Random thoughts just popped in my head and I just remembered that all the water in a given city is all centralized. Just add poison and boom, eradicated an entire city who are full of dissidents/opposition as punishment for voting the “wrong” way, or for a protest, or if the population is filled with “filthy undesirable [Insert Racial Group Here]”, or something like that.

Kinda unsettling to see that we are all just attached to “the grid” 😖

  • Havatra@lemmy.zip
    22·
    1 day ago

    Unsure why you’re getting downvoted (this is “No Stupid Questions”, after all), but I’ll give my 5 cents:

    Reason 1:
    The people is essentially the reason why a government has power. Without the people (and their support), the government governs a whole lot of nothing, and they will be forced to do labour themselves.

    Reason 2:
    Poisoning the water is not very accurate, and may lead to both the death of many whom already are supportive of the government (which will create distrust), and people only getting sick depending on the amount they drink (the dose makes the poison).

    Reason 3:
    Despite a population having a lot of dissidents, these people still work and contribute to society in some ways. It has to get pretty bad before it will be “worth it” to remove them from society.

    Reason 4:
    Even if it’s so bad that you’re looking at an open revolt against the government, poisoning the water will only really yield MAD, which is usually undesirable.

    Ultimately, it’s unlikely desirable for any government to do this, as there are better ways (for the government). However, there have been some attempts at genocide through water supplies before, so it’s not completely unheard of. Check out Project Coast.