Why did pirates bother making prisoners or enemies "walk the plank" instead of just chucking them overboard? Imagine this, you’re the dreaded captain of a ship of 50 men. You just overtook a smaller ship of about 20 men. Among the survivors who didn’t jump ship to evade capture, the captain who insists, “a captain goes down with his ship” and 7 other capable men. “Gut ‘em,” someone yells from your midsts. “Let’s just throw him overboard!” shouts another. All sound like desirable actions and you have trouble choosing between the many ideas your men offer. You’re the captain for a reason, people fear you and because of this, they respect you.
Then all of a sudden, one of your men pulls out his knife and says, “you’re too slow boss, I’ll do it myself.” Astounded by this you rally your men and order this crewmember to be restrained. Now you have two problems, you have to get rid of these men whose treasure you just stole and you have people in your crew questioning your rank in power. So how do you fix this? Intimidation. “Marx! Jimmy! Put that piece of wood there!” you say and before you know it, you’re walking a man off your ship with a sword to his back. With shark infested waters below, you force him closer and closer to the edge. Your men stand at the edge of the ship, watching eagerly while the man in front of you begs for you to spare him.
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AuthorI have way too much time on my hands and I'm way too over analytical of everything. It makes for weird conspiracies supported by questionable evidence and unpopular opinions. Archives
October 2018
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