From: Timothy Collinson <xxxxxx@port.ac.uk>
To: xxxxxx@simplelists.com
Sent: Sunday, May 13, 2018 8:45 AM
Subject: Re: [TML] Response to Jim's Theory of Imperial Censorship

As one of the articles you quote reminds us, Traveller was inspired by the Dumarest series and as far as I've read in these books (I must finish them one day!), the empire is very very distant and hands off with perhaps considerably less travel/contact/trade than we typically imagine in the Third Imperium. Under these conditions it seems very reasonable you'd have the variety of governments without anyone - even relatively nearby - caring very much at all. I guess I'm picturing a continent like Europe (or maybe Africa) in the Middle Ages where you might be at war with a neighbour or two but have little idea and care even less what the monarch/chieftain/despot a few hundred miles away was doing. Even if you knew about it, it would be easy to dismiss as "those heathens/foreigners/aliens" and leave them to it.

Every once in a while I like to go back & read the original Adv1 (LBB) 'The Kinunir' to get a real feel for the way in which the Imperium was originally presented. The adventure that introduced the 'Chirpers' is another one. Vanejen is a classic TU 'backwater' that no one really cares about.

Europe was stunned when the Vikings suddenly appeared even though the Norse had been 'up there' for centuries & I'm sure, esp since modern-day Denmark was Norse territory back then, there had been more than a little contact.

p.s. Now, during the 3rd Frontier War, Vanejen had an IN Naval Base orbiting it & as long as the base was there the 3I certainly *would* care!

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