True. Okay. I forgot that they have perfect supernatural lie detection available.
This seems like a remarkably harsh rule, since the dynamics of the mate bond with a human provide sufficient incentive to turn the mate without permission—whether permission would have been granted or not—that many people will do it, and it seems likely that a large number of them will successfully finish the turning and bond to their mate, necessitating large punishments for both the perpetrator and the victim of an act of which the victim was entirely innocent and which the victim is overwhelmingly likely to retroactively endorse. Leaving arguments of the morality of nonconsensual turning aside, a law that seems so likely to lead to the Empire carrying out so many morally questionable punishments seems suspect.
That one’s not going to carry a death penalty. It is true and obvious that mates would generally still prefer to turn without permission than let their mates die. The rules accomplish two things:
a) strongly encourage at least a good-faith attempt at convincing the mate first;
b) serve signaling purposes to human societies they later reveal themselves to (“no, of course kidnapping humans to turn them is illegal; it carries an N year hiding sentence, and if we can humanely arrange for them to serve it without said mate, we do”, as opposed to “yeah, if one of us wants to snag and vamp one of you badly enough it’s gonna happen and we’ll throw them an engagement party, sucks to be you”).
Also, any penalty short of death is going to be relatively little actual deterrent, in the long run. It’ll encourage vampires to make a strong attempt to convince their mate, but if that isn’t possible they will be quite willing to simply kidnap and turn them, in the sure knowledge that they will forgive them once turned, and make sure that the bond is fully established before the Empire intervenes so that they aren’t serving N years hidden in the absence of their mate.
True. Okay. I forgot that they have perfect supernatural lie detection available.
This seems like a remarkably harsh rule, since the dynamics of the mate bond with a human provide sufficient incentive to turn the mate without permission—whether permission would have been granted or not—that many people will do it, and it seems likely that a large number of them will successfully finish the turning and bond to their mate, necessitating large punishments for both the perpetrator and the victim of an act of which the victim was entirely innocent and which the victim is overwhelmingly likely to retroactively endorse. Leaving arguments of the morality of nonconsensual turning aside, a law that seems so likely to lead to the Empire carrying out so many morally questionable punishments seems suspect.
That one’s not going to carry a death penalty. It is true and obvious that mates would generally still prefer to turn without permission than let their mates die. The rules accomplish two things:
a) strongly encourage at least a good-faith attempt at convincing the mate first;
b) serve signaling purposes to human societies they later reveal themselves to (“no, of course kidnapping humans to turn them is illegal; it carries an N year hiding sentence, and if we can humanely arrange for them to serve it without said mate, we do”, as opposed to “yeah, if one of us wants to snag and vamp one of you badly enough it’s gonna happen and we’ll throw them an engagement party, sucks to be you”).
In a manner of speaking.
Also, any penalty short of death is going to be relatively little actual deterrent, in the long run. It’ll encourage vampires to make a strong attempt to convince their mate, but if that isn’t possible they will be quite willing to simply kidnap and turn them, in the sure knowledge that they will forgive them once turned, and make sure that the bond is fully established before the Empire intervenes so that they aren’t serving N years hidden in the absence of their mate.