Is the Alliance Evil? (Firefly)

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*ahem* Spoilers Ahead

I'm mainly basing this off of Serenity, since I only caught like 2-3 episodes of Firefly when it was on Fox, but I'd say the Alliance is... well to make an analogy they are sort of like the Dark Jedi. While the Sith are probably evil to a degree, with thier total dedication to the 'dark side' of the force. The 'dark jedi' employ BOTH sides of the force in thier uses. The Alliance seems to use the good of thier technology and influence as a lawmaking body to improve human life in thier perspective, and they will go to decidedly morally questionable methods to do so.

The Military experiments on River (As seen in the opening of Serenity) seem to show that thier darker side is towards domination of the entire system, presumably under Good intentions, of 'Civillizing' the outer world 'cowboys'.

The situation with the Reavers probably showed best thier methods: They wanted to create peace, even using artificial forced means, but the unexpected death of almost all the population of Miranda, and insanity of the survivors (Reavers) stopped thier more forceful methods, and so they turned more towards a slow, steady pace, (much like how Palpatine slowly rose though the ranks of the Senate and Poltical Arenas to gain control of the empire, through legal means) of getting everyone in the stystem under thier control.

There's also the question of what the motives of those in charge actually are. They could be evil, under a guise of 'peace'. (Echoing the Emperor's stated intentions to Anakin in Ep. III) for control of the entire start system... or they could be good, using evil methods to get to thier goals.

That's how I see it anyway, but I need to go back and watch Firefly, because I probably funked up some stuff in what I said.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by LeHah

Well, there you go. The Military experiments on River. Does some skunk ops represent the entire Alliance? Probably not - much like how a fireteam of soldiers does not represent most people in the United States.

No, but when the military force of a country/empire grows large enough, it starts to enforce other doctrines and acts as a symbol of that nation/empire's power and dominance. They are in part a way to let people know that they can fight you with a lot of force if necessary. They are, for lack of a better term, an Icon.

Compare the United States' Military Force in Iraq. Yes we are technically a democracy and not in a state of war, but our large force (Which I think is only outnumbered by the Chinese, correct me if I'm wrong) also acts as a way for the US to enforce thier foreign policy, in perspectives some would consider bad, while others would view it as good.

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Yes, the Alliance created Reavers. They did so by accident, mind you. It wasn't a grand evil experiment - the evil was that they tried to cover it up at all.

Every government in the world is guility of evil then. We all have our little secrets, from a single person to an entire government. Of course bad shit is going be covered up. It would be bad PR

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Your attempt to use Palpatine in your speech makes little or no sense. Can you be a bit more specific?

I was using Star Wars, and Palpatene in particular for an analogy. Palpatine came to power legally and enacted all sorts of restrictions and new laws in the name of ensuring peace in the galaxy, mostly from the 'betrayal' of the Jedi, and to take back the breakaway 'Confederate Star Systems'.

On the flip side, The Alliance created the reavers and as a side-effect boosted thier military force for 'protection' from them, and to hopefully bring back the outsiders into 'civilization'.

The main difference is that we see that Palpatine was intentional in creating the clones and instigating the huge Clone War for his own gain, while the Reaver creation was an accident.

However in both situations a larger military force was the outcome.

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Again - assumption. You can't say they're evil OR good because we don't know shit about the Alliance. They have a big military force and they don't like Mal or Zoe and they want River back and... thats about it. Theres no political commentary, no mention of who's in charge of the Alliance, no mention of territories or regions. Is the Alliance communist? A Republic? We don't know.

Political Commentary... actually I think there is, but its not outright given to the viewer... its somewhat implied. Consider the fact that they were working on River at all. This shows that in at least some way, the Alliance has uses for domination and using psychic agents to win against thier enemies, either Browncoats or Reavers. Obviously they want her back to continue whatever operations they were doing before.

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No, you mostly made sense. Its just that everything in it has been covered already in this thread.

I guess that's my fault for entring the thread late =\

--Edit--
I just thought of something, it might have been brought up... but uh... the "Hands of Blue" who are chasing River might be agents of a controlling force that might be in top positions of authority in the Alliance.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Originally Posted by LeHah

When the military grows large enough to control the government, there is no more government to speak of. That is not the case with the Alliance as theres obviously a beaureaucratic part to it.

I was just saying that the Military seemed to embody a sort of 'image' for part of the Alliance. When I said enforce other doctrines I meant that through the subversive tactics of foreign policy, they would expand the Government's 'influence' and Sphere of Cultral domination.

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The US Military Force has *nothing* to do with Iraq's situation.

Oh? Seems to be that the US Military's Forces, along with other colalition armies went into Iraq and removed a leader from power and set up a new government. The protection of the people as well as the elimination of the old regime's forces has been shown to be at least in part the Military's job, as a protection 'service' (For lack of a better word). If you're referring to the possible 'civil war' that has been predicted very recently, then you're correct.

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The Bush Administration are the ones that had the military deployed;

Well of course. Any President and thier administration are the ones who deploy the military.

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otherwise you'd have another scenario like when Douglas MacArthur was removed from his position following his crossing the 38th parallel.

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Ahh yes, that was the lone actions of a General who stepped beyond his bounds, I see what you're saying.

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Making snide remarks to undermine my point only make you look like an ass.

You seem to have missed what I said, I'll reiterate:

You said: "the evil was that they tried to cover it up at all."
I replied: "Every government in the world is guility of evil then." I said that because every government has covered up stuff at one time or another, so since you said that it was evil of them to cover it up, I was saying that every government in the world could also be considered evil in that line of reasoning. I did not intend it to be a snide remark, moreso it was a response, or quip I guess *Shrug*

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The fact that you can make sweeping, overt gestures about people everywhere and the history of not just our government but *every* government is about as stupid as it is vauge.

Obviously I can't provide proof that every government has covered up things, but it seemed better to say that, versus "most governments", where someone would then say "Oh I see, so there are perfect governments out there huh? NOT!" or something like that. I was trying to avoid that argument.

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Well, keep in mind we're seeing this from beyond the fourth wall. *We* know that Palpatine is behind the CIS movement but no one else really does even by Episode III where most people are just really suspicious or very much dead.

True. I concede then.

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What powers did Palpatine enact? We cannot say if his declairing the formation of the Galactic Empire anything more than grandstanding because we don't know what laws were effected when the Clone Wars started.

This is a stretch, but Order 66 could be considered a war power

On a more serious note, as you said we can only conjecture from dialouge (Specifically when Pademe mentioned more 'sweeping changes' or 'sweeping war-time powers' something to that effect) what he did exactly, so I have no answer for you right now.

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We know *nothing* about the political situation in Star Wars aside from the fact that it's VERY thinly veiled analogy of the Bush Administration come Episode III. (Obi-Wan's bitching about how he serves democracy is just horribly silly given how long the galaxy has been at war by Episode III and how Kenobi has been directly serving the orders of the Supreme Chancellor for a number of years by now)

True. However we may learn more in the upcoming TV Series, which is set between Episode III and IV.

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It was obviously an accident and not an orchestrated event.

Ahhh... see that's what I was NOT inferring:

[quote = DN]
The main difference is that we see that Palpatine was intentional in creating the clones and instigating the huge Clone War for his own gain, while the Reaver creation was an accident.

However in both situations a larger military force was the outcome.[/quote]
I even said myself that the Reaver 'creation' was an accident.

However, I found the spot that probably caused the confusion:

Originally Posted by DN

The Alliance created the reavers and as a side-effect boosted thier military force for 'protection' from them, and to hopefully bring back the outsiders into 'civilization'.

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I guess I should have said "created the reavers on accident'". The boosted military force was a guess on my part, so you're correct on that.

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You don't know anything about the Alliance's military force aside from *them having one*. There is no statement about a buildup of any military measure before, during or after the war with the Seperatists in Firefly.

As I just said, It was a guess/assumption on my part, so you win on that.

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You cannot have political commentary in Firefly for two reasons

Well I was talking about how the Experiments on River reflect a 'darker' policy, and yes the American Civil War is obvious. The Alliance are the Northern States and the Browncoats are the defeated Confederacy, yep.

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Yeah, I pay my soldiers to die, not to win!

That's not a good economic strategy

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River is a tricky topic. We're told she's an experiement - but not much else. She's psychic somehow, an amazing fighter, insane and has this secret locked in her head. In terms of logic, that really doesn't add up at all - in terms of story, it's cheap crapola.

I think the reason why it doesn't add up logically is that we're missing a vital piece of the story that might have been planned to be revealed later on. She seems to be central to the Alliance's more dubious endevours and may prove to play a large role should they ever continue on with the story.

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They also might have blue hands because they enjoy sitting on them a lot. Whats your point? You have nothing to support that idea aside from the idea it's self. It's rubbish.

I retract what I said. Apparently in one of the Comics (which are as Canon as the show and movie) they got killed off.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.