Let's Read Animorphs! The Whole Series! Ch-ch-ch-chaaanges

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freebooter: Jul 7, 2009

Acebuckeye13 posted:

They definitely have a "World Police" vibe, which is fitting for when these books were written�especially considering (late book spoilers) their willingness to kill innocent aliens to achieve their objectives in winning the war.

Which given that it was the '90s, and Applegate was a teenager in the '60s, is probably based on Vietnam. Big evil empire (but more complicated when you delve into it), big good empire (but more complicated when you delve into it), and little guys caught in the middle. Plus lots of shades of grey within each species - Andalite traitors, the Yeerk peace movement etc

Epicurius posted:

I think it's hard now to talk about Harry Potter as a piece of literature, because while you certainly can separate a piece of art from the artist, Rowling's recent very public anti-trans statements has caused a pretty major reevaluation of the books by former fans of them and hers. So, because we're so close to it, it's very hard for people to go back to before and evaluate the books outside of Rowling's acts and opinions.

I think even minus Rowling becoming a huge jerk, a lot of people will look back on the Harry Potter books as an adult and see them really differently. Not just the obviously problematic stuff that's been noted a million times like the literal slavery or the hook-nosed goblins that run the banking system, but even the more subtle stuff that isn't outright ~problematic~ but is just fundamentally not very... mature, I guess? They're basically wish fulfillment books about British boarding schools, heir to the legacy of Billy Bunter or Anne of Green Gables. Anglophilic fantasy which happens to be literal fantasy and is deeply, deeply infused with British notions of class (even if foreign readers like you or I didn't realise that as kids).

On a direct Animorphs comparison, there's not a lot of complexity in Rowling's books. Applegate's world is one of endless shades of grey. Rowling's is a more simplistic Manichean battle between good and evil. Unlike the Animorphs, her characters rarely have any doubt about what's right and what's wrong. There's not necessarily anything wrong with that, but as you get older you realise the world isn't quite that simple, and I think Animorphs probably imparts better life lessons to kids than Harry Potter does. (Though I also hate to use that phrase, since good stories are fundamentally good stories, and kids' fiction shouldn't be primarily about education as though you're trying to put your dog's medicine inside some meat.)

# ? Nov 17, 2020 07:40

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# ? May 24, 2024 23:56

Comrade Blyatlov: Aug 4, 2007; should have picked four fingers

If books don't teach kids about thermals they are literal trash

# ? Nov 17, 2020 07:55

Tree Bucket: Apr 1, 2016; R.I.P.idura leucophrys

I personally never got into HP- I suspect because I found Animorphs and my brother's Pratchetts first. Interestingly, there's a bit in Equal Rites were a young girl named Esk "borrows" the mind/body of an eagle and gets stuck- lost in its instincts and the joy of flight (and thermals!!!) and the purity of the predator mind. A very Animorphs kind of sequence, come to think of it! And of course Angua the werewolf gives us a description of the wolf mind and its sense of smell that could fit happily in a Cassie book.
Anyway, as we all know-

Comrade Blyatlov posted:

If books don't teach kids about thermals they are literal trash

# ? Nov 17, 2020 08:38

Turpitude II: Nov 10, 2014

wizzardstaff posted:

I've never read Animorphs fanfic but I have to assume this is a major theme in that community. Right?

i wouldn't say a major theme, but there are certainly trans portions of fandom who relate to tobias' body dysphoria and conflict over his identity.

which is generally approved of as a valid reading of the text, even if it might not have been intended. (probably also helps that applegrant's daughter is trans)
https://twitter.com/kaaauthor/status/946567604935606272

# ? Nov 17, 2020 08:46

Khizan: Jul 30, 2013

Epicurius posted:

I always wonder....Both Ax and Elfangor can fly Taxxon ships without trouble, but I sort of wonder about that. Taxxons have a lot of little hands, You'd think that, not only would their controls be smaller, so as to be comfortable for them, but they'd also require more hands to fly than controls made for two handed people, like Andalites and us. If a Taxxon is going to be flying the ship, why not optimize the controls for four or six handed flight?

I'm not sure if that would be any more efficient. There's only so many inputs that flight needs and I don't think you'd get better control by dividing the basic functions up between more controls. I'd expect basic flight controls to be fairly similar while the other hands handled things like weapons/countermeasures/communications/sensors/etc.

# ? Nov 17, 2020 10:40

Rochallor: Apr 23, 2010; ふっっっっっっっっっっっっｃｋ

freebooter posted:

Harry Potter vs Animorphs

You do not, in fact, have to hand it to J.K. Rowling, but I think her ability to write effortlessly engaging prose papers over a lot of the unsavory and lovely aspects of her work. It just feels clever. It makes precocious readers feel smart for getting through it--and they should! But it makes it difficult for older readers to come back to it.

Animorphs didn't really feel smart to me (except for the Chronicles) in the same way back in grade school. I was reading them alongside Goosebumps, which were every inch the stupid cliffhanger-driven tat people thought Animorphs were from the covers. It wasn't until reminiscing about them later on that I got just how weird of a series it is.

And as you've said, Harry Potter is playing around in clearly defined genres. Animorphs is kinda doing the same thing, but the genres are bleeding together much more freely and K.A. Applegate is really interested in pushing them as far as they can go. Which is how a series that started with a kid turning into a dog takes a pit stop at space opera before ending on a war crime!

# ? Nov 17, 2020 13:13

Cythereal: Nov 8, 2009; I love the potoo,
and the potoo loves you.

And let's not forget that Animorphs does get weird as hell on random side adventures at some point.

I think the last book I read involved the Animorphs discovering Atlantis and the race of evil merfolk who lived there who had stolen a Yeerk submarine and were planning to attack the land-dwellers. :v:

# ? Nov 17, 2020 13:18

Comrade Blyatlov: Aug 4, 2007; should have picked four fingers

I'm absolutely certain that no book like that ever existed.

# ? Nov 17, 2020 18:36

ANOTHER SCORCHER: Aug 12, 2018

Cythereal posted:

I think the last book I read involved the Animorphs discovering Atlantis and the race of evil merfolk who lived there who had stolen a Yeerk submarine and were planning to attack the land-dwellers.

Comrade Blyatlov posted:

I'm absolutely certain that no book like that ever existed.

The plot Cythereal described is very close to Animorphs #36, The Mutation.

# ? Nov 17, 2020 18:55

Comrade Blyatlov: Aug 4, 2007; should have picked four fingers

No, it never existed.

# ? Nov 17, 2020 18:59

ManlyGrunting: May 29, 2014

Honestly one of the charm points of this series is the absolutely ridiculous variance in quality of the books

# ? Nov 17, 2020 19:48

freebooter: Jul 7, 2009

Cythereal posted:

And let's not forget that Animorphs does get weird as hell on random side adventures at some point.

I think the last book I read involved the Animorphs discovering Atlantis and the race of evil merfolk who lived there who had stolen a Yeerk submarine and were planning to attack the land-dwellers.

This is the most far-out the series ever gets, and even though that book is dumb as hell I still enjoyed it as a kid!

# ? Nov 18, 2020 00:02

OctaviusBeaver: Apr 30, 2009; Say what now?

A lot of the books that add nothing to the overall plot make up for it by being fun little sci-fi vignettes. I think the merpeople one fits in that category just because of how bizarre it is. Some just don't really have anything going for them like the kangaroo book.

# ? Nov 18, 2020 02:14

Epicurius: Apr 10, 2010; College Slice

The Andalite Chronicles-Chapter 12

quote:

We had shoved the Taxxons and the badly wounded Hork-Bajir into the cargo hold of the ship. We had not even looked into the hold to see what else might be in there.

Now we looked.

We opened the door and Alloran and Arbron stood with their shredders ready in case the surviving Taxxons tried to attack us. But the two Taxxons had other things on their minds. They were attempting to kill and eat each other. They had already finished off the wounded Hork-Bajir.
<Stop it or I�ll kill you both!> Alloran yelled.

But the Taxxons were out of control, caught up in their own evil bloodlust. It was a vile thing to watch. Taxxons don�t have powerful tails like us, or blades like the Hork-Bajir. They can only rear up and slam their upper bodies against each other while trying to gouge with their round mouths.

<Their Yeerks have left them,> Alloran said. <This is how Taxxons behave when they are not Controllers. Their Yeerk parasites have left them to destroy each other.>

<Where did the Yeerks go?> I asked.

Alloran calmly leveled his shredder at the Taxxons and fired. It was a low-level blast, just enough to knock the Taxxons unconscious.

We stepped past their sagging bodies, careful to keep our hooves out of the gore. Behind them, the hold of the ship was filled with transparent circular tanks. It was too dark to see what was in the tanks.

<Computer. Lights,> Alloran said.

Lights came on, and I instantly wished they hadn�t.

The hold of the ship stretched for perhaps a hundred feet straight back, with a width of a third that. Filling most of that space, glowing a sludgy green, were dozens of tanks.

And in each tank, swimming through the viscous liquid, were gray slugs.

<Yeerks!> I said.

<There must be thousands! Tens of thousands!> Arbron said.

<I suspected this might be the case,> Alloran said. <These are Yeerks being transported to the Taxxon world. They�re here to get bodies. Hosts. Each of these will be given a Taxxon.>

<What do we do with them?> I asked.

<We seal the bridge then open the outer hatch,> Alloran said calmly.

It took me a few seconds to realize what he was saying. If we opened the outer hatch while we were still in space, the vacuum would suck everything in the hold out. Out into the airless cold. The Yeerks would die almost instantly.

<Prince Alloran, we can�t just kill them all,> I said. I looked closely at him to see if maybe he had been joking.

His eyes were cold. <Aristh Elfangor, I give the orders. You obey the orders.>

<But they�re helpless,> I protested.

<They are Yeerks. And this is war. Would you rather wait till they have Taxxon bodies?>

I didn�t know what to say. I looked at Arbron. He kept his face carefully expressionless.

<We � we can�t do this,> I said. <It�s wrong. They are our prisoners. We can�t! It would be murder!>

<Be careful what you accuse me of, Aristh Elfangor,> Alloran said harshly. <You�re a child, so I forgive your impertinence. This time. But you are here to learn, not to question orders. And one of the things you�ll learn, my idealistic aristh, is that war is not about striking brave poses and playing the hero. War is about killing.>

<Andalites do not kill prisoners,> I said.

Alloran laughed. <Is that what they taught you in school?> He laughed again. <Well, child, I learned my lessons in the battle for the Hork-Bajir world, not in a classroom. And let me tell you: The only thing that matters is staying alive. Besides, little aristh Elfangor, it�s a bit late for you to get delicate. Not now, with the blood of your enemies staining your tail.>

This wasn�t happening. It couldn�t be. Alloran was a war-prince. I couldn�t disobey a warprince.

But this was monstrous.

<I won�t kill prisoners,> I said. <Not even Yeerks.>

<I could execute you right now for disobeying me,> Alloran said.

For a moment that seemed to stretch on and on, we stood there, face-to-face. I could barely breathe. I was risking my life, and probably destroying my future in the military, just to save my enemies. It was insane!

But I could not imagine myself sending the Yeerks flying off into the vacuum of space. I couldn�t do it.

<Sir,> Arbron said tentatively. <We are so close to the planet surface that Yeerk sensors might pick up the heat signature of thousands of Yeerks being � flushed � into space. And they would investigate.>

It was true. Maybe. But was it enough to get the prince to back off?

<Well, we wouldn�t want that,> Alloran said sarcastically. <We�ll wait till we�ve completed our mission on the surface. Then, as we leave the system, we�ll clean out this filth.>

I breathed again. But I wasn�t fooling myself. I had made an enemy of Prince Alloran. And I wasn�t sure I could count on Arbron, either.

<Time to acquire the Taxxons, if that meets with Aristh Elfangor�s high moral code,> Alloran said.

I turned away and walked back to the two stunned Taxxons. Without hesitating, I placed my hand on one of the Taxxons� slimy flesh.

Morphing technology allows a person to absorb the DNA of any creature he touches. It takes concentration and focus, because the biotechnology of morphing is triggered by thought commands.

Focus, I told myself. Put everything else out of your mind, and let the Taxxon become a part of you.

And as I stood there, the Taxxon�s DNA migrated into me.

My life, which had gone rapidly downhill at a shocking speed, was about to get much worse.

And then, with the skeptical eyes of Prince Alloran and the frightened stare of Arbron upon me, I began to morph.[/quote]

So while Elfangor would never have heard of Geneva, as far as human wars are concerned, here's the beginning of the Geneva Convention on the Treatment of Prisoners.

quote:

1. Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed hors de combat by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction founded on race, colour, religion or faith, sex, birth or wealth, or any other similar criteria.

To this end the following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever with respect to the above-mentioned persons:

(a) Violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture;

(b) Taking of hostages;

(c) Outrages upon personal dignity, in particular, humiliating and degrading treatment;

(d) The passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples.

While the Andalites obviously aren't signatories, Elfangor seems to have a natural sense that, as prisoners and non-combatants, the Yeerks in the tanks deserve that sort of treatment. Alloran, obviously, disagrees.

What do you think? Who's right? When is it legitimate to kill your enemy, and when is it not? These Yeerks right now are obviously helpless and no threat...they're a bunch of almost blind slugs in tanks. That being said, this is a raid, The only purpose here was to get Taxxon DNA to morph. They're probably not going to be able to take the Yeerks back to the Andalite homeworld. And, if they land with the shuttle, undercover, as they're planning to do, once they land, the Taxxons will just take the Yeerks off the ship for implantation, not knowing anything is wrong. Does that change anything?

On the other hand....So, in December, 1944, there was the Battle of the Bulge. The Germans, in a last ditch attack, massed their troops and led an offensive into the American lines, driving US troops back (the aforementioned bulge), until the Americans were able to counterattack and stop them. During the offensive, part of the German 6th SS Panzer Army captured an American convoy, and took it prisoner. The unit decided, since they were on such a tight schedule, they had no way of dealing with the American prisoners. So, they lined them up in a field and machine gunned them. Even though some escaped, about 84 died, This became known as the Malmedy Massacre. After the war, the perpetrators of the massacre were put on trial....some were sentenced to death, others to life imprisonment, and others to shorter terms. If we accept that the Malmedy massacre wasn't justified (and I don't think it was), how is that different than what Alloran wants to do?

The Andalite Chronicles-Chapter 13

quote:

As an Andalite aristh, I�d been trained in morphing. Back at basic training they first transformed us with the morphing technology. And they gave us a djabala to acquire and morph.

A djabala is a small, six-legged animal, maybe a third the size of a young Andalite. It has a mouth and a tail and no natural weapons. It lives by climbing trees and eating the highest leaves.

You have to morph the djabala in order to pass the morphing proficiency test. So I did. But then, like a lot of arisths, I morphed a kafit bird. I have heard that some planets have many types of bird. But since we only have three, and since the kafit is the best species of the three, it�s popular with
young cadets looking for fun.

It was a wonderful experience. I always loved the idea of flying. But of course, morphing for pleasure is discouraged. So I only did it one time.

That was all the morphing I had done. A djabala and a kafit bird. I had never even dreamed of morphing a Taxxon.

Taxxons are a nauseating species. Even if you�ve seen holograms of them. But trust me, till you�ve been up close to a Taxxon, you just don�t know how awful they are. The smell alone is enough to make you sick.

But now I had no choice. I had to show Alloran that I was still a good soldier. I had to prove that I was brave, no matter what he thought of me. I couldn�t show any hesitation.

So I focused my mind on becoming the Taxxon. And the changes began immediately.

I felt my upper torso begin to melt down into my lower body. As I watched, my blue-and-tan fur ceased being individual hairs and melted into a plasticlike covering. The bare flesh on my upper body did the same thing, turning hard and shiny.

I felt myself falling as my legs shrank. They seemed to be sucked up into my body. Way too fast!

My stomach hit the deck so hard it knocked the air out of me.

Then, almost as quickly, I was lifted back up off the deck. Dozens of sharp cones were sprouting from my belly. I was growing Taxxon legs.

I looked backward through my stalk eyes and saw that my body was stretching out behind me. I was rapidly becoming a fat worm. Ten feet of rippling, slimy segments rolled backward, engulfing my tail. The process made a sound like wet cloth being dragged over gravel.

I could hear my own internal organs dissolving. Squishing, slippery sounds. I could hear other organs, organs I didn�t even have a name for, take their place.

Then � I was blind!

My eyes had all been blinded at once. I couldn�t see anything. I felt fear grow within me. Fear that threatened to become panic. I was blind!

Muddy at first, then sharper, my sight slowly returned. But it didn�t exactly make me feel better.

It was an eerie, distorted, broken world I saw.

Taxxons have compound eyes. Each red globule eye is really a thousand smaller eyeballs, each one taking its own tiny picture of the world. Everything I saw around me was shattered into a million small frames. It was overwhelming.

And then I felt something new. A new sense �

I moved unfamiliar muscles and realized that they operated my mouth. My round, red mouth. And through that mouth came a deluge of sensory input. It was like smell. And like something I�d never really experienced before. It�s called the sense of taste, I think.

And what I tasted � what I smelled � all that my senses cared about was the bright smell of blood.

I never even felt the Taxxon�s instincts well up beneath my own troubled and battered Andalite mind. I had no warning. All at once, the Taxxon was in my head.

How can I even convey the horror?

Have you ever felt in yourself some awful, evil urge? Some fugitive thought that you quickly snuffed out? Well, as I became fully Taxxon, I felt such a feeling. And it was not some faint wisp of thought, but a raging, screaming hunger.

A hunger for anything living.

A hunger for anything with a beating heart.

My shattered Taxxon eyes saw two Andalites.

My own people! I wanted to devour my own people.

But Taxxons are not fools. My Taxxon brain saw and understood the Andalite tails. It knew they were weapons. It knew it could not fight them. And that weakness gave rise to a rage that was like a nuclear fire in me.

I was hungry! Hunger like no hunger any other creature can ever know.

As I struggled to reassert my own identity, I understood why the Taxxons had made their alliance with the Yeerks.

The Yeerks had weapons. Weapons to use to feed fresh, warm flesh to the raging Taxxon hunger.

The Taxxons had given up their freedom. But freedom is nothing to a Taxxon, compared with that hunger.

<How are you doing, Elfangor?> Arbron asked me.

<Fine,> I lied. <Only �>

<What?>

<When you morph, be very careful. Be strong. You�ll have to fight the hunger.>

Arbron laughed. <What, are you afraid I�m gonna morph and try to eat you?>

<Yes, Arbron. I am afraid.>

Honestly, how can you not feel sorry for these things?

# ? Nov 18, 2020 02:48

Fritzler: Sep 5, 2007

Epicurius posted:

The Andalite Chronicles-Chapter 12
On the other hand....So, in December, 1944, there was the Battle of the Bulge. The Germans, in a last ditch attack, massed their troops and led an offensive into the American lines, driving US troops back (the aforementioned bulge), until the Americans were able to counterattack and stop them. During the offensive, part of the German 6th SS Panzer Army captured an American convoy, and took it prisoner. The unit decided, since they were on such a tight schedule, they had no way of dealing with the American prisoners. So, they lined them up in a field and machine gunned them. Even though some escaped, about 84 died, This became known as the Malmedy Massacre. After the war, the perpetrators of the massacre were put on trial....some were sentenced to death, others to life imprisonment, and others to shorter terms. If we accept that the Malmedy massacre wasn't justified (and I don't think it was), how is that different than what Alloran wants to do?

I don�t think it is justified, but are there any Allied equivalents to this massacre? If so how did did their punishments compare to these German punishments? I do think there�s an argument to be made about killing defenseless yeerks. All the Yeerks that people have seen want to take over the free will of intelligent species. It seems to be another horrible, walking torture. Preventing that from happening does seem somewhat justified, keeping free will. However these Yeerks are acquiring taxxons who agree with the enslavement so maybe that is more justified.

# ? Nov 18, 2020 03:14

Soup du Jour: Sep 8, 2011; I always knew I'd die with a headache.

Elfangor makes the moral choice here. A few decades later, Jake will not.

# ? Nov 18, 2020 03:15

Comrade Blyatlov: Aug 4, 2007; should have picked four fingers

I don't really see it any differently than sinking a troop ship, for example. No, they might not be in combat at that exact moment, but they're still manpower.

It's difficult to apply the Geneva Conventions, because as the previous poster points out, what the Yeerks do is slavery in and of itself.

Would people have any compunctions about blowing up a train full of Confederate soldiers - or indeed, the burning of Atlanta by General Alloran Sherman?

# ? Nov 18, 2020 03:22

Comrade Blyatlov: Aug 4, 2007; should have picked four fingers

But, the fact that these books take the time to even pose the question without really giving a hard and fast answer on it is laudable in and of itself, imo.

# ? Nov 18, 2020 03:23

Epicurius: Apr 10, 2010; College Slice

Comrade Blyatlov posted:

Would people have any compunctions about blowing up a train full of Confederate soldiers - or indeed, the burning of Atlanta by General Alloran Sherman?

I might have compunctions about blowing up a train full of Confederate soldiers if I've captured the train and none of the soldiers are in a position to fight.

# ? Nov 18, 2020 03:49

GodFish: Oct 10, 2012; We're your first, last, and only line of defense. We live in secret. We exist in shadow.

And we dress in black.

The Yeerks are waging a war of annihilation, with their end goal being the complete enslavement of, as far as we know, every other intelligent species in the galaxy. I don't think Elfangor is wrong not to kill them, but but Alloran would still be justified in doing so. Additionally, the only time you can really ever kill a Yeerk without also killing a slave at the same time is when the Yeerk is entirely helpless (excluding the rare chance of capturing one and tying it down for 3 days until it starves to death, which seems like a worse moral act really, since you torture both the Yeerk and the host). The fact that the Taxxon's are willing hosts, doing this to avoid the endless hunger definitely adds a wrinkle, but this is still the Yeerks on the way to arming themselves for battle to conquer every other species.

# ? Nov 18, 2020 03:50

Tree Bucket: Apr 1, 2016; R.I.P.idura leucophrys

Comrade Blyatlov posted:

But, the fact that these books take the time to even pose the question without really giving a hard and fast answer on it is laudable in and of itself, imo.

Yep. Absolutely.
Not too much later after these books came out, our society discussed "should we start torturing people for information if they're terrorists, or at least terrorist coloured!?" and a really worryingly large number of people did not seem to display any ability to argue beyond "good guys are good and bad guys are BAd." They should've read about Elfangor as kids, dammit.

# ? Nov 18, 2020 04:10

Cythereal: Nov 8, 2009; I love the potoo,
and the potoo loves you.

GodFish posted:

Additionally, the only time you can really ever kill a Yeerk without also killing a slave at the same time is when the Yeerk is entirely helpless (excluding the rare chance of capturing one and tying it down for 3 days until it starves to death, which seems like a worse moral act really, since you torture both the Yeerk and the host).

This is why I come down on "I don't know if kill them all would be the right thing, but I don't think it would be an entirely wrong thing." The terms and circumstances of the war that the Yeerks have set - and given their circumstances I can't blame them - are uniquely thorny.

# ? Nov 18, 2020 04:22

CidGregor: Sep 27, 2009; TG: if i were you i would just take that fucking devilbeast out behind the woodshed and blow its head off

GodFish posted:

Additionally, the only time you can really ever kill a Yeerk without also killing a slave at the same time is when the Yeerk is entirely helpless (excluding the rare chance of capturing one and tying it down for 3 days until it starves to death, which seems like a worse moral act really, since you torture both the Yeerk and the host).

I feel like this is the real crux of the dilemma here. The alternative to killing them en masse in their pool is to kill them while they're controlling a slave mind that will then also die. Killing just the Yeerk feels like the strictly-superior option, from the perspective of saving lives being your primary goal. The Yeerks being helpless in this scenario is misleading because a Yeerk is always helpless unless it is in a slave body trying to kill you.

# ? Nov 18, 2020 04:27

Rochallor: Apr 23, 2010; ふっっっっっっっっっっっっｃｋ

Elfangor lets the kids know in the very first book that the Hork-Bajir are a peaceful species who have been enslaved against their will, and now we're starting to get a somewhat sympathetic portrayal of the Taxxons. You've also got Chapman, Visser One, Tom... it's seriously impressive that the only outright bad guy so far is Visser Three. There are a couple of one-off villains I remember from later books, but the series is really good about its ambiguous antagonists. The Yeerks on the whole are kind of an example of that, given this scene.

# ? Nov 18, 2020 04:51

Comrade Blyatlov: Aug 4, 2007; should have picked four fingers

420 space flush yeerks erryday

# ? Nov 18, 2020 04:56

disaster pastor: May 1, 2007

Quoting myself from the book 6 discussion.

disaster pastor posted:

It's undisputed that the Yeerks are the aggressors in this war, so the kids, as resistance, have a liiiiittle bit of leeway here. But man.

As a general rule, the only guaranteed lawful way to kill an enemy combatant, especially pre-War on Terror, is during combat. But it's literally impossible to kill an unhosted Yeerk "during combat" (unless it's trying to escape from a dying host). So killing a Yeerk in combat always means killing a potentially innocent host. If you want to kill Yeerks without killing hosts, you have to kill a helpless Yeerk. If you want to prevent innocents from becoming hosts, you have to kill helpless Yeerks.

It's some supremely hosed moral calculus that middle schoolers should not be expected to have to do.

Elfangor is not a middle schooler, exactly. I think he makes the right moral choice here, but I think the math is slightly different for him; he's not a guerilla resistance member, he's officially part of the military. The base problem still exists: Yeerks are helpless prisoners unless they're enslaving a host. So the kids feel like they have to take whatever wins they can get ("either kill them now or kill them and a human later"), but Elfangor definitely does not. Elfangor feels, I think correctly, that they can afford and are in fact obliged to take prisoners, even when it's way outside of their mission and may be outside of their expected capabilities.

# ? Nov 18, 2020 05:20

Comrade Blyatlov: Aug 4, 2007; should have picked four fingers

I want to talk about why I say Alloran did nothing wrong. These are spoilers for this book and the rest of the series, so don't scan if you don't know.

It becomes really clear that the Hork-Bajir world was an unmitigated defeat for the Andalites, and by extension, the rest of the galaxy. The Yeerks won there, and while it's not really clear how many Hork-Bajir there were there pre-Quantum Virus, it's reasonably safe to infer a couple of things. First, the war is at best a slow, grinding attrition on both sides. Second, the Hork-Bajir the Yeerks currently have are pretty clearly the linchpin of their combat forces. Third, it stands to reason that had the Yeerks captured all of the Hork-Bajir intact, it would absolutely have swung the tide of the war in their favour.

Alloran knew all of this. The Quantum Virus, whatever it is, wiped out the bulk of the Hork-Bajir. It could be argued this was a mercy killing - better dead than slaves - but it also fits the 'scorched earth' way of fighting a war. The Yeerks absolutely saw the Hork-Bajir as a resource, and Alloran denied them that resource, and in all probability, stopped the Yeerks winning the war. I guess you could draw a comparison between that and the atomic bombings of Japan - absolutely an atrocity, but perhaps an understandable one.

I think the way he sees it, is that he is damned for what he did, but he had no other choice but to let the galaxy die.
If you've ever seen The Fog of War, about McNamara, he discusses making similar choices.

# ? Nov 18, 2020 06:59

freebooter: Jul 7, 2009

Fritzler posted:

I don�t think it is justified, but are there any Allied equivalents to this massacre? If so how did did their punishments compare to these German punishments?

The perpetrators of the Malmedy massacre were put on trial by the occupying Allies, not by the Germans. Winners tend not to put their own war criminals on trial at all. This in fact crops up in the very final Animorphs book!

When I think of Allied war crimes in WWII what springs to mind is mostly aerial bombings like Hiroshima/Nagasaki and Dresden, but in terms of something close to the Malmedy massacre, I guess the US soldiers who liberated Dachau gunned down the concentration camp guards - though in light of the circumstances and emotion, that's more understandable than Malmedy. There's a scene about it in the movie Shutter Island, which is also a very good illustration of the phenomenon of "contagious shooting" - a whole bunch of dudes are keyed up on adrenaline and as soon as somebody opens fire, everybody instinctively lets rip. (I don't actually think is is likely a realistic portrayal of what went down.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oF99aB8nd9o

Also, if you've seen the movie Dunkirk, the old bloke who steers a small boat in to rescue is based on the real life figure of Charles Lightoller, who really did that, and was the senior surviving officer of the Titanic, but whose interesting life also unambiguously involved massacring the captured sailors of a German U-boat during WWI:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Lightoller#Sinking_of_UB-110

# ? Nov 18, 2020 07:35

nine-gear crow: Aug 10, 2013

Then again the twist to Shutter Island throws EVERYTHING DiCaprio�s character says across the entire movie into doubt, the fact that Scorsese uses �flashbacks� to portray them is just a ploy to gently caress with the audience and lend credibility to all the lies.

# ? Nov 18, 2020 08:58

OctaviusBeaver: Apr 30, 2009; Say what now?

I don't think blowing up a troop transport is usually considered to be against the laws of war. Nobody surrendered the ship to them and none of the Yeerks tried to surrender individually.

# ? Nov 18, 2020 13:46

Strategic Tea: Sep 1, 2012

I think they should be obliged to take prisoners if possible, but in practice they are deep behind enemy lines on an urgent mission. I would equate flushing the tanks to bombing a barracks, it isn't pleasant but they are in a war for survival and it's a valid military target.

# ? Nov 18, 2020 14:08

Strategic Tea: Sep 1, 2012

But actually I suppose a better framing would be - should soldiers be allowed to refuse a surrender when they're still fighting and urgently need to be somewhere?

# ? Nov 18, 2020 14:11

Cythereal: Nov 8, 2009; I love the potoo,
and the potoo loves you.

I think this also comes down to one fundamental question: is it ever okay to kill a Yeerk in their natural state, given what they are?

# ? Nov 18, 2020 14:24

SSJ_naruto_2003: Oct 12, 2012

Cythereal posted:

I think this also comes down to one fundamental question: is it ever okay to kill a Yeerk in their natural state, given what they are?

mind control slugs get btfo

# ? Nov 18, 2020 21:15

Comrade Blyatlov: Aug 4, 2007; should have picked four fingers

Comrade Blyatlov posted:

420 space flush yeerks erryday

# ? Nov 18, 2020 21:53

Fritzler: Sep 5, 2007

freebooter posted:

The perpetrators of the Malmedy massacre were put on trial by the occupying Allies, not by the Germans. Winners tend not to put their own war criminals on trial at all. This in fact crops up in the very final Animorphs book!

I understand that point which is why I asked! I worded poorly though, by saying German punishment I meant punishment that the Germans received, rather than the other way around.

I don't really like comparing fictional stuff overly to real life disenfranchised people, but because of the way Yeerks operate this is like destroying a European boat sailing to Africa for slavery. Completely justified destroying in my opinion. From what we learn later though it does throw a wrinkle that we know some Yeerk's do not agree with this policy and are part of a resistance.

# ? Nov 18, 2020 22:02

Khizan: Jul 30, 2013

Cythereal posted:

I think this also comes down to one fundamental question: is it ever okay to kill a Yeerk in their natural state, given what they are?

Gross brain control slugs? Yes, of course.

# ? Nov 18, 2020 22:13

ninjahedgehog: Feb 17, 2011; It's time to kick the tires and light the fires, Big Bird.

Here's a question that I can't remember if the books answer or not -- Do the Andalites even have the capability of keeping Yeerk POWs fed? Kandronas are a pretty rare and valuable thing as I recall, to the point where it was tough even for the Yeerks to get a replacement sent to Earth before their forces there started starving.

EDIT: Come to think of it, another comparable situation to this might be the Highway of Death -- Yes, they were completely vulnerable, yes they were retreating, but they definitely had *not* surrendered and the war was still going on so it's still technically a valid military target, just one that was hopelessly outclassed by Coalition airpower.

ninjahedgehog fucked around with this message at 23:01 on Nov 18, 2020

# ? Nov 18, 2020 22:54

freebooter: Jul 7, 2009

Fritzler posted:

I understand that point which is why I asked! I worded poorly though, by saying German punishment I meant punishment that the Germans received, rather than the other way around.

Ah right. Well, yeah, the Dachau reprisals saw no attempt at charges laid. The My Lai massacre would be another American war crime that comes to mind: one of the biggest, most indisputably evil and high profile American war crimes of the 20th century, and even then only one guy got charged and he was given a slap on the wrist.

I did a human rights and international law course as part of my degree a few years ago, and what I took away from it was basically that international law, and the rules of war, are a centuries-long work in progress. The nation-state still reigns supreme and major military powers can still get away with doing whatever they want. The invasion of Iraq was a war crime on a massive scale that didn't even pretend to try to be about humanitarian intervention. China is currently conducting multiple cultural genocides and nobody can or will do much about it except issue diplomatic rebukes.

ninjahedgehog posted:

Here's a question that I can't remember if the books answer or not -- Do the Andalites even have the capability of keeping Yeerk POWs fed? Kandronas are a pretty rare and valuable thing as I recall, to the point where it was tough even for the Yeerks to get a replacement sent to Earth before their forces there started starving.

I'm not sure if it's been mentioned yet but the Yeerk empire is an empire in exile - the Andalites are occupying, or at least blockading, the Yeerk homeworld. So theoretically they could drop them home via Z-space.

# ? Nov 19, 2020 01:10

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# ? May 24, 2024 23:56

Epicurius: Apr 10, 2010; College Slice

ninjahedgehog posted:

Here's a question that I can't remember if the books answer or not -- Do the Andalites even have the capability of keeping Yeerk POWs fed? Kandronas are a pretty rare and valuable thing as I recall, to the point where it was tough even for the Yeerks to get a replacement sent to Earth before their forces there started starving.

This I can answer. Seerow is the one who gave the Kandrona ray generators to the Yeerks in the first place, so the Andalites have the technology to build and produce them.

# ? Nov 19, 2020 01:36

The Something Awful Forums > Archives > Comedy Goldmine > Let's Read Animorphs! The Whole Series! Ch-ch-ch-chaaanges

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