Enough with the False Parallels

I really like Wilhelm Arcturus' perspective on the game. He's a good writer, but recently, he parroted the latest talking point in the Imperium's increasingly desperate repertoire of attempted propaganda:

"In their effort to defeat us, our enemy has had to become us. As the CFC/Imperium had often been called Band of Brothers 2.0, the Moneybadgers have begun to look a bit like the Imperium 2.0."

This is an obvious propaganda point, and a pretty bad one at that. Why? Because it relies upon a false parallel that assumes the reader is foolish enough to believe all coalitions are the same. It's disingenuous, and it frustrates me to know end.

Here's a tip to those who resonate with this argument: the people shooting you aren't a coalition, despite the naming.

Let's consider the nature of the two groups being compared.

The Imperium was a group of multiple alliances that all took orders from Mittens. Don't believe me? Time and again, alliance leaders tried to do their own thing, and they were forcibly brought back into line. Individual alliances were given their marching orders by Goonswarm and if they didn't obey, they suffered consequences. Spoils of war were held initially by GSF and distributed by agreement among other member alliances, based on how useful they were to the GSF war effort. They fought as one, they defended each other, they deployed together.

As a result, coalition content increasingly became the reason people logged in. Alliance- and corp-led activity entropied, and the coalition stepped in to fill the void. Increasingly, GSF poached corporations and FCs from their allies. They didn't do that necessarily with ill intentions, but rather because those corporations began to identify more with their fellow coalition members than the members of their own alliance. When faced with the choice of being part of a lesser partner or GSF itself, the choice was a clear one. Consider that for a moment: they identified so much as members of the Imperium that leaving one alliance was no big thing to them. The coalition identity overrode their alliance identity, and in some cases corporation identity.

Now, compare that to the MBC. Its member alliances are all still directing their own efforts. They're still feuding with each other (see Snuff and Shadow Cartel, or Violence of Action and The Culture). And you know what? No one is attempting to stop these feuds. You don't see PL coming in to play peacemaker the way GSF would have in the Imperium. That's because no on expects or wants the MBC to endure beyond the death of the Imperium.

Alliances in the MBC are running their own alliance fleets. They tend to do their own thing, and coordinate only when necessary to take down larger targets. Each of the alliances that consumed Imperium space did so through their own efforts. Sure, they timed their efforts to coincide, but the Imperium died to a number of simultaneous invasions, not a single, centrally coordinated one.

And, the thing that started this whole thing off - IWantIsk hiring TISHU to savage SMA - happened by the efforts of a single alliance. They didn't wait for PL and NC. to join in. In fact, that wasn't even a gleam in their eyes when it started. They literally did it for the lulz and paycheck.

The two groups couldn't be further apart in kind. Whereas one was a fist, the other was death by a thousand cuts.

And it all happened not because the MBC wanted to build some new power structure, but solely to tear down the horrible beast complacency had allowed to be born. Once it was revealed as a paper tiger, everyone wanted to join in. They're a coalition only to see the Imperium smashed into a thousand pieces.

I'm sorry, but anyone who things the MBC is - in any way - unified is delusional. This isn't a partnership joining together to control all space, the way the Imperium was. This isn't a group moving through the ocean together.  This is a mob, rending the king to pieces for a thousand different reasons.

Some fight against the Imperium because they were conquered in war. Some because of Burn Jita and other ganking shenanigans. Some because they were scammed. Some because of the arrogance. Some simply because the Imperium was the top dog to kill. Some because they hate the type of mentality the existence of the Imperium cultivated in its members.

Notice something about that? "It's not me.  Yep, it's you."

They don't WANT to be like the Imperium, and never will be. The only thing getting them to work together is to push the Imperium's nose as far into the dirt as possible, to stamp out everything it was. This is a backlash of years of pent-up hatred.

The Imperium was unified in that it stood FOR something. The MBC is unified AGAINST something. Coalitions fighting against a thing never last. Stop acting as if the Imperium and the MBC are the same. 

Even a cursory comparison shows that they patently are not.