So instead of derailing a thread that was already pointlessly derailed I have instead decided to post it here as a question. What is Taboo in Shadowrun? I understand that much of this is arbitrary, but I would like to know what people think.

The biggest taboos I think are various forms of mind control (influence, mob mind... ect.)

Things that invade someones mind w/o their consent like mind probing, psychotropic ICE, or forcing someone into VR and feeding them BTL chips of your own choosing would be a big no no.


A lesser taboo I'm thinking of would be forcing someone into a mental state against their will would also be considered right up there. For instance shooting a troll with a kamakazi injector pellet and then shooting him with stick and shock and watching the insanity might be a big no no.

Although there are many taboos in SR I think the biggest thing about SR is you have to get caught red handed for anything bad to happen. I would however like to know other people's thoughts on what is or is not taboo in the Shadowrun world.

For every taboo you can come up with, there's always someone out there crazy enough or evil enough to do that. Just like the doctor that was raising kids in the Matrix, the general public was outraged, but he only lost his corp backing after the public found out about it. Nothing in the Sixth World is taboo enough for no one to try it.

I still say that because people in general are so sexually repressed and hung up, and children are still, even in Shadowrun, perceived as the ultimate innocents, that the sexual predation of children will always be a no no for a culture. The definition of "what is a child" may differ, but if it does, that same culture will allow adults rights to those no longer protected against the taboo against the sexual predation of a minor. In other words, if you have a culture where a boy of 14 is no longer consider a boy for protection from predation, he will also have most of the same rights and privileges that adults of the same socio-economic standing have. This one is really iron clad historically, and there are few, if any, other topics that are so staunchly viewed as despicable.


Isshia

As I read Street Magic, most Awaked people consider the the following activities taboo:

Toxic magic, eg conjuring toxic spirits.

Summoning insect spirits.

Using the Sacrifice metamagic on non-consenting metahumans. (Although some people don't consider all metahumans "people"; extreme Humanis is probably fine with sacrificing orks, and extreme Sons of Sauron is probably fine with sacrificing humans.)

Of course, whenever someone breaks a taboo, then interesting stories become more possible.

A taboo that no one, anywhere, ever breaks? Only the ones enforced by the Universe: no resurrection, no teleportation for mundanes, and don't EVER fire an assault rifle in each hand.

Well Cantankerous I hate to disagree with you on the fact that it has "never been done in history." When slaves were still around in the Americas there were people who you know.... and it wasn't considered taboo. They were considered property and not actual humans so people who owned slaves could do whatever they wanted to them w/o consequences. It is why most African Americans are pretty much all mixed race. Now there was a different concept on that these people were not actually humans and therefore might not fall under the societies understanding of "children" and if it is or isn't acceptable to molest or hurt them. However I believe that in 2070 yes this is a big no no in pretty much 99% of the SR world.

Taboos get broken I was just wondering what the 2070's taboos are, since I feel like the acceptable has been stretched.

Masterofm, I think the only taboo left would probably be incest. Everything else is nothing more than really exotic sex/entertainment. Honestly, if someone wants to have sex with animals, then they could probably find a were-animal willing to do the nasty with them. Hell some shapeshifters might get off on it... who knows.

Also with VR, even the taboo of incest goes away. You're not really porking your mother/father/sister/brother, you're screwing some virtual person. It's just over-glorified masturbation.

It would seriously vary from society to society, as it does now.

Actually, no. What you did with your own slaves was your business, but heaven help you if people found out. I'm a mutt, man, part Native American, part African American, part European and my own varied heritage always fascinated me. So, I did ALLOT of research on this topic. And you happen to be VERY wrong. Even on the Indian (Hindi) sub-continent, where the age at which a child was no longer considered a child was lower for most of it's history than in any other part of the world where written records were routinely kept, under a certain age even the sexual abuse of slaves was universally taboo. Not because they were slaves, but because they were children.

In the US South, it was taboo just to have sex with your African slaves. Period. And the children that came out of such unions were doubly taboo. Ever read the mark Twain classic, "The Tragedy of Puddin' Head Wilson"? And the sexual abuse of girls that were too young for the ruling culture (but were often already considered adults among the Africans themselves) was HUGELY taboo. This did not stop the abuse entirely, but you DAMNED sure made certain that no one found out about it, because it was actually an offense for which you could have your slaves taken away in many Southern States (with Georgia being the toughest on it). But hey, it's the nature of taboos to get broken.

Still though, that doesn't make them any less taboo.


Isshia

I've broken that one

Actually, this was a potential wetwork tactic I came up with: Snipe the target with capsule rounds loaded with DMSO/K10.

Keep firing until permanent berserk sets in.

Especially effective when fired through a window during a board meeting.

I highly doubt you'd need to bother with multiple shots. Unless they're prime runners, they don't even get edge with which to make the edge test.

Unless they are filler, all targets have edge in my games. Not much but usually a point. However, YMMV.

/off topic

While runners wouldn't see it, I would imagine that being a TM would be fairly taboo in the hysteria of 2070.

Why would you shoot them with a drugged dart as opposed to.. you know, a bullet? If they're important enough to be killed, they're important enough to be given antidotes to drugs like that.

As for the OP... You ask an interesting question. I mean, isn't 99% of what shadowrunners do taboo? Killing, stealing, general mayhem, yadda yadda yadda. I would think all of these would be 'taboo'. But I suppose you mean something that 99% of people would look down on as opposed to about 50%.

I'd imagine not alot in SR times. Incest likely would, but only actually going through with it as opposed to say hiring a joygirl who happens to look like your sister. That and child molestation (once again, only the actual act as opposed to faxsimilies).

In the non sexual catagories, toxic magic and insect spirits... I'm sure a general undead taboo as well, and unwilling live sacrifices.

I would think mind altering drugs and mind control and such would be put under the catagory of distasteful (like stealing) as opposed to taboo. I mean, it isn't all that different then kidnapping someone and torturing them. It isn't well received, but it isn't what most would consider a taboo.

Keep in mind that the state of SR genetics and their availability means that most of the physical problems of incest can easily be dealt with. With that out of the way, bias against incest are about as warranted as racism or other forms of prejudice, and pro-incest activist groups would have their place.

Are there even actual undead in Shadowrun? All I've seen are HMHVV infected, corpse robots (I refuse to call what they presented in Street Magic zombies), and spirits which may or may not be dead people.

The main issue with incest isn't genetics, but the Westermark effect. The actual increase in the probability of birth defects produced by single-generation incest is so low that, on its own, it can be ignored. It is only when certain recessive genetic diseases are known to run in a family that problems crop up. However, it is simply natural for people who live in the same household, particularly who grow up in the same household, to be devoid of sexual feelings for each other, and to actually have anti-sexual feelings for each other. This sexual revulsion is then extended to others and generalized. For people who grow up with brothers and sisters, the very concept of sibling incest tends to be revolting, and they'll have strong negative feelings toward people who engage in it.

People who grew up without siblings, on the other hand, tend not to have such strong views on the matter. And siblings who grew up apart tend to be strongly attracted to each other.

This has interesting implications for systems in which non-related children are raised together from an early age, such as the kibbutz Children's Society system.

I really shouldn't be getting as turned on by this topic as I am.

I ment more along the lines of possessing corpses. Come to think of it, organlegging would be a fine line between taboo and simply distasteful. Alot of people think the dead should be buried/burned and otherwise left alone.

Zombies = Possessed Corpses.

Among other things, the wieless AR world that links just about everyone together is goig to alter the perception of family. Even today, family boundaries are changing, by 2070 with magic super-tech and them crazy injuns, getting head from your siter may just be perfectly acceptable, who knows...

Acceptable, perhaps, but still. . . I believe "revolting" is the term I'm looking for. Then again, I fall into the same-household category that hyzmarca was talking about, so apparently, I'm naturally biased against it.

That may be the reaction to homosexual and cross-metatype couples too, but since we are told those are OK (since it reflects a progression of today's views on same sex and multi-racial couples), I'm sure other that things may have changed to allow for various things that might be considered deviancy by today's standards.

Actually, cross-metatype couples aren't okay. They're actually less okay than polygamous lesbians in a pentangular relationship. At least, it was as of Sprawl Survival Guide. Most often the worst such interracial couples would get are strange looks, but more than a few people would gladly make an example of them by hanging their corpses in some public place. But that's just in Seattle.

Different areas and different cultures will have different taboos, as is the case today. There are still some deeply traditional cultures in the Sixth World which hold on to their traditional ways, including traditional taboos. Others are much more "enlightened".

Yes but...

The massive easy-to-use AR interfaces (remember, damn near everyone can get a commlink, sim module, and even linguasofts) means that the cultures are almost impossible to isolate and the amount of blending will put even our most cosmopolitan communities to shame. For some this might actually allow for less blending - the link is used to keep in touch only with those of the same subculture - but for most it will be a gateway towards a pan-global community. And that means a lot of AR porn of all types...

You know...I am hoping when Vice comes out, it will have a section in it on Taboos, as, well...the topic DOES seem to come up on here alot.

Sounds like a book from an older edition, meaning that the views in there are from ten years+ in Shadowrun's past.

They still hang nooses from trees, occasionally.

Things like that take a long time to go away, ten years isn't that long.

Perhaps, the increased adoption of the internet is changing how rapidly social trends change today, how much different is it going to be in 2070?

Not that much. Hatred is still hatred and the basises for some of it is so old, so ingrained into the human psyche that it will take a hell of a sight longer than just over half a century for it to disappear.

Isshia

Really? So every white boy in Tennessee still has a noose in his trunk to hang the black man? I don't think so - in fact, I know it's not so. Overt racism has dropped off dramatically in 'just over half a century' - and we haven't had nearly as much interconnectivity along with the kinds of massive world-shaking changes SR has had that tend to bring people new ways of viewing things.

Take a good long look at how much social perception of racism changed even between the sixties and the seventies, then compare that to how racism is perceived today. Even with the span of a decade, the change in social outlook was staggering, over 50 years, the previous view is considered to be alien to most.

right, Ares, having quashed bug hives then tries to have tame hives. oops.
Personally, going back to the first post in the thread, I've usually used variarous mind control spells regularly. I see it as more merciful to trick a guard than shoot him. and on one occassion I used mob mind to cause a bar room brawl to escape from a couple of bad guys.

The only thing I see as overall taboo's would be things that interfer with your ability to do your job- like fragging over johnsons (taking the money and not doing the job) or contacts or setting up other runners and getting caught at it.

To Happy and Janice both:

We aren't talking about every individual here, but over all perspectives. Ask just about any African American, or Native American, or other large minority in the United States whether or not racism still exists, and exists STRONGLY! I think that to say that the base opinions are changing is putting rose colored blinders on. The specifics are thankfully changing, which is a great first step towards over all change, but if either of you is honestly suggesting that racism is a thing of the past, I want to know where you are living, so I can journey to your world, because people, mine isn't like that at all!

Racism was always reviled by the people who weren't racist themselves, and the ones who were truly racist were almost always a tiny majority, just as they are today. Now the majority are simply more able to make themselves heard about it. THAT is what the Internet has changed. It has made the silent majority no longer silent.




Isshia

The overall perspective has changed. Neither of us claimed that racism no longer exists, merely that it has gone from being generally acceptable to rather unacceptable. This thread is about changes like that, and that's what we're pointing out to you. Hell, you even caught a glimpse of it in your own post...

Now magnify this 1000x and see what constant access to worldwide culture will bring. Seventy years will be plenty of time to see memes come and go.

Cantankerous... he was talking about overt racism. Overt. There is and always will be some form of racism, because you can't keep people from thinking it. The difference is despite the fact that there is racism it has actually improved in the last 50 years. Doesn't mean that it's gone, but it has improved. Might never be gone since you can't control the thoughts in people's heads.... yet.

@ Snow_Fox - The reason why I find mind control spells taboo is not for the fact that you can use them to get you out of a tight spot, but for the fact that you can control people like a puppet and have them do terrible things. If you wanted to make someone be unable to chase you, you can hit them with a high force orgasm/orgy spell that will drop everyone. You could make yourself invisible, or you could have a spirit slow them down. Using people like a tool is still using people like a tool. You might not be killing them, but the possibility for abuse is just staggering.

Yeah I didn't kill the guard, I just mind probed him, stole all of his money from his bank accounts, and then had him snatch all of the information I needed for that data steal... but I didn't kill him. I mean I'm not a monster.

Your right, racism still exists today, and likely will for many years to come. However, the original point her is if cross Metarace relationships are taboo. Yes, some racism exists in modern day, but noone would say that an interracial couple is a taboo.

In the same light, sure there are racists in SR4, and -those- people might think poorly of a cross Metarace couple, but the largest part of the population isn't going to consider it Taboo. Sure, some humanis people might try stringing up a Human/Elf couple, but you have to remember that for each person who would do that, there are thousands who wouldn't. Taboos work in the exact opposite way. If there was one person who accepted it per thousands that don't, then we'd be talking Taboo. In the mean time we're looking at frowned upon by some, hated by a few, and indifference by most.

Getting away from the racism topic for a minute.



You could do that and THAT wouldn't be much different or kinder than shooting the man. But you can also JUST suggest that he really needs to take a leak RIGHT NOW and get past him without doing anything more egregious to him than making him desert his post for a few moments. As with ANY weapon, magical mind control is all about HOW you use it.

You can kill a man with a a Narcoject Pistol too. Or with with a punch that wasn't designed to kill. It doesn't invalidate those approaches either to use them to try to get past the sentry.


Isshia

Actually you find ALLOT of people today who not only say that an interracial couple is taboo, but that they should be legally forced to separate. Now maybe you wouldn't find to many people in your own neighbor saying that, but this is a big old world man.

Isshia

I've got to agree with Snow Fox here. I think I already said this, but I'll point it out again. A mind control spell to get someone to do something isn't any worse then a ton of other things you could do to them. I mean you could be broke and unemployed, or you could be dead and broke. Personally I'd rather have the air in my lungs.

Mind controling a person to pass you all their cash isn't really any worse then hacking their accounts and stealing it. Mind controlling a person to steal data for you isn't any worse then using threats/blackmail. Mind controlling a person a person to not attack you is far less worse then killing them. I mean there isn't really any affect you can get via mind control that you couldn't get some other way, and those other ways aren't taboo, so why is doing it via mind control suddenly taboo?

I'd even argue that it is LESS egregious than using threats or blackmail or physical assault (and still more so than simply hacking their account would be) because the person is less intimately culpable than they are if they succumb to blackmail or threats, they weren't responsible for what was done to them, which is at least partly the case in the other two instances, and while the mental aspects of being mind raped is terrible, you still have all those aspects in regular rape as well as the physical ones. In being beaten to a bloody pulp to get your money, the mental aspects of THAT stay with you as well.


Isshia

I don't know, I guess it's a lot different here in BC, but I almost never see anyone who so much as thinks twice when they see interracial couples. Though, that may be because Caucasian/First Nations couples are extremely common in this part of BC.

Alot? Like more then 95%? No. Not a Taboo. More then 50%? No. If it was really a majority that thought that, it would be a law. It isn't a law, thus it isn't a majority. If it isn't the majority, then it isn't a true Taboo, just something that a few people think of as Taboo, thus falls under the category of 'hated by a few and disliked by some'.

Ok, if you want to get loose with the definition of Taboo, yes, it is a Taboo for some. But I think the OP is asking for Taboos that are basically universal.

You may say alot, but what you mean is "I know a fair number of these people, but I don't even know .1% of the people in the city in which I live."

And thus commence the shunning!


Dirty munchkins...

Hey, gimme a break. It was a troll NPC and the players said they wanted to hire some heavy support. Though it wasn't actually a pair of assault rifles, it was a pair of Enfield AS-7 shotguns.

I think you're forgetting that the US isn't the only nation around. Over 50% Hell yes, in several Asian nations (yes, including China and India) and most of the Middle Eastern nations. Since more of the worlds population lives in these nations than does in the rest of the world combined it might even be said to be more than 50% of the people world wide.

The West isn't the world folks.


Isshia

Well, rape isn't any worse than a ton of stuff that you could do to a person. But though it may not cause any physical damage, it is a severe violation that damages one's sense of security and self-integrity. Turning a person into a meat puppet against their will is the same sort of violation, but even more intimate. For someone to reach into your mind, the fundamental totality of your personal being, and rearrange it to suit his whim. That is going to be traumatic. The bigger and longer manipulations are going to be more traumatic, but even the smallest one is likely shatter the victim's sense of personal integrity. One might know intellectually that there are magicians and BTLs out there who can mess with your mind, but to have it happen to you is a different ball of wax entirely.


Actually, laws do tend to be made by a small handful of elites in high office. The majority has little to do with it.
This is especially true of large governments that control several culturally distinct regions, where the less powerful cultures are generally at the mercy of the mightier ones, but still maintain their own values and taboos.

See, that's totally different. Of course we respect the special relationship between shotguns and their owners.