To them, the lives they lead are all they know. They cannot imagine what it would be like to be anything else. And so, I believe that being told they are merely incomplete shards is more like an insult to them. A statement that what they see as a full life is not enough, never can be enough, no matter how hard they strive to improve their lot.

To them, the world unsundered is too distant to even be an echo of a memory, their previous lives no longer anything to do with them. Their desire to preserve the world they see as theirs is very understandable indeed, no matter how mistaken.