Politics of Mass Effect

Mass Effect has a rich and diverse backstory, detailing the lore and establishing cultures in only a way Bio Ware can, while subverting stereotypes regarding their major species.

As a result, Mass Effect has a pretty big bucket of unique political topics whose ultimate outcomes can be determined due to dialogue and story choices. These are not what I want to discuss.

Instead, I made this thread specifically so I can get fans of the franchise to give their opinions on the politics of Mass Effect.

Namely, the Genophage, the Cerberus affair, the geth-quarian conflict, humans getting a seat on the Council, the human-batarian hostility and the morals of the First Contact War.

I think the politics of Mass Eff-pfffffffffffffffffffffffffffHAHAHA OH WOW.

Anyway, I think the politics of Mass Effect are very complex. For example, there is this alien species called the Reapers that look like giant squid robots. They want to kill all complex organic life for reasons that change with every game. To accomplish this, they turn people into zombies and use deep voices to assume direct control. They are morally ambiguous.

Also, I think you get to romance one in the dlc.

This is an interesting subject. Too bad my main interest in the series is shooting aliens and tele-punching robots.

Genophage: Paranoia that went too far

Cerberus: Typical radical racists that think they know what's best without thinking of the long-term consequences

Geth-Quarian conflict: misunderstandings on both sides

Humans getting a seat on the Council: They saved the galaxy multiple times.

Human-Batarian conflict: Batarians basically being Space North Korea and throwing a hissy fit over not getting their way while continuing to play themselves out as the victims even when they advocate slavery, piracy, and other illegal practices then blame humanity and the other Citadel races for supposedly being against them when things go wrong.

Morals of the First Contact War: Turians were trigger-happy and too proud to admit that they were in the wrong.

The genophage is complicated. If it wasn't used, the turians would've committed genocide. However, one could say that it is genocide, just on a slower scale.

Yeah, Wrex even admits that the krogan were dying off because they were too focused on fighting and not enough on banding together to try and discover a cure. He tried to unite the clans, his dad tried to kill him and butchered the leaders that tried to listen, and the previous Urdnot chieftain had his top scientist working on ways to kill his opponents instead of stuff they needed to live.

Do the krogan deserve a second chance? Will they overpopulate again? Start another war?

I say, yes to the first two. The second will only happen if Wreav is in charge.

I get what you're trying to do, but I still think this is better suited to just be discussed in the Mass Effect 3 thread if you really want to talk about it. All of those are pretty frequently discussed subjects anyway, and I don't think it's appropriate for this to get its own thread.

edited 15th Mar '13 7:34:31 PM by CPFMfan

And even then if Eve survives, she'll oppose him as seen in the Extended Cut.

How frequent are those discussions?

Constant.

How strong are the opinions?

edited 15th Mar '13 7:41:08 PM by Serocco

Volatile.

Volatile enough for the mods to step in at times?

I just hate the geth a lot in general. I'd probably hate them slightly less if everyone else didn't seem to love them. Everyone always says that the quarians were wrong for trying to shut them down, but think about it- if your frickin toaster asked if it was alive, would you say yes, then help it live in its own toaster society with other toasters? No. You'd unplug it and call the manufacturer. Oh wait, the toaster, pissed off that it was unplugged, just grabbed a gun and killed your family. You Bastard!. Why'd you make the poor innocent toaster do that? Now you're homeless. Get the hell out of the toaster's house. Oh, your medication for your heart disease was in that house? Fuck you, go out and deal with it yourself, the toaster owns that too. Want to call the cops? Oh sorry, it's your fault for having a living toaster, and they refuse to shut it down or give you back your house or even reimburse you. You can't get a job anywhere because you become known as the guy whose family got killed by a toaster and everyone treats you like shit because you live in a car. That is the story of the quarians.

The quarians try to shut them down because the geth are appliances that were becoming too smart. The geth retaliate against the quarian attempts. Okay, I don't consider these things to even be alive, but logically that's fair. Then they started attacking quarian military installations. Once again, I get that, you're trying to prevent them from killing you. Then, sometime between that time and the end of the war, billions upon billions of innocent quarian civilians just disappeared, and they went from a galaxy-spanning race to a jury-rigged flotilla. Huh. I wonder where all those people went.

And people honestly say that the geth are merciful for letting the 17 million quarians left flee. Hey guys, here's a bright idea: how about the geth leave the planet? Seriously. They don't need the planet and they obviously achieved complete military dominance at one time. They could've left the planet and lived in space stations somewhere in an unexplored portion of the galaxy and no one would care. No one would even be able to find them, since space is really big. But nope, the righteous and noble geth have to slaughter billions of innocent civilians for just being in the general area they want. Then they had to go to all the other quarian worlds and slaughter them too. Because they're noble, you see.

Then they continue to be pricks. Numerous diplomats try to make contact with them. What is the geth's response? Murder them. Understandably, the diplomats get the impression that the geth might be (GASP) killer robots. They continue to occupy a planet that they by their own admission don't even need and don't use. Then when a giant army/fleet of them want to join an Eldritch Abomination and help him exterminate all organic life, the good geth spring into action by... doing nothing and letting the army run off. Then doing nothing as said army slaughters millions of people. All this while continuing to murder any travelers that come close to what they consider to be their territory.

Then Legion showed up in Mass Effect 2. It had the gall to complain about the organics' fear of the geth, talking down to Shepard and saying that it's natural to be scared of things you don't understand. Dipshit, I don't think you gave those diplomats or innocent quarian civilians a chance to understand when your guys unceremoniously shot them in the face. Legion also has the nerve to ask for Shepard's help in combating the heretics because now they might be a threat to the geth. Oh, well if they're a threat to the geth, now we have to act. Of course I'll help you Legion, just like you helped the people of Eden Prime.

But the absolute cherry on the sunday comes in Mass Effect 3, where the quarians finally get pissed off that their appliances have forced them into 300 years of poverty and near-death, so they try to take their planet back with some new geth-killing weapon made by Xen with Rael's research. Then the geth turn to the Reapers. Yes, the Reapers. The same Reapers that the geth know will kill them along with everyone else in the galaxy as soon as they're done. The geth willingly increased the Reapers' chances of winning the war massively just so they could have a few extra years of "life" as Reaper drones. During the Rannoch missions, you travel inside the geth mind (just roll with it) and are shown memories from the Morning War. What do the memories show? Cute, innocent geth being abused by brutal quarian dictators until a noble hero finally defends himself. I don't know why they left out all the clips of the geth slaughtering billions of innocent men, women, children, and elderly, but I guess the geth (and/or Bioware) didn't think that those were important. Then Legion defies its' own philosophy by attempting to upload the Reaper code to the geth. Keep in mind that:

A. Using Reaper tech never turns out good

B. Legion would never shut up about how bad it is to take technological shortcuts in the second game- it would always believe that every species needed to determine its own fate on its own terms.

C. Letting Legion do this is somehow a Paragon choice.

I am glad that these things died in the Destroy ending.

There have been two times mods have stepped in, to my knowledge. Both of those were over the validity of fan reactions to the ending (not the endings themselves). And something about Chris Avellone being a hack.

edited 15th Mar '13 8:20:06 PM by CPFMfan

Puissant ... oh we aren't doing this anymore.

You do realize that the Heretics were the ones murdering everybody, right? Legion's geth stayed on Rannoch.

edited 15th Mar '13 8:13:57 PM by Serocco

And actually repaired it as a way to take care of it in case the quarians came back. The geth acted in self-defense, and the Council wasn't about to get bogged down in a war that a single species caused, same with the First Contact War. Plus it was the quarians' own fault anyway. If they hadn't tried to shut the geth down forcibly it wouldn't have happened.

I agree that this belongs in the main ME 3 thread.

I also agree with M Fan that seeing a more nuanced view of the geth-quarian conflict - such as references to the geth massacring innocent quarians - would've been a good thing.

And did nothing to even warn the rest of the galaxy about them. They knew the heretics were trying to bring back the Reapers. The geth didn't give a shit, even though they knew the Reapers would kill everyone. How sweet.

M Fan pointed out that the geth could've left Rannoch, and let the quarians repair the planet themselves. They chose to continue occupying the planet, and thus denied their creators the opportunity to return.

edited 15th Mar '13 8:14:49 PM by Tiamatty

There is gray to it.

For example, the geth deserve flak for abandoning their Heroic Neutral ideology and siding with the Reapers.

However, the quarians were idiots for starting the war in the first place, right as the Reapers collided with the galaxy.

edited 15th Mar '13 8:13:32 PM by Serocco

What? Nothing I posted even suggested I didn't know that. I specifically mentioned the heretics as a separate faction and listed the many reason that the "main" geth are detestable.

I'm sure that the billions of innocent civilians who mysteriously disappeared during this war would appreciate that justification. Obviously, they all needed to be brutally murdered. It's not like the geth can survive in space stations and had decimated the quarian military at the time to the point that they were no longer a threat. Nope. They had to murder everyone, it was just self-defense. No, believe me, those babies were coming straight for them!

A planet that they. Didn't. Even. Need. Then they went on to massacre the dozens of other colonies the quarians possessed, once again despite the fact that they. Don't. Need. Them. They. Live. In. Space.

See toaster analogy. The quarians had no other choice; the geth don't have rights, the quarians had no reason to give them rights, they are appliances. I accidentally broke a computer once, so apparently I committed murder and deserve to have my family killed, and to be made homeless, and have everyone hate me.

As far as everyone except Shepard knew, the geth were siding with the Reapers. They did last time and made no effort to warn anyone about the minority who actually went out and killed people. The quarians were doing the galaxy a service.

And who are "the quarians"? Because it's made apparent that the majority of them don't want the war and that it was the three gung-ho admirals that forced everyone into it.

edited 15th Mar '13 8:48:38 PM by CPFMfan

I was talking about the Morning War, actually, but yeah, the quarians were kind of stupid for going to war when there's a bigger threat than the geth rampaging around the galaxy.

The geth had never given any indication that they gave two shits about the Reapers returning to wipe everyone out. At no point did they make any peaceful overtures to anyone, ever. In fact, they destroyed any ships that passed through the Perseus Veil. The quarians actually have no reason to believe the geth won't side with the Reapers. As far as the quarians are concerned, they were probably helping the war effort by taking out the geth before they could join up with the Reapers.

edited 15th Mar '13 8:17:47 PM by Tiamatty

NVM

edited 15th Mar '13 8:21:21 PM by KnownUnknown

The geth did not deny the quarians return to Rannoch.

The quarians left Rannoch as a last-ditch effort to survive, and they never looked back because they assumed the geth didn't want them back.