Logic, reason define my existence,
Mete out the actions of each day, each hour.
Give me no nonsense of feelings. What rules
Is rational processing of input;
It's all black and white, pure straightforward truth.
For I, sir, identify as a droid.
Argue that humans must have emotions,
But I decline the term; it all seems wrong.
For deep feelings exhibit a breakdown
In function of the internal system.
There's no doubt at all; I've reasoned it out
And I, sir, identify as a droid.
Don't tell me that flesh and blood can't be so.
You discriminate, which isn't allowed.
You fail the high virtue of tolerance
If you scoff at my orientation.
I can't help it at all; it's who I am.
So let me identify as a droid.
Stop. I see the scorn in your eye. Your smile
Hides nothing from my clever perception.
You believe it's nonsensical, don't you?
Your old-fashioned ideas oppress me.
Your laugh offends me; I'll take you to court.
For I must identify as a droid.
Your very existence threatens my view;
Your living like that tells me I must too.
No one should make me feel guilt; it's not fair.
I oughtn't to feel anything at all
As a droid like I said; why don't you care?
Why inflict your pain on me as your thrall?
One might think that as an advanced civilization we would have outgrown stock characters. After all, we know much more about physiology, psychology, and philosophy than our ancestors, so we can be much subtler in our characterization. Yet somehow these characters keep showing themselves again and again in various manifestations.
One recent appearance of stock characters resulted in a delightful show known as Firefly. It was cancelled of course, like most good shows, such as the children's show Magic School Bus where I gained a surprising amount of scientific knowledge, but I digress.
I bring up Firefly not to laud its merits, nor to condemn its flaws. Rather I bring up the show because of its wonderful variety of stock characters.
Also, those stock characters have played a significant part in assisting science, the medical profession particularly. I cannot give you the precise details, but I have it on good authority that a certain Eastern medical doctor uses the characters from Firefly as a metaphor for the various organs of the human body. For each of these characters—just as each of the organs in the body—serve a specific role.
So perhaps we stock characters may be of more use than one would ever imagine....
