How is Shinra, Inc. evil? (FF7)

[Destructionator XV]

I just played through Final Fantasy 7 again, paying more attention to the story this time than ever before, and after seeing the events of the game, I am left wondering how Shinra is so bad.

Throughout much the game, the protaginists and Shinra both have the same goal: stop the madman Sephiroth from destroying the planet. Shinra formulates a plan, devlops technology to carry out this plan, and then at the last minute members of the terrorist AVALANCHE group sabotage their plan, and then bitch about them being worthless.

Example: Meteor is falling on the planet. Shinra scientists figure they can use a high yield bomb to blast it apart, pushing the bulk of the mass out of harms way.

They make huge materia to use in their bomb, then take their space rocket and set it to automatically ram the meteor.

AVALANCHE decides they don't want this to happen, because the loss of a huge materia is more important to them than the loss of the entire planet, and retreive the huge materia. The rocket still does some damage to meteor, but since its payload was stolen, it fails in its task.

Back on the Highwind, a Shinra designed and built airship stolen by the terrorists, Cloud et al metions Rufus' plan failed. Of course it did! You just sabotaged it!

In the beginning, and for some time before this, Tseng and the Turks are trying to bring Aeris in for study. But he does this in a polite, nonviolent way for a long time. There are flashbacks showing Tseng asking Aeris and Elmyra to go volentarily.

Judging from the videos Professor Gast made with his information from Ifalna, the studies would probably have consisted of interviews and maybe blood samples. Madman Hojo would have probably been more invasive than that, given his attempt to mate Aeris with Red XIII, but even he did not want to see harm come to "precious specimen". And, also, Hojo did alot of his stuff with approval from higher up; Rufus mentions he "kept a lot of things to himself".

Let's look at Shinra's attempts to stop AVALANCHE early on. Well, given that AVALANCHE was setting bombs in their power plants with no regard for innocent life (Reeve says to Barrett "how mant people do you think died when No. 1 blew up?"), if I were in charge of Shinra, I would have done the same thing: stop the terrorists from causing any more damage and taking any more lives.

Dropping the plate on Sector 7 seems rather evil to me though. I can't think of a good justification for that: sure the terrorists were causing great damage and needed to be stopped, dropping that plate surely caused more damage than AVALANCHE could ever hope to incur.

Moving on to Rufus's little speech he gives about ruling with fear rather than money. Nice speech, but he didn't act that way at all when in power, so it was just empty words.

In the hunt for Sephiroth, again, Shinra does all the work, and Cloud's group takes all the credit. The Turks (who are wicked awesome btw) are hot on his tail the whole way through, with your party following them and fighting them when they try to do their jobs. On more than one occasion, the Turks voluntarily assist Cloud hunt down Sephiroth, realizing that they do have a common goal.

Shinra takes down two of the WEAPON creatures, and destroys the barrier on the North Cave. Though then, with Rufus incapacitated, asshole Heidegger and madman Hojo start doing their own thing, but luckily, another Shinra exectutive, Reeve, takes steps to control these rogues, however since he doesn't have as much power as Heidegger, he is forced to bring in Cloud to do the work. This is really the only point in the game where I see Shinra as being really bad.

What about in the past? Professor Gast never did anything that was evil. He did mistake Jenova for an ancient, but it was an honest mistake, no evil intent. The creation of Sephiroth went rather smoothly and his fall to madness was not their fault. There was no way Shinra could have forseen him going mad like he did. Before seeing Jenova in the Nibel reactor, he seemed to be a compassionate, competent man. His madness was not Shinra's fault.

The destruction and slaughter of Corel may be an evil act. We don't have enough information to say for sure; there may have been circumstances there that we don't know about. Remember the story was told by the leader of the terrorists, Barrett, and also, he was not there at the time, so he also didn't know all the facts.


Let's add up the evil acts we see:

Sector 7 plate drop. (An over-response to the terrorists)
Corel massacre. (Circumstances unknown)

And also all the bullshit about draining the Planet's life with Mako reactors - I fail to see why this is so bad. It seemed to be a rather clean, efficent process (the byproducts of the reaction we see is materia and something coming out of the top of the reactors in Midgar when turned up; could be simply cooling water, like in real power plants). Destroying the planet? Come on, in the game, we don't see any adverse effects on the planet, and the reactors have been running for years. All we have is the word of terrorists and nature freaks that it is seriously harmful. These people would probably be against nuclear power too.


So, am I missing something here? Shinra has some assholes working for them, and did a total of 2 questionable actions throughout all the years we see, and works very hard to save the planet when it is threatened by Sephiroth. What is so bad about them?

[Mayabird]

On draining the Planet's life, the area around Midgar was made desolate for a very long distance around, and Aeris remarks that "People say flowers can't grow in Midgar" and that flowers only grow in her church. She didn't say "under the plate" where it'd be a simple matter of lack of water and sunlight. In the city, period. Midgar used to be the site of several villages; in the desolate land that's there now, there isn't anything that could support a few scattered villages, much less several in that area.

The Lifestream also had to come from a long distance away, beyond the desert to reach Midgar, and Holy was attacking the city, if I remember the dialogue at the end. I thought it made it pretty clear that Shinra was draining the Planet's life, but that they didn't truly believe it and they weren't actually just baddies at heart.

[Destructionator XV]

On draining the Planet's life, the area around Midgar was made desolate for a very long distance around,

Hmm, that is right. The area around the Condor reactor is pretty dead too. However, Corel, Nibelheim, and Gongaga, all of which have reactors, seem to be doing alright. Factors to remember though, Corel is a relativily new reactor; about 4 years old (Marlene was a baby when it was built). Gongaga's blew up at some point, so it might have had time to recover. But Nibelheim's has been running for at least 5 years with no apparent ill effects.

Junon has a little bit of the bad land around it, but not a whole lot. Though, their reactor is underwater so its effects would not be so evident.

and Aeris remarks that "People say flowers can't grow in Midgar" and that flowers only grow in her church.

And don't forget her house, which had lots of flowers growing just fine.

She didn't say "under the plate" where it'd be a simple matter of lack of water and sunlight. In the city, period.

Well, the upper city was artificial; there might not be adequate soil up there.

Midgar used to be the site of several villages; in the desolate land that's there now, there isn't anything that could support a few scattered villages, much less several in that area.

It was my understanding that the little villages were all absorbed into the greater city and became the sectors.

The Lifestream also had to come from a long distance away, beyond the desert to reach Midgar,

Yeah, you're right....

and Holy was attacking the city, if I remember the dialogue at the end.

What was happening there was Holy was countering Meteor, but Meteor was already too close, so Holy was basically right on top of the city, and that proximity caused some collateral damage.

I thought it made it pretty clear that Shinra was draining the Planet's life, but that they didn't truly believe it and they weren't actually just baddies at heart.

After looking over the evidence you provided, I have to agree with you. So the reactors were indeed draining the life, and its effects in the Midgar area were getting pretty bad and Shinra probably didn't even realize it. The spread of the problem would have been gradual.

[Mayabird]

and Aeris remarks that "People say flowers can't grow in Midgar" and that flowers only grow in her church.

And don't forget her house, which had lots of flowers growing just fine.

That's true. I hadn't remembered that until you mentioned it. Huh. That doesn't make any sense, does it? Unless it just has something to do with her Ancientness and connection to the Planet, I guess. It's been a while since I played it, so I probably need to again to catch these things.

Midgar used to be the site of several villages; in the desolate land that's there now, there isn't anything that could support a few scattered villages, much less several in that area.

It was my understanding that the little villages were all absorbed into the greater city and became the sectors.

Yes, they were. The sectors were all once villages. I didn't word that well, though. What I was saying is that apparently the land there was fertile enough to support a pretty decent density of villages. I don't see how the desolate desert around Midgar could support that high a density if it had been in that state in the first place.

and Holy was attacking the city, if I remember the dialogue at the end.

What was happening there was Holy was countering Meteor, but Meteor was already too close, so Holy was basically right on top of the city, and that proximity caused some collateral damage.

I'll need to rewatch the ending, but that one shouldn't be so hard to dig up. I'll post again after I see it.

[Destructionator XV]

Unless it just has something to do with her Ancientness and connection to the Planet, I guess.

Well, I see two possibilities: either she is dedicated and spends lots of time caring for the flowers, something most people in Midgar wouldn't do, or the fact she is Ancient does something. Both seem pretty reasonable to me, or it could be a combination of the two.

It's been a while since I played it, so I probably need to again to catch these things.

It's such a good game. Well worth the time playing through again. I smashed through it in just two days, though I skipped most the secrets; I just wanted to refresh my memory of the story. Took 23 hours game time and was well worth every minute.

Just when playing it, remember you still have to eat! Good games are too addictive.

Yes, they were. The sectors were all once villages. I didn't word that well, though. What I was saying is that apparently the land there was fertile enough to support a pretty decent density of villages. I don't see how the desolate desert around Midgar could support that high a density if it had been in that state in the first place.

I see. That certainly makes sense.

If the desolation around the city didn't spread so far, I would just say it was caused by the construction of the city itself; Shinra would have brought in quite a bit of heavy machinery to build it and that would have surely scarred the land to some extent. But the damage to too great to be fully explained by that theory, so the Mako theory is still the most plausible explaination.

Another thing is I think it rains over Midgar, though I can't seem to remember actually seeing it, despite having just played the game in the last few days. I do know we see clouds in the sky in a few cinematics. That means the environment is at least somewhat moist, and in moist environments, there is usally more plant life than we see.

And also, in the cinematic that shows Zach and Cloud's escape in Nibelheim, it shows Midgar with some green around the outskirts. It didn't look like grass though, more like scattered moss, which is still consistant with the brown we see on the world map around the city.