Red versus Blue

"Does the general public know how badly the first contact went wrong?" Ty asked.

"None of the identities of your Seven are public knowledge. Certainly no one has the faintest idea that Hua Noah had anything to do with it."

"So Red hasn't been trumpeting that."

"It wouldn't be to Red's advantage, as I see it," Arjun said. "Now that they are allied with the Diggers, they want to make the Diggers out to be sympathetic. Revealing that they killef Hu Noah and his nurse would hardly serve that end."

"So we are just being made out to be some sort of anonymous thug squad. The Diggers chased us off with help from Red. We abducted a hostage as we were running away."

Arjun looked him in the eye. "No intelligent person in Blue believes that, of course."

"But Blue hasn't put out a countervailing narative yet either."

"It isn't Blue's strong suit." Arjun sighed. "Never has been, right? We're technocrats. We make decisions like engineers. Which doesn't always line up with what people imagine they want."

"Are you speaking of Blue in general?" Ty asked. "Or Rio in particular?" Using the name of the Ivyn central habitat as synecdoche for its culture.

"Both. A blue mentality that places us at the top of the decision-making pyramid. There's a reason why the very few Aidans who have become prominent in Blue have been musicians, actors, artists."

"They're supplying something our culture lacks," Ty said.

"You were supposed to supply it," Arjun said. Meaning, as Ty understood, the Dinan race. "And you did, during the heroic age."

Ty could feel a not altogether cheerful smile on his face. "By actually doing things, you mean," he said, "as opposed to pretending to do them in made-up entertainment programs."

"You know what, though? It's all entertainment. Real or made up. It's stuff that people watch on screens or varps. Red gets that."

"Well," Ty said, "maybe we can continue the discussion in my bar if we get out of this. But the bottom line for now, if I'm hearing you right, is that, narrative-wise, Red is killing us."

Neal Stephenson (2015), Seveneves, p. 803-804

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