Poll: Last of Us : What would you have done? ( SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

[Sniper Team 4]

I really, really, really don't know. At the very least, I would demand to speak with Ellie before anything. It would have been so easy to wake her up and talk to her, but the Fireflies refused. It also didn't help their case when they were constantly threatening to kill me when I did all that work to bring her to them and I had posed no threat to them. I think though, if pushed to it, I probably would have done the same thing Joel did. I hope I never have to find out for certain though.

 

[theuprising]

Lol so according to focus tests what the right move was was very clear to parents playing the game. Lol, proof parents would be some of the least moral and most self interested people in a crisis.

 

[Nicha11]

Lol so according to focus tests what the right move was was very clear to parents playing the game. Lol, proof parents would be some of the least moral and most self interested people in a crisis.

Oh yes, deciding not to take the life of an innocent child is an indication of both immorality and self interest.

 

[Caiphus]

I'm no doctor/scientist. My whole conflict revolves around how likely it was that a cure/vaccine would have been synthesised, and whether or not Ellie had to die. The whole thing sounds slightly unbelievable.

But, I mean, it was written that way to create drama.

So, assuming that a vaccine would have been made/produced, and that killing Ellie was the only way to do so, then I would have let her die.

Not an easy choice by any stretch of the imagination though.

Lol... Lol

I'm afraid this post shows a distinct lack of empathy on your part.

 

[mmmikey]

I'm no doctor/scientist. My whole conflict revolves around how likely it was that a cure/vaccine would have been synthesised, and whether or not Ellie had to die. The whole thing sounds slightly unbelievable.

It's seldom that you just happen upon an easy fix. The doctor in the recording described it as a breakthrough, but not in certain terms a vaccine, but as a big step forward in their research. But let's say they did find a vaccine, only 2 infectious diseases in history have been eradicated. One is smallpox. It took decades of effort in a world with a growing infrastructure and faster means of transportation to finally get it eradicated.

A fungus is different from a virus in that the fungus is a living organism that can grow on its own while a virus needs cells to multiply. Fungal infections are far rarer than viral infections, our bodies naturally resist them well. People usually have weak immunity to get an internal infection. So if a healthy person's defenses were to fail to stop a fungal infection and it was deadly, humanity would be screwed. Just look at what happened to the American chestnut tree. I think the only people who would be left alive after such a thing would be people who were immune to the effects of the spores/fungus.

So putting that aside, if the Fireflies happened to get lucky and score a vaccine then there's the issue of getting it out to people. I doubt from what little we saw with how they interacted with Joel that they'd be as vigilant in vaccinating the uninfected as the WHO was about eradicating smallpox. That's even saying they'd have the means of producing it, storing it, and transporting it. That's not even taking into consideration how readily people would believe them or give them the chance or wouldn't try to take the vaccinations for themselves.

I think its safe to assume Joel didn't take those things into consideration when he decided he was gonna get Ellie out of there at whatever the cost. It wasn't a certainty that Ellie would have provided a cure. It could've been for nothing. But to take an unconscious child and make the choice for her life is pretty damn immoral. We're not saying humanity is doomed without her sacrifice. Humanity went on for 20 years after the outbreak. Humanity has survived a whole host of other plagues in times when there were no treatments and no effective prevention.

I'll change the scenario a bit. Would you let a group of men have their way with a drugged up (unconscious) 14-year-old girl if it meant a breakthrough in the treatment of HIV? Would you deny her parents/guardians/family access to see her? Would you deny her her own personal sovereignty? Would you be willing to give the men a pardon for that action if it meant something significant for the whole of humanity? Could you walk away knowing full well what would happen? The protection of the children, the most defenseless members of society, especially when they're completely vulnerable, is pretty much a cornerstone of human society and I'd argue of human morality as well.

 

[Caiphus]

It's seldom that you just happen upon an easy fix. The doctor in the recording described it as a breakthrough, but not in certain terms a vaccine, but as a big step forward in their research. But let's say they did find a vaccine, only 2 infectious diseases in history have been eradicated. One is smallpox. It took decades of effort in a world with a growing infrastructure and faster means of transportation to finally get it eradicated.

A fungus is different from a virus in that the fungus is a living organism that can grow on its own while a virus needs cells to multiply. Fungal infections are far rarer than viral infections, our bodies naturally resist them well. People usually have weak immunity to get an internal infection. So if a healthy person's defenses were to fail to stop a fungal infection and it was deadly, humanity would be screwed. Just look at what happened to the American chestnut tree. I think the only people who would be left alive after such a thing would be people who were immune to the effects of the spores/fungus.

So putting that aside, if the Fireflies happened to get lucky and score a vaccine then there's the issue of getting it out to people. I doubt from what little we saw with how they interacted with Joel that they'd be as vigilant in vaccinating the uninfected as the WHO was about eradicating smallpox. That's even saying they'd have the means of producing it, storing it, and transporting it. That's not even taking into consideration how readily people would believe them or give them the chance or wouldn't try to take the vaccinations for themselves.

I think its safe to assume Joel didn't take those things into consideration when he decided he was gonna get Ellie out of there at whatever the cost. It wasn't a certainty that Ellie would have provided a cure. It could've been for nothing. But to take an unconscious child and make the choice for her life is pretty damn immoral. We're not saying humanity is doomed without her sacrifice. Humanity went on for 20 years after the outbreak. Humanity has survived a whole host of other plagues in times when there were no treatments and no effective prevention.

I'll change the scenario a bit. Would you let a group of men have their way with a drugged up (unconscious) 14-year-old girl if it meant a breakthrough in the treatment of HIV? Would you deny her parents/guardians/family access to see her? Would you deny her her own personal sovereignty? Would you be willing to give the men a pardon for that action if it meant something significant for the whole of humanity? Could you walk away knowing full well what would happen? The protection of the children, the most defenseless members of society, especially when they're completely vulnerable, is pretty much a cornerstone of human society and I'd argue of human morality as well.

I'll have a go with the scenario first. It's tough to deal with. It would also probably depend on my relationship to the girl. Philosophically, not going through with the (I assume this is what we're talking about) rape would result in the loss of a chance at life for thousands of people. [footnote]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loss_of_chance_in_English_law[/footnote]. Not that it has anything to do with negligence, of course.
That said, it would be much better/easier on my soul to obtain consent from the girl. And, similarly, in The Last of Us, I think it would be a lot easier to deal with the loss of Ellie if she consented to the procedure. Even though, from her actions immediately before and after, we can see that she feels guilty anyway.
Furthermore, HIV hasn't completely ruined humanity. It is ravaging certain parts of Africa at the moment, but I believe there's less than 10,000 people with it in my country, New Zealand. And most of them have got decent life expectancies. So there's a big difference there.


Since I've tried to weasel out of it, short answer: I'd probably let it happen to the girl, but desperately and selfishly try to wash my hands of the whole thing as quickly as possible.


As to the bigger picture in the game; well it requires some suspension of disbelief anyway. Frankly the cordyceps-zombie disease is a little ridiculous. So trying to imagine a completely real-life scenario with which to compare it is a bit futile. In terms of transporting the vaccine, though, the population in the game has greatly diminished so that might help.

I suspected that taking some brain tissue and then magicking up a vaccine would have been a stretch. In any case, nobody can really be blamed for wanting to save Ellie, or to sacrifice her. I'm no parent, so my paternal instinct didn't really kick in while watching my friend play the game. I actually got a little bit angry at Joel for what he did. But that's me.

 

[mmmikey]

I suspected that taking some brain tissue and then magicking up a vaccine would have been a stretch. In any case, nobody can really be blamed for wanting to save Ellie, or to sacrifice her. I'm no parent, so my paternal instinct didn't really kick in while watching my friend play the game. I actually got a little bit angry at Joel for what he did. But that's me.

I was thinking of HIV as one that was a recent, scary virus, I suppose it would be more valid a point in the 1980s or 1990s than now.

I think the brilliance of the ending is the sheer amount of moral gray area it all falls into. I feel like Ellie's despondent nature hinted at her knowing this may be a one way trip and Joel's telling her they can still turn back as his own way of confronting the horrible truth of what it may take for them to find out what they need to know about her condition. Add in the Fireflies' complete lack of concern over Ellie's life and the doctors' disregard for their oath as well as Marlene's personal attachment to Ellie, promise to her mother, and duty to her organization.

I was with Joel up until his execution of Marlene. After thinking about it, it was the only way he could be sure Ellie had a chance of staying hidden and safe with him. It was a complete twist of the prologue's ending. Joel was armed and Marlene was talking him down not knowing he was armed and dropping her guard/lowering her weapon. I felt like for him he wasn't going to make the same mistake twice. It wasn't the fungus or infected that got his daughter, it was a soldier following orders. You could tell on some level that he knew Ellie wanted their journey to have some meaning in that scene and he was taking way her choice at that point.

I hated Joel for lying to her afterward. She put her trust in Joel up to that point. She knew he was lying. She wanted there to be an end to people suffering from the infection. I think it would be interesting to come back to them and see how it sat with her after she had time to think about it, but clearly she accepted the lie, because sometimes its what people really want. And I shifted my thoughts on Joel about this as well, because she is all he really has at that point. I thought she deserved the truth, but I could empathise for Joel.

 

[Caiphus]

I was thinking of HIV as one that was a recent, scary virus, I suppose it would be more valid a point in the 1980s or 1990s than now.

I think the brilliance of the ending is the sheer amount of moral gray area it all falls into. I feel like Ellie's despondent nature hinted at her knowing this may be a one way trip and Joel's telling her they can still turn back as his own way of confronting the horrible truth of what it may take for them to find out what they need to know about her condition. Add in the Fireflies' complete lack of concern over Ellie's life and the doctors' disregard for their oath as well as Marlene's personal attachment to Ellie, promise to her mother, and duty to her organization.

I was with Joel up until his execution of Marlene. After thinking about it, it was the only way he could be sure Ellie had a chance of staying hidden and safe with him. It was a complete twist of the prologue's ending. Joel was armed and Marlene was talking him down not knowing he was armed and dropping her guard/lowering her weapon. I felt like for him he wasn't going to make the same mistake twice. It wasn't the fungus or infected that got his daughter, it was a soldier following orders. You could tell on some level that he knew Ellie wanted their journey to have some meaning in that scene and he was taking way her choice at that point.

I hated Joel for lying to her afterward. She put her trust in Joel up to that point. She knew he was lying. She wanted there to be an end to people suffering from the infection. I think it would be interesting to come back to them and see how it sat with her after she had time to think about it, but clearly she accepted the lie, because sometimes its what people really want. And I shifted my thoughts on Joel about this as well, because she is all he really has at that point. I thought she deserved the truth, but I could empathise for Joel.

Well, like I said, it's difficult to come up with a perfect comparison. We don't really have any examples of diseases that infect the majority of urban populations almost overnight, and eventually kill >95% of all humanity. I suppose cancer would be the closest? But even then it's not really close at all.

I felt bad for all the people that had been lost along the way. Especially Sam and Henry. With a vaccine, they might have been saved. But, again, you get into assumptions about whether or not a vaccine really could be produced from Ellie. So it's tough.

But oh yeah, the ending is good. It's definitely good. Not agreeing with the main character doesn't take anything away from it. We occasionally have these discussions about "Could you play a video game if the main character did something evil like rape". And this is a good example of that. And the great thing is, it's tough to fully disagree with Joel, despite the fact that what he did was, at least partially, evil and selfish.

 

[Vandenberg1]

True, but if there is no one who can grasp the beauty that the gods have given, then what is the point of it being there?

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

Lol so according to focus tests what the right move was was very clear to parents playing the game. Lol, proof parents would be some of the least moral and most self interested people in a crisis.

Oh yes, deciding not to take the life of an innocent child is an indication of both immorality and self interest.

Innocent? Ellie?

Not only has she murdered plenty, she has directly facilitated and inspired murder by the most efficient killer since the fungus.

She's a child, sure. But not an innocent one.