Since when is popular SF opposed to genocide?

[james_davis_nicoll]

Rather alarmed by The Day of the Doctor's rejection of established tropes.

Comments

[bruce munro (from livejournal.com)]

Well, it's usually the case (at least in recent decades [1]) that the aliens being genocided are, like Orcs, inherently evil, and therefore there is No Other Choice.

[1] Unlike the Good Old Days, in which simply resisting humans overrunning your planet and driving you to extinction was sufficient reason for a little quick genocide.

[joenotcharles.livejournal.com]

Daleks actually have 50 years of consistent protrayal showing this to be actually true, though.

More to the point, in this episode killing all the Time Lords was actually justifiable self defense, given what they were planning to do. (And this also was set up in an earlier story, not just inserted here to make a false choice.) Which is what makes this an especially impressive rejection.

[bruce munro (from livejournal.com)]

"Daleks actually have 50 years of consistent portrayal showing this to be actually true, though."

Well, yes. Orcs, too, were consistently portrayed as evil.

My reason for being slightly snarky there is that an author _deliberately_ creates the alien race as irredeemably bad, he or she doesn't find them under a bush - and spreading the meme that "there are some people that are so bad that the only choice to kill them" is problematic in itself, isn't it?