[OOC] Judgement Call Needed

[robkelk]

---

looking at the With Liberty thread, I think we need a consensus judgement call on Haruhi's competence level - she's either incompetent or not, and we need to decide it out of story, IMO.

---

My take on Haruhi's competence level is: Does it really matter?
Disclaimer: I still haven't actually seen the anime (my copy of volume 1 is still held up in Customs); I'm going by what others have written about her or in her character.
So... Haruhi's used to dealing with people who, sooner or later, agree with her. Fenspace is made up of rugged individualists (the Heinleinians most obviously, but they don't have a monopoly on stubbornness); not everyone in this setting is going to agree with her. This culture clash alone is enough to derail her best-laid plans, no matter how competent she is.

---

Those are the two points driving Cap'n Mal's fury in the For Liberty threads. For him, it's not a question of "competence" (Haruhi's a competent general. But then, so was Douglas Haig.) but a question of trust.

---

This doesn't help Haruhi "win friends and influence people", either...
As long as she has to work through normal or slightly abnormal people, her plans aren't going to be followed to the letter. Presenting herself in such a way that people don't trust her (and none of the SOS-dan are stupid enough to let her go anywhere near the front lines, which is the only thing that'll get some of the movers and shakers to trust her) simply compounds the matter.
If her plans aren't followed, it doesn't matter how good those plans are.

---

You can't choke Haruni. The universe any everytyhing (the SOS-dan foremost) will prevent it.

---

The SOS-dan will prevent it, or at least try to, but the universe couldn't care less (unless she really is a god, which is A Matter Of Canonical Doubt).

-Rob Kelk
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012