This is old, but seems oddly relevant.
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Brutal!? You don't know the MEANING of brutal until you've heard the story of Culture Three!
How brutal WAS Culture Three you ask?
Culture Three was SO brutal that they maimed, tortured, enslaved, and in general brutalized
THEMSELVES!
You see, Culture Two had made a virtue of stoic resistance to pain, stubborn fortitude, that sort of thing.
So when Culture Three came around, they had a problem.
How were they going to impress everyone as being EVEN TOUGHER?
Their answer? They would arrive at a battle, stand on a tall hill where everyone could see them
and chop off one of their own limbs! Then they'd wave it around, screaming and shaking it at their enemies.
It worked! It scared the hell out of their opponents! They ran like crazy!
You could tell who was a real war hero back then by how few arms or legs he had left.
War parades were quite different too. Instead of sturdy old warriors walking slowly past the reviewing stands
they tended to roll, and at a good clip, too.
To you, an inferior alien, this may seem bluntly stupid -- the product of a sick, primitive society.
SNORT! You couldn't be more right!
Culture Three was, as you can well understand, only the third Thraddash Culture
and was therefore far from the tempered perfection you have encountered here and now.
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Brutal!? You don't know the MEANING of brutal until you've heard the story of Culture Three!
How brutal WAS Culture Three you ask?
Culture Three was SO brutal that they maimed, tortured, enslaved, and in general brutalized
THEMSELVES!
You see, Culture Two had made a virtue of stoic resistance to pain, stubborn fortitude, that sort of thing.
So when Culture Three came around, they had a problem.
How were they going to impress everyone as being EVEN TOUGHER?
Their answer? They would arrive at a battle, stand on a tall hill where everyone could see them
and chop off one of their own limbs! Then they'd wave it around, screaming and shaking it at their enemies.
It worked! It scared the hell out of their opponents! They ran like crazy!
You could tell who was a real war hero back then by how few arms or legs he had left.
War parades were quite different too. Instead of sturdy old warriors walking slowly past the reviewing stands
they tended to roll, and at a good clip, too.
To you, an inferior alien, this may seem bluntly stupid -- the product of a sick, primitive society.
SNORT! You couldn't be more right!
Culture Three was, as you can well understand, only the third Thraddash Culture
and was therefore far from the tempered perfection you have encountered here and now.
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