Red-White

WHITE VS. RED

Red believes that the goal of life is for each person to find their own passion by following their impulses.

To be able to do this, they need to live in a society that prioritizes the needs of the individual to explore whichever path they choose to walk down. It needs to be a world free of restrictions and limitations.

White wants to create a world that maximizes the happiness of the group. A key part of accomplishing this is making sure that everyone is safe and secure. To do this, there must be rules and regulations that ensure individuals don't selfishly endanger the group.

In short, this is the classic battle of freedom versus security. What's best for a society? A world in which people are free to act or one in which they are free from harm? Do we prioritize the individual's ability to do what they want or a society's ability to best protect itself? Is a seat belt law curtailing liberties or saving lives? How much personal freedom is worth societal protection?

To red, this is an issue of whether or not others get to tell you how to live your life. Red thinks of white as a dictator unfairly enforcing its will. Red sees this conflict as democracy versus fascism.

To white, this is an issue of social responsibility, of looking out for the greater welfare. White sees red as someone embracing anarchy and endangering society. White sees this conflict as order versus chaos.

At its core, this conflict is about what is best for how we govern ourselves.

Order vs. Chaos

White believes in the importance of rules. Red hates rules – red just wants to be free. White wants things neat and orderly; red likes things messy and chaotic. White believes that red needs to be reigned in to avoid anarchy, but red believes white needs to be abolished to avoid fascism.

Defense vs. Offense

White thinks the best offense is a good defense. Red doesn’t think that much; red just likes smashing things. White feels a need to protect. Red feels a need to destroy. Obviously, these two agendas clash.

Strategy vs. Spontaneity

White believes that rules always help. There’s no reason that shouldn’t apply to battle. Red doesn’t feel a need to think that far ahead… That’s what impulses are for.

What do the two colors have in common?

The key to understanding an enemy color pair is to examine what conflict defines them. For red and white that is the eternal conflict of chaos and order. White is all about structure. White wants peace and harmony for everybody. To ensure this happens, white lays down the law, quite literally. White knows that its rules upon rules will make sure that everyone is doing what they should to guarantee a peaceful community. Red, on the other hand, is very much about following its heart. Red does what it feels it should do. Now, when everyone acts on their own wants and desires it causes some conflict. Red's okay with that. Conflict is an essential part of life. If two people disagree let them smack each other around. Ideas like this lead to chaos. Once again, red's okay with that.

So how does the force working towards order commingle with the force working towards chaos? The answer is to let each part have its role in how the guild functions. One half picks the goal while the other half chooses the tools to accomplish the task. This leads to two possibilities. A group with a moral center using whatever it feels is necessary to get the job done (this is the Boros for those that care). Or a group bent on creating anarchy that uses careful planning to bring it about.

The two colors actually have more in common than you might first think. First, both colors are very driven. True, by different things (morals for white and emotion for red), but nonetheless both create fervent followers willing to die for their cause. Second, both embrace the military although at opposite ends of the spectrum (the orderly platoon versus the ragtag mob). And third, both colors have a very aggressive “attack first, ask question later” streak that seeps out into deck archetypes (white weenie and sligh).

White and red might be on two different sides but they do share the same coin. Their actions are often so similar that you need to understand their motivation before you can tell whether they're red or white.

How do the two colors differ? What is the guild's internal conflict?

As stated above, red and white want diametrically opposed things. White acts as a means to bring the community together. To safeguard the needs of the many. Red acts to ensure that each individual has the freedom to do whatever it wants even if that freedom imposes on others. White makes rules. Red breaks rules. White carefully builds structure. Red breaks down structure wherever it can find it.

The internal conflict of the guild stems from this divergence. Red/white is always focused on its goal but its ends don't always match its means. Red/white often finds itself breaking the very rules it has set out to create. To create peace, it will kill. To ensure freedom, it will enslave. Its long term strategy and short term tactics are constantly at odds with one another.

This internal disconnect makes red/white hard to understand. Sure, red/white knows what it's up to but those around it are always a little taken aback at what it is willing to do to get the job done.

What does the guild care about? What is its end goal? What means does the guild use to achieve these ends?

To understand what red/white seeks, we need to look at the desires of each of the colors separately. White wants peace. Red wants freedom. White wants everyone to have security. Red wants everyone to have choices. The balance is that red/white seeks all of these things for some of the people. Red/white is king of rationalization. That is, red/white comes up with reasons to explain why chaos is in fact order. And why order is in fact chaos. Red/white is also the master of compromise (to itself, that is). To save some, it will sacrifice others. To establish a rule, it will break the very rule it is trying to establish. It will live up to its high ideals no matter how low it has to stoop to live up to them.

Red/white's end goal is to have a purpose that it uses all its energy to reach. What is that end goal? Ironically, it is to either create peace or to create chaos using the opposite as a tool to do so. In the end, red/white is trying to find a way for order and chaos to co-exist without any uncomfortable side effects. And when those happen, it brushes them under the rug or rationalizes why they aren't such a problem.

While red/white is conflicted in what it wants, it is not conflicted in how it hopes to accomplish it. Take your people. Give them the same goal. Give them the same means to reach that goal and then get out of the way. The drive of red/white's followers is so fanatical that red/white doesn't need to spend any more time indoctrinating them. Red/white just paints the bullseye and let's the force that is their legion do what it must.

What does the guild despise? What negatively drives the guild?

The key to understanding what an enemy color pair despises is to look at the other enemies of the two colors and see what those two colors have in common. Red's other enemy is blue while white's other enemy is black. What do blue and black have in common? Sneakiness. Indirectly and subtly accomplishing one's goal. Red/white hates that. Red/white is all about being open and honest about what you're doing. If I'm planning to cave in your skull, I tell you to your face what I'm going to do.

Red/white is all about being focused and direct. It doesn't get subtlety. It wants to see its enemies coming because it enjoys a good fight. Being sucker punched or stabbed in the back is so not what red/white wants to have happen. Red/white wants things played by the rules. You know, the rules it made. If its enemies don't understand its rules, that's okay. But at least red/white has them. Playing without clear-cut rules is cheating. And red/white does not condone cheating. At least not what it defines as cheating.

What is the color's greatest strength and biggest weakness?

Red/white's greatest strength is its focus. When it decides to do something there is no hesitancy. It acts forcefully and brutally. It does what's needed to get the job done. Whatever it takes.

Red/white's greatest weakness is its complete lack of subtlety. Red/white's enemies always know exactly what red/white is up to because red/white tells them. To their face. Multiple times. Red/white doesn't hide anything. And quite often that's a big liability.

Orderly Chaos

I couldn't end without the ever-so-controversial examples from pop culture.

The Punisher – For those of you that don't read comics (or see really bad movies), the Punisher is a man named Frank Castle whose family was gunned down by mobsters (they were accidentally caught in some crossfire). To make amends, he has vowed to stop all people like those that took his loved ones. How? By killing them, of course. Aha, you say, he kills, doesn't that make him black? No, killing for selfish gain is black. What the Punisher does is not for himself but for society as a whole (yeah, yeah, I know that can be debated but it's how the character is written). The Punisher is guided by a very strict set of ethics. He truly believes he is making the world a better place. (That's the white part.) But he feels he is above the law and he accomplishes his task as he sees fit most often by blowing the bad guys away. (That's the red part.)

The A Team – As you can see vigilantes feel right at home in red/white. The A Team is no exception. The A Team is out to do good. They have a strong moral center and are clearly guided by the desire to right wrongs. That said, they are in no way constrained by anyone else's rules. They do what it takes to accomplish their task (and other than BA getting shot every eighth episode no one ever seems to get hurt).

Worf – Worf is a Klingon (heavy red) raised by humans (heavy white). He has great respect for structure as a member of the Federation yet still understands the primal emotions that guide his people. His whole character is based on the internal conflict of these two forces.

V from V for Vendetta – This is another comic book reference (and a good one at that – way better than the Punisher in my comic tastes – although to be fair Garth Ennis does write a mean Punisher). I chose it for two reasons. One, the movie (with Natalie Portman) is coming out soon so hopefully this reference will make sense to more people within the next year. Second, he is the best example of a character that flip flops the means and ends. V is trying to create anarchy and chaos but through very tight and structured means.