A most excellent idea, Sir.
Horses! They seem to have a lot of those. Maybe they feed the tiger horses.
Seriously, though, all manner of vehicles are still in running order, trucks, cars, campers, semis, tanks and even a helicopter (well…). But apparently not a single damned tractor survived. Too bad, one of those would come in really handy with all this farming everyone is doing now.
I finally put my finger on something that bothered me. When the Kingdom was paying their tribute, they seemed to be meeting the Saviors somewhere other than at the Kingdom’s settlement since they were feeding pigs walkers nearby and didn’t want the peasants to know anything about it.
This seems like a really stupid way for the Saviors to collect their half. How can they be sure they’re getting their full share without going to the settlement and verifying? Seems like they would want to constantly remind everyone of how much of a threat they are. Surely they wouldn’t allow their vassals to pick the meeting spot for the exchange for fear of ambushes like mentioned upthread.
…giving them the tools to survive involves teaching them to read, write, think logically, have a basic understanding of civics, history, and science.
I’m not sure that’s a fair objection though. Doing it this way is just more of the same, letting the subjugated do all the work. Including the work of subjugation.
The King and his own henchmen are keeping order among the population in his kingdom. It doesn’t matter if they are doing it with clubs or lollypops, just so the people keep on producing. As long as that command group is cowed by Negan, there really is no need to cow or otherwise meddle with the lower levels of the population pyramid. In fact, anything that contradicts the “everything is normal, keep on doing as you’re doing” order of things is more likely than not to create dis-order. And that will reduce the net benefit to Negan’s group.
As for the threat of ambush, well, bullies may tend to over-confidence once they have gained control. Negan himself may be a tactical genius (not saying he is, but he might be) but there’s no reason to believe all his lieutenants are too. The one that was into taunting and casual brutality surely seems quite confident in the safety associated with his position.
That seems contradictory to the Negan we saw who wanted a certain “look” in Rick’s eyes leading to the scene with Carl and the hatchet. I would think Negan / and Negan’s lieutenants would want to have visibility to anyone growing fed up enough to start rebelling. Especially groups not founded on a top down violence model.
Some underling in some place that still governed themselves as a democracy might start getting uppity and interrupt the flow of supplies. Negan should want to snuff those types out before they become a danger to his authority and use them as a further example to the rest of the settlement. If , for example, a small group just comes back from a tribute drop missing a member it doesn’t have the same emotional impact on the settlement as a whole. It would be no more devastating than if someone was killed by walkers on a foraging run. But if you make the whole of the settlement witness the paying of tribute, it reinforces the policy of paying that tribute, and lets you flush out troublemakers.
You’d think a guy who beats folks to death with a baseball bat would understand this.
I think he understands it perfectly well. I’m afraid you may not.
Negan wanted to thoroughly and completely cow Rick because Rick is a leader. Cowing the rest of Rick’s close associates was just gravy. Despots don’t need to directly control every single person in their domain; that would be way too much work. It is Rick that is in charge, and Rick that will (presumably) go back to Alexandria to break the news and gather the tribute. And just as Rick in the past turned the Alexandrians to his will, Negan is now quite certain that Rick will once again exert his influence. And that influence is now entirely and completely at Negan’s beck and call.
Rick will brook no interference, will accept no disobedience let alone insurrection, that might return Rick and Carl to the horrific tableau so recently ended. Negan and his lieutenants can go home and get drunk, confident that Rick is broken to Negan’s will, and Rick will handle his own.
As for your final sentence, I’m not envisioning any surviving group in the ZA that is not founded on one or another top down model. Anarchy is tough enough without zombies, the whole “on your own” thing seems to invite getting munched in your sleep. Nor does democracy, or representative democracy, seem likely to get the job done. The ZA seems particularly suited to old fashioned leaders who fight in the front ranks, not theoreticians who sit back and manage battles.
But that is exactly my point. The front ranks for Negan would be collecting the tribute and keeping his vassals cowed. Perhaps he doesn’t do it all himself, but his lieutenants damned sure should be. The way they conducted the pig pick up makes his guys nothing more than truck drivers, worried about logistics. To properly keep the Kingdom cowed, that fist fight should have ended up with a Kingdom fighter dead. No way you’d allow them to fight, or fight back – even if one of your Savior thugs started it. Everybody drawing their guns on everybody else just proves that the Kingdom isn’t properly oppressed yet. It should have looked like the Lucille scene (not that we need another of those) with the smart mouthed knight being killed at leisure with nobody saying a word against it, let alone drawing a gun.
And as far as more egalitarian societies making it in the ZA, Alexandria did for quite some time (though I will admit I don’t understand why), but right there is an example.
Alexandria functioned as a kingdom, with Diana(?) the effective Queen. Her husband built the wall, and she (perhaps with his help initially, but we never saw that played out) ran the place. They had town meetings and gave lip service to consensus, but there was no question that Diana was in charge.
Further to Negan, you might read about the ways some modern real despots controlled their populations. Say, East Germany or Soviet Russia back in their heyday. The secret police controlled every aspect of society, but not by being everywhere and brutalizing people wholesale. It isn’t necessary, nor desirable, to terrorize every single person face to face. Terrorize some, who make it known to others. Bonus if those you terrify have some leadership role, like town mayor or church elder. The word gets around. Oh sure, somebody might get drunk and mouth off, or bitch about standing in line. But the blabbermouth’s friends and family will be the first to shut him up, for fear of reprisals. Nobody knows when the secret police may show up, or who may be their stooge.
“Everybody drawing their guns…” proves that the Saviors really are cowed, since nobody fired a shot. The internal leadership quelled the insurrection, and acquiesced to seeing their own man beaten almost to death. If your toughest guys, street wise and capable of surviving out in ‘the wild’, know they have to control themselves and knuckle under to Negan’s minions, even on serious provocation, surely the rest of their society poses no great danger. You couldn’t ask for a more compliant population than that!
That’s a good point. But the guy who was in charge of Negan’s minions called off his man before he could do too much damage. I suspect it’s because he knows that you can only push people so far. Also, I wonder if Negan would punish his own people for messing up the gravy train?
Personally, I think it’s a sign that the Kingdom is stable and healthy. They don’t need everyone working 24/7 to keep things going. Thus, people do their work and the kids have school and chores, the adults have choirs, there’s time for art. Think about Rick & Co. They’ve never had time to educate Carl. Except for comic books, I’m surprised he can read. I suppose reading is a quiet, portable form of entertainment.
StG
They got some tutoring in while staying at Hershel’s farm in season 2.
[It seems I used “Saviors” in my post when I meant “Ezekiel’s subjects”. I believe the Saviors are Negan’s minions. But you do seem to understand my point anyway 
]
Exactly. Negan’s guys stopped their own bully from going too far. Just as Ezekiel’s guys also stopped short of a gun battle.
I again maintain that Ezekiel’s men display the classic behavior of subjugated people. Proud, slightly defiant, but sufficiently cowed as not to risk a battle they believe they will not ultimately win. And so they allowed the bully to beat their own teammate, and likely wouldn’t have intervened had he been killed.
And Negan’s guys display the behavior of a (moderately) wise conqueror. One particularly cruel member of the team, perhaps by happenstance or maybe by design, throws his weight around enough to draw a backlash. Which the team then quashes, with some brutality. But not with a killing though. Killing only reduces the work force and maybe leads to attempts at revenge, which can only reduce the work force still further. And playing out those messy scenarios really does screw up the gravy train.