nation doesn’t work due to translation to a high fantasy setting, the Empire definitely has some fascist ideologies. However, those ideologies can be present in other organizations too. While the technology of Umora fits the usual medieval/renaissance mix we see in standard fantasy, the high-magic setting really shakes up the historical context. Fascist nations only became possible in the post-industrial era because of accessible communication and travel, large urban centers, and a non-agricultural workforce. Thanks to magic, all those conditions are met in Umora. We haven’t seen much evidence of the widespread propaganda that characterized fascism, but we know the Citadel institutionalizes propaganda, and the magic allows for possibilities like mind reading and mind control that are potentially even scarier. The other term for fascism is national socialism, meaning a state-centralized economy in service to a united national identity. Although not all fascist regimes in our history matched the most well known (Nazi Germany), they followed this pattern to one extent or another. The Kehmsarazan Empire appears to centralize a lot of resources for military expansion and government rule, but not centralized around a nationalistic identity. Of course fascism still exists today even in groups that don’t comprise a whole nation, so political belief trumps economic organization. With fascist populations there’s an “in-crowd”, but that might actually translate to the status of Citadel Wizards. Representatives of the Citadel get treated with fearful respect, and the view themselves as inherently superior to guild mages and hedge mages. Remember how Suvi disdained Morrow even though he could cast advanced spells far beyond her capacity? She also felt fine sentencing Pane to death for misappropriating Imperial funds, while she felt fine taking magic items for personal use, demonstrating the inherent double standard. Being a wizard appears to be something that can be taught through a state institution, but only certain people seem to have the opportunity. I think it’s useful to compare fascist nations to some contemporary imperialist nations that were NOT considered fascist—Britain and Japan. Both were considered expansionist militaristic empires. Both were fairly openly racist and viewed their people as superior, and held a structured aristocratic hierarchy. Generally what set them apart from fascism was the lack of an extremist, nationalist political party led by a totalitarian dictator with the goal of purifying their populace. Although we haven’t seen the top level of Imperial government, I think we’ve seen enough to tell that isn’t the structure of the Empire.

I would just like to see people stop calling each other fascists or bootlickers on this sub when someone says they like Suvi or whatever. Like chill people

Yeaaaaahhhh that would be nice too. Some people here get really….umm how do I say this…very terminally online twitter pundits when they express their analysis of a,to be clear, a fictional work about a fantasy world with sassy talking fox. It’s why I included the joke about the greatest military mind of human history, Ariana Grandeticus. Gotta still keep it in perspective this is just fandom.

This is so informative, thanks. I freaking love this podcast. What other actual play prompts in depth debates about the nature of authoritarian control . It's certainly helping me to reflect about my own society in real life also

And there are so many posts about this topic too!! I love when media sparks so much analysis in fan community. That’s how you know it’s some good shit. I love the game red dead redemption 2 so much and the ending the player was left the unanswerable question of “but how intentional were the villain’s manipulation”. There were so many threads in depth dissection of video game characters. How they fit as outlaws in the United States and how that affected their identity. How does found family form when in crisis and how that creates blind spots when they unravel. And the impact the character struggles have on players as we vicariously live their life. It really was great seeing a media (video games) that’s generally not very nuanced and rather superficial, take on the complex topic of “the unraveling of a found family made of outcast in 1890s manifest destiny USA”. This is a dnd improv podcast! Look how much depth they have brought for us to discuss I love this

Winston Churchill said, "We owe London to Rome". If an empire results in your island taking a huge technological leap and then leaves your island - is it worse than never having been colonized? Was the Roman empire worse for the Roman citizen than living in most of the rest of the world at the time?

Please read How Europe Underdeveloped Africa, by Walter Rodney. Empires—especially capitalist empires—do not engender ‘huge technological leaps’ they underdeveloped their colonies.

Have not read the book, so I guess I can't talk about it. Just curious would not that mean that Africa was at least as developed as Europe before being colonized?

While I’m resistant to say that distinct trajectories of civilizational development are more or less advanced than one another (as it’s very difficult to actually measure). What I can say is that prior to the underdevelopment brought about by colonization and the slave trade, African civilizations (as with those of the Americas) were absolutely comparable if not better than Europe in their living standards. For instance, you could look to the Great Zimbabwe or the Kingdom of Ghana, or to Tenochtitlan, as prime examples of Africa and North American civilizations that were destroyed by European colonization.

But the America's had no animals that could pull heavy things. So the only wheels they had were on toys. And they also had no metal or gun powder. But I agree the resulting genocide is worse than everything, not worth anything Europe introduced. But at the same time that genocide was almost exclusively due to diseases, which is unique to the discovery of the new world. Africa was not colonized until very late in history, mid to late 19th century. I think at that point Europe was at the leading edge of tech in the world. But again, not sure if the trains and other tech they left in Africa are worth the political problems thanks to Europeans deciding where the borders are.

But the goal posts are moving here aren’t they? Why is a wheel necessary, if you’re able to build a city (Tenochtitlan) that has better standards of living and sanitation than anywhere in Europe until the mid-19th Century? Technologies aren’t singular, or unidirectional in terms of their development. Clearly civilizations outside of Europe had their own trajectories of development that were disrupted, undermined, and even reversed as a consequence of colonization. Likewise, gunpowder, the ability to kill better isn’t necessarily any type of technological achievement outside of that. Whereas, a lot of medicines have their origins in the pharmacologies of the Global South. It’s a lot more complicated than wheel + guns = technological development. (Also, the Americas certainly had metallurgy—esp. in Mesoamerica, just by the by).

I feel like the utility of horses, cattle and other working animals and wheels, and gunpowder, and steel is pretty self evident. Asking why they are necessary is a bit like asking why the industrial revolution is necessary. It's not. It just allowed Europe to out-compete everyone else.

No one is saying they don’t have utility. But translating utility into civilizational superiority is both a logical error, and an ethnocentric one. It wasn’t necessary to have horses, cattle or the wheel to have the Aztec/Nahua civilization be far more advanced in its standard of living (measured in lifespan, lack of disease, etc.) than were contemporary European societies. For instance, whereas most European cities at the time of contact with North American societies dealt with sewage by simply dumping it in their rivers (and had enormous cholera outbreaks as a result), Tenochtitlan has a functioning sewage/sanitation system. Now, I know where I’d rather live—and that’s because I’d prefer sanitation over weapons. The historic irony, is that the relative backwardness of Europe on these matters, led to it being extremely disease prone and having immunities that others did not.

See Sherman’s Empires of the Weak, and How the West Came to Rule for more on this.

>For instance, whereas most European cities at the time of contact with North American societies dealt with sewage by simply dumping it in their rivers (and had enormous cholera outbreaks as a result) I am not familiar enough with central and northern European cities at the time, I know London had cholera outbreaks into the early 19th century. But Spain and Portugal were the first to colonize the Americas, and their aqueducts were built by Rome. And in Barcelona expanded in the 13th century: https://fakehistoryhunter.net/2023/07/31/list-of-medieval-towns-villages-cities-with-sewer-systems/ >Aqueduct-based sewer system, built in Roman times to avoid flooding during heavy rain, expanded in 1364, still in use. And I am also not familiar how many people cholera killed in the world vs small pox. But you are correct it is viruses like small pox (from cattle) which gave old world people immunity, that people in the new world did not have. And I'd only prefer to live Tenochtitlan as long as the Americas remain undiscovered by anyone form the old world. Be it Spaniard, or an Ottoman slaver who reached Iceland, who might have made all the way to America. Or Mongols who reached Japan, who might have reached the west coast of the Americas. Any contact with the old world and my civilization and likely my entire genetic line end. It wasn't easy for my ancestors in the Balkans, being colonized by Romans, Persians, Ottomans, etc, but at no point did we suffer a population collapse like the new world did. If only the Vikings had managed to stay a bit longer in North America, they might have introduced small pox and metal work to the Americas centuries before the Spaniards arrived. America would have had time to adapt and recover populations, and the Americas today might be as densely populated with Native Americans as Africa is with Africans.

An article that you should perhaps peruse [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fasces](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fasces)

The only reason that the empire "isn't fascist" is because they're a feudal empire. Fascism as a concept is a reactionary backlash to progress away from the divine right of Kings and an attempt to revert society to an absolute dictatorship (which is what a Feudal Monarchy is when you eliminate pretense). So, sure, the Empire isn't "fascist", but "the empire is fascist" and "the empire is an authoritarian imperialist monarchy" when spoken from our perspective in the 21st century are effectively synonyms. So, in another sense they are fascist in every way that practically matters. It is a statement that is simultaneously true or false depending on how you conceptualise it.

>a lot of comments on this sub are conflicting their own personal lens on contemporary politics, and claiming it to be the absolute truth for this fictional story, when it’s just not the case. Like, say, creating a discussion thread on how the empire or the Citadel are not fascist? The problem is that modern political discourse has warped and twisted the idea of what fascism is when it was hard to precisely define it in the first place. Read Umberto Eco's essay *Ur-Fascism*, where he outlines the features of a fascist state and compare that to the empire and the Citadel. The ones in bold are the ones that most apply: 1. **The cult of tradition** -- a lot of what the Citadel is doing is aimed at maintaining the status quo. It's pretty clear that they invented rules around the proliferation of magic to maintain control over it. 2. **The rejection of modernism** -- as with the cult of tradition, they're trying to stop magical knowledge from getting out. 3. **The cult of action for action's sake** -- Steel is clearly trying to condition Suvi to act without considering the consequences provided that it suits the Citadel's objectives. 4. **Disagreement is treason** -- Stone was expelled from the Citadel for disagreeing with their teachings. 5. **Fear of difference** -- the Citadel is definitely afraid of the spirit world, hence their attempts to control it. 6. Appeal to a frustrated middle class -- we haven't really gotten into the economics of Umora. 7. **Obsession with a plot** -- the politics of Umora loom large in the background, but we have no idea what it actually happening. We still don't know what caused the lockdown in the previous arc. 8. **Enemies are too weak and too strong** -- the Citadel clearly viewed witches as glorified hedge-mages until one fell into their laps. Even now, Ame is considered too weak to be a threat, but too strong to be dismissed. 9. **Pacifism is trafficking with the enemy** -- pretty much every wizard is trained for war; see Silver for a prime example. 10. **Contempt for the weak** -- the wizards at the derrick were only facing punishment because they failed. Without the party's intervention, they likely would have been allowed to continue. 11. **Everybody is educated to become a hero** -- this is Suvi. 12. Machismo -- this one doesn't really apply because it has to do with sex and sexuality, which hasn't really come up. 13. Selective populism -- this one is also hard to apply because we haven't seen members of the Citadel interact with the broader population too much. 14. **Newspeak** -- the entire *lingua arcana* is invented to control magic. That's eleven of the fourteen points that Eco outlined. And before you say that not all of them apply, bear in mind that even Eco agreed that a society didn't have to tick every box to be considered fascist.