Earth for Humans... Let's Keep it that Way

[Scarlet Shocker]

There are many posters in the city saying as much. I don't know who pays for them but they've been there a very long time. 

 

They hint that the "enemy" is the other, the alien (literally in this case I guess) - the undesirable that YOU, dear citizen need to be afraid of. Non-humans are bad.

 

Except the PPD. PPD is full of Kheldians who are ready to protect the banks. PPD Kheldians don't seem to protect ordinary citizens when the Outcasts or Trolls are getting up to nefarious crap on the streets of Atlas Park or Kings Row. I've never yet seen a Kheldian PPD officer in Perez Park rescuing anyone from the Circle of Thorns.

 

But if a bunch of villains try and take down Kings Row or Skyway City bank... they're all over it like measles on RFK Jr. 

 

So what are they really about? The ultra-capitalists protecting the almighty dollar? Propping up the banks

 

Of course, I'm being very tongue in cheek here, But it does seem weird that this anachronism has stood for so long. Is there any reasonable explanation? I'd love to hear it. 

[Snarky]

We need to stop this alien menace!

 

Donate to @Snarky and we can set up a force to deal with this.  We can call it Isolation Control Extraterrestrial.  We will document these money worshipping aliens, and stop them from whatever evil plans they have for our banking systems!

 

Your donation of 20 mil or more to @Snarky will get a personalized thank you!

[Troo]

 

b e c a u s e 

 

🙂 

[keyguardactive]

And what about mutants? They're not human, right?

 

Sure, some mutants are Outcasts, but many of them are heroes! And they have to look at those signs every day? Seems unfair. 

[Major_Decoy]

Also, those are anti-Rikti billboards and Rikti are humans.

[Jiro Ito]

The game started with the conclusion of the first Rikti war and Omega Team's sacrifice, then a few years later we have another Rikti invasion.  Depending on where your character is in the story, you are a part of defending the invasion, completing Lady Grey's TF to stop it, and finding the trigger for it in Nemesis.  It makes sense that there would be such a large anti-alien contingent.

 

We've also got Kheldians and Praetorians, neither of which are Earthlings.  I'm surprised there isn't a larger "Earth is for Earthlings" movement going around.

[Obsidiman]

Sounds like a Malta sponsored ad campaign.  Just keep all the 'freaks' in the crosshairs or in a cage and life will safer. 

 

That or the government is doing its usual 'common enemy' distraction to focus the sheeple's attention on anything other than what their politicians are actually up to that they have no business knowing about. 

[MTeague]

The "Earth For Humans.. Let's Keep it that way", and the "They are still among us!" billboards, both definitely started as anti-Rikti notices. Whether governmental organizations wanted citizens to be extra alert for possible alien infiltration, or whether or not private individuals full of (potentially justified) paranoia paid for them to go up, I think is never truly specified.

 

But I have always assumed the world of Paragon City has it's fair share of humans who don't just fear and hate the Rikti, but who view any form of intelligent life that isn't "pure" human as a threat to humanity's continued existence. 

• Rikti, of course would be hated by them.
• the Lost, in particular, would be seen as an existential threat by them, since they're literally being converted to Rikti.
• But also, Dillo, or Grym?  Both would be hated by them. 
• Kheldians? Hated by them.
• Devouring Earth would be targetted by them, and with good reason. I mean, Hamidon. Terra. etc.
• Mutants of any kind, including every member of G.I.F.T, would probably be seen as impure, not-human-enough. 
  • Not unlike how many humans in the Babylon 5 Universe never trusted telepaths, ultimately leading to the Psi-Corps and finally the Telepath War.
  • and of course, the X-Men are rife with examples of this.
• The Legacy chain and Midnighters would probably get a pass, since ultimately they're basically human casters.  But any magical Beings, heroic or not, would probably be feared and hated by the same people who fund these billboards. 

I'm not going to draw parallels to current real world politics, because it wouldn't change anyone's mind anyway.

 

But in the real world, for a very very long time, humanity has always been easily prodded to fear an "other". Whether via Religion / Sectarian conflict, whether tribal / ethnic conflict, etc. There have always True Believers who fuel that from genuine fear and hate, and always Demagogues who don't care but use that fear as a tool to push an agenda. Given that the world of City of Heroes is still full of humans, I assume it still wrestles with these problems as well, and some of the billboards are an in-universe acknowledgement of this. 

 

It can be leveraged for backstories, AE story arcs, etc, and hopefully in a tasteful / constructive manner.

Edited 18 hours ago by MTeague

[TheMoneyMaker]

3 hours ago, keyguardactive said:

And what about mutants? They're not human, right?

 

Sure, some mutants are Outcasts, but many of them are heroes! And they have to look at those signs every day? Seems unfair. 

Mutants are humans, just a little differenty

[Maelwys]

It's the other way around.

Humans are Mutants.

 

How'd you think they we got eyes, legs and the ability to talk? 

 

[UltraAlt]

6 hours ago, Scarlet Shocker said:

There are many posters in the city saying as much. I don't know who pays for them but they've been there a very long time. 

 

They hint that the "enemy" is the other, the alien (literally in this case I guess) - the undesirable that YOU, dear citizen need to be afraid of. Non-humans are bad.

 

Well, I think that the original intent was to be anti-Rikti and not anti-other in general.

 

We may be at the point that these signs should be removed due to .. what you are implying ... political content against non-humans (or those that some would consider to be non-human).

 

I don't think I'm the only one that has created alien characters (from other planets or from other dimensions) and/or characters that are not "human" at all.

I wouldn't consider vampires, werewolves, elves, etc. to be human. Lizard and cat creatures certainly are not humans.

 

7 hours ago, Scarlet Shocker said:

Of course, I'm being very tongue in cheek here, But it does seem weird that this anachronism has stood for so long. Is there any reasonable explanation? I'd love to hear it. 

 

Yeah, I would take this as a move to request that the Homecoming DEVs to change the billboard art to make it clear that it is about fighting back against the Ritki invasion instead of being against the "other".

"Join Vanguard today! Protect Earth from the Rikti Invaders!" or is that still going to cause problems?

 

 

 

[MoonSheep]

Earth for Humans... Let's Keep it that Way

 

oh.. i see how it is. screw your city, save it yourselves

 

<disgruntled bleeting sounds>
 

🐑

[Scarlet Shocker]

I wholeheartedly agree with many of the comments here, and yes I understand it was an early response to the beginning of the game itself at the end of the Rikti invasion.

 

But I think there's an interesting point that many of the PPD in the banks are kheldians - why is that, and what is their motivation to join the PPD? If these powerful extra-terrestrials are joining the PPD en masse why aren't they joining other branches of the security services? Why do the PPD need the help of heroes when they have shape changing types who can wipe the floor with most metahumans? 

 

If Peacebringers are so good why hasn't Longbow recruited some? (And conversely why hasn't Arachnos recruited Warshades?) 

 

To me it kind of jars in that it leaves a lot of unanswered questions. Surely it can't just be really lazy writing can it? 

[Xenodi]

I believe that Peacebringrs are following Sunstorm’s example: Benjamin Carter was a PPD officer, and Sunstorm seems to coordinate Kheldian activities currently. I think it is quite logical that many of the Peacebringers work for the PPD:
https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Sunstorm

 

 

Edited 4 hours ago by Xenodi