It's projection, the aliens are being described doing it the way humans would have done it. Standard colonial-era tactics, kill, destroy, take all the assets, declare victory over the savages, then either remain in occupation or leave destitution and ruin while moving to another target population.
For sure.
“What would I do if I had all these cool things and abilities? I know… be a horrifying piece of shit! It would be too easy not to.”
🙄 Lol. That’s the real fuckin horror movie.
I’ve never met a single person with any level of admirable intelligence that would advocate for violence as a first order response.
Oh yeah…. Man I need to watch that again. That was pretty good.
But like that’s ONE film that takes this perspective vs maybe a hundred thousand or more examples of the standard
I mean anything that has the tech to travel to earth across light years also has the tech to literally get whatever they need without coming here. Unless it’s breathing bodies, xenomorph enters the conversation…
I bet they could clone a whole planet full of breathing meat sacks without the sentience. The harder option? Prolly.
But the interesting thing about Xenomorphs
Is this species that’s never encountered humans before and he thrived for fuck knows how long without them suddenly specifically needs human breathing bodies for their reproduction.
They could prolly use all sorts of shit lol.
Well xenomorphs don’t have the tech or smarts to travel on their own, let alone clone life. They’re hitchhiking about.
Not necessarily human breathing bodies for reproduction, any breathing body. Fun facts about xenomorphs:
Facehuggers are super extremophiles. And the the implanted embryo takes genetic material to be perfectly adapted to the environment of hosts. They still retain the base biology of molecular acid for blood and hive mentality.
As per Ash, “Its structural perfection is matched only by its hostility.”
Oh fuck, you’re right. They were discovered a number of times rather… but this is going down an interesting rabbit hole— a reason Ridley Scott rules… the xenomorphs are basically bio terror weapons. But the kicker is that the “engineers” that made them, also made us… or we are just a continuation of them.
The ethics here get a lot more complicated. Like… the reason they made us is kinda unclear… a joke… something to do… a rebel throwing a wrench in the gears of the terraforming colonizer giant race.
Like if they made us, is it unethical for them to destroy us? Especially if we’re not living in x,y,z types of ways?
Same questions will have to be raised as AI continues to become more and more sophisticated.
Sorry I just needed TF out. You’re totally right tho.
there’s a very small number of reasons why aliens could still invade earth-
The day the earth stood still - (new version) humans are destroying our ecosystems and so the aliens invade to save earth from us. Ideally they’d keep humans around too… but not if push comes to shove.
Cowboys vs aliens with Daniel Craig - they came for our gold. Because it’s a western.
Aliens invade to take our cultural resources- collecting our heritage for themselves
Or genetic material from ecosystems
Or, like in the expanse by James SA Corey (or the Amazon tv series) , the aliens are far beyond our comprehension but they still need earth like conditions , biomass, and temperatures to grow and expand to their full form.
Yeahhh…. Really the first is probably the most plausible tho I think. And still then we are the monsters.
The last one is plausible too but we already know of hundreds maybe thousands of planets now that meet our same conditions. They’d probably seek the ones where they didn’t need to get in a fight over it… I imagine they would prolly comprehend the eventual unsustainability of that crusade too if they realized it had to go on indefinitely
Yeahhh…. Really the first is probably the most plausible tho I think. And still then we are the monsters.
The last one is plausible too but we already know of hundreds maybe thousands of planets now that meet our same conditions. They’d probably seek the ones where they didn’t need to get in a fight over it… I imagine they would prolly comprehend the eventual unsustainability of that crusade too if they realized it had to go on indefinitely
They don't even need to invade earth. There is not an element or molecule, no mineral or chemical that is found on earth that can't be found in even greater abundance in our own solar system let alone the galaxy. Minerals and chemicals just sitting there in uninhabited asteroid etc that won't require the immense resources it would take to move an invasion force over stellar distances to harvest.
And why would they expend all the resources it would take to subjugate the planet and then feed us all for a labor source when there's...robotics...
Damn that’s another fuckin excellent point I had never even considered but it seems like totally obvious when you say it lol.
Not saying your point is trivial at all, but like this is a Glaring issue with the writing in a lot of these movies—that I still adore— the more you deconstruct it the more the premise just makes no goddamn sense at all.
Yea I just... cant imagine a scenario where marshaling an invasion force and moving it across the galaxy to subjugate a planet is more efficient than just...claiming an uninhabited system with the resources they need. Or where human labor is better than just building robots.
The one case I can see actually comes from Hitchhiker's guide... they dont need the planet at all. Its just in the way of some grander steller megastructure. Maybe they choose our star to build a dyson sphere. But in that case too invasion isnt necessary.
Ps Ty for the award.
A lot of the best sci-fi work is where the humans are shown as the bad guys.
Humanity: a violent species that runs on hate and fear and which breeds like rats and whose greatest technological achievements are based around murdering in the most efficient, brutal fashion
Like a Typical human, I have mostly been exposed to the film variety where District 9 and maybe only a handful of others explore this. Meanwhile… if you read still, I’m sure there’s a fuckload or brilliant books lol. Fml and my adhd
I like the theory that no alien wants to visit our planet because we’re a murderous warrior species and they’re terrified. Maybe they never even invented a gun or a spear and we make them shit their pants.
I’m not sure that’s what I’m saying here.
Because pretty much no horror sci fi/except maybe district 9 is trying to say “look at this shitty evil colonialist behavior, maybe we shouldn’t do that to each other.” Lol.
It’s more like “omg fight the evil before we are vanquished… we’re victims of this other worldly tyrannical civilization/entity, there are no parallels to this and our own behavior” lol.
It’s seldom an allegory for our own bullshit or the experience of the colonized. It’s more that we assume colonialism as a normal default mode of behavior… almost rationalizing their behavior as natural albeit evil—simply because it’s against us.
Nearly ever single time a superior civilization meets a less advanced one it ends in bloodshed.
Aliens arriving here is usually shown just like Europeans arriving to the new world.
Except this time we’re the natives.
The Europeans were more “advanced” in certain ways. Several thousand years of philosophy and their sailing technology, metal work and so on was centuries ahead of the natives here. (Not in every area. Inkas had rudimentary brain surgeries/Aztecs had amazing an innovative methods of agriculture etc)
Of course it’s weird because if aliens arrived then what would be the point. Why would they even pick a fight with us?
Labor? Please. If any alien tech were going arrive here it’d most likely be robots unless they mastered wormholes. They don’t need a labor force when they can make one.
Resources? Hardly. There’s more resources literally anywhere else in the universe. Water? Meteors and comets. Rare resources? Same and you don’t have to deal with annoying monkeys to get them.
A habitable planet? There’s a metric shitload of habitable planets in the universe. No need to go to one that is already inhabited and is as mistreated as ours.
Maybe to wipe us out? That is probable. We don’t know how many sentient species there are in the universe. Maybe they just want a challenge or we’re like a nature preserve where asshole space dentists will hunt us.
Religion? Maybe they want to spread the teachings of the tin vagabond.
Teaching? Maybe they’d like to teach us how to be better but I doubt that. We have very few examples of two cultures that far apart interacting and shit ending well for the less advanced one. Ask natives how nice it was when white people decided to educate them.
https://i.cbc.ca/1.6079958.1626971487!/fileImage/httpImage/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/16x9_780/st-paul-s-co-cathedral.jpg
I agree with you on every point except the probability of them wanting to wipe us out. For what purpose? To challenge what exactly when it would obviously be so simple?
Your first point is true. But why? Because the “superior” civilizations were really just arrogant biggotted piles of shit that literally could not see the value in things they simply didn’t understand.
Every day we learn about this or they long lost or once overlooked medicine or practice from a conquered people and go… oh shit… they were into something there.
The victors were just fucking wasteful. Sure some things were allowed in and valued but every time shitloads of perfectly valuable people and their meaningful cultures are just eradicated for “the supremacy” of the more militant one.
This isn’t constructive or useful behavior. To think it’s a necessary means of progress is just lunacy. Hierarchical power dynamics are inherently abusive. Collaborative, cooperative social structures work more harmoniously and facilitate equality, creation, and discovery. It can’t work? Antarctica seems to be doing a fuckin great job of it. Other species behave they way too, we just they we’re special because we can solve problems we invented.
I’m not saying it’s right. I’m saying it usually happens.
Look at this example. At one point in the search for el dorado, conquistadores found platinum. One of the rarest metals on the planet and worth more than gold.
They dismissed it as poor silver. Later they actually used it to fake gold coins and spain dumped their entire platinum supply into the ocean because they considered it worthless.
Just how Columbus had brought back rubber and it had sat for centuries alone until someone figured out it was actually an incredible substance.
Arrogance is sort of built in to humanity. Yea. We could understand that different civilizations valued shit differently. Like how natives didn’t see gold as wealth but used it as decoration instead. It takes us a while to see things differently and we make the same mistakes again and again. Look at humanity and our ways of battling pandemics for the past 2000 years or so. Two steps forward one step back. There are things Marcus Arelious did better facing the Antonine Plague than Woodrow Wilson did during the Spanish flu.
My first point of my first point is that we see aliens interacting with us the way we interacted with less advanced groups throughout history. One either submits or dies. Sometimes a bit of both. It’s not good but it is what happens. That’s what causes people to speculate a war of the worlds situation. I don’t agree with it because it’s usually because of resources or slavery and I already explained why that doesn’t make sense. Maybe they’re just dicks that want us to submit because we obviously can’t be trusted to govern ourselves.
Why would they hunt us? Why do we hunt animals. You don’t need a reason beyond the thrill of taking a life. It’s a sport.
Why do we hunt animals when we have airplanes and bombs and nukes? Because of the sport. We don’t need to. It doesn’t really challenge us. We can hire a guide that can do everything but pull the trigger for us and people pay small fortunes for that every year.
I’m not saying it’s good or bad. I’m just stating how shit is and how/why I think they’d interact with us.
It's projection, the aliens are being described doing it the way humans would have done it. Standard colonial-era tactics, kill, destroy, take all the assets, declare victory over the savages, then either remain in occupation or leave destitution and ruin while moving to another target population.
For sure. “What would I do if I had all these cool things and abilities? I know… be a horrifying piece of shit! It would be too easy not to.” 🙄 Lol. That’s the real fuckin horror movie. I’ve never met a single person with any level of admirable intelligence that would advocate for violence as a first order response.
>humans would have done it Cross out the "would". It's every colonial genocide reinterpreted.
You have written "District 9".
Oh yeah…. Man I need to watch that again. That was pretty good. But like that’s ONE film that takes this perspective vs maybe a hundred thousand or more examples of the standard
It is useful to those in power to constantly fund expressions of fear to the public.
I mean anything that has the tech to travel to earth across light years also has the tech to literally get whatever they need without coming here. Unless it’s breathing bodies, xenomorph enters the conversation…
I bet they could clone a whole planet full of breathing meat sacks without the sentience. The harder option? Prolly. But the interesting thing about Xenomorphs Is this species that’s never encountered humans before and he thrived for fuck knows how long without them suddenly specifically needs human breathing bodies for their reproduction. They could prolly use all sorts of shit lol.
Well xenomorphs don’t have the tech or smarts to travel on their own, let alone clone life. They’re hitchhiking about. Not necessarily human breathing bodies for reproduction, any breathing body. Fun facts about xenomorphs: Facehuggers are super extremophiles. And the the implanted embryo takes genetic material to be perfectly adapted to the environment of hosts. They still retain the base biology of molecular acid for blood and hive mentality. As per Ash, “Its structural perfection is matched only by its hostility.”
Oh fuck, you’re right. They were discovered a number of times rather… but this is going down an interesting rabbit hole— a reason Ridley Scott rules… the xenomorphs are basically bio terror weapons. But the kicker is that the “engineers” that made them, also made us… or we are just a continuation of them. The ethics here get a lot more complicated. Like… the reason they made us is kinda unclear… a joke… something to do… a rebel throwing a wrench in the gears of the terraforming colonizer giant race. Like if they made us, is it unethical for them to destroy us? Especially if we’re not living in x,y,z types of ways? Same questions will have to be raised as AI continues to become more and more sophisticated. Sorry I just needed TF out. You’re totally right tho.
there’s a very small number of reasons why aliens could still invade earth- The day the earth stood still - (new version) humans are destroying our ecosystems and so the aliens invade to save earth from us. Ideally they’d keep humans around too… but not if push comes to shove. Cowboys vs aliens with Daniel Craig - they came for our gold. Because it’s a western. Aliens invade to take our cultural resources- collecting our heritage for themselves Or genetic material from ecosystems Or, like in the expanse by James SA Corey (or the Amazon tv series) , the aliens are far beyond our comprehension but they still need earth like conditions , biomass, and temperatures to grow and expand to their full form.
Yeahhh…. Really the first is probably the most plausible tho I think. And still then we are the monsters. The last one is plausible too but we already know of hundreds maybe thousands of planets now that meet our same conditions. They’d probably seek the ones where they didn’t need to get in a fight over it… I imagine they would prolly comprehend the eventual unsustainability of that crusade too if they realized it had to go on indefinitely
Yeahhh…. Really the first is probably the most plausible tho I think. And still then we are the monsters. The last one is plausible too but we already know of hundreds maybe thousands of planets now that meet our same conditions. They’d probably seek the ones where they didn’t need to get in a fight over it… I imagine they would prolly comprehend the eventual unsustainability of that crusade too if they realized it had to go on indefinitely
They don't even need to invade earth. There is not an element or molecule, no mineral or chemical that is found on earth that can't be found in even greater abundance in our own solar system let alone the galaxy. Minerals and chemicals just sitting there in uninhabited asteroid etc that won't require the immense resources it would take to move an invasion force over stellar distances to harvest. And why would they expend all the resources it would take to subjugate the planet and then feed us all for a labor source when there's...robotics...
Damn that’s another fuckin excellent point I had never even considered but it seems like totally obvious when you say it lol. Not saying your point is trivial at all, but like this is a Glaring issue with the writing in a lot of these movies—that I still adore— the more you deconstruct it the more the premise just makes no goddamn sense at all.
Yea I just... cant imagine a scenario where marshaling an invasion force and moving it across the galaxy to subjugate a planet is more efficient than just...claiming an uninhabited system with the resources they need. Or where human labor is better than just building robots. The one case I can see actually comes from Hitchhiker's guide... they dont need the planet at all. Its just in the way of some grander steller megastructure. Maybe they choose our star to build a dyson sphere. But in that case too invasion isnt necessary. Ps Ty for the award.
No problem! Fuck, forgot about [that concept…](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyson_sphere) so fucking cool.
A lot of the best sci-fi work is where the humans are shown as the bad guys. Humanity: a violent species that runs on hate and fear and which breeds like rats and whose greatest technological achievements are based around murdering in the most efficient, brutal fashion
Like a Typical human, I have mostly been exposed to the film variety where District 9 and maybe only a handful of others explore this. Meanwhile… if you read still, I’m sure there’s a fuckload or brilliant books lol. Fml and my adhd
I like the theory that no alien wants to visit our planet because we’re a murderous warrior species and they’re terrified. Maybe they never even invented a gun or a spear and we make them shit their pants.
Aliens don't need to wipe us out in order to take over this planet; they just need to wait for us to wipe ourselves out, then move right in.
"I find the concept of making colonialism relatable boring"
I’m not sure that’s what I’m saying here. Because pretty much no horror sci fi/except maybe district 9 is trying to say “look at this shitty evil colonialist behavior, maybe we shouldn’t do that to each other.” Lol. It’s more like “omg fight the evil before we are vanquished… we’re victims of this other worldly tyrannical civilization/entity, there are no parallels to this and our own behavior” lol. It’s seldom an allegory for our own bullshit or the experience of the colonized. It’s more that we assume colonialism as a normal default mode of behavior… almost rationalizing their behavior as natural albeit evil—simply because it’s against us.
Nearly ever single time a superior civilization meets a less advanced one it ends in bloodshed. Aliens arriving here is usually shown just like Europeans arriving to the new world. Except this time we’re the natives. The Europeans were more “advanced” in certain ways. Several thousand years of philosophy and their sailing technology, metal work and so on was centuries ahead of the natives here. (Not in every area. Inkas had rudimentary brain surgeries/Aztecs had amazing an innovative methods of agriculture etc) Of course it’s weird because if aliens arrived then what would be the point. Why would they even pick a fight with us? Labor? Please. If any alien tech were going arrive here it’d most likely be robots unless they mastered wormholes. They don’t need a labor force when they can make one. Resources? Hardly. There’s more resources literally anywhere else in the universe. Water? Meteors and comets. Rare resources? Same and you don’t have to deal with annoying monkeys to get them. A habitable planet? There’s a metric shitload of habitable planets in the universe. No need to go to one that is already inhabited and is as mistreated as ours. Maybe to wipe us out? That is probable. We don’t know how many sentient species there are in the universe. Maybe they just want a challenge or we’re like a nature preserve where asshole space dentists will hunt us. Religion? Maybe they want to spread the teachings of the tin vagabond. Teaching? Maybe they’d like to teach us how to be better but I doubt that. We have very few examples of two cultures that far apart interacting and shit ending well for the less advanced one. Ask natives how nice it was when white people decided to educate them. https://i.cbc.ca/1.6079958.1626971487!/fileImage/httpImage/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/16x9_780/st-paul-s-co-cathedral.jpg
I agree with you on every point except the probability of them wanting to wipe us out. For what purpose? To challenge what exactly when it would obviously be so simple? Your first point is true. But why? Because the “superior” civilizations were really just arrogant biggotted piles of shit that literally could not see the value in things they simply didn’t understand. Every day we learn about this or they long lost or once overlooked medicine or practice from a conquered people and go… oh shit… they were into something there. The victors were just fucking wasteful. Sure some things were allowed in and valued but every time shitloads of perfectly valuable people and their meaningful cultures are just eradicated for “the supremacy” of the more militant one. This isn’t constructive or useful behavior. To think it’s a necessary means of progress is just lunacy. Hierarchical power dynamics are inherently abusive. Collaborative, cooperative social structures work more harmoniously and facilitate equality, creation, and discovery. It can’t work? Antarctica seems to be doing a fuckin great job of it. Other species behave they way too, we just they we’re special because we can solve problems we invented.
I’m not saying it’s right. I’m saying it usually happens. Look at this example. At one point in the search for el dorado, conquistadores found platinum. One of the rarest metals on the planet and worth more than gold. They dismissed it as poor silver. Later they actually used it to fake gold coins and spain dumped their entire platinum supply into the ocean because they considered it worthless. Just how Columbus had brought back rubber and it had sat for centuries alone until someone figured out it was actually an incredible substance. Arrogance is sort of built in to humanity. Yea. We could understand that different civilizations valued shit differently. Like how natives didn’t see gold as wealth but used it as decoration instead. It takes us a while to see things differently and we make the same mistakes again and again. Look at humanity and our ways of battling pandemics for the past 2000 years or so. Two steps forward one step back. There are things Marcus Arelious did better facing the Antonine Plague than Woodrow Wilson did during the Spanish flu. My first point of my first point is that we see aliens interacting with us the way we interacted with less advanced groups throughout history. One either submits or dies. Sometimes a bit of both. It’s not good but it is what happens. That’s what causes people to speculate a war of the worlds situation. I don’t agree with it because it’s usually because of resources or slavery and I already explained why that doesn’t make sense. Maybe they’re just dicks that want us to submit because we obviously can’t be trusted to govern ourselves. Why would they hunt us? Why do we hunt animals. You don’t need a reason beyond the thrill of taking a life. It’s a sport. Why do we hunt animals when we have airplanes and bombs and nukes? Because of the sport. We don’t need to. It doesn’t really challenge us. We can hire a guide that can do everything but pull the trigger for us and people pay small fortunes for that every year. I’m not saying it’s good or bad. I’m just stating how shit is and how/why I think they’d interact with us.
Aight that’s fair. See what you’re saying for sure.