Species: The Human
Apr. 8th, 2014 06:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bordersmodsHumanity is familiar, with all it's quirks of health and psychology. The only difference in this world from our own is how humanity has been forced to grow in tandem with dragonkind and the fay. While minds and bodies are the same, technology and history and culture have some significant differences.
History
On the whole, up until the 19th century, humanity's history has followed similar lines to that of our world. Most of the same countries formed in Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Americas-- there are some differences, particularly in Africa and North America, as colonialism and slavery met stiffer resistance from native populations who had much larger force of dragons than the invaders. Africa has been divided into twice as many countries, by modern times, more along tribal lines. The Americas, South America in particular, has the same. Canada is has sixteen provinces, and the United States into fifty-eight states: a third of them are native or fay governed and only loosely allied with the country as a whole, with one swathe in the middle of both countries that is considered "wild" territories, controlled only moderately by dragons.
More modern history of the world, from colonialism onwards, has several deviations from ours. The colonies who revolted against England and France in the Americas faced not an empty continent where most of the natives had been decimated by plague, but one where the fay who had immigrated centuries prior had already inoculated their new neighbors. Thus, the development of the new governments, particularly in the States and Canada, and the westward expansion was checked with lots of little wars, defeats, and eventually diplomacy to bring the native tribes and fay refuges into the new nations as small, state-sovereign and province-sovereign entities. By 2014, the last city-states on the edges of the two countries (one near where Alaska would be, for Canada, and one wedged between California and Mexico, for the United States) have finally officially allied, though they have not quite joined yet.
Mexico, to the south, is much the same as it is in our earth, only with an even more important native culture mixing with that of the imported Catholics, creating a religion much like Santaria and Hoodoo, with its melding of native gods and Catholic saints. The Aztec nation had gained such power with the help of the great feathered serpents that were native to the area that the intruding Spanish, without the help of their diseases to weaken the natives and with a lack of dragon support from Europe, couldn't do much more than negotiate and barter, rather than conquer. Mexico is a much stronger nation in this world than in ours, and the Aztecs are still alive and well.
Slavery persisted in parts of Europe and the Americas only until the very early 1800s, when a massive uprising of an African nation in the interior of the continent, with an unstoppable force of dragons, decimated all foreign ports and colonies in Africa. Shortly after, an uprising assisted by wild dragons in the States brought the problem closer to home, and after an earlier and rather messier version of the Civil War, slavery was abolished and, in the face of a new wave of fay immigration from Europe and Africa in the early 1900s, rather quickly given the civil liberties that took them until the 1960s to get in our time. The quieter and less official slavery of dragons continued for much longer, however, well into the 20th century, when the late 1980s finally saw the "partnered" class of dragon given full citizenship and the right to vote, as well as a council that advises the Senate, though as of yet no ability to run for office. Dragon rights lobbyists are still trying to get unpartnered dragons the right to vote and allow for dragonkind politicians.
Technology
Many technological aspects of the world of Borders are the same as those in our earth: electricity was harnessed, the radio and the television were invented at the same times, gunpowder and rifles led to handguns and automatic weapons, and steel and plastic are popular materials to make things with. Most technology is slightly different in small ways, but would be recognizable to someone from the real world. Some exists alongside magical means for the same tasks-- religiously avoided by dragons and portions of the human race, though it might be-- and some incorporate magic into their use, whether as a power source or a component made by magic instead of hands or machinery.
The most obvious differences between the technology of our earth and that of this earth come mostly from the incorporation of dragons into the American lifestyle. Cities are much less dense, much more sprawling, with a regulated distance between skyscrapers of a certain height and much larger, broader streets to allow the smaller and mid-sized dragons to fly over them. Most cities actually have designated flying and walking laneways for dragons, who must follow their own set of traffic rules in their more three-dimensional space.
In all shopping and entertainment zoned districts, rooftops and special parking lots are used as landing pads for shopping or just transporting dragons. Not all stores and entertainment establishments cater to dragons inside, but at least a third do, usually those closest to the special dragon-zoned residential districts. Even sidewalks on main thoroughfares in public and dragon-zoned districts cater to dragons by including multiple layers of human-sized sidewalks-- one at ground level, one at shoulder level to an average mid-sized dragon, and one at shoulder level for the smallest of the large breeds-- beside a larger dragon-sized sidewalk. Freeways are sometimes even the same way, with multiple lanes stacked on top of each other rather than side by side.
Every dragon-zoned residential district along the edge of even small cities has not only an ordinary grocery store, but a ranch of buffalo, beef cattle, crosses of the two, sheep and goats, and even llamas and horses, reserved for dragons. About half the population prefers the cheapest option when purchasing from the ranches: catching and killing their own meals, often to take home and hang in a refrigerated room, like a human would buy frozen food to reheat later. Sometimes the dragon pays to have meals salted or smoked for better preservation, but take no more preparation than that. More expensive options treat the ranches more like a restaurant, and dragons can request their meals prepared in a variety of ways. Dragons living further inside a city, or as part of a neighborhood too small to have their own cattle ranch, just have to fly a little further from home to get to the "store". The biggest and oldest cities, like New York and Washington DC, have actually grown around their ring of ranches a time or two, creating new suburbs around the fields for livestock, which in turn create more ranches along their outer borders.
Another major way in which technology differs is in the area of travel. Dragons provide much more of the transportation than any other mode besides a car: airplanes are still primitive, invented much later, and both trains and boats, while useful, aren't as direct as a dragon. Some dragons serve as local taxis, often medium-sized ones, while companies of larger dragons serve as long-distance travelers, making cross-country trips in the span of about twelve hours. Passengers are carried either on a dragon's back-- for smaller dragons and braver and fewer numbers of passengers-- or in compartments carried by a dragon or two, slung below them and steadied with steel cables and magic, for larger or less daring groups. Cargo is easier to manage, and all overland cargo and mail is handled by dragon, with only long transoceanic voyages forged by ships. Cars are still the most popular method of transportation, though with a less dense and generally lower population, they aren't quite as much of a problem as they are in our Earth.
Computers are probably the one area of technology that is more advanced, compared to our Earth, and which uses very little magic in its use and construction, if any. Driven by the need for dragons to interact with machines in any setting, touch activated screens and voice activated software are widely spread. Virtual reality and holograms aren't quite there yet, but they're not far away, either, and three-dimensional visuals aren't quite as popular as true magical illusions, but they're close.
Identification and records tracking are both far more computerized. Most forms of identification are digital rather than magnetic or manual, as is most money. Digital credit sticks-- in one size for humans and another for dragons-- are inserted into computers to read, and function as both identification and credit card. Credit cards still exist, themselves, but are considered obsolete, and only those who want to work underground or under the table still use actual money. Paper money didn't really ever catch on, however, and most actual cash transactions take place with an antiquated coin system. Coins are most popular among unpartnered dragons, fay, and as currency in the wild lands.
Politics and Culture
Human culture, like culture today in our world, is based largely on dominance and curiosity, and where the two intersect. It may be the species' biggest flaw that we always want to know the whys and hows of everything, but it is also its biggest strength, because it has led to humanity being the most populous and, generally thought, most powerful species on Earth, through their endless experimentation, leading to technological and magical breakthroughs, both. Humanity has the impetus, even if it doesn't always have the means, to move things forward.
However, the bulk of humanity also has the motivating need to have dominance, to always be the strongest and the best, and to have others look up to them and admire them. Combined with curiosity and creativity, a lot of opinions and disputes can and have turned into all-out wars. They are the species, of the three, most driven to conquer and dominate their world, and that puts them at odds with their non-human counterparts. Because humanity is also the most populous of the three intelligent species on Earth-- though not at the nearly seven billion of our world, humanity’s over two billion human people worldwide is easily four times more populous than dragons and fay put together-- that's not only a lot of wars among themselves, but a lot of wars trying to put those two species down, too. Before Western cultures began integrating dragons into their own society, there were bloody battles between humans and dragons. The battles between humans and fay still rage in many parts of the world.
The influence of fay on human, human on dragon, and both of the vice versas-- fay and dragons have little interaction that does not end in violence, and thus little interaction in general, so can hardly be said to have cultural influence on each other-- is difficult to track and compare, but it is most definitely there. Magic is one of the most obvious ones, because without the fay, there would be no magic, and now magic-- particularly in America, where the fay and humanity live more or less in peace-- has become an integral part of human culture, nearly as much as technology has. There are products for sale in stores and on television with magical components, and professions-- piloting, marketing, healing, even athletics-- have all been heavily influenced by the presence of magic. As anyone who has read in Harry Potter would wish, you can buy magical quills that improve your penmanship or spelling, and there are indeed sports-- maybe not Quidditch-- where flight and illusion are as much a part of the rules as which goal is whose and what counts as scoring a point.
For example, one of the most popular "new" sports is dragon polo, which is like polo, only in a three dimensional airspace and with dragons as the "mounts" instead of horses. Another is the simply named "magicball" (like baseball or basketball, only with balls that are magical), which is actually more like a cross between laser tag and dodgeball, out in the open, where different thrown balls have different status effects, and being hit by them gives or takes away points for the team. Even traditional sports have magical aspects: rules barring magical strength and stamina in contestants, or rules moderating them; magical traces on a finish line for disputed winnings; magical buffers to protect from tackle damage; etc. Magic has worked its way into nearly every facet of life, in some way.
Other non-human culture and values have slipped in, particularly in America, as well. For example, the native tribes especially have picked up their fay allies' respect for nature and often live in a very fay-like fashion integrated with their own traditions. Worship of the fay's typical triad of gods and goddesses, with the accompanying respect for woman, is probably the second most popular religion in the States behind Protestant Christianity. Competitions of strength and agility, and loyalty to the "flock" of childhood, have been leeched from the dragons. More often, however, non-human culture is influenced by humanity, rather than the other way around, if just due to sheer numbers and acclimation.
History
On the whole, up until the 19th century, humanity's history has followed similar lines to that of our world. Most of the same countries formed in Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Americas-- there are some differences, particularly in Africa and North America, as colonialism and slavery met stiffer resistance from native populations who had much larger force of dragons than the invaders. Africa has been divided into twice as many countries, by modern times, more along tribal lines. The Americas, South America in particular, has the same. Canada is has sixteen provinces, and the United States into fifty-eight states: a third of them are native or fay governed and only loosely allied with the country as a whole, with one swathe in the middle of both countries that is considered "wild" territories, controlled only moderately by dragons.
More modern history of the world, from colonialism onwards, has several deviations from ours. The colonies who revolted against England and France in the Americas faced not an empty continent where most of the natives had been decimated by plague, but one where the fay who had immigrated centuries prior had already inoculated their new neighbors. Thus, the development of the new governments, particularly in the States and Canada, and the westward expansion was checked with lots of little wars, defeats, and eventually diplomacy to bring the native tribes and fay refuges into the new nations as small, state-sovereign and province-sovereign entities. By 2014, the last city-states on the edges of the two countries (one near where Alaska would be, for Canada, and one wedged between California and Mexico, for the United States) have finally officially allied, though they have not quite joined yet.
Mexico, to the south, is much the same as it is in our earth, only with an even more important native culture mixing with that of the imported Catholics, creating a religion much like Santaria and Hoodoo, with its melding of native gods and Catholic saints. The Aztec nation had gained such power with the help of the great feathered serpents that were native to the area that the intruding Spanish, without the help of their diseases to weaken the natives and with a lack of dragon support from Europe, couldn't do much more than negotiate and barter, rather than conquer. Mexico is a much stronger nation in this world than in ours, and the Aztecs are still alive and well.
Slavery persisted in parts of Europe and the Americas only until the very early 1800s, when a massive uprising of an African nation in the interior of the continent, with an unstoppable force of dragons, decimated all foreign ports and colonies in Africa. Shortly after, an uprising assisted by wild dragons in the States brought the problem closer to home, and after an earlier and rather messier version of the Civil War, slavery was abolished and, in the face of a new wave of fay immigration from Europe and Africa in the early 1900s, rather quickly given the civil liberties that took them until the 1960s to get in our time. The quieter and less official slavery of dragons continued for much longer, however, well into the 20th century, when the late 1980s finally saw the "partnered" class of dragon given full citizenship and the right to vote, as well as a council that advises the Senate, though as of yet no ability to run for office. Dragon rights lobbyists are still trying to get unpartnered dragons the right to vote and allow for dragonkind politicians.
Technology
Many technological aspects of the world of Borders are the same as those in our earth: electricity was harnessed, the radio and the television were invented at the same times, gunpowder and rifles led to handguns and automatic weapons, and steel and plastic are popular materials to make things with. Most technology is slightly different in small ways, but would be recognizable to someone from the real world. Some exists alongside magical means for the same tasks-- religiously avoided by dragons and portions of the human race, though it might be-- and some incorporate magic into their use, whether as a power source or a component made by magic instead of hands or machinery.
The most obvious differences between the technology of our earth and that of this earth come mostly from the incorporation of dragons into the American lifestyle. Cities are much less dense, much more sprawling, with a regulated distance between skyscrapers of a certain height and much larger, broader streets to allow the smaller and mid-sized dragons to fly over them. Most cities actually have designated flying and walking laneways for dragons, who must follow their own set of traffic rules in their more three-dimensional space.
In all shopping and entertainment zoned districts, rooftops and special parking lots are used as landing pads for shopping or just transporting dragons. Not all stores and entertainment establishments cater to dragons inside, but at least a third do, usually those closest to the special dragon-zoned residential districts. Even sidewalks on main thoroughfares in public and dragon-zoned districts cater to dragons by including multiple layers of human-sized sidewalks-- one at ground level, one at shoulder level to an average mid-sized dragon, and one at shoulder level for the smallest of the large breeds-- beside a larger dragon-sized sidewalk. Freeways are sometimes even the same way, with multiple lanes stacked on top of each other rather than side by side.
Every dragon-zoned residential district along the edge of even small cities has not only an ordinary grocery store, but a ranch of buffalo, beef cattle, crosses of the two, sheep and goats, and even llamas and horses, reserved for dragons. About half the population prefers the cheapest option when purchasing from the ranches: catching and killing their own meals, often to take home and hang in a refrigerated room, like a human would buy frozen food to reheat later. Sometimes the dragon pays to have meals salted or smoked for better preservation, but take no more preparation than that. More expensive options treat the ranches more like a restaurant, and dragons can request their meals prepared in a variety of ways. Dragons living further inside a city, or as part of a neighborhood too small to have their own cattle ranch, just have to fly a little further from home to get to the "store". The biggest and oldest cities, like New York and Washington DC, have actually grown around their ring of ranches a time or two, creating new suburbs around the fields for livestock, which in turn create more ranches along their outer borders.
Another major way in which technology differs is in the area of travel. Dragons provide much more of the transportation than any other mode besides a car: airplanes are still primitive, invented much later, and both trains and boats, while useful, aren't as direct as a dragon. Some dragons serve as local taxis, often medium-sized ones, while companies of larger dragons serve as long-distance travelers, making cross-country trips in the span of about twelve hours. Passengers are carried either on a dragon's back-- for smaller dragons and braver and fewer numbers of passengers-- or in compartments carried by a dragon or two, slung below them and steadied with steel cables and magic, for larger or less daring groups. Cargo is easier to manage, and all overland cargo and mail is handled by dragon, with only long transoceanic voyages forged by ships. Cars are still the most popular method of transportation, though with a less dense and generally lower population, they aren't quite as much of a problem as they are in our Earth.
Computers are probably the one area of technology that is more advanced, compared to our Earth, and which uses very little magic in its use and construction, if any. Driven by the need for dragons to interact with machines in any setting, touch activated screens and voice activated software are widely spread. Virtual reality and holograms aren't quite there yet, but they're not far away, either, and three-dimensional visuals aren't quite as popular as true magical illusions, but they're close.
Identification and records tracking are both far more computerized. Most forms of identification are digital rather than magnetic or manual, as is most money. Digital credit sticks-- in one size for humans and another for dragons-- are inserted into computers to read, and function as both identification and credit card. Credit cards still exist, themselves, but are considered obsolete, and only those who want to work underground or under the table still use actual money. Paper money didn't really ever catch on, however, and most actual cash transactions take place with an antiquated coin system. Coins are most popular among unpartnered dragons, fay, and as currency in the wild lands.
Politics and Culture
Human culture, like culture today in our world, is based largely on dominance and curiosity, and where the two intersect. It may be the species' biggest flaw that we always want to know the whys and hows of everything, but it is also its biggest strength, because it has led to humanity being the most populous and, generally thought, most powerful species on Earth, through their endless experimentation, leading to technological and magical breakthroughs, both. Humanity has the impetus, even if it doesn't always have the means, to move things forward.
However, the bulk of humanity also has the motivating need to have dominance, to always be the strongest and the best, and to have others look up to them and admire them. Combined with curiosity and creativity, a lot of opinions and disputes can and have turned into all-out wars. They are the species, of the three, most driven to conquer and dominate their world, and that puts them at odds with their non-human counterparts. Because humanity is also the most populous of the three intelligent species on Earth-- though not at the nearly seven billion of our world, humanity’s over two billion human people worldwide is easily four times more populous than dragons and fay put together-- that's not only a lot of wars among themselves, but a lot of wars trying to put those two species down, too. Before Western cultures began integrating dragons into their own society, there were bloody battles between humans and dragons. The battles between humans and fay still rage in many parts of the world.
The influence of fay on human, human on dragon, and both of the vice versas-- fay and dragons have little interaction that does not end in violence, and thus little interaction in general, so can hardly be said to have cultural influence on each other-- is difficult to track and compare, but it is most definitely there. Magic is one of the most obvious ones, because without the fay, there would be no magic, and now magic-- particularly in America, where the fay and humanity live more or less in peace-- has become an integral part of human culture, nearly as much as technology has. There are products for sale in stores and on television with magical components, and professions-- piloting, marketing, healing, even athletics-- have all been heavily influenced by the presence of magic. As anyone who has read in Harry Potter would wish, you can buy magical quills that improve your penmanship or spelling, and there are indeed sports-- maybe not Quidditch-- where flight and illusion are as much a part of the rules as which goal is whose and what counts as scoring a point.
For example, one of the most popular "new" sports is dragon polo, which is like polo, only in a three dimensional airspace and with dragons as the "mounts" instead of horses. Another is the simply named "magicball" (like baseball or basketball, only with balls that are magical), which is actually more like a cross between laser tag and dodgeball, out in the open, where different thrown balls have different status effects, and being hit by them gives or takes away points for the team. Even traditional sports have magical aspects: rules barring magical strength and stamina in contestants, or rules moderating them; magical traces on a finish line for disputed winnings; magical buffers to protect from tackle damage; etc. Magic has worked its way into nearly every facet of life, in some way.
Other non-human culture and values have slipped in, particularly in America, as well. For example, the native tribes especially have picked up their fay allies' respect for nature and often live in a very fay-like fashion integrated with their own traditions. Worship of the fay's typical triad of gods and goddesses, with the accompanying respect for woman, is probably the second most popular religion in the States behind Protestant Christianity. Competitions of strength and agility, and loyalty to the "flock" of childhood, have been leeched from the dragons. More often, however, non-human culture is influenced by humanity, rather than the other way around, if just due to sheer numbers and acclimation.
