Would you exterminate all of the Daleks? "Spoilers for Doctor Who: Genesis of the Daleks"

[Lagamorph]

Also, in Genesis aren't there only a few hundred or few thousand Daleks at absolute most? Most of the Kaled population is still humanoid at that point and haven't been mutated by Davros yet have they? There certainly weren't millions of them at that particular point in time.

If anything, he'd be saving far more Kaled people from being turned into Daleks than there were Daleks in existence at that time.

 

[TheGamingNewsGuy]

Also, in Genesis aren't there only a few hundred or few thousand Daleks at absolute most? Most of the Kaled population is still humanoid at that point and haven't been mutated by Davros yet have they? There certainly weren't millions of them at that particular point in time.

If anything, he'd be saving far more Kaled people from being turned into Daleks than there were Daleks in existence at that time.

Click to shrink...

I think it was Thousands but i could be misrembering. But he is still killing an entire species

 

[Dalek]

You have to kill all the Daleks. They will always find a way to return and kill millions.

except for Rusty!

 

[Stinkles]

Yeah - Genesis is pretty much considered to be the 1st act of the Time War.


That was not my intention. I meant to be exterminate. Just waiting on a Mod to change it

Click to shrink...

I like it. The people like it. They say that Islamic scholars and artists operating at the highest level deliberately inserted imperfection into their work that god himself might not punish their pridefulness. Any time you see me make a typo, that's for why.

 

[TheGamingNewsGuy]

I like it. The people like it. They say that Islamic scholars and artists operating at the highest level deliberately inserted imperfection into their work that god himself might not punish their pridefulness. Any time you see me make a typo, that's for why.

Click to shrink...

Eh - i still think it would be better to have Exterminate in the title..

 

[Dalek]

Also:

https://io9.gizmodo.com/top-10-most-ridiculously-overcomplicated-doctor-who-vil-1624290084

3) The Daleks ("Bad Wolf"/"The Parting of the Ways", 2005)
So you're the Daleks, and you've been basically wiped out in the Time War. You need to create a new army of evil mutants encased in super-armor — but you're really, really racist. So you don't want to turn just any humanoids into Daleks, you want to find a handful of humanoid cells that are worthy of mutating into Dalek life forms. So far, so good. So of course, you take over a media satellite in the far future and create spoofs of early-2000s game shows and reality shows. Wait... what?



No, see, it makes perfect sense. The Daleks want to kidnap humans without anybody noticing, to harvest their DNA. So they create exact replicas of Big Brother and The Weakest Link, and probably Who Wants to Marry a Millionaire too. Anyone who is "eliminated" on those shows is apparently killed — but is actually teleported millions of miles away, to the Dalek ship. The Daleks have the capacity to teleport people without being detected, but they don't just kidnap people from Earth or elsewhere, because that wouldn't be nearly as cool. At a certain point, the Daleks have amassed a huge, unbeatable army of Daleks and a nearly endless fleet of warships — but they don't launch their invasion of Earth, they just keep on running game shows until the Doctor stumbles on them.

Oh, and the Daleks randomly have a cyborg lady on their media satellite, running all their stuff for them, even though she isn't loyal and betrays them the first chance she gets. They also have a huge staff of humans working for them, who have to be kept ignorant about what the games are really about.



(Side note: given that Rose destroys an entire Dalek war fleet just by waving her hand, after looking into the heart of the TARDIS for a second, you have to wonder why the Time Lords didn't try that tactic during the Time War. Or if the Time Lords did try that, why the Daleks didn't develop a defense against the "look into the TARDIS and become a god" maneuver.)

 

[Christian]

I can only think of one Dalek worthy of extermination.

 

[Hanbei]

It's one of those things that's just way too difficult a question to answer, like ''if you could time travel to 1889, would you kill Hitler?"

Click to shrink...

 

[Tabaxi]

You have to kill all the Daleks. They will always find a way to return and kill millions.

except for Rusty!

Click to shrink...

Rusty basically just redirected the Dalek programming from "kill everything" to "just kill Daleks." He's as genocidal as the rest.There really isn't an example of a "good" dalek that wasn't either part-human (Dalek Sec) or still wanted to commit genocide (Caan, Rusty).

Which has always been my issue with the moral ambiguity of the Doctor destroying the Daleks, since they appear to lack freewill to be anything other than the killing monsters they were designed to be.

 

[Dalek]

I can only think of one Dalek worthy of extermination.

Click to shrink...

 

[Blader]

It was meant to be Eccleston. It's why he refused to be in it, because he didn't feel as though it was accurate to his incarnation of the Doctor.

https://www.radiotimes.com/news/tv/2019-09-18/why-christopher-eccleston-turned-down-doctor-who-50th/

Click to shrink...

bit odd since the whole point of the episode is that the Doctor doesn't push the button and commit the act. I feel like Eccleston has given a handful of reasons for not wanting to return.

I would've liked to see him back for the 50th but he is right that it worked out in the end in that we got a John Hurt Doctor out of it.

 

[BDS]

I don't think the Daleks have done a single decent thing in their entire history, so yes, just wipe them out.

 

[Samemind]

Have the Daleks shown any shred of a personality or desire that doesn't involve grievous harm to other living beings? I have no context from the show besides these things exist to end lives.

I might opt to not push the button, but more on the assumption of a hypothetical trolley problem where you have the Daleks' victims on one track and victims of whatever Daleks were keeping in check on the other.

Under my current understanding, they have more in common with viruses than other intelligent lifeforms.

 

[TheGamingNewsGuy]

Have the Daleks shown any shred of a personality or desire that doesn't involve grievous harm to other living beings? I have no context from the show besides these things exist to end lives.

I might opt to not push the button, but more on the assumption of a hypothetical trolley problem where you have the Daleks' victims on one track and victims of whatever Daleks were keeping in check on the other.

Under my current understanding, they have more in common with viruses than other intelligent lifeforms.

Click to shrink...

In some extended universe material yeah but it's extremely rare if at all and there is usually a story based reason for it but they always end up the same - always turn into their base desire to bring harm to others

 

[Deleted member 29660]

I don't think the Daleks have done a single decent thing in their entire history, so yes, just wipe them out.

Click to shrink...

The only one I can think of travelled through time and went utterly insane realizing how evil his race was and tried to help set them up to be destroyed.

Didn't stick , but that's about it for good deeds.

 

[Bradbury]

I mean, it was Moffat's plan for the original draft of Day of the Doctor, but RTD said in an interview that in his mind originally he envisioned the regeneration into 9 being triggered by whatever act it is that ended the war, which is why the trauma weighs so heavy - he was 'born' in the blood of that moment. But it was never on screen, so hey ho.

Click to shrink...

the ironic part is that thanks for him not returning his head canon became kind of the canon to nine, not remembering the truth about the moment

 

[The Unsent]

Rusty the Dalek showed they have the capacity to chage, and the series 9 2 parter showed thet can have hidden mercy.

But still yes. The Doctor sucks all the Daleks into a void on 'Doomsday', that might be worse than killing them. It's the ramifications in the timeline of destroying them at their genesis which is more of a corcern.

The Doctor often has a warped morality than a good one, sometimes he's wiped all the known Daleks out by retargetting their own weapons against themselves, which is still genocide. (Revelation destroying Skaro and the crossfire in Day of the Doctor)

 

[Deleted member 1476]

Yes I would.

if tumors all of a sudden gained a voice would you all of a sudden decide we shouldn't eradicate cancer since it's alive?

Click to shrink...

You bet your ass there would be people trying to save cancer. There's a defense force for absolutely everything.

 

[Ferrio]

Wouldn't the Sixth doctor do it? Dude was a psychopath.

 

[TheIlliterati]

Ooops all Daleks

 

[The Unsent]

Wouldn't the Sixth doctor do it? Dude was a psychopath.

Click to shrink...

Many of the Doctors commit violence, the 6th Doctor was just more honest with his presentation and would strangle his enemies, instead of using an exploding screw driver or regeneration energy as a weapon or throwing an orange...

 

[PlanetSmasher]

Many of the Doctors commit violence, the 6th Doctor was just more honest with his presentation and would strangle his enemies friends, instead of using an exploding screw driver or regeneration energy as a weapon or throwing an orange...

Click to shrink...

fixed

 

[The Unsent]

fixed

Click to shrink...

It depends if you accept Regeneration Blues as an excuse or part of his personality affected him strangelling Peri.

 

[Ferrio]

fixed

Click to shrink...

It depends if you accept Regeneration Blues as an excuse or part of his personality affected him strangelling Peri.

Click to shrink...

To be fair it was Peri of all people.

 

[Mivey]

I accidentally the Daleks once.
It was certainly a unique experience.

 

[Double 0]

Early six was a problem. An arrogant, violent problem. But later six would never do anything close to this.

Also, 9 being the one to do it makes no sense to me. But his memory being fried due to it does.

I personally would have had 8 do it, but I love War Doctor and War Master, so whatever.

And I totally would have. Ramifications be damned, Daleks suck. So do Cybermen.

 

[PlanetSmasher]

Early six was a problem. An arrogant, violent problem. But later six would never do anything close to this.

Also, 9 being the one to do it makes no sense to me. But his memory being fried due to it does.

I personally would have had 8 do it, but I love War Doctor and War Master, so whatever.

And I totally would have. Ramifications be damned, Daleks suck. So do Cybermen.

Click to shrink...

How are the War Master serials? They're all starring Jacobi, right?

 

[TheGamingNewsGuy]

How are the War Master serials? They're all starring Jacobi, right?

Click to shrink...

Yes they all star Jacobi and apparently they are really good

 

[Siggy-P]

Have the Daleks shown any shred of a personality or desire that doesn't involve grievous harm to other living beings? I have no context from the show besides these things exist to end lives.

I might opt to not push the button, but more on the assumption of a hypothetical trolley problem where you have the Daleks' victims on one track and victims of whatever Daleks were keeping in check on the other.

Under my current understanding, they have more in common with viruses than other intelligent lifeforms.

Click to shrink...

It's not whether they've shown it but rather that they are entire race with every emotion purposefully mutated out of them until all they can feel is hatred and arrogance.

Only 4 daleks have shown any other emotion or desire. 2 were hybrids of human and dalek DNA, 1 was driven insane and the third was just flipped like a switch to only want to kill other daleks and nothing else.

 

[PlanetSmasher]

It's not whether they've shown it but rather that they are entire race with every emotion purposefully mutated out of them until all they can feel is hatred and arrogance.

Only 4 daleks have shown any other emotion or desire. 2 were hybrids of human and dalek DNA, 1 was driven insane and the third was just flipped like a switch to only want to kill other daleks and nothing else.

Click to shrink...

Are we counting Oswin as one of the four?

 

[Siggy-P]

Are we counting Oswin as one of the four?

Click to shrink...

I may be misremembering but I think Oswin was a human turned into a fake-dalek creature rather than an actual proper dalek.

 

[Deleted member 25606]

Yes I would.




You bet your ass there would be people trying to save cancer. There's a defense force for absolutely everything.

Click to shrink...

Don't remind me, but your right.

 

[TheGamingNewsGuy]

Early six was a problem. An arrogant, violent problem. But later six would never do anything close to this.

Also, 9 being the one to do it makes no sense to me. But his memory being fried due to it does.

I personally would have had 8 do it, but I love War Doctor and War Master, so whatever.

And I totally would have. Ramifications be damned, Daleks suck. So do Cybermen.

Click to shrink...

Mondas Cyberman i would be kinda reluctant because the Mondas Cybermen modified themselves in order to survive - it was that or death

 

[MrZaha]

Would i kill the extremely hard to kill super smart time traveling alien nazis who want to kill everything that isnt them and can pretty much only be beaten by one man with plenty of deaths along the way? Hell yeah i would id kill all the borg too. They kill too many people and are near unstoppable, cant take a chance with them.

 

[TheGamingNewsGuy]

Would i kill the extremely hard to kill super smart time traveling alien nazis who want to kill everything that isnt them and can pretty much only be beaten by one man with plenty of deaths along the way? Hell yeah i would id kill all the borg too. They kill too many people and are near unstoppable, cant take a chance with them.

Click to shrink...

I would probalby kill the Borg considering how much of a threat they cause.

 

[Wallace Wells]

Have the Daleks shown any shred of a personality or desire that doesn't involve grievous harm to other living beings? I have no context from the show besides these things exist to end lives.

I might opt to not push the button, but more on the assumption of a hypothetical trolley problem where you have the Daleks' victims on one track and victims of whatever Daleks were keeping in check on the other.

Under my current understanding, they have more in common with viruses than other intelligent lifeforms.

Click to shrink...

Didn't the human/Dalek hybrid in The Dalek's Take Manhattan show some personality?

 

[Toxi]

I would. Yes, I would make a good Dalek.

It's hard to argue morality here because Daleks are genetically engineered to hate everything that is not Dalek. The only way to make Daleks not do this is to infuse them with other species' DNA, which I assume is not an option here.

Didn't the human/Dalek hybrid in The Dalek's Take Manhattan show some personality?

Click to shrink...

Dalek Sek did. However, I'm assuming that infusing the Daleks with non-Dalek DNA is not an option here.

You see the same thing happen with the Dalek in the episode Dalek after absorbing Rose's DNA, though its solution to the new ethical dilemmas it was posed was to just self-exterminate.

 

[Deleted member 7051]

I would probalby kill the Borg considering how much of a threat they cause.

Click to shrink...

The Borg isn't really the same as the Daleks. The Borg is fundamentally a hyper advanced artificial intelligence that assimilates organic material, typically intelligent life, and uses their bodies as an unwilling puppet.

So there's, like, no moral quandary to be had. Disabling the Borg and freeing the enslaved people it has collected is absolutely the right thing to do, no questions about it.

The Daleks, though? They're living, breathing sentient life and their intellect and achievements rival that of the greatest civilisations in all of space and time. Yes they're incredibly destructive and horrifyingly determined to wipe out life, but they're still living beings themselves. Who are we to destroy them? Neutralise them, sure. Prevent them from ever harming another planet again, absolutely...

But never destroy them.

 

[Nepenthe]

Yes they're incredibly destructive and horrifyingly determined to wipe out life, but

Click to shrink...

There is no but. There is both a moral responsibility and an imperative of self-defense to destroy a collective group bent on killing all life. Whether or not they are sentient is irrelevant to the matter. The Daleks deserve to go as much as the Borg does.

 

[Toxi]

The Borg isn't really the same as the Daleks. The Borg is fundamentally a hyper advanced artificial intelligence that assimilates organic material, typically intelligent life, and uses their bodies as an unwilling puppet.

So there's, like, no moral quandary to be had. Disabling the Borg and freeing the enslaved people it has collected is absolutely the right thing to do, no questions about it.

The Daleks, though? They're living, breathing sentient life and their intellect and achievements rival that of the greatest civilisations in all of space and time. Yes they're incredibly destructive and horrifyingly determined to wipe out life, but they're still living beings themselves. Who are we to destroy them? Neutralise them, sure. Prevent them from ever harming another planet again, absolutely...

But never destroy them.

Click to shrink...

Daleks are genetically engineered to desire genocide. Let me repeat that, Daleks are genetically engineered to desire genocide.

Let's say we somehow find a way to neutralize them and stop them from killing anyone. By doing so, we consign them to a life of suffering, because Dalek existence is predisposed on killing everything that is not a Dalek. It's effectively torture.

The only way to actually live with the Daleks is to alter their DNA to the point where they are no longer Daleks.

 

[Deleted member 7051]

Daleks are genetically engineered to desire genocide. Let me repeat that, Daleks are genetically engineered to desire genocide.

Let's say we somehow find a way to neutralize them and stop them from killing anyone. By doing so, we consign them to a life of suffering, because Dalek existence is predisposed on killing everything that is not a Dalek. It's effectively torture.

The only way to actually live with the Daleks is to alter their DNA to the point where they are no longer Daleks.

Click to shrink...

This would be a reasonable angle if it weren't for the fact that the very argument that Kaleds were genetically modified into Daleks implies there would be a way to prevent it or reverse it. You can't hand out a death sentence to an entire species because one man manipulated their genetic code to become psychotic mass murderers hell-bent on destroying all life in the universe. Especially when we've seen Daleks overcome that conditioning and express far more personality and independent thought than "Exterminate!"

What would be so bad about turning the Daleks back into Kaleds (which I assume any species capable of wiping out the Daleks was sufficiently advanced enough do) and why would simply destroying them instead be preferred?

 

[TheGamingNewsGuy]

I totally get the Doctor's reasoning but in terms of i would the exact same thing as him...probalby not

 

[Vincent Alexander]

I vote yes for many reasons, but none as important as this: if he killed them all, I wouldn't have to suffer through another episode with Daleks.

 

[MrZaha]

You can't hand out a death sentence to an entire species because one man manipulated their genetic code to become psychotic mass murderers hell-bent on destroying all life in the universe. Especially when we've seen Daleks overcome that conditioning and express far more personality and independent thought than "Exterminate!"

What would be so bad about turning the Daleks back into Kaleds (which I assume any species capable of wiping out the Daleks was sufficiently advanced enough do) and why would simply destroying them instead be preferred?

Click to shrink...

I disagree with this you can hand out a death sentence to an entire species even if the species were genetically manipulated by one man. It doesnt matter how they started out it matters what they became. What they became is a threat to all life since all they do is try to kill everyone. So there are some daleks who overcame their conditioning but so what theyre still murderers many times over. Its best to get rid of them all and be done.

 

[JediTimeBoy]

Technically, wouldn't that make you another Davros ?!?

Extermination of the Daleks; sounds like a great title of a sequel to Genesis...

 

[Teiresias]

The Doctor lets a genocidal species rampage on through the universe, while at the same time using misogynistic attacks to bring down a woman Prime Minister that had the totally reasonable foresight to destroy a ship that threatened the earth.

Yes, kill all the Daleks and screw the Doctor.

 

[Deleted member 7051]

I disagree with this you can hand out a death sentence to an entire species even if the species were genetically manipulated by one man. It doesnt matter how they started out it matters what they became. What they became is a threat to all life since all they do is try to kill everyone. So there are some daleks who overcame their conditioning but so what theyre still murderers many times over. Its best to get rid of them all and be done.

Click to shrink...

So then we wipe out any species that fits this criteria? Or any species we consider a threat? Within the Doctor Who universe, the Time Lords were even worse than the Daleks. The Time War wasn't some glorious battle of good versus bad, but two races equally capable of wiping out all life across all of time and space fighting over who got to say they were in charge. So I guess the Time Lords have to go too? Including the Doctor?

Who decided we have the right to declare that entire species should be wiped out? What happens when you're the one considered the threat to all life in the universe because you believe you have the right to decide who lives and who dies and the power to make it happen? Will you stand aside and let yourself be wiped out or will you become a tyrant?

 

[TheGamingNewsGuy]

Technically, wouldn't that make you another Davros ?!?

Extermination of the Daleks; sounds like a great title of a sequel to Genesis...

Click to shrink...

Extermination of the Daleks (comic story)

Extermination of the Daleks was a comic story published in Doctor Who: Battles in Time. It was written by Steve Cole. The Daleks are the masters of Earth! The Daleks, now protected with crossed strips of the Krikoosh's cage, have unleashed their proton cannon on Earth and all life has turned...

tardis.fandom.com

In all seriousness i wouldn't be suprised if we got that title down the line

 

[Aprikurt]

I think being contractually obligated to make appearances every year in less and less interesting ways is a far crueller fate for the Daleks.

 

[Toxi]

This would be a reasonable angle if it weren't for the fact that the very argument that Kaleds were genetically modified into Daleks implies there would be a way to prevent it or reverse it. You can't hand out a death sentence to an entire species because one man manipulated their genetic code to become psychotic mass murderers hell-bent on destroying all life in the universe. Especially when we've seen Daleks overcome that conditioning and express far more personality and independent thought than "Exterminate!"

What would be so bad about turning the Daleks back into Kaleds (which I assume any species capable of wiping out the Daleks was sufficiently advanced enough do) and why would simply destroying them instead be preferred?

Click to shrink...

I would certainly prefer genetically engineering the Daleks into an emotionally whole species over wiping them out.

No Dalek in the history of Doctor Who has overcome the genetic disposition to kill. The only exceptions either had DNA from non-Dalek species, or simply redirected their genocidal hatred at other Daleks. There is no peaceful coexistence with Daleks as long as they remain Daleks, so your only options are to wipe them out or to make them no longer Daleks.

So then we wipe out any species that fits this criteria? Or any species we consider a threat? Within the Doctor Who universe, the Time Lords were even worse than the Daleks. The Time War wasn't some glorious battle of good versus bad, but two races equally capable of wiping out all life across all of time and space fighting over who got to say they were in charge. So I guess the Time Lords have to go too? Including the Doctor?

Who decided we have the right to declare that entire species should be wiped out? What happens when you're the one considered the threat to all life in the universe because you believe you have the right to decide who lives and who dies and the power to make it happen? Will you stand aside and let yourself be wiped out or will you become a tyrant?

Click to shrink...

The difference between the Time Lords and the Daleks is that the Time Lords' problem is cultural. The Daleks' problem is genetic.

Though I think anyone considering wiping out the war-era Time Lords would be in the right to consider it. They posed an existential threat to the universe.

And yes, this is a very cynical take, but I also think the sheer stakes necessitate that cynicism. A problem of Science Fiction is that while it's about fanciful versions of current issues, the exaggeration of those issues can change how we address them.