Attitudes (Term)

Gens toward Simes -- and -- Simes toward Gens
(Source:  Index card file.  UNTO ZEOR, FOREVER -- Gen (out-Territory) Attitude toward Simes.  Stainer girl "knew nothing" of Simes -- she was beaten.  Teenagers are watched, might be beaten to death.  Rifle kept on wall inside the door of the station -- but they wait for wagon to come from Center.  Tended to view Simes as basically superior and therefore a perpetual threat in any competetive situation (such as medicine.)  Afraid Simes will take over.
Five interns threatened to quit if Digen stayed.  Lankh's experiments.  One intern whistling "an unsavory little tune associated with anti-Sime jokes."  Regarded Simelan as a form of secret communication designed to exclude Gens.
"Slimy" tentacles.
Didi Rill studied about Digen in school -- but didn't study what it is like to live in-Territory as a Sime.  Digen's changeover courses for teenagers:  Three new Gen schools in 12 years. 
Regard changeover as losing their kids -- disappearing in-Territory and are never heard from again.  Cut off and alone, beyond all reach.  Digen says people can write or phone out-Territory and there's a lot of traffic. 
View of Sime "superiority" -- everything everyone wants to be -- graceful, dexterous, surefooted, strong, fast, can see in the dark or around corners, never need a watch or a map.  Don't even sleep like a Gen.  (This is a mundane, surface attitude.  Sime view is on a nageric level -- GEN is superior.)
Changeover victim beaten by his family and left in a dirty alley. 
(Source:  Index card file, "Sime attitude toward Gens" -- Letter from Jacqueline Lichtenberg, November 25, 1975)  Tecton culture is an amalgam of  the Householding and Sime Pen cultures.  Regards Gens with "patronizing paternalism."  No sharp instruments, Gens can't drive.  Naturally, out-Territory Gens hate and resent Simes ("wild west" mentality) -- fear their inclusion into surgery -- yet know they are dependent on the patronizing bastards.  In-Territory Gens are only a few generations out of the Pens -- they deserve the patronizing.  Gens treated like clumsy, inept, incompetent children.  The worst swear word you can call a Gen is a word meaning "Pen-fodder" -- a person fit only to be Killed.
By Yone's time, patronizing attitude has been mitigated.  Gens come to realize that they ARE clumsy and untrustworthy in certain functions, but that in fact they are the dominant part of any Sime~Gen relationship.
Pure Distect philosophy taught by Klyd to Hugh.  Though Hugh absorbed it, Klyd knew it only intellectually, which leads into the Tecton culture and eventually causes it to shatter under the impact of Klairon Farris.
Tecton based on:  A channel can over control a Gen, any Gen, and in fact SHOULD do so, though at times he has to submit to the Gen's control voluntarily. 
(Source:  Index card file.  "Childhood" --- House of Zeor) 
Hugh's point of view and opinion ---  Children in-Territory had seen the madness of Need, the Kill, the overwhelming strength of the sime.  Neighbors, parents, siblings, schoolmates would consider those who had established a Choice Kill (notice Hugh's lack of understanding.)
Out-Territory ---  Hunted, despised, hated by relatives and friends --- adolescents beaten to death by loved ones --- parents' love warped by the fear the child would change over while they slept and attack them --- kids not allowed hammers, nails, knives, or other dangerous tools.
"Thrino" accepts that she has no name because she is a Gen and sticks to the hatred of the perverted Householders (for awhile at least).  Self-hatred.  Not even a "little girl" any more, but a Gen.
Category:Terms