Pathos and Ethos

The tundra seemed infinite, and the visibility was impaired by a light, haze-like snowfall.

I saw troops and various machinations of war all about me. Climbing atop a small hill, I noticed that a considerable portion of the visible forces was united under a white banner. They paraded about, and, in this very act, they seemed to radiate a whitish light, as if they were attracting those other forces in the area. The other army, of similar vastness but differing in design, was considered to be its rival (although perhaps this conception only held true as a self-fulfilling prophecy), and was thus compelled to perform similar maneuvers at some distance under its red banner. I found the marching tune of the whites, whose camp I was more or less in the middle of, rather disturbing. It was not motivational or intimidating. It resembled something more like propaganda to be announced over loudspeaker. Phrases such as “a human life is a human life,” “murder is wrong,” and “714 weeks is life” were repeated in what was by any means an eerie voice. I asked a soldier nearby (one without a banner, all of the whites were busy parading), he simply looked at me strangely and then reverted his attention to watching the parade. I could not even find the source of the sound; there were no speakers of any sort. I left the whites and approached the reds. As the sound of the whites’ parade and the eerie voice gradually let out, I began to hear something similar from the reds. “We must respect individuals’ rights to their own bodies,” “it’s a mother’s choice,” “freeeedoooommmm.” Not that I had any means of quantifying them, but the eerie sounds of the whites and reds seemed to be centered at the heart of their parading, and seemed to decrease in volume as I moved away (or increase as I approached, in the case of the reds). In fact, it seemed that there was an entire aura to the affair, a combination of the voices, the radiant light, and what seemed to me more or less the effect of an intoxicating drug. To the soldiers, the showing of the red force had a similar effect as the whites’ did: the conglomerate of red forces seemed to draw some of the surrounding forces under its banner. Most of the groups not already red or white were resilient, however, either forming their own groups or refusing to be colored altogether. Interestingly, most of the alternate groups were merely shades of pink. It did not seem that they were partially convinced or partway between the two banners; the troops that had a hard time deciding, and there were plenty, often switched rapidly between banners before choosing one. No, the pinks, as was the case with the few other present colors (such as blue and green), had a different attitude altogether. They seemed to find that their ideal state was a combination of the reds’ and whites’ qualities. Their technique of battle was a combination of qualities from both. The blues, whom I only spared a glance (by now, I wasn’t particularly optimistic), had founded a completely different technique of combat. The armies seemed to gain in ranks from their showings of power through battle or parade, but such demonstrations were limited in their effect on troops who already loyally belonged to a faction (as they were firm in their belief in the red or white school of warfare).

However, gathering up the courage, I inspected closer. Upon this inspection, the differences between the reds and whites turned out to be much smaller in practice than they appeared to be, and in fact they only seemed to distinguish between the particular manners in which the army was ineffective. The white army's vehicles had wheels without any sort of tires (rather, they had metal ridges), while the red vehicles were large and operated on three mechanized legs. The reds considered their vehicles large and menacing and the whites' small and harmless, while the whites considered the reds' vehicles inefficient and easy targets while their own small and difficult to strike. The blues, similarly, could only be seen on unarmored horses.

At the break of battle, which was more of a continuous state of warfare than actual individual battles, it became apparent that the weapons of the troops were all identical in function, however different they may have appeared. While the vehicles and other machinations still managed to find distinct ways to fail spectacularly, the only differences between the weapons seemed to be their appearance. Merriam machine guns versed Harper machine guns and Webster howitzers versed Collins howitzers. Perhaps some were more effective; it was difficult to tell. I discovered adhominium powder, which powered almost all of the projectile weapons on all sides.

There was a special band of uncolored forces that did not fly any banner. They were not like the rest of the uncolored. They were not undecided, but rather decided in their abstention. There were no Webster howitzers or adhominium-powered guns to be seen amongst them. They did not have any means of war, in fact. Weapons had no effect on them, nor did they seem to particularly care about the potential of this seemingly amazing ability they had. They seemed almost detached and transcendental. They wandered about and often made strange noises at troops of various banners. But these noises were not battle cries or calls of orders to soldiers. These noises made didn’t seem to have any purpose in intimidation or military tactic. I slowly considered this in my mind; it seemed as if I was missing something. It was only at this point that I realized that I had forgotten language and communication altogether. It had been such an easy process, sliding into this world, that I had not even noticed. In a rush, I remembered everything. Language, logic, reason. I saw the bewildered troops around me, still in the state I had been seconds earlier. They stood bewildered at what these uncolored people could possibly be doing, making these noises with their mouths, and of course already in awe having learned, in practice, that their weapons have no effect on them.

And at this point, the true nature of this world became apparent to me. It was clear that the troops hadn’t the slightest common sense. They were caught up in their banners, armies, and those eerily voiced beliefs that they saw nothing else. The uncolored ones tried to communicate rationally, rather than fight, but it was a lost cause. And even within their intent, they were horrid at judging the best method of warfare. They saw no actual communication of reason; the only important thing was… Well, what was it? Did they value their military might more, or their banner more? Did the banner just symbolize the military might? What was with those eerie voices anyway; could the soldiers even understand them?


I awoke to the slam of a heavy textbook on my desk. I wearily looked around the classroom and gradually the sound of conversation (strangely loud) overcame my ears. I scowled at the student next to me who had felt the need to ensure that I remained attentive. The memories of my dream were gradually replaced by those of what I was doing prior to sleep. Everyone was adorned in either red, white, or pink t-shirts; it was one of those “breast cancer awareness day” things that schools do (of course, there were some students who had forgotten, and they had been forced to wear an embarrassing grey smock over their shirt in class). What were we discussing again? Ah, right, abortion. Well, I wasn’t the only one not participating. There were only a handful of debaters on both sides of the argument, together about half the class. As I listened to them argue, I noticed that they were really only repeating the same things over and over. I probably hadn’t missed much. The one side’s argument was that killing any human being was always wrong no matter what (amongst various other and less secular claims), while the other seemed to repeatedly make some variation of an appeal to individual liberty and rights to one’s body. Of course, now being awake, I was then a target of some members of both sides. Both attempted to turn me to their cause with talk of rights and freedoms or of moral righteousness. Although they were at first surprised that these appeals did not move me in the slightest, they eventually desisted and left me be. I asked one of the more vigilant debaters nearer to me a few questions. “What is so special about a human life?” Rather than try to introspect and actually determine what, intuitively, is to be valued in a human life (for, clearly, we value human lives very much, but we never stop to question whether it is purely because it is a human life or because of what a human life entails), he simply gave me a weird look, muttered something under his breath, and returned to his verbal foray with someone diagonally across the room. It did not seem that anyone was up for any real consideration of the question at hand, so I returned to my doze.


It seemed for a moment that the reds and whites were actually diminishing in strength due to their constant warfare. After quite a while, they weren’t much smaller (the forces seemed infinite, nor did any direction on the horizon reveal anything other than more distant combatants), but they were spent. During a lull in the combat, I paid more attention to the individual details. The troops did not seem to be any different in demeanor or stature, but the aftermaths of the combat was apparent in the holes in their uniforms and the damage to their equipment. Some of the banners were tainted slightly, too. However, despite this, and the battle had been raging for quite some time without much variance in tactics or intensity, the combatants paraded with the same amount of vigor, tattered uniforms and equipment or not. The radiating light was no less intense, but of a slightly darker shade. The continuous voice had not changed in the slightest. Suddenly, all movement ceased, all weapon fire and parading stopped. For a second, only the voice hung in the air, with no other movement or sound.


This time, the bell awoke me. The vigilant debaters ceased in their combat at the sound. With parting glares, they collected their materials and joined the other half or so of the class (who were already partway to the door) in leaving the room. For whatever reason, I seemed to look at them in a worse light than I had before. It did not seem that a single one of them had shifted so much as a concession on their beliefs. They still held their beliefs strong, but only departed with hatred and a pugnacious air about them.