User blog comment:GrandMethuselah67/Neutral 'verse Character Sheet: Emperor Bradley Hargrave/@comment-26322734-20160905061619/@comment-4867780-20160905225703

Considering Bradley can rewrite the empire's very reality both through Operation Chandra and the classical wish machines (and probably a number of even more advanced ways), it is quite clear that he doesn't actually need to make his "real-life" population happy any more than he does in the Polis.

He does it because he wants to, because he so firmly adheres to higher philosophical principles (control <=> happiness - hidding the control part precisely to preserve the happiness and allow their synergic coexistence) that play the essential role of making him different from his straightly dominant father (otherwise he would just rewrite everyone's mind and be done with it). This I-can-afford-it nastiness for no practical reason clearly goes against what he believes in, against the very spirit and purpose of the Hagrave Empire and the control/happines balance it embodies.

Could is be the point of said empire is to teach readers an aesop about how freedom is more important than happiness ? It kinda feels like you ended up compromising the happiness part just to make sure we pick the freedom side ^ ^;