Borg Culture

Borg Culture
A look at the psychological and sociological impacts of visible
implants and cybernetic enhancements

The cyber fiction genre does not suit bulked-out armoured chassis
individuals walking around the local 7-11 without a care in the
world.

This document is not intended as an essay, it provides a few guidelines
for social impact of borg enhancements on the human being, and
hopefully stimulates some interesting concepts.

Full Borg: [Robotic Machine with a human brain]

Stigma of not being human
The majority of the population are still visibly and emotionally human.
A wide segment readily opt for cybernetic implants, cosmetic
improvements for vanity or improved health options and endurance. The
key to the acceptance of this wide-segment is the 'invisible' nature of
these technologies. People pay more money to reduce the physical impact
on their appearance. Everybody wants to look beautiful, young
and&;#8230;human.

There is however a growing enclave of the population opting for partial
or total physical alteration. From hard mounts on the exterior of their
skull through to full body conversions, replacing their biological
bodies with cyborg simulacra. These people are not taking this life
choice because it is fashionable. In fact, the truth is, this life
choice places a stigma upon them that in some cases can drive them out
of the human village. So what kind of a person takes this choice?

Cyborg and Visible Implant Culture
Off world industry, mining, terraforming, colony policing and
skirmishes have created a demand for agents more durable than the human
body alone can provide. Robots cannot always be used and it costs a lot
to reproduce the human brain.

Full borgs and cyberpsychosis
Developing countries provide an abundant source of cheap human
resources. The type of people who may sell a kidney, lung or limb to a
body bank, are also the people who come forward to the corporations for
full body replacements. They have no life where they are, as a human,
and so, often misguidedly, are seduced by the idea of a better life as
the employee of a corporation that would strip away their human flesh
and encase their brain and vital organs in a machine.

Once so converted, the individual is bereft of all senses, sight,
taste, touch, smell and sound must be piped through a digital
interface. These synthetic sensations can be as good as reality, if not
better, but such observations are not considered by the borg-individual
whose resentment builds into a sociopathic fury known as
cyber-psychosis. The stigma of full borg conversion amongst the
majority of the human population has been the subject and much debate.
The strongest thread to all the theories is the underlying fear invoked
by the appearance, strength and lack of humanity of the full borg. The
full borg is intimidation on all levels. This stigma is the cause of
increased alienation in many borgs. You do not see a borg relaxing with
old work colleagues in a health spa, or getting wasted on Tequila and
jiving the night away in some seedy road-side ranch hotel. It just
doesn't look right. And most groups of humans are unable to tolerate
such events. The Borg quickly learns to feel an outcast amongst his
original species. And so the frustration, resentment, depression and
the rage often builds in intensity.

Full borg culture is a cold mix of machine law and human phobia. Taste
of beauty is often the first quality to be lost. A hunger for direct
stimulation becomes an obsession. Wariness, aloofness and self
delusions follow, usually expressed through an aggressive means. The
soul suffers. Love becomes difficult, as the emotional centres locked
within the brain struggle to respond to a lack of facial, tactile and
olfactory guideposts. Guideposts which the full borg spent years since
birth as an organic entity developing.

An interesting factor to consider is that the majority of people taking
the full borg option, are from poorer cultures with strong religious
faiths. Often, these people then find themselves being isolated within
Westernised locations, a racial tension exists, adding to the dangerous
weight straining the borg's sanity. Cyber-psychosis can be an extension
of racial / religious intolerance.

Full borgs are emotional harbours of vulnerability without the natural
ways to express them. Their brains are ultimately human. Although it is
a common phenomena for the human-side to atrophy in the long term
borg.

What does a full borg do for relaxation? Where do full borgs go for
recreation? Special centres were initially set up for borgs, many with
total-sleep units that literally knocked the brain out and placed the
borg in storage until their next job came up. These centres have become
more established, they have expanded into communities, usually
exclusive to none-organic occupants. The provision of entertainment and
recreation has become sophisticated.

Money and the privilege of position or rank can alleviate many causes
of cyber-psychosis. An example is the provision of more acceptable
simulacra to spend relaxation time within. People such as military
servicemen and emergency services personnel who have taken the full
borg option and operate inside the vast bulks of armoured attack units,
or fire rescue units, would find it impossible to enter normal human
society. Such people are given full support by their employer when out
of duty: the large borg systems have swap-out units, where the brain
and vital organs can literally be removed as a single unit, and slotted
into a more human simulacra, skin clad machines often referred to as
Host systems. These allow the privileged to move around through normal
society without the usual stigma.

Visible implant culture attracts much less stigma than the full borg
but the effects are still there. Face plates, cowls, tuff skin and
armoured body sections all risk a negative reaction from human society.
The rapid pace with which visible implants became a commonly available
option has meant that the majority of humans have not had time to
adjust. There is still a sense of aversion amongst most humans to
having their physical appearance [beauty] impaired by a visible
addition. Many security points, banks, airports and some nations, will
restrict access to implants which are deemed military in nature.

Such public restrictions have been attacked by the Borg Rights Lobby as
negative, and detrimental to human/ Borg relations.

End.