Red Teams and Blue Team: True or False Friends?
From Seneca Letter 3 - On True and False Friendship
Seneca wrote a letter discussing what he felt the word friend meant:
Often a man will make someone their friend first, and judge them worthy of friendship later
Seneca was talking about how easily people give their friendship to others without deciding whether that person was worthy of their friendship first.
For a friend is someone that we can be honest and open with, leading the discussion to places that would be improper to those we do not trust with our whole self.
Open and honest communication is how problems get solved instead of glossed over. And that starts not with trust of another, but trust of self.
Red Team/Blue Team
So how does friendship play into red and blue teams? Offense and Defense?
The same way as normal friendship: through honesty and trust. And like friendship, partnership requires times to determine if the other team is worthy of our trust.
I have often seen red teams willing to give out their friendship to any team simply because they existed. And while I do not disagree that being friendly is the preferred action, partnership should only be reserved for those teams which a strong bond has formed over time.
Because real magic can happen when the red team has at least a couple other teams that they can call “partners.”
In the latest video from Hacker Philosophy Weekly, we take a philosophical deep dive into True and False Friendship via Seneca’s letter, read by Vox Stoica.