Lucidor wrote:Commander McLane wrote:As far as illegal goods are concerned: contrary to public opinion it is not illegal to sell them anywhere. So there is really no need to dump anything in space. The only illegal act is to take slaves, narcotics, or firearms out of a main station (as opposed to deliver them into a main station).
Is there any reason for this? The logical thing would be to forbid it entering the station and not allow trading it at all. You would have to sell it to a rock hermit or something.
Because Co-operative law, and local planetary law, are two different things. Slavery, gun-running and drug dealing aren't illegal in the Co-op: they're just controlled. On some planets, they're illegal; on others they're not. On some planets, booze is illegal but megaweed isn't; on others, sugar is forbidden but cannibalism is a cultural expectation. It's a big and awkward galaxy and the Co-operative doesn't really do any more than provide a simple set of guidelines to keep everybody trundling along at roughly the same pace without too many fights breaking out. There are a variety of ways to become an offender, for example, from smuggling to murder. The sentence is the same, though: outlawry with a bounty on your head. Even then, if you manage to avoid justice for long enough, all will be forgiven. It's a very rudimentary code.
In non-Co-op stations, like Convenience Stores, slaves, narcotics and firearms can be bought perfectly legally. In fact, it's a good reason to visit your local Con Store: even if they've only got a couple of tons of narcotics available, the profit margin per ton can sometimes be eye-wateringly extreme. Personally, though, I rarely trade in guns and never in slaves. But if I scoop slaves, I can't bring myself to dump them, even if there are more tempting targets available. I've got to bring them in: where, in the absence of a free-the-slaves OXP, I rationalise some system where I turn them over for release.
