Altruism · 5:54pm Apr 17th, 2017
“Shēdo no understand what just happened.” Standing in the street, Shēdo admired her new bag and thought about all of their new supplies. She felt suspicious about what had just taken place, and she felt guilty for feeling suspicious. She wanted to believe that there were good creatures in the world, even after everything that had happened.
“What don’t you understand?” Conifer asked as he rubbed up against Shēdo to enjoy her fluffiness.
“Everything,” Shēdo replied. With a grunt, she gestured at the general store.
“Well,” Conifer began, drawing the word out and making it long. “He did say that he wants Rusty Rail to be the next Ponyville, whatever that means. They have to start somewhere, and that means building a reputation. Being nice is an advantage for them, because we’ll go out into the world and tell others about how nice the ponies of Rusty Rail are.”
“So he gives away stuff?”
“It’s called altruism.”
Hearing the strange word that Shēdo had never heard before, she barked. A nearby pony stood staring, but did so in a polite way. Reaching up, she began scratching at the back of her skull, using the calloused pads of her paw, and not her diggy-diggy claws. Diggy-diggy claws could become scalpy-scalpy claws if she wasn’t careful.
“Doing good for the sake of doing good,” Conifer continued, his whole face scrunching from concentration as he tried to think of a way to explain this to his companion. “Although in this instance he is hoping for a return from his investment in kindness, he is still doing good for the sake of doing good. Dodge City Junction is apparently a bad, bad place, and Rusty Rail is trying to be the exact opposite.”
“So… like Shēdo trying to be a good dog for the sake of being a good dog, because so many dogs are bad?” Shēdo reached down and her paw came to rest on Conifer’s back. “Shēdo do good to make up for the bad that her kind has done.”
“Yeah… that sort of works.” Conifer wiggled around a bit, trying to scratch his back beneath Shēdo’s calloused paws. “But altruism is doing something good, doing the right thing even though you might not get anything in return.”
“Samurai.” Shēdo bowed her head. “Stories of how things were. Do good for the sake of honour. Do right for the sake of one’s soul. Exercise builds the muscle, but only good deeds make the soul stronger, Minori say.”
“That sounds incredibly wise.” Conifer swayed back and forth, trying to get an itchy spot scratched. “Altruism as a form of soul calisthenics.” When Shēdo’s paw began rubbing his back, the zebra colt’s eyes rolled into the back of his head and his tongue hung out, sensation robbing him of all intellect.
“Shēdo do altruism,” she announced as she gave her zebra companion an absentminded scratch. With her other paw, she gestured at the tiny town all around her. “If Shēdo do good and keep ponies safe, then ponies safe to do good and good is done. If little ponies are in danger, they get scared, they stay in houses and maybe not do as much good. Right?”
Conifer did not reply, but stood there, looking stupid while getting his back scratched.
She's not smart, but she's wise.
sounds like shedo give gives good scratchies