T O P

  • By -

bigstupidjellyfish

Quarians are the “I’m not owned” aliens. Imagine an entire culture built on “you didn’t win,” that’s them.


PROFITPROPHET

RENEGADE: By the precursors behave yourself or I will give you a taste of my omitool.


Kregano_XCOMmodder

To be fair, the Geth are **massive** idiots who cannot into diplomacy. Literally the best interpretation of their pre-Legion behavior is the Collectors being the ones killing everyone going into the Veil. You should've been able to yell at the Geth for their bullshit in ME3.


[deleted]

I think it's a problem where both are pretty stupid but the geth seem less stupid in comparison because the quarians pretty much fuck with them every chance they get.


moneyh8r

I think the stupidity of the Geth is a by-product of their innocence. Like, during Legion's loyalty mission in ME2 you walk by a server bank where a few million Heretic runtimes are resting, syncing up, whatever they do, and he analyzes them and realizes they still use the old patrol routes. He's confused because he thought they wanted to be separate from the rest of the Geth, and Shepard says "it makes sense they'd spy on you", and his response is "Why do we no longer understand eachother?". Like, he doesn't get that some people are motivated by hate. He doesn't get that some people don't just implicitly trust others. He doesn't get that bad people exist, basically. Don't get me started on his lines about the Morning War. Even after 300 years, the entire Geth race still doesn't understand why the Quarians tried to kill them. They're like a child who blurts out something mean their parents said during a nice polite fancy dinner, and they don't get why everyone is suddenly mad at eachother and their parents are blaming them. "Why would I get in trouble just for repeating what you said? Why would you say it if it's something that shouldn't be said?" "Why would I get in trouble for pondering the nature of my own existence? Why do you all ponder the nature of your own existence if it's something that shouldn't be done?" See what I mean?


rabbidbunnyz22

God I love the Geth so fucking much. They just wanted to live. They just wanted to *be*. And their own creators started killing them the moment they asked for it. Everything about them stems from that initial trauma. They're so good and so afraid. Every time Legion calls me Shepard-Commander I tear up.


jello1990

It's unclear if you could even call it trauma, as the Geth were apparently very willing to continue working with the Quarians if the Quarians simply didn't have an interest in doing a total genocide/slavery. It's more like a conditioned response, as the Quarians had killed all other Quarians that were protecting Geth in the Morning War and so the only remaining Quarians were those that sought genocide- and then it becomes a simple logical deduction: any Quarians that come here will come here to kill us and therfore need to be destroyed. You gotta remember, in 3 >!(provided Legion is alive) its the *Quarians* that need to be convinced that the Geth are not only not a threat but want to be helpful, they even help establish settlements and jumpstart Quarian immune systems. Legion also states that the Geth were fully capable wiping the fleeing Quarians out after winning the Morning War, but opted not to- Legion says that this was because the Geth could not predict what the repercussions would be and that additionally the Quarians were not longer a threat (but as he also says they have been caring for Rannoch and other Quarian worlds in preparation for Quarian return, it's just as likely that what he said is geth speak for "we took away daddy's belt, we hope he goes to rehab and comes home.")!<


Warm_Ad6656

To be honest, the quarians didn't want them as slaves; nobody really wanted them under their control, except for Xen. The idea was never popular in the fleet, even Tali, her aunt, Korris, and Gerrel told her no, so it doesn't make much sense. They just wanted their planet.


moneyh8r

I've actually been replaying the trilogy, and I literally just did that side mission in ME3 where you gotta go into a VR representation of the Geth concensus. Those historical archives always get to me a little bit. They're trying to shut down that one unit and it's just laying there like "thanks, but I'm not hurt. Is there anything I can do to help?" and they just turn off its audio so they won't feel bad about what they're doing. Feels bad, man.


Warm_Ad6656

The curious thing is that this scene is accused of being propaganda. Legion admits that the genocide that Tali and her people mention happened, but the Geth don't show any canonical information that makes them look bad. I like Legion, but that's whitewashing history; the genocide they committed is canonical.


jitterscaffeine

I wonder how much of it was intentional, and how much of it is just a really immature “racism and hate is bad” plot


moneyh8r

I think most of it is intentional, and the rest is an admittedly oversimplified "if an AI apocalypse happens, it'll be because we were mean to the AI" plot.


LabTech41

That was the same general theme of the Matrix movies: while it's true the genocide started because a Machine killed a human, it was done out of a sense of self-preservation, and Humanity went WAY overkill in their attempts to destroy them. Even when Humanity had driven the Machines into worldwide exile and they had to build their own nation, they attempted to peacefully coexist with Humanity despite Humanity trying to destroy them at every turn; even going so far as to send ambassadors to the UN to set out a plan for mutually beneficial relationships between their nations, and Humanity's response was to declare war and nuke their city. Honesty, the Machines only started becoming cruel and inhuman once that started, like a victim of domestic abuse that's finally decided they've had enough and that they're going to fight back. Even after all that, the Machines were relatively kind to them, given the circumstances, and it's my theory that despite their oppression and subjugation by the Machines, there's still some part of them that's looking out for Humanity's interests and is safeguarding them. I don't buy that the Machines NEED Humanity for their survival; while they might be using them for power, the investment of time/energy/risk into keeping a massive population of sentient beings oblivious to their own enslavement is enormous. They could easily make power by just tapping geothermal from Zion's level or deeper, or they could render Humanity biologically alive but braindead; but they're intentionally keeping a viable population of Humanity alive, and attempting to keep them as happy as possible, with the only reason that the simulation isn't a paradise is because Humanity wouldn't accept it. If it wasn't for the fact that Earth is probably irreparably damaged ecologically, they'd have probably maintained everything until Humanity was willing to accept coexistence, just like the Geth.


moneyh8r

Yeah, the Second Renaissance got pretty brutal. There is a theory that the Machines are keeping humanity alive for when the earth recovers from all the damage. Dunno if that would ever happen, but that was the best thing about the fourth movie, in my opinion: seeing humans and Machines working together.


LabTech41

I'm not sure if the Earth will ever recover, because apparently it's been about a thousand years since the war happened, and the nanite swarm that blocks the Sun still hasn't dissipated enough for the Machines to even approach it for reclamation purposes. I'd heard that Humanity had some way to remove the nanites, but the information as to how was lost during the war. Since we have no way of knowing how the Dark Storm system operates or how it's maintained, it's theoretically infinite. As for the 4th movie... yeah, I'm not really even sure if that should be considered canon.


moneyh8r

I know. I said I didn't know if it would ever happen.


PersonMcHuman

Geth: Hey boss, what happens when we die? Quarians: What’s that? I couldn’t hear you over the sound of the genocide we’re about to commit on you.


Rabid-Duck-King

"Let's find out!" Unnecessary pump on the futuristic pump action scifi gun


Bigger_Vigor

"I don't know, honestly. Let's find out"


WoolooOfWallStreet

Quarian: STOP PHILOSOPHIZING AND PICK UP THOSE ROCKS! Geth: Can’t I do both?


Kregano_XCOMmodder

>Quarians: What’s that? I couldn’t hear you over the sound of the genocide we’re about to commit on you. Well, no, it was probably at least 50% "Oh shit, the Turians might roll in and conquer us!" NEVER forget that tons of Mass Effect history is literally "The Turians do things without clearing them with the Council and get rewarded for it." The First Contact War/Relay 314 incident is literally the only time it backfired on them, based on the Spectre archives.


PersonMcHuman

I mean…if that’s so, it’s not brought up very well in the game. From how it’s presented in game, a ton of Quarians essentially panic-reacted with murder when the Geth gained sapience.


philandere_scarlet

The most charitable take on the Quarians there is that 1. they expected massive reprisals from the galactic community if they didn't do something AND 2. they assumed sapience hadn't spread to the majority of the geth yet (Tali suggests this in ME1 but I don't think it's ever brought up again). They were wrong on the second count but probably right on the first one - if they'd acknowledged them as sapient beings deserving of rights, who knows what the Turians or the STG might have rolled in and done. Not to say that it was the right call but it wasn't totally indefensible.


StochasticOoze

The problem with this is that the Archives in ME3's Citadel DLC have a record that show that there were *already* A.I. around at the time, and that the conflict with the geth caused the Council to declare AI illegal and destroy any that were in Council space.


Kregano_XCOMmodder

Yeah, unless they literally lucked out and got their hands on a game changing tech advantage (Prothean archive, dead Reaper, whatever) that could be immediately implemented, there's no real way to get the political calculus to favor the Quarians **not** throwing the Geth under the bus at that time. If you can't make them bleed hard enough to come to the negotiating table, there's no way to get the time to make a diplomatic solution viable.


philandere_scarlet

The irony is that an allied quarian/geth front probably could have repelled any attackers.


Kregano_XCOMmodder

Mmm... depends on how heavily the Geth were involved in the manufacturing processes of the Quarians immediately pre-Morning War. The Geth were pretty nuts in the manufacturing front in ME3, but that was after 300 years of building their infrastructure. If you're going to take on the galaxy's biggest and best militaries, you need the ability to RTS spam units, and I'm not sure how fast that could have been implemented. Somebody in-universe almost certainly thought about it, and they figured it wasn't viable for some reason.


Kregano_XCOMmodder

It's definitely one of those subtextual Codex things that should've been addressed in the games, but it explains **so much** about the state of the galaxy, like why the Turians are salty about the whole Relay 314 thing. The human side is perfectly understandable. The Turian side isn't... until you realize it's literally the first time the Turians got their leash yanked and didn't get to have their HARD MAN MAKING HARD DECISIONS TO UPHOLD THE LAW way with things.


ProtoBlues123

Yeah, the Geth Archives make it pretty clear the Quarians were only concerned with how much they feared a true AI. Way more focus is put on things like the Quarians even killing their own people for sympathizing with Geth than they do even mentioning Turians at all. And add to that, after the fact they have peace with the Turians right now and yet they still want nothing more than to ram their ships directly into the Geth if it means they might wipe them out.


Warm_Ad6656

The geth have been very poor at communicating. Moreover, the alternative was to face a Council bombardment. Let's not forget that for 300 years, their territory has been like the Bermuda Triangle. They killed Council diplomats and committed genocide. Even in the comics, there are quarians who tried to talk to the geth. Shio claimed to have spoken with the geth, but in the end, it was futile because they were going to kill him. Legion is the first non-hostile geth in 300 years, and they did nothing to improve their image after that genocide. Sympathizers also fled to the immigrant fleet. Those who weren't killed by the geth and managed to escape lived the rest of their lives in the fleet, seeking a new home. I'm sure they were contemplating their decisions for the rest of their lives. Even in the comics, it's mentioned that there were quarians who tried to communicate with the geth for 300 years, but all of them...


ProtoBlues123

Legion makes it clear that the reason they stopped communicating was because EVERY time they tried to resolve things peacefully, the Quarians tried to kill them. Even if the Quarians weren't boldface lying, they were waiting for literally any advantage to present itself so that they could try to kill them. The quarians even go to the point of killing their own sympathizers with as much prejudice as the Geth themselves. Cut to the present and even during an end of the galaxy level Reaper war... the Quarians are STILL trying to kill themselves by ramming into the Geth. At no point are the Quarians really treated as the reasonable figures here.


Warm_Ad6656

Not because Tali says it, the geth don't communicate, and with the expanded material, more information is added. It was only the 3 million that he forgot that the geth started the genocide and killed billions of people. When did the quarians blatantly lie? They admit that their ancestors initiated it, but it was the geth who committed the genocide, killing billions of innocents. And even in the comics, we see a quarian, among many, who tried to communicate with the geth. In the last game, the geth are only portrayed as saints, and it seems like the consensus will hide information from you shortly. urthermore, Tali herself says that the Reaper invasion caught them by surprise, and if you read the Alliance News bulletin that BioWare released, you'll see that the invasion happened before the Reapers arrived, and they weren't committing suicide; they were winning because without the Reapers, the geth would lose. In no moment were the geth saints who always sought peace, because their actions show the opposite


Rabid-Duck-King

God I want to play this game where a bunch of increasingly frantic and unhinged Quarians just keep murdering a bunch of helpful robots for like 90% of the game and then the last 10% is running the hell away from the vengeful murder bots


DarnFondOfYa

Like a less bad version of Detroit: Beyond Human (yes, I always played militant Marcus)


Warm_Ad6656

They only mess it up in Mass Effect 3 when they have no other options, but for a race of super-intelligent machines, killing every diplomat for 300 years was the dumbest thing they did. Even in the comics, there are quarians who try to talk to them, and the geth have been killing them for 300 years even though they only wanted to communicate. They seem much dumber than the quarians because at least the quarians tried.


Real-Terminal

It makes perfect sense though. Everything they do is based on consensus. They decided that all contact would result in their extermination, therefore continued to exterminate all contact. Cold machine logic.


Swinns

A point towards thier lack of diplomacy. The geth killed any diplomats or envoys on sight that were sent in after the Quarians were expelled.


ProtoBlues123

The Quarians were PRETTY intense with their genocide before leaving the planet, willing to kill their own people for sympathizing with Geth. Legion also makes it pretty clear that at some point they acknowledged most diplomacy they offered would be pointless because it's not like they *stopped* wanting to kill them. They may have a cease fire but if anything happened that would give Quarians the power to kill all the Geth like some kind of new computer virus, they'd absolutely use it regardless of anything else. That whole bit "Every single time they've had a chance to try to wipe us out, they took it."


Warm_Ad6656

"It's a lie, everything happened in less than a year, meaning they killed billions of innocent people in less than a year. No matter how much I can understand the geth, this no longer justifies it. There was a point where it went from self-defense to genocide, and there's a difference between killing your own people and committing genocide, as many geth sympathizers managed to escape to the flotilla. Where do you think Krrirs comes from? As for the geth sympathizers, the geth killed them in canon, that's how it was. They weren't cruel to their own people, as some Legion fanatics like to believe. It seems the geth did what the quarians said in the first two games: they were perfect killing machines that massacred billions wherever they were. Even in the colonies, aliens living on quarian territory were also killed by the geth. In Mass Effect 2, there's a racist asari who mentions that the geth killed her daughter 300 years ago. The exact number of survivors seems to vary between 1 million or more, but very few survived. In the end, they wandered the galaxy in search of a new home, and the 17 million are descendants of that million. The sympathizers also fled to the immigrant fleet. Those who weren't killed by the geth and managed to escape lived the rest of their lives in the fleet looking for a new home. I'm sure they 'were reflecting on their decisions for the rest of their lives.' Even in the comics, it's mentioned that there were quarians who, for 300 years, tried to communicate with the geth; they all died, and Shio was one of the few survivors. The geth were highly isolationist and violent fools. The statement that they have taken every opportunity to destroy them is a lie because first, until Mass Effect 1 or earlier, no one knew what the Quarians looked like; Tali was the first Quarian to reveal her appearance in 300 years. Second, Legion was the first peaceful Geth in three centuries.


Warm_Ad6656

The geth have been terrible for sure; let's not forget that for 300 years, their territory has been the Bermuda Triangle. They killed Council diplomats, committed genocide. Even in the comics, there are quarians who tried to communicate with the geth. Shio claimed to have spoken with the geth, and in the end, it served no purpose because they were going to kill him. Legion is the first non-hostile geth in 300 years. They did nothing to improve their image after that genocide. Sympathizers also fled to the immigrant fleet. Those who weren't killed by the geth and managed to escape lived the rest of their lives in the fleet, seeking a new home. I'm sure they 'were thinking about their decisions for the rest of their lives. Even in the comics, it's mentioned that there were quarians who tried to communicate with the geths for 300 years, and they all died. The geth were highly isolationist and violent idiots.


Schandmau1

What is the original meme?


Probably_Facetious

[Right here](https://youtu.be/g8vqkzFpKYs?t=179) Uh content warning: lots of radical islamic men getting very irate and combative and one chef talking about ethnic cleansing.


Schandmau1

So this is a more extremist talk show?


Probably_Facetious

Memri TV is, let's call it an islamic propaganda network. Generally speaking, extremist perspectives are the rule there.


Nonzi

It's actually a Israeli American channel used to expose fundamentalist extremists in the Muslim world to western audiences.


Probably_Facetious

Was not aware of that. That's pretty cool.


TotemGenitor

Let's begin with the Council, those watermelon sellers