If we’re talking Mad Max: Fury Road, or even Beyond Thunderdome, this feels like the characters are reclaiming a moral boundary that had collapsed.
Though I also note they are quite a bit more focused on the community element: do they want to be a community together; can they, personally, deal with those requirements; can they find a place and resources to do it; etc.
Other communities exist, but are overpoweringly and explicitly ingroup-eats-outgroup or even ingroup-eats-ingroup in the sense of being exploitative.
Yeah, I think sufficiently advanced post-apocalypses are basically “The Before Times”. (And, even medium-advanced post-apocalypses certainly share structure with what the OP is talking about). But, for me there’s something particularly compelling about origin stories for how bits of morality first appeared in the world at all.
I agree they make for really good stories. I tell you what I would like to see more of in these stories is leaning into the moral dessert of it all.
Fox and Hound: make friends and gain the ability to survive bear attacks!
Mononoke: make not-enemies and not-die to spirit stampedes or cold iron!
Primal: make friends and you can eat anything!
Actually, the Primal example is so on the nose I feel like a better term is needed for coordination-related-morality. Moral dinner seems fitting. Be good, so you can eat.
I do think it’s kinda important that a major moral of the fox and the hound is “make friends because having friends is nice.” (or, to be more clear: “make friends so you have people to play and have fun with, who like you, who give you a feeling of lasting connection”. Notably, Todd doesn’t get saved by a bear. What’s he getting out of it?)
But yes getting literally saved from bears is a big part of the package.
If we’re talking Mad Max: Fury Road, or even Beyond Thunderdome, this feels like the characters are reclaiming a moral boundary that had collapsed.
Though I also note they are quite a bit more focused on the community element: do they want to be a community together; can they, personally, deal with those requirements; can they find a place and resources to do it; etc.
Other communities exist, but are overpoweringly and explicitly ingroup-eats-outgroup or even ingroup-eats-ingroup in the sense of being exploitative.
Yeah, I think sufficiently advanced post-apocalypses are basically “The Before Times”. (And, even medium-advanced post-apocalypses certainly share structure with what the OP is talking about). But, for me there’s something particularly compelling about origin stories for how bits of morality first appeared in the world at all.
I agree they make for really good stories. I tell you what I would like to see more of in these stories is leaning into the moral dessert of it all.
Fox and Hound: make friends and gain the ability to survive bear attacks!
Mononoke: make not-enemies and not-die to spirit stampedes or cold iron!
Primal: make friends and you can eat anything!
Actually, the Primal example is so on the nose I feel like a better term is needed for coordination-related-morality. Moral dinner seems fitting. Be good, so you can eat.
I do think it’s kinda important that a major moral of the fox and the hound is “make friends because having friends is nice.” (or, to be more clear: “make friends so you have people to play and have fun with, who like you, who give you a feeling of lasting connection”. Notably, Todd doesn’t get saved by a bear. What’s he getting out of it?)
But yes getting literally saved from bears is a big part of the package.