Hypothetical Re: Rainforest Mining

[Kannap]

Please consider the following hypothetical:

You are a powerful CEO in a dystopic society. Pressured by your shareholders and seeing a huge opportunity to make money, you travel to a remote rainforest and begin a mining operation of dubious legality.

You bring a few dozen workers with you, lots of industrial equipment, and a small company of mercenaries to act as security.

The indigenous tribes scout out your destruction of the forest from a distance; they realize you plan to raze their ancestral lands for profit. They then send a bunch of raiders led by an elite boy warrior calling himself Jungle Boy to dismantle and sabotage your operation.

Despite having technological advantage and more people on your side, Jungle Boy and his company use guerrilla warfare tactics and strategic raids to pick you off. Your mercenaries are eventually baited into a trap and defeated. You then find yourself surrounded by the returning angry tribesmen and their spears.

Assuming you watched Avatar recently

The tribal chief forces your people to rebuild and replant the forest without the use of modern equipment. You are horrified as you witness your people being forced to move fallen trunks around, digging out roots, and kneeling down in mud to reseed the earth amidst the horrors of the forest (bees, snakes, and other horrific things) and the rainstorms.

Your accountant attempts to start a revolution but it is quickly crushed by the tribesmen.

You are relieved that as the leader, you don’t have to do the horrific manual labor. However, Jungle Boy sits atop your shoulders and makes you carry him from place to place as he bosses your people around, basically using you as a living transport and making you witness the depths to which your people have fallen. There are tribal guards around at all the time but that’s not necessarily the point… you have become so traumatized, mentally subjugated and horrified that you don’t really dare to try and escape nor throw the little monster off.

After the entire forest is properly seeded, you and what’s left of your people are allowed to return to the Empire.

Some of your cohorts try to petition the Empire to avenge this great insult but the Emperor says he can’t be involved, though he’s “hands off.” The Emperor warns you very strictly that he doesn’t want any more Imperial citizens setting foot on that cursed soil.

At a business meeting, a business advisor suggest to you that you purchase a few Imperial bombers and use them to level specific targets on the rainforest. He tells you that he’s confirmed with the Empire and they don’t care so long as there are no “boots on the ground.”

However, other people tell you you should move on. Your business is in bad shape now and buying a few bombers and carrying out this op? It makes no economic sense. However, you haven’t necessarily gotten over what the tribe has done (even though technically speaking, you were the aggressor first).

Do you buy the bombers and try to take revenge?

Or do you let it go?

Please explain your reasoning.

I strip the company for its assets, scattering the ashes of the company and cashing in for whatever money I can get out of it. I take that money and give it all to ecosocialist persuasions in the empire. I then disappear to become a hermit in the woods and nobody ever hears from me again.

Why would I bomb the tribes in the forest? We were doing a horrible thing to them and desecrating their sacred lands and presumably doing untold lasting damage to the forest and the lands. Good on them for killing the people who were doing the harm and making the rest of us make the situation right before being benevolent enough not to kill us too. I take this as a chance to learn my lesson and stop being a exploitative capitalist piece of shit.

[FNU]

Well, I've heard it said that drums often sound like rolling thunder [insert Fortunate Son on infinite loop].

[Port Caverton]

Let it go, get the company back in shape, and then used some money to bomb Iran

[Kannap]

I buy the bombers and use them to carry out an indiscriminate terror bombing campaign of the society that enables this sorta shit.

Wait I change my answer, I use some of the money to buy the bombers and bomb the everloving shit out of the capital city of this dystopian empire.

[FNU]

I buy the bombers and use them to carry out an indiscriminate terror bombing campaign of the society that enables this sorta shit.

Wait I change my answer, I use some of the money to buy the bombers and bomb the everloving shit out of the capital city of this dystopian empire.

You two are examples of what happens if humanity uses 100% of it's brains.

[Kannap]

Despite the existence of an apparently super-powered "Jungle Boy," a CEO actually being in the rainforest with his workers is the most unrealistic part of this hypothetical.

Especially since this is clearly an illegal operation. Just gonna go get directly involved in the crimes in the rainforest for some reason.

Well, IM hypotheticals are known for stretching the imagination too far to the point that everything's just so wrong and flawed it's uncomfortable.

One day it's insisting the modern Greek army could win WW2, the next day its insisting CEOs of companies perform labor like their servants employees.

[Esternial]

A CEO deciding to personally go set up a mining operation sounds unlikely. I don't feel particularly immersed in this hypothetical...

You're a CEO. You hire people to do this for you.

[Infected Mushroom]

In this case, you led from the trenches but only partly.

As the workers used their machinery amidst the trees, you stand on a hill next to a portable luxury caravan like a final boss overlooking it all, surrounded by a few of your most elite mercenaries. You can issue orders with a large PA speaker. From time to time you enter the caravan to take calls from the shadowy shareholders.

[Heloin]

In this case, you led from the trenches but only partly.

As the workers used their machinery amidst the trees, you stand on a hill next to a portable luxury caravan like a final boss overlooking it all, surrounded by a few of your most elite mercenaries. You can issue orders with a large PA speaker. From time to time you enter the caravan to take calls from the shadowy shareholders.

So I’m a foreman with an overly inflated job title.

[Kannap]

In this case, you led from the trenches but only partly.

So I'm not a CEO, I'm a low tier manager. Just as useless though, so I guess that's fair.

As the workers used their machinery amidst the trees, you stand on a hill next to a portable luxury caravan like a final boss overlooking it all, surrounded by a few of your most elite mercenaries. You can issue orders with a large PA speaker. From time to time you enter the caravan to take calls from the shadowy shareholders.

So again, what's the point in me being there? Sounds like I'm providing no value whatsoever to the ongoing operations by being there in person.

[Infected Mushroom]

In this case, you led from the trenches but only partly.

So I'm not a CEO, I'm a low tier manager. Just as useless though, so I guess that's fair.

As the workers used their machinery amidst the trees, you stand on a hill next to a portable luxury caravan like a final boss overlooking it all, surrounded by a few of your most elite mercenaries. You can issue orders with a large PA speaker. From time to time you enter the caravan to take calls from the shadowy shareholders.

So again, what's the point in me being there? Sounds like I'm providing no value whatsoever to the ongoing operations by being there in person.

You lead and motivate with your personal reputation/terror factor. It’s an Imperial business tradition. A corporate variation of how kings used to lead and fight from the frontlines.

[Infected Mushroom]

In this case, you led from the trenches but only partly.

As the workers used their machinery amidst the trees, you stand on a hill next to a portable luxury caravan like a final boss overlooking it all, surrounded by a few of your most elite mercenaries. You can issue orders with a large PA speaker. From time to time you enter the caravan to take calls from the shadowy shareholders.

So I’m a foreman with an overly inflated job title.

Who is also the highest operating officer of the company. But if you screw up, the mafia-like shareholders can replace and sanction you in horrific ways.

When you do perform, the benefits are astronomically good though.

[Kannap]

So I'm not a CEO, I'm a low tier manager. Just as useless though, so I guess that's fair.



So again, what's the point in me being there? Sounds like I'm providing no value whatsoever to the ongoing operations by being there in person.

You lead and motivate with your personal reputation/terror factor. It’s an Imperial business tradition. A corporate variation of how kings used to lead and fight from the frontlines.

So I'm not a CEO or a manager, I'm just a common employee who has some seniority/leadership responsibilities over my coworkers.

[Kannap]

So I’m a foreman with an overly inflated job title.

Who is also the highest operating officer of the company. But if you screw up, the mafia-like shareholders can replace and sanction you in horrific ways.

When you do perform, the benefits are astronomically good though.

The shareholders all have addresses, I presume, and I'm supposedly buying bombers.

I love when a plan comes together.

[Infected Mushroom]

A CEO deciding to personally go set up a mining operation sounds unlikely. I don't feel particularly immersed in this hypothetical...

You're a CEO. You hire people to do this for you.

Under our business model yes.

[Eahland]

A CEO deciding to personally go set up a mining operation sounds unlikely. I don't feel particularly immersed in this hypothetical...

You're a CEO. You hire people to do this for you.

Under our business model yes.

Under any business model that makes any kind of sense whatsoever, the guy in charge of a corporation large and powerful enough that it could consider buying military bombers is not going to be overseeing a mining operation involving a few dozen guys. He'll necessarily have scores or hundreds of operations that scale or larger that need to be overseen, and will not be able to personally focus his attention on a single relatively minor operation. The only way a large-scale corporation can function is through delegation.

[Infected Mushroom]

Under our business model yes.

Under any business model that makes any kind of sense whatsoever, the guy in charge of a corporation large and powerful enough that it could consider buying military bombers is not going to be overseeing a mining operation involving a few dozen guys. He'll necessarily have scores or hundreds of operations that scale or larger that need to be overseen, and will not be able to personally focus his attention on a single relatively minor operation. The only way a large-scale corporation can function is through delegation.

Yes, there would be lots of delegation.

But with Imperial customs, from time to time that delegation is expected to take place from more of a physically front lined position. Simply put, a CEO who never appears to lead from the trenches won’t be perceived by the company as someone to be feared and respected. Of course, as the CEO you’re not really doing any manual labor in any event.

[Eahland]

Under any business model that makes any kind of sense whatsoever, the guy in charge of a corporation large and powerful enough that it could consider buying military bombers is not going to be overseeing a mining operation involving a few dozen guys. He'll necessarily have scores or hundreds of operations that scale or larger that need to be overseen, and will not be able to personally focus his attention on a single relatively minor operation. The only way a large-scale corporation can function is through delegation.

Yes, there would be lots of delegation.

But with Imperial customs, from time to time that delegation is expected to take place from more of a physically front lined position. Simply put, a CEO who never appears to lead from the trenches won’t be perceived by the company as someone to be feared and respected. Of course, as the CEO you’re not really doing any manual labor in any event.

Basically what it comes down to is, unless this mining operation constitutes the bulk of the corporation's activity, the CEO is not going to be able to personally oversee it. He's going to have too much other shit that needs him to take care of it to be uselessly babysitting an operation that some distant underling should be handling. And if a mining operation involving a couple dozen guys does constitute the bulk of the corporation's activity, it's not a big enough corporation to have the ability to create a private air force and commit acts of war against foreign countries.

Unlike a lot of your hypotheticals, the basic dilemma here isn't completely ridiculous. The problem is that you've stuffed it into a completely ridiculous frame, and you're making up more nonsense to try to defend the ridiculous framing instead of focusing on the actual important part of the dilemma.

Instead of insisting on the PC being the CEO of the corporation, who has no business being the guy on the ground here, maybe try making them the commander of the detachment of the PMC (possibly a subdivision of the same overall corporation running the mining operation) providing security for the operation, who doesn't have air power assigned to a relatively minor operation, but could potentially call up the chain to get some if he were to assure superiors that trust him that it's necessary...

[Infected Mushroom]

Yes, there would be lots of delegation.

But with Imperial customs, from time to time that delegation is expected to take place from more of a physically front lined position. Simply put, a CEO who never appears to lead from the trenches won’t be perceived by the company as someone to be feared and respected. Of course, as the CEO you’re not really doing any manual labor in any event.

Basically what it comes down to is, unless this mining operation constitutes the bulk of the corporation's activity, the CEO is not going to be able to personally oversee it. He's going to have too much other shit that needs him to take care of it to be uselessly babysitting an operation that some distant underling should be handling. And if a mining operation involving a couple dozen guys does constitute the bulk of the corporation's activity, it's not a big enough corporation to have the ability to create a private air force and commit acts of war against foreign countries.

Unlike a lot of your hypotheticals, the basic dilemma here isn't completely ridiculous. The problem is that you've stuffed it into a completely ridiculous frame, and you're making up more nonsense to try to defend the ridiculous framing instead of focusing on the actual important part of the dilemma.

Instead of insisting on the PC being the CEO of the corporation, who has no business being the guy on the ground here, maybe try making them the commander of the detachment of the PMC (possibly a subdivision of the same overall corporation running the mining operation) providing security for the operation, who doesn't have air power assigned to a relatively minor operation, but could potentially call up the chain to get some if he were to assure superiors that trust him that it's necessary...

Sounds very reasonable.

But I think at this stage, it’s too late to change it (and thread wouldn’t necessarily benefit from it). I’ll keep it in mind for future scenarios.

[Horizonte Mexico]

So if it's imperial customs to be a big target, why wouldn't the big bad country say this is legal to begin with?

[NPCWest Florida]

I would get a priest to figure out what demon possessed me to do that

[Risottia]

Bombers? How dreadfully expensive.
Just a couple of small, incospicuous light aircrafts and lots of flu and corona viruses sprayed repeatedly in the area. Oooh, measles, too. How about some cholera and ebola and yellow fever? Tyhpus?

And it's not revenge. It's just "cleaning the area". Nothing personal while I wipe off the tribe.
Later, ooh, look, a pristine area ready to be used... by a local company, of course, which happens to be 51% property of another foreign company, which happens to be 51% property of mine.

This is kind of inventive. I'm actually kind of impressed with this. It's a plausible response to what the OP suggests your character has gone through; it takes the setup and uses it in a way that mixes things right.

The fact that I'm (mostly) lawful good doesn't mean that I'm incapable of evil. It merely means that I choose not to commit it.

[Infected Mushroom]

This is kind of inventive. I'm actually kind of impressed with this. It's a plausible response to what the OP suggests your character has gone through; it takes the setup and uses it in a way that mixes things right.

The fact that I'm (mostly) lawful good doesn't mean that I'm incapable of evil. It merely means that I choose not to commit it.

I see… whereas I’ve been described as lawful neutral

[Ayytaly]

Joke's on OP. I'd make the tribe chieftain my second-in-command, return to headquarters, and send the board of directors to mine the forest themselves.

Manually