Do people genuinely think the Horde is evil?

[ohwell]

gen·o·cide
/ˈjenəˌsīd/
Learn to pronounce
noun
noun: genocide; plural noun: genocides

the deliberate killing of a large number of people from a particular nation or ethnic group with the aim of destroying that nation or group

Just because they didnt kill EVERYONE doesnt mean it isnt an act of genocide

Infracted.

Your definition has the version I argued earlier. If they don't kill everyone, it needs to have intent according to your definition. She didn't intend on wiping out the night elves.

[mysticx]

Well the actual lore talks about how Jaina and the Silver Covenant were assaulting/killing blood elves, including shopkeepers in addition to imprisoning them.

https://wow.gamepedia.com/Purge_of_Dalaran

Read the page you're linking to: "Though compliant Sunreavers were imprisoned, many proved defiant in the face of exile from Dalaran and took up arms against Jaina, the Alliance forces, and the Silver Covenant,", when you start waving weapons around, things escalate.

In all fairness, some Silver Covenant opportunists took advantage of the situation, but it's still a far cry from "I'm feeling particularly spiteful today, let's burn an entire city filled with civilians!"

[ohwell]

I'm going to assume that this is just you not having a full comprehension of what the words mean, so I'll break it down as simply as I can.

Destruction is not necessarily the total and utter annihilation of something, destruction can be an action or a process in which destruction is caused.



- Link

Additionally, genocide's definition is not simply the destruction of a group, but is better understood if you review all definitions.



- Link

You seem to quote word meanings and not get the actual usage when it comes to those particular meanings. Nothing you linked implies that destruction does not mean totally gone. Look up the definition of destroy and come back to me? Oh you refuse because it literally says "put an end to the existence of (something) by damaging or attacking it" from the exact source you used. Destruction according Merriam Webster is the end of something's existence no matter which version of those 3 you use. Process in the 2nd option isn't implying incomplete. It's saying the entire process of culminating in it being gone.

Also your final definition further supports what I said earlier. Sylvanas never had any intent on destroying the night elves as a people. She wanted the military stations gone from Kalimdor so she would have sole access to the azerite. Show me where she said she wanted to wipe the night elves out in particular.

So it's funny how you linked all of these things and called me stupid when you only prove me more correct. You argued earlier it didn't matter intent and then suddenly link it again.

Destruction does in fact mean completely gone and it's right there in the verb destroy.

[Sevarin]

Also camp taurajo was one battle by defectors no less, it was nothing close to anything genocidal.

i personally play on both factions, i honestly find the faction conflict to be completely moronic and forced at this point. and it should have been completely ended at the end of MoP.

however, i find it funny that some alliance players use the whole "it was done by defectors" fairly often so its okay. yet wrathgate, which was always considered to have been done by defectors until they had to make sylvanas look even worse - like she needed help there - was done by defectors, and horde was always blamed. the player faction of horde are also defectors that went after garrosh and sylvanas for their evil deeds, but they are still considered the evil ones by many alliance.

eh whatever. the whole thing is stupid anyway. lets murder eachother and weaken our forces when weve worked together several times the save the planet. especially when we know there are bigger deadlier threats out there that could come at any moment. at this point we deserve to be wiped out by the next threat that shows up.

after all, its world of WARcraft, which means we have to be at war with horde and alliance. its impossible to be at war with other threats!

[Ardenaso]

@TheRevenantHero my mistake, it wasn't an oversight - it was originally a bug but they made it a feature - so yeah: Jaina did personally slay Blood Elves

the Alliance High Elves should be ashamed for not only allowing this to happen, but also fully taking part in it; with this they pretty much sealed off their legitimacy and claim to Silvermoon and their faces should be plastered everywhere in Murder Row

[Sondrelk]

Whether the Horde is evil depends on how you look at it.

If we look at it how the game clearly intends us to see it then the Horde is not evil.
However how the Horde comes across as a whole they still don't seem evil, but rather completely moronic and lacking in morals. Semantics or not, BfA is the third time the Horde has chosen to follow a tyrant. It started with the Demon Blood, which was clearly shown as a perfectly acceptable choice for the Orcs. Then we had Garrosh which was at least not fully accepted, but still painted the Horde as terrible warmongers. And then finally Sylvanas, which again showed that the only seeming constant in the Horde is their willingness to accept atrocities if they get to have a war and sate their bloodlust.

The problem is that the writers either do not have enough time, or simply chooses not to explore these issues in depth, and so we end up with the surface level, each of which paints the Horde in a terrible light.

[CTiranno]

Read the page you're linking to: "Though compliant Sunreavers were imprisoned, many proved defiant in the face of exile from Dalaran and took up arms against Jaina, the Alliance forces, and the Silver Covenant,", when you start waving weapons around, things escalate.

In all fairness, some Silver Covenant opportunists took advantage of the situation, but it's still a far cry from "I'm feeling particularly spiteful today, let's burn an entire city filled with civilians!"

When someone tries to kick you and the rest of your people out from your homes and to imprison you for the actions of one guy, the least you can do is taking up arms. Not only Jaina acted without knowing if her accusations were true against every Sunreaver but she also allowed the Silver Covenant to act without restrictions, therefore becoming responsible for actions like when a High Elf tortured a Sunreaver before letting him fall in the jaws of a shark.

Going back to the main point of the post, the Horde is perceived as the evil faction for the simple reason of being a proactive faction while the Alliance is more reactive. Horde's actions move the narrative forward and, while doing so, receive the blunt of players' response.
For this reason, all the actions in response of the Alliance are always justified by the players, even if the end are even worse.

The Horde might be perceived as "evil" only because her actions are always in the spotlight while the "evil" actions of the Alliance are mostly depicted in subplots and such, like the kidnapping of Thrall at the beginning of Cataclysm happening in the starting zone of the Goblin.

[Raisei]

Except that wasn’t the other option the only people she actually kills are those who actively work against her at no point is she shown acting against people who just didn’t support her like garrosh did.

Apart from you know... trying to kill the entire Horde, Alliance and rest of the planet. Specifically telling Azshara to murder the Horde champions working for her in Nazjatar oh and helping to release an Old God so he can "litter the streets with corpses".

Nah, you are right, she was a fair and competent ruler!

[Subrias]

Honestly I don't see Horde or Alliance, I just see individual races. This arbitary division into Horde and Alliance is the most forced thing ever and exists only because of gameplay purposes. No, I don't think Horde is evil.

you see races! you racist!!!

[Varodoc]

I find it both presumptuous and hilarious that some people equate the kidnapping of one shaman to the systematic genocide of an entire elven kingdom.

[bowlink]

Don't ask retorical questions. The answer is yes btw the horde is evil period, end of story.

Does the alliance have clean hands? Fuck no, but alliance has atliesr tried to end things peacefully 3 times already 4 if you count this current armstris.

Personally i'm getting sick of it.
Personally the alliance could do with some more zealotry, do something with Catherine Rogers, or that scarlet brotherhood etc. Oh who am i kidding, this alliance we are talking about, the day we get intersting lore for alliance is the day bobby kottick stops lining his own pockets

[Nerovar]

The problem with the Horde and Blizzard's messaging is that the Horde only stops following their comically evil leaders once they reach peak derangement and start cannibalizing the Horde. I mean, what is Blizzard trying to tell us here? That the Horde is fine with all the mass murder stuff as long as their leader doesn't sell them out? I feel like Blizzard doesn't want its playerbase to view the Horde like this but they're too inept to present them in any other way.

[CTiranno]

I find it both presumptuous and hilarious that some people equate the kidnapping of a shaman to the systematic genocide of an entire elven kingdom.

Considering that same shaman was part of a neutral organisation and ended up saving the entire world in that expansion, I would say it was a good thing the SI:7 failed in his task.
Also, members of the Alliande tried to do the same thing on multiple occasions, Jaina against Orgrimmar in Tides of War, Daelin during the founding of Orgrimmar against both orcs and trolls, Garithos against the blood elves and the Alliance against goblin's refugee ships. The Horde just happened to be the faction with the burden to move the narrative forward and so her single attempt to destroy a kingdom in wow was a successful one.

[Raisei]

Well the actual lore talks about how Jaina and the Silver Covenant were assaulting/killing blood elves, including shopkeepers in addition to imprisoning them.

https://wow.gamepedia.com/Purge_of_Dalaran

Jaina's goal was arresting and evicting them though. Some of the Belfs decided to attack her while she was trying that. Bad idea. The canon quest texts specifically tell you that the "compliant" Belfs are send to the Violet Hold, only those that fight against the order are killed.

And the only reason why this was even necessary in the first place is that Aethas Sunreaver looked on in silence as the madman Garrosh had a weapons of mass destruction transported through Dalaran. Had he acted, the Purge would not have happened. But I know it is much easier to just paint Jaina as a bloodthirsty monster then accept that the Blood Elves brought it on themselves.

[CTiranno]

Jaina's goal was arresting and evicting them though. Some of the Belfs decided to attack her while she was trying that. Bad idea. The canon quest texts specifically tell you that the "compliant" Belfs are send to the Violet Hold, only those that fight against the order are killed.

And the only reason why this was even necessary in the first place is that Aethas Sunreaver looked on in silence as the madman Garrosh had a weapons of mass destruction transported through Dalaran. Had he acted, the Purge would not have happened. But I know it is much easier to just paint Jaina as a bloodthirsty monster then accept that the Blood Elves brought it on themselves.

When you incriminate an entire ethnic group for the actions of one of them and instigate a pogrom resulting in multiple deaths, yes, you are a monster.

[Sondrelk]

The problem with the Horde and Blizzard's messaging is that the Horde only stops following their comically evil leaders once they reach peak derangement and start cannibalizing the Horde. I mean, what is Blizzard trying to tell us here? That the Horde is fine with all the mass murder stuff as long as their leader doesn't sell them out? I feel like Blizzard doesn't want its playerbase to view the Horde like this but they're too inept to present them in any other way.

The sad part is that BfA started on the right track to actually conclusively ending the debate on whether the Horde is actually just that lacking in morals.
When you read the "A good war" short released in the BfA pre-patch you get a real sense that Blizzard is actually self-aware enough to realize that it really doesnt look good for the Horde to kickstart yet another war with the wholesale destruction of not just a city, but in a sense the entire Night Elven civilization.

Saurfang has some real good insight at the end when he wonders whether the Horde was always just waiting for the excuse seeing how easily he himself accepted the war with little to no resistance.

And then of course the entire thing is dropped, all the bad stuff is placed on Sylvanas' feet and even when we have direct confirmation in-game that the majority of the Horde accepted her rule we are just supposed to close our eyes and ears and pretend it simply isnt true.

[Packmule]

Both factions are evil & good.

[Nerovar]

The sad part is that BfA started on the right track to actually conclusively ending the debate on whether the Horde is actually just that lacking in morals.
When you read the "A good war" short released in the BfA pre-patch you get a real sense that Blizzard is actually self-aware enough to realize that it really doesnt look good for the Horde to kickstart yet another war with the wholesale destruction of not just a city, but in a sense the entire Night Elven civilization.

Saurfang has some real good insight at the end when he wonders whether the Horde was always just waiting for the excuse seeing how easily he himself accepted the war with little to no resistance.

And then of course the entire thing is dropped, all the bad stuff is placed on Sylvanas' feet and even when we have direct confirmation in-game that the majority of the Horde accepted her rule we are just supposed to close our eyes and ears and pretend it simply isnt true.

There's a huge dissonance between what Blizzard wants us to see in their stories and what people end up actually seeing.

[Sharnie786]

The Horde are evil. Their history, present and future is evil. You have a Horde biased dev team that are trying to change that now though

[Accendor]

when Turalyon inevitably becomes a tyrannical dictator of the holy light and rules the alliance with an iron thumb of golden malevolence, finally we will experience an evil Alliance story.
that, or anduin becomes to descend into the darkness of the void (the other half of being a priest) and we'll get it that way.
point is.....it is only a matter of time before there is an evil Alliance story line.

I mean we are waiting 16 years now

- - - Updated - - -

Your definition has the version I argued earlier. If they don't kill everyone, it needs to have intent according to your definition. She didn't intend on wiping out the night elves.

You can do arguing, Blizzard called it a Genocide themselves. No reason to discuss IRL semantics.