RDMs great plan : Pander to everyone ?

[Anguirus]

^ Would you prefer they'd called it "The Force"?

[Sarevok]

If people started experiencing visions and strange entities started entering the ship I would expect a military to react like in Stuart Slades Armageddon. Not saying that they would go Ghostbuster with proton pack wielding marines zapping head people. But at the very least not react like dumbasses. These people have faster than light travel, transhuman AI, orbital bombardment etc. It takes a lot to be a god in their eyes compared to primitve stone age tribes. Sending visions is pathetic. Even low end dark jedi could do it. Realistically the Bsg folkes should have found the One True Guy and kicked his ass like all the fake gods on Stargate shows.

[Starglider]

There is of course the sexism of having the three 'evil' cylon models being all male (rationalists and realists, naturally... eeeevil!), and the 'good' models consisting of three females and one male (all emotional 'trust your feelings' types, 'cause emotions make one human and humanity is the only real virtue), but that's a secondary complaint.

[PeZook]

There is of course the sexism of having the three 'evil' cylon models being all male (rationalists and realists, naturally... eeeevil!), and the 'good' models consisting of three females and one male (all emotional 'trust your feelings' types, 'cause emotions make one human and humanity is the only real virtue), but that's a secondary complaint.

Huh? Leobens are all pretty religious and emotional, and they're portrayed as evil - every single one. The Simons are sometimes "good" (or at least 'not evil') sometimes scary evil.

And how are the D'Annas supposed to be the good model, when they're all batshit crazy sadists?

[Starglider]

There is of course the sexism of having the three 'evil' cylon models being all male, and the 'good' models consisting of three females and one male.

Huh? Leobens are all pretty religious and emotional, and they're portrayed as evil - every single one.

The Leobens were in the rebel faction, they survived and made it to noble savage paradise earth. Though it's true that they were the nastiest of the rebel cyclons - there was a bit of 'it's ok that you tortured me, it was for my own good' from Kara (yay more Christian bullshit) but they didn't get the redemption that the Sixes did. So you're just reinforcing my point; male cylons = evil, female cylons = good.

The Simons are sometimes "good" (or at least 'not evil') sometimes scary evil.

Wrong. The only time they seemed sympathetic was in the initial fake-out to try and trick Starbuck. By the final episode the Simons were all for methodically dissecting the small girl, and the writing kept rubbing

And how are the D'Annas supposed to be the good model, when they're all batshit crazy sadists?

No moreso than the sixes - and like them, D'Anna is redeemed (because she strives to follow god's plan, and that makes everything, up to and including genocide and torture, ok) and makes it to noble savage paradise.

[Anguirus]

^ Every D'Anna dies, except for one that stays on Earth One (i.e. NOT any kind of paradise).

As far as sympathetic Simons and Cavils, I hear both can be found in "The Plan."

[Junghalli]

If people started experiencing visions and strange entities started entering the ship I would expect a military to react like in Stuart Slades Armageddon. Not saying that they would go Ghostbuster with proton pack wielding marines zapping head people. But at the very least not react like dumbasses. These people have faster than light travel, transhuman AI, orbital bombardment etc. It takes a lot to be a god in their eyes compared to primitve stone age tribes. Sending visions is pathetic. Even low end dark jedi could do it. Realistically the Bsg folkes should have found the One True Guy and kicked his ass like all the fake gods on Stargate shows.

I don't agree. First off, these people have been memetically primed to accept those visions, just like Christians would be memetically primed to accept visions of Jesus and shit. It's pretty natural that a lot of them would see things like the visions and Starbuck's resurrection through god-colored glasses instead of thinking "hey, you know if you could slip some nanites into a person's brain you could give them these visions" or "you know, uploading somebody before the moment of death and then cloning their body and putting their mind back into it doesn't exactly require godlike power, just advanced but quite plausible technology". Second, you have to keep in mind the situation they're in. They've watched their entire species being genocided and they're desperately fleeing the people that did it, who are coming to finish the job. That's exactly the sort of situation in which people are likely to start turning to religion and the supernatural for solace. A lot of people will want to believe that there's some powerful supernatural force guiding and protecting them, because the alternative, that they're completely on their own, is really fucking scary. A lot of people will be less skeptical about the visions and stuff than they might otherwise be because they will want to believe in them.

Yeah, the whole thing could probably have been handled better, but I don't think it's unrealistic or a flaw that the reaction of many of the characters was not "obviously must be some alien trying to manipulate us with technology, let's go kick its ass lol".

I'm much more dubious of the Cylon religion. Quite frankly, AIs are simply not going to suffer from the neurological bugs that predispose humans to religion unless they're very biomorphic or just really badly designed. In fairness, IIRC Caprica suggests the first might be the case.

[Starglider]

AIs are simply not going to suffer from the neurological bugs that predispose humans to religion unless they're very biomorphic or just really badly designed. In fairness, IIRC Caprica suggests the first might be the case.

Caprica directly confirms that both are true. Not only is all Cylon programming derrived from an upload of a raving fundie (note; in real life, competence in AI research seems to be inversely proportional to superstitiousness, thankfully), it wasn't even a proper transfer, the centurions are driven by some kind of fucked up dumbed down version.