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This page will be a compilation of all of my thoughts/responses to the logical and/or moral questions that I found the most interesting.
Beliefs
Whether something is bad should be determined solely by its harm, good, or lack of effect on a reasonable benevolent person with no consideration for societal norms or laws(as while these are often taken as a sign of objective morality, they are often very flawed or rigged to punish some actions more heavily than objectively more harmful actions. Take the Salem witch trials: it was both socially and legally acceptable for innocent women to be put on trial for witchcraft then summarily executed. People, at least in some cases, have and will forever make the wrong calls on subjective decisions, so it is very very unwise to use law or social norms as a basis for morality.). Whether something is moral in any other term is solely subjective. Additionally, rebuke for actions or takes should only come from morality as any other reason whether it be societal/social norms, religion, or a personal bias only seeks to limit individuality.
People, unless displaying a "logical pathway" based only in hatred or other illogical emotional reasons, should always be given a chance to explain themselves and their reasoning for doing things.
Sex and sexual things including the bare human body are completely normal and should not be tabooed.
Animals are too simple to have the concept of morality and as such any actions by animals are purely for survival or self interest and should not be taken as having bad intent. While animals are purely moral, humans can also kill or harvest them/their animal product morally only for their own self interest for food, self defense, or resources. Whether to eat animal products is one's own choice and unless there is a very significant amount of people who decide to not eat meat or a certain animal product it will not make a difference in the amount of animals killed or used.
Nothing in a video game can be toxic because toxic should be reserved for ACTUALLY harmful PERSONAL interactions. Nobody referring to their toxic ex means that their ex used a taboo video game strategy and to use toxic in such a way dilutes the word. Playstyles can be unfun, unbalanced, uncounterable, unhealthy or any manner of words that do not have such weight to them(although even these are subjective and personal views on such things should not be forced on others), but to call something in a video game toxic is to use the word incorrectly.
The only video game actions that should be negatively viewed are ones with the intent of hindering or impeding one's own team with the only intent of hindering or impeding the team. If someone is not having fun in a match or if they are going for something specific(a speedrun or certain killstreak for instance) then they are free to leave a match through whatever means they want(especially if they are starting to get tilted) but no one should queue into the match with the sole purpose of leaving it as that would only ruin the experience of your teammates for what is essentially no reason.
Salt content is morally and ethically sound if and only if everything on the creator's end stays within the game(either the salt coming from video game actions or from mostly innocuous chatting rather than from antagonizing someone with words) and the video is either made to call out a truly harmful person or it is for entertainment purposes only with names censored and/or a disclaimer to not try to find or cause harm to the person featured. Intentionally making people angry, sad, or otherwise negative intentionally, unprovoked, and through a personal interaction for either content or personal satisfaction should be frowned upon.
While I do think that using slurs or other horrible things intentionally should never be tolerated, I do think there should be consideration given on whether that person knows it is harmful and that person given a chance to apologize sincerely for the use. However, if the person continues to use the word intentionally or displays lack of care for the true meaning behind such words or phrases, it is then fair to use an appropriate level of criticism to that person. Intentional ignorance should not be tolerated, but people are a product of their environment and sometimes what is used offensively/problematically in one place is very different from others or what is widely accepted.
Tolerance is a social contract and if people break that social contract they lose the privilege of playing the victim or otherwise crying crocodile tears when someone does not tolerate them.
Family is not above criticism and should be held to the same standard if not higher by any family members who truly care for that person. I personally have had to alienate a family member because of intolerance and trying to force extremist views on others and would do it again 1 million times over.
Some people are and will forever be malicious for the point of maliciousness or in self interest with no regard for the harm caused to others with reasonable reactions and/or so brainwashed that logic will not be able to overcome their hatred. A lot of people can change, but not everyone and people should be held accountable if they are told what they are doing is wrong along with a logical reason why and do not change.
All people are by default deserving of respect and kindness regardless of immigration status, sexuality, gender identity, disability, and any other aspect that does not reflect them as a person. Any negativity directed at anyone for the previous reasons is unacceptable and should be met with major resistance.
Patriotism is NOT unwavering unconditional love for everything your country does but rather wanting your country to be the best it can be and fighting for the country to be so. Nationalists have adopted the term patriot and used it as a weapon to defend countries(and America especially) because they believe either you are with or against the country and always need to defend it unconditionally. Very few things are so black and white and it is not patriotic to blindly follow what a country does but rather a symptom of ignorance, lack of critical thinking, and not truly being a good person.
Responses
I answered the following questions from the survey in the post above. I find this survey to be very interesting and with very thought provoking and well phrased questions and would highly recommend putting your thoughts into it should you so wish by clicking the image above!
Question: What messages do you think Fallout 3 tried to get across?
Answer: The Fallout series has some themes that seem to be static across all of the series and some that are unique to each game. As such I will be dividing them into general and game specific.
General: (1)One of the main messages of the Fallout series in general is that War and fighting is never good, no matter what side or how necessary it may be. Fighting means death and strife which is a net negative whichever way you slice it. (2)Another theme is the mistreatment of ghouls and super mutants mirroring real life bigotry, particularly racism. This is meant to put the player in the shoes of the ghouls through their recounted experiences of mistreatment for their physical characteristics rather than merit and instill the player with a sense of how horrible it feels to be a victim of bigotry and show that no matter what people look like they are still people such deserving of respect and love. (3)Another consistent theme is the idea of a large portion of people being horrible as shown through groups like raiders. Even in a world where everyone is just trying to survive there will always be those who try to take from, bully, and assert control over others just to feel powerful and be malicious even in places like nuka world where resources are not a problem. If people are allowed to be malicious with no consequence, a lot of them will be.(4) Another consistent theme is the idea of power and resources corrupting. People in big corporations like Vault Tec often knew the bombs dropping were coming and easily could have created infrastructure to allow people to survive and thrive but instead chose to play with people's lives and experiment on them from their ivory towers, treating the vault residents as a science experiment rather than actual people.
Game specific: Fallout 3 in particular is a tale of hope and selflessness even at the worst of times. The main message is to work together and be willing to sacrifice for the people you care about.
Question: What messages do you think Fallout 4 tried to get across?
Answer: Fallout 4 is a tale of rebirth and hope. Even after the bombs are dropped, their partner is killed, and all seems lost, the sole survivor is able to escape from their tomb and be reborn into a world vastly different from the one they knew. The sole survivor is then able to go around the wasteland shaping their own fate along with the fate of the entire Commonwealth by deciding which faction gets to rule. No matter what side the sole survivor chooses, the world is essentially reborn. Whether it be from a shadowy organization that has been known to be morally and ethically reprehensible mirroring the prewar companies and Enclave(the institute), a organization that is good intentioned but too narrow focused(the railroad), a organization that fears anything different and kills anything different out of that fear(Brotherhood Of Steel), or an organization that starts off weak but like the sole survivor can be reborn better and more resilient than ever for the ultimate good of the commonwealth(the minutemen).
Question:What messages do you think Fallout New Vegas tried to get across?
Answer: The main theme of Fallout New Vegas is most shown in its central conflict: Which government is best for the people? A government that is quite similar to the past government of the united states: taking power and territory by force, headed mostly by average people and as such subject to common bigoted beliefs such as those against super mutants or even against human gay people(NCR), a government modeled after the Roman empire and as such having morally reprehensible methods such as slave labor, rejection of modern advancements, and rule by might rather than merit, or government by a single person which would make the wasteland at their mercy with no means of accountability(House or The Courier). This poses the question of how much emphasis should be put on autonomy versus the best possibility for moral and ethical correctness, forcing the player character to make the choice themselves. Another big theme of New Vegas is the idea of questioning capitalist ideals. In the middle of a wasteland surrounded by ruin and strife is a capitalist machine with endless resources, only providing its sanctuary to the wealthy while even just outside the gates in Freeside there is fighting and lack of essential infrastructure.
Question: (if you played fallout 76) what messages do you think fallout 76 tried to get across?
Answer: The main theme of Fallout 76 is the need for community cooperation and kindness. This is shown quite blatantly through the main quest where if you choose to nuke places where communities have been built like the Whitesprings, the overseer herself berates you for not working together to make Appalachia a better place as well as more indirectly by visual storytelling like how all of the responders were apart when they died so they got overrun.
Question: What was your favorite part of Fallout 3?
Answer: The final sacrifice to turn on the purifier. I think it is the perfect ending, having the father and son united in their acts of self-sacrifice with James sacrificing himself for his son and his son in turn sacrificing themself for the betterment of the entire capital wasteland.
Question: What was your favorite part of Fallout 4?
Answer: Building up the minutemen. I think the minutemen are the perfect representation of the good will of the Commonwealth, with the actions of the Sole Survivor slowly breathing life back into the group until it eventually becomes a big enough power to stand against the more militaristic and unethical groups like the institute and brotherhood.
Question: What was your favorite part of Fallout New Vegas?
Answer: The Arcade Gannon questline. I think it is a very good redemption arc that shows the dangers of not questioning orders from authority, the regret that people can have over actions they didn't think through and how an ignorant person can change, how some will cling to flawed reasoning even when faced with the reality of them doing something bad(Orion), and how some people who have done bad things can change and be redeemed.
Question: What was your favorite part of Fallout 76?
Answer: Being able to meet and play with good people. I think the stories of 76 were a bit lacking but the community aspect was and is great.
Question: Do you think that politics is important in the games?
Answer: Yes.
Question: Do you think that the franchise is anti-war?
Answer: Yes.
Question: Which game do you play the most?
Answer: Fallout 3.
Question: Which game do you think is the most nuanced?
Answer: Fallout New Vegas.
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