Unsanctioned.

This really should be in quotation marks. No one with half an ounce of brain matter actually believes it’s unsanctioned. I mean, take a look at this thrice-damned mess. No matter where you go in that bloated carcass they call an Empire, there’s sites containing thousands of people waiting for some merciful soul to come deliver them from evil.

You think that’s unsanctioned, really? If you do, you can’t exactly be holding the Empire’s own security forces and law enforcement in high regard. Much like the slaver raids outside of their borders, decried as Rogue Elements or Criminals or… well, unsanctioned. It would appear that if we’re to take any of this at their words, a very large chunk of their Navy has gone rogue and a sizable chunk of the Empire’s population engages in unsanctioned slave trade and processing.

Of course it’s sanctioned.

I don’t know if any of you remember this, but a while back Jamyl Sarum once condoned – and likely ordered in the first place – the outright murder of children having been freed and on their way to a free nation. Try to imagine this for a moment. Take in the weight of what that means. The freedom of a Minmatar child was a greater horror to these people than their blatant and outright murder.

So now enough of the various factions composing CONCORD have managed to get these sites onto our overviews, and we’re slaughtering “unsanctioned” slavers and getting maybe a quarter of the slaves at the location crammed into a hauler before it zips off into the unknown. My hangars across the Empire are starting to fill up with enough freed slaves that it’ll take me considerable effort and time to get them all through the Network.

So why is this, you might wonder. Why have the powers that be allowed this, and why didn’t Kittenz veto the hell out of it? Allow me to lay out a few reasons.

First of all, do remember the lovely Kittenz’ provenance. Tash-Murkon have always been a house that prefers a more… mercantile approach to slavery. It’s about profits, work-forces, trade and practicality for them. This is a downright delightful means towards the end of them getting their competitors knocked out of the game rather permanently. Slave prices will rise, their personal stocks will be far more attractive to customers and she even gets to pretend that it’s the Rule of Law.

Secondly, this allows a lot of people to keep pretending they’ve done anything of note. Four hundred times however many sites they do? That’s a lot of freed slaves! Of course, compared to the ocean of shackled men, women and children in the Empire, this is pretty much like pissing in it and expecting floods to happen. Of course, the floods will remain conspicuous in their absence, and when this little celebration is at an end people will pat themselves on the back and cease doing anything of worth. Job done, qe? Ne.

The Purge will be done, markets will have been created and profits are to be made again. Breeder facilities will remain “unsanctioned” yet plentiful, with slavers wandering the hallways sporting a semi-erection. Breaking facilities will be cathedrals of tormented howling and sobs. Spirits will break under the lash and chain. Trillions of fates will remain horrifying.

So tell me, ladies and gentlemen of New Eden. Will you be done when this little diversion is over? Will you have done your part, and consider yourself finished? Don’t. Do not allow yourself to be lulled into complacency by this. Take it for the lesson it is, in just how vile the Empire’s slavery truly is. How they feed their markets with “unsanctioned” slavery, while at the very same time using it as a smokescreen to give their practices a slight veil of legitimacy.

These chains must be broken for good, and the only way to achieve that is to maintain the pressure.

Even if you have to be… “unsanctioned”.