Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[umiman]

Have you ever looked at what it means to be the force of good in the face of evil when it comes to entertainment mediums? If you look at every situation, being good means to maintain the status quo, or attempt a return to a previous situation. I really can't think of an instance where being the "good guys" means "the guys who want progress".

For example, Star Wars. The Empire wants to unite the galaxy for god knows what reason. In doing so, it modernizes its army by several huge jumps, creates tonnes of jobs, becomes an extremely efficient machine, and maintains order through law (and to some extent, fear). Sure, they blow up a planet now and again and commit genocide here and there, but the net result is they got things done and there was actual, technological development. Whereas the Rebels want to return to a time where for 10,000 years, nothing happened and the same blaster used 10,000 years ago is more or less the same as the one used at the end of the Galactic Republic.

I can think of countless anime where factories, work, cities, all represent evil and badness while forests, idle land, and peasantry all represent good and holy stuff. Someone is always automatically evil, or bad, the moment they want to industrilize something or revolutionize something whereas someone is always good the moment they fight such principles. Sure, the villians always end up dressing or acting the part, but if you think about it... what's so bad about what they really want to do?

This is completely contrary to real life, where such rules don't exist (whoever wins the conflict writes history) but really is more of an entertainment thing. What do you think? Why do such principles exist? Do people automatically associate change with evil and bad?

[Keilden]

The Empire wants to unite the galaxy to fight some guys with snakes as weapons.

[sneakey pete]

I've got another saying for you

"to use fiction as an example of real life is to always fail"

[Jim Groovester]

I offer a counter-example. Gurren Lagann. Have you seen it? In that anime, the villains want to maintain the status quo, as allowing the heroes to unlock their full potential would mean the destruction of the universe. Yet despite that, the heroes triumph against them, and vow to avert the disaster while avoiding capping their power at an arbitrary level.

And I always thought that the Empire was a regression instead of progress. The oppression of alien species, the abuses of human rights, genocide, torture, and so on. The Rebel Alliance wants to bring back the Old Republic, as it was a far freer and diverse union.

So my conclusion is, based on a few examples in fiction, there is not enough evidence to conclude that the heroes generally maintain the status quo while villains generally advocate progress in some form.

[Grek]

WWII is the answer here. Hitler industrialized Germany creating massive amounts of jobs, technological advancement, etc., while commiting genocides and starting a massive world spanning war after everyone thought that gobal war would never happen again. Trench warfare, the return to the policy of unrestricted submarine warfare, air strikes against civilian targets, the holocuast, pearl harbour, the use of the atomic bomb, etc. are the things that people remember from WWII. In a whole lot of people's subconcious, industrialization brings up imagess of nationalism, fascism, nazi stormtroopers, devastated countrysides, endless global war and death camps.

[Cheeetar]

WWII is the answer here. Hitler industrialized Germany creating massive amounts of jobs, technological advancement, etc., while commiting genocides and starting a massive world spanning war after everyone thought that gobal war would never happen again. Trench warfare, the return to the policy of unrestricted submarine warfare, air strikes against civilian targets, the holocuast, pearl harbour, the use of the atomic bomb, etc. are the things that people remember from WWII. In a whole lot of people's subconcious, industrialization brings up imagess of nationalism, fascism, nazi stormtroopers, devastated countrysides, endless global war and death camps.

For me, industrialisation brings up images of starving orphans,as opposed to Nazi Germany.

[Grek]

That too.

[Okenido]

This trope/cliché unfortunately comes up too often.

I would of liked Final Fantasy VII much more without it.

[SHAD0Wdump]

Trench warfare is from WW1...

*SHAD0Wdump returns to not being a part of further discussion in this topic.*

[sneakey pete]

WWII is the answer here. Hitler industrialized Germany creating massive amounts of jobs, technological advancement, etc., while commiting genocides and starting a massive world spanning war after everyone thought that gobal war would never happen again. Trench warfare, the return to the policy of unrestricted submarine warfare, air strikes against civilian targets, the holocuast, pearl harbour, the use of the atomic bomb, etc. are the things that people remember from WWII. In a whole lot of people's subconcious, industrialization brings up imagess of nationalism, fascism, nazi stormtroopers, devastated countrysides, endless global war and death camps.

Funny, by being "good" the USA heavily industrialized itself cementing its place as a world superpower for the next 60+ years.

Besides, look at most technological advances that have benefited human kind and tell me that they happened due to someone being evil.
The light bulb was invented for evil? The transistor?

[Grek]

Funny, by being "good" the USA heavily industrialized itself cementing its place as a world superpower for the next 60+ years.

Besides, look at most technological advances that have benefited human kind and tell me that they happened due to someone being evil.
The light bulb was invented for evil? The transistor?

The idea presented here is not that technology and progress is evil, but that technology and progress is depicted as evil in fiction. Technology is a good thing, but people still do stuff like the Empire in Star wars and Mordor in LOTR. Both are Team Evil and both are militaristic industrialists. I seriously doubt that you will fine a luddite promoting their beliefs on the internet.

The USA gets away from the "Industry=Evil" trope because it's a democracy which is something that makes people happy, because there was never an actual ground invasion of the USA with machine guns artillary and people in trenches and because they won the war so they get to write history in a way which depicts them in a favorable light.

[sneakey pete]

Oh, i thought this topic was saying that evil was necessary for progress to happen.

[JoshuaFH]

The Lorax is one of my favorite Dr. Seuss stories.

Yes, I agree with Umi, in fiction atleast, it's the one that aims to maintain the status quo that the plot sides with. It's one of the reasons why I began to hate shows like family guy, because a character like Joe would finally be able to walk, which is a great thing, then everyone (including his wife) gangs up on him to make him a paraplegic again, despite the fact that he's living a happier, better life and against the fact that what they're doing is clearly an egregious affront to the law and they all should be prosecuted for it.

[umiman]

It's strange isn't it? We know that maintaining the status quo is actually quite reviled in the real world, yet it's something that fiction tends to maintain as "good". I don't really understand how we came to such a contradiction.

[Keilden]

We also have the god of change in WH and WH40K.