Above the Law
- Thread starter DethVanXan
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Like I said earlier, it's hard to be original nowadays. The group itself might resemble Rainbow six, but I'm going to make sure the plot to this stays as far away from anything already out there as I can. This isn't going to happen for a few years atleast so I'll have plenty of time to tweek it until I'm happy that it is original enough.RhomCo said:
You just described the A team. Nicely done.DethVanXan said:
While I myself think that a group that can work around the red tape would be awesome, history with human beings tells me that it will not be very long at all before that ability gets overused. Further, if it is in fact a group of multi-national members, who selects them? I mean we are talking about effectively authorizing a multi-national glorified hit squad. It just seems logistically and ethically hard to do.
No. Mass Effect is sci-fi. This takes place firmly in modern day. No Aliens. No Robots.8-Bit_Jack said:
Dropping a nuclear bomb on civilian targets was ethically hard. That didn't stop people from doing it.Kalfira said:
Well while that point is valid you must also consider this. The president had to make the decision if Japanese civilian lives were more important than the hundreds of thousands of american solider lives would be lost trying to capture mainland japan. It wasn't really an ethics dilemma as much as simple math. Even then it was ULTIMATELY the presidents call to make, this group we are talking about would not get their power from any kind of legitimized authority, IE a government, and would be criminals all over the world. A simpler solution would be just get rid of the red tape in the first place.DethVanXan said:
I understand your point. But this group would get their orders from the United Nations, a legitimate global authority, they just wouldn't be public about it. Also remember; This is a story. It doesn't have to be completely realistic, just plausable.Kalfira said:
Complete lack of red tape could lead to issues with lower profile cases, this group would be deployed only in extreme circumstances.
I like you're idea and its not very far off from reality.
Aristocracy in every nation, for thousands of years, has operated unofficially and been "above the law" in many respects. So all you're really talking about here is the logical conclusion reached when the "ruling class" perfects their position.
The important thing to remember is that political beliefs really have nothing to do with it. Everyone in power will become corrupt and expand that power. It was once kings and royal courts, now its elected politicians and bureaucrats.
In the US, W. gave us the PATRIOT Act: which laid a nice foundation for future removal of civil rights. We then replaced him with Obama: who immediately appointed ridiculous numbers into the unaccountable and uncheckable positions we call "czars". The evidence that all leaders get like that with too much time in power is mountainous, so I'll not bother continuing.
But good luck with your project! And my money says a story with history and human nature kept in mind will be far more effective than any hastily assembled fantasy about "Illuminati" governments
Aristocracy in every nation, for thousands of years, has operated unofficially and been "above the law" in many respects. So all you're really talking about here is the logical conclusion reached when the "ruling class" perfects their position.
The important thing to remember is that political beliefs really have nothing to do with it. Everyone in power will become corrupt and expand that power. It was once kings and royal courts, now its elected politicians and bureaucrats.
In the US, W. gave us the PATRIOT Act: which laid a nice foundation for future removal of civil rights. We then replaced him with Obama: who immediately appointed ridiculous numbers into the unaccountable and uncheckable positions we call "czars". The evidence that all leaders get like that with too much time in power is mountainous, so I'll not bother continuing.
But good luck with your project! And my money says a story with history and human nature kept in mind will be far more effective than any hastily assembled fantasy about "Illuminati" governments
Thank you. I was using the Illuminati idea just to get the point across that shadowy 'power behind the throne' could play a role in the story. The story will deal with corruption will inevitibly grow in positions such as these.FaithorFire said:
This is exactly why I posted this here, to get feedback from people of varying political backgrounds to offer a wider range on ideas. Thanks agian guys, this is definitly helping. Also; Hundreth post Woooo!!
I know it's been mentioned, but this is awfully close to copywrite infringement off of Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six and Ghost Recon franchises. Both tend to be called in when lethal force is nessesary and local authorities cannot handle the situation. Both are shadow ops organisations. Both work somewhat above the law, being granted special privledges and juristictions depending on how large a threat is present, though Rainbow is always accompanied by a handler that acts as a sort of moral compass (as well as the Ghost Recon team later in the serise). Both belong to the UN, enacting on what they vote on is a suitable threat (so no world leaders, mostly terrorist groups). Finally, both are comprised of the elites of every military organisation within the world (admitttedly, only picking soliders from American, British, French, German and other such steadfast allies of NATO to begin with).DethVanXan said:
These points are not to deter you, however. I whole heartedly want another novel (if done well) about some shadow-ops group that's put into place to save the world from evils we cannot comprehend. In all honest, I'd prefer if their moral compasses won in the end of it all, but I enjoy seeing those paragon of humanity moments a lot more than most. Just wnat to make sure you differ it enough to not get sued.
I'll try. I actually haven't played any of ther Rainbow Six games nor the Ghost recon games so I didn't realise how close my idea was to them. I'll just have to make the plot as unique as I can and make the characters more interesting and differant.HellsingerAngel said:
Thanks for the heads up.
Agreed. Think they would end up becoming the villains and someone else having to hunt them down. I guess many fiction already presented that scenario but can't come out with one example at the moment. The closest real life example would be the catholic inquisitors. Despite being named by the Pope and in some cases the rulers of some catholic nations, they would act independently and in some cases even against the major authorities. Christian reforming movements and nations cutting relations with the papal states, with massive wars were a response to such a powerful and oppressive "enemy". Maybe that could inspire you. Inquisition is depicted in World of Darkness and Warhammer 40,000. Their zeal is depicted also on WoW Scarlet Crusade.Demon ID said:
Rainbow Six and Ghost Recon only really stay close to this idea in their pre-Vegas and pre-Advanced Warfighter incarnations.DethVanXan said:
If you want a suggestion on how to make your stuff different from what's already on offer, for a start don't have your characters all American or 'American in a different uniform' (which is to say, not American but act as if they were).
Thats a stupid idea. Laws are different for every country. So what, if a woman in Iran is stoned to death for a crime in their country, just because it is illegal to the UN does that mean that this private group is going what? Invade Iran?
Stupid idea, impossible. Religions are different, laws are different, cultures are different, this is entirely impossible.
I'm guessing you are probably basing that off Mass Effect with the Spectres, and if you played that game you should understand how stupid the idea is
Stupid idea, impossible. Religions are different, laws are different, cultures are different, this is entirely impossible.
I'm guessing you are probably basing that off Mass Effect with the Spectres, and if you played that game you should understand how stupid the idea is
I just reccommend you don't use this idea, it might sound cool, but its been done a hundred times. From the Jedi, Spectres, Rainbow 6, Ghost Recon, even this 'The Losers' movie looks similar in some ways.
It is impossible, and if you try to write it as anything but that way then you're going to either be ripping someone else off, or its just going to be so false it will be a joke. I'm not trying to be cruel but its true. The idea is impossible, for SO many reasons. If they are led by the UN then there are still going to be biased, especially since the soldiers will be from countries. For example, if you pull from the best special forces in the world? Its mostly going to be British, Israeli and American. Americans believe they have the best in the world so they'll want to be the main spot light in a story (hence why rainbow 6 worked decently). So for example....you'd make the Americans the majority, but wait a second....people believe that what George Bush did with invading Iraq was a war crime. Then the team should go in and get the American president. Good luck with that. Such things are impossible, biased factions and commanders would make it totally impossible, and of course, as I said before, the differing opinions and views on things.
It is impossible, and if you try to write it as anything but that way then you're going to either be ripping someone else off, or its just going to be so false it will be a joke. I'm not trying to be cruel but its true. The idea is impossible, for SO many reasons. If they are led by the UN then there are still going to be biased, especially since the soldiers will be from countries. For example, if you pull from the best special forces in the world? Its mostly going to be British, Israeli and American. Americans believe they have the best in the world so they'll want to be the main spot light in a story (hence why rainbow 6 worked decently). So for example....you'd make the Americans the majority, but wait a second....people believe that what George Bush did with invading Iraq was a war crime. Then the team should go in and get the American president. Good luck with that. Such things are impossible, biased factions and commanders would make it totally impossible, and of course, as I said before, the differing opinions and views on things.
What a terribly uninformed opinion. Did you even read the novel Rainbow Six? That's not at all how it worked. Granted, I will say that a good portion of the forces were elite American CIA/Rangers and British SAS, with the exception of Louise and Deiter (BFST and GSG-9 if I'm not mistaken). They also have close ties with Isreal within the novel and it's already hinted that there are new recruits on the way from their Spec Ops team. So that's a host of NATO allies right there, which is why the intitution was first created It then absorbed special forces from all over the world to make the most elite team possible.Fenwolf2003 said:
As for their missions? It's an anti-terrorist group, for the most part. So they disguise themselves as whatever anti-terrorist group would be in that region, are announced as an elite team and then put to work. As for your example, there's really no need for anyone to get involved except the local authorities. But if you really want to get technical, yes, stonning someone is illegal, according to any UN sanctioned laws, which technically override any country's laws. The only problem is that the UN is not gobally recognised as a governing body, just a sort of place world leaders can hang and chill out, so most of the "laws" they come up with aren't actual laws. That doesn't mean, however, that everyone just ignores them. Most are put into practice by the countries that attend so everything works out in the end. Most of the "stonings" you say are legal are done by extremist factions, which is exactly what Rainbow is set up to destroy. They just tend not to unless something on a large scale happens.
So yes, the idea could be pulled off flawlessly, so long as the writer pays attention!
I think you misunderstood the point of my statement. It was to MOCK you, not a request for information as the the details of your attempted cliche.DethVanXan said:
If you want to write the same thing thats been done to death by everyone else (my example was mass effect, and there are countless others that match your particular setting listed in this thread) then by all means do so, but you asked the Escapist's opinion, and my opinion as one of the many folk on this site is that your idea is cliched and likely will result in a finished product of no real merit or significance artistically.
Then again, Twilight is often confused for quality literature, so good luck.