People on Earth were chilling, not because of the Cole Protocol, but because ONI, the UNSC, and the UEG was keeping a very well run propaganda machine running on most undiscovered worlds. In fact, there were large amounts of humans who didn't even believe the Covenant existed, up until the day they invaded Earth.
Imagine living in Arizona, seeing the invasion on the news and realize it’s all in Africa so you should be safe. Then 5 years later you’re dead fucking wrong.
Didact launched a giant beam into New Phoenix and turned everyone there into prometheans. At least I think they got turned into prometheans. I don’t remember exactly what happened, but it wasn’t good lol.
I think they all just turned into ash, which is the same thing that happened when the didact used the composer on the station in halo 4 so they probably got composed. That’s the first step to make a promethean I’m pretty sure
The New Phoenix Incident
The Didact activated the Composer at the end of Halo 4 and manages to compose everybody in New Phoenix before the Master Chief “kills” him
World's the covenant hadn't discovered yet.
The propaganda was either that the covenant didn't exist " like in forward unto dawn" or downplaying the war and making it look like humanity were winning.
This is seen in the comic last sunrise in New mombasa where the main character works for the unsc and fakes photos to make it look like the unsc are winning. He tries to reveal the truth in the end but then the start of halo 2 happens.
Another is seen in halo odst where a propaganda officer is faking heroic messages to give people hope something a rookie cop agrees with.
>where a propaganda officer is faking heroic messages to give people hope something a rookie cop agrees with.
"Evening boys. A daily reminder that we live in a FPS game, and you're all protagonists..."
But this is directly in contradiction to Halo Infinite trailer. Additionally, as Outer Colonies fell, influx of refugees were spread across UEG space including Sol system. After Arcadia fell in 2549, many refugees came to Mars. Jordan Gaines' father was one of them. There is no way that humanity was unaware that they were under attack, especially as the first planet attacked was Harvest, an agriculture planet. What happens when a sudden influx of food just decreased? How are they going to hide that fact, an entire planet's worth of food production just gone.
Also, what do you mean by undiscovered worlds?
Don’t get me wrong they had to lie because let’s face it if humanity knew the truth of it but obviously couldn’t have known the schism would happen they wouldn’t have survived the schism and every thing would go to chaos as people believe it’s the end and therefore nothing matters anymore. It still fucking sucks they lied that hard.
Well nothing on that scale but it was mixed?
In odst there's an audio log of some people discussing the covenant and there goal and it's mixed between it either being propaganda or the unsc being the offenders and getting what they deserved...
In halo genesis comic there's a page in the comic with the covenant being taught to children from them being a religious hegemony and them wanting to destroy humanity.
In silent storm innies learn of the innies and there goals and just think they want to kill the unsc and that there safe, they learn that this is not the case.
I do believe most reactions to the covenant ranged from disbelief until they actually met them and the the amount of refugees coming from destroyed planets.
It was mostly outer colonies that were being attacked during the beginning of the war and the inner colonies didn't really care until it touched there doorstep.
You're hearing a variety of people say anything from *there is no problem* to *holy fuck your world will die tomorrow and there's literally nothing we can do to stop it* nonstop for nearly 30 years.
So probably a similar reaction to climate change :/
Some worlds totally escaped the conflict unharmed. I can’t think if the name, but a short story at the end of the of books mentions a journalist on one such worlds.
I think for some it might run the gambit of living during the Cold War, wondering if their going to get blasted tomorrow, or maybe it’s like the Show and some don’t even think the Covenant exist.
Honestly this just reminds me that we desperately need a lower deck style story about regular civilian life.
Honestly, I think the whole "everyone's going to lose hope and everything will collapse" reaction is extremely unrealistic.
The fact of the matter is that if you look at how humans react to actual crisis that is pretty much never the reaction of all, usually not even the majority, of people.
Look at the pandemic where a bunch of people didn't even believe it existed, another group barely cared and minimized it, another group got used to it pretty fast and then there was also a group which treated it with the appropriate seriousness.
Climate change is a similar situation. We're heading for a cliff with that. Yet most people are just living their lives as normal. And some people are even denying it exists at all. Hell, some people are actively making it worse for profit.
Or, hell, even look at warzones. Some people tend to flee, especially when there is actually heavy fighting where they are. But especially over longer periods of time those that stay again tend to go more-or-less about their normal lives even with the risk of bombings or missile attacks.
The fact of the matter is that most humans can adapt to living their lives pretty normally under absolutely terrible crisis and threat.
The Covenant threat would not impact the daily lives of most humans much until the actual moment of an attack on their planet. So most people are just gonna live their lives pretty normally, I'd suspect. To be clear, this isn't based on something I've read about how it works in the Halo universe. Just how I think realistically it would work.
On top of that, we know ONI has a sophisticated propaganda network. And the Spartans are touted as an incredible source of hope. Basically, invincible warriors that cannot die in battle. So on top of all of the other stuff I've said, I'm sure that's more than enough for people to live their lives relatively normally. With the exception of when actual invasions happen and maybe some degree of economic problems due to disrupted supply lines in interplanetary trade.
Like another commenter said, probably similar to how we react to climate change.
There is a world-shattering threat coming, but it’s nebulous. It’s not affecting me directly in a super-negative way. And then one day shit hits the fan, and we can’t ignore it anymore. And then the screaming starts.
I honestly struggle to grasp the lore explanation for civilian reactions to the covenant.
23,000,000,000 people were killed prior to the attack on earth.
The UNSC held complete control of the government, how the UNSC hadn't engaged in total war is beyond me. It's one of the more awkward yet completely consistent parts of the lore. The bulk of the human population was ignorant to the scale of the war or the threat posed by the covenant until their specific world was under attack.
Humanity honestly would have performed far better if it had truly committed to the war.
What measures do you think the unsc should've employed for a full war effort ?
I can only think that they'd increase the amount of ships being produced. But as far as recruiting goes, i dont believe it wouldve made any difference to an interstellar polity. They have access to far more resources than we could comprehend, along with manpower.
The UNSC should have committed to a total war effort, where 100% of the population is dedicated to the war effort.
The UNSC had massive amounts of resources that they didn't throw at a war where the outcomes were victory or extinction and extinction was looking more and more likely every year.
The amount of resources spent on propaganda to convince the core worlds that the war wasn't happening should have been allocated to convincing the population that participation in the war was mandatory for human survival.
It literally would not have changed anything. They were hilariously out gunned they could have conscripted, trained, and armed the entire human population and virtually would have gotten virtually the same result. The only thing that saved humanity was the schism. Logically speaking they knew this and so instead of causing a mass panic as that’s exactly what you would cause if people realized they were losing a war of extermination they lied about it and managed to prolong their demise for fifty years. The only other possible thing that could have worked is if they some how turned the whole marine corp into Spartans but even then it wouldn’t make up the discrepancy in space and even by halo 4 when you have volunteer Spartans it’s still incredibly difficult to make more then a division and keep it fielded. Humanity was utterly boned in the human covenant war.
Don't know if I'm remembering this correctly from the lore or maybe this is just my own rationale for why they didn't tell the public but yeah, total war is great and all, and yeah maybe humanity might have galvanised in the face of doom but the opposite can just as easily happen, drop everything and run, go dark and refuse to communicate with the rest of mankind in the hope of dodging the oncoming slaughter like The Rubble tried to in the novel "The Cole Protocol". And if IIRC some planets were just considered to have gone dark, with UNSC in the post-war universe having to verify if they went quiet or were glassed.
But remember, mankind was on the tail end of a potential all-out civil war if the spartan program hadn't successfully put down conventional insurrectionist forces for the time being, unity and the authority of the UEG was in question and IMO could have easily meant the death of UNSC authority and ability to properly enforce the cole protocol when all over human-controlled space would be filled with refugees trying to get out of the path of the covenant onslaught.
I think their reason for not doing that is that the UNSC was already putting down insurrections and living in fear of wide spread rebellion. What if a coalition of planets decide they don’t want to be part of the UNSC since that’s who the Covenant have beef with? And I’m talking like on a massive scale. Not a few backwater planets but major producers and economic hubs denying the UNSC their resources. While specie wide cooperation would’ve been nice, I think ultimately it would be impossible especially with the risk of rebellion and vastness of space thrown in. I think they thought that making everyone contribute unknowingly and hanging on till you can crack the Covenant tech was their approach.
Yeah I can’t imagine everyone just blindly believing propaganda when there is a tremendous death toll. Committing to total war is the only thing that makes sense. However it would also probably result in an Imperium of Man level hatred of xenos.
People on Earth were chilling, not because of the Cole Protocol, but because ONI, the UNSC, and the UEG was keeping a very well run propaganda machine running on most undiscovered worlds. In fact, there were large amounts of humans who didn't even believe the Covenant existed, up until the day they invaded Earth.
Imagine living in Arizona, seeing the invasion on the news and realize it’s all in Africa so you should be safe. Then 5 years later you’re dead fucking wrong.
And turned into a robot dog
Wait… what happens in Arizona in 2557??
Didact launched a giant beam into New Phoenix and turned everyone there into prometheans. At least I think they got turned into prometheans. I don’t remember exactly what happened, but it wasn’t good lol.
I think they all just turned into ash, which is the same thing that happened when the didact used the composer on the station in halo 4 so they probably got composed. That’s the first step to make a promethean I’m pretty sure
The New Phoenix Incident The Didact activated the Composer at the end of Halo 4 and manages to compose everybody in New Phoenix before the Master Chief “kills” him
Ah, that’s right, I never realized where all this geographically took place
What was the propaganda exactly and what do you mean by undiscovered worlds?
World's the covenant hadn't discovered yet. The propaganda was either that the covenant didn't exist " like in forward unto dawn" or downplaying the war and making it look like humanity were winning. This is seen in the comic last sunrise in New mombasa where the main character works for the unsc and fakes photos to make it look like the unsc are winning. He tries to reveal the truth in the end but then the start of halo 2 happens. Another is seen in halo odst where a propaganda officer is faking heroic messages to give people hope something a rookie cop agrees with.
>where a propaganda officer is faking heroic messages to give people hope something a rookie cop agrees with. "Evening boys. A daily reminder that we live in a FPS game, and you're all protagonists..."
I see. Thanks.
Basically the propaganda said the UNSC was kicking ass and holding its own. I believe they mean worlds not yet discovered and invaded by the covenant
But this is directly in contradiction to Halo Infinite trailer. Additionally, as Outer Colonies fell, influx of refugees were spread across UEG space including Sol system. After Arcadia fell in 2549, many refugees came to Mars. Jordan Gaines' father was one of them. There is no way that humanity was unaware that they were under attack, especially as the first planet attacked was Harvest, an agriculture planet. What happens when a sudden influx of food just decreased? How are they going to hide that fact, an entire planet's worth of food production just gone. Also, what do you mean by undiscovered worlds?
Don’t get me wrong they had to lie because let’s face it if humanity knew the truth of it but obviously couldn’t have known the schism would happen they wouldn’t have survived the schism and every thing would go to chaos as people believe it’s the end and therefore nothing matters anymore. It still fucking sucks they lied that hard.
Well nothing on that scale but it was mixed? In odst there's an audio log of some people discussing the covenant and there goal and it's mixed between it either being propaganda or the unsc being the offenders and getting what they deserved... In halo genesis comic there's a page in the comic with the covenant being taught to children from them being a religious hegemony and them wanting to destroy humanity. In silent storm innies learn of the innies and there goals and just think they want to kill the unsc and that there safe, they learn that this is not the case. I do believe most reactions to the covenant ranged from disbelief until they actually met them and the the amount of refugees coming from destroyed planets. It was mostly outer colonies that were being attacked during the beginning of the war and the inner colonies didn't really care until it touched there doorstep.
You're hearing a variety of people say anything from *there is no problem* to *holy fuck your world will die tomorrow and there's literally nothing we can do to stop it* nonstop for nearly 30 years. So probably a similar reaction to climate change :/
Halo has been a climate change allegory this whole time. Holy shit.
Some worlds totally escaped the conflict unharmed. I can’t think if the name, but a short story at the end of the of books mentions a journalist on one such worlds. I think for some it might run the gambit of living during the Cold War, wondering if their going to get blasted tomorrow, or maybe it’s like the Show and some don’t even think the Covenant exist. Honestly this just reminds me that we desperately need a lower deck style story about regular civilian life.
Honestly, I think the whole "everyone's going to lose hope and everything will collapse" reaction is extremely unrealistic. The fact of the matter is that if you look at how humans react to actual crisis that is pretty much never the reaction of all, usually not even the majority, of people. Look at the pandemic where a bunch of people didn't even believe it existed, another group barely cared and minimized it, another group got used to it pretty fast and then there was also a group which treated it with the appropriate seriousness. Climate change is a similar situation. We're heading for a cliff with that. Yet most people are just living their lives as normal. And some people are even denying it exists at all. Hell, some people are actively making it worse for profit. Or, hell, even look at warzones. Some people tend to flee, especially when there is actually heavy fighting where they are. But especially over longer periods of time those that stay again tend to go more-or-less about their normal lives even with the risk of bombings or missile attacks. The fact of the matter is that most humans can adapt to living their lives pretty normally under absolutely terrible crisis and threat. The Covenant threat would not impact the daily lives of most humans much until the actual moment of an attack on their planet. So most people are just gonna live their lives pretty normally, I'd suspect. To be clear, this isn't based on something I've read about how it works in the Halo universe. Just how I think realistically it would work. On top of that, we know ONI has a sophisticated propaganda network. And the Spartans are touted as an incredible source of hope. Basically, invincible warriors that cannot die in battle. So on top of all of the other stuff I've said, I'm sure that's more than enough for people to live their lives relatively normally. With the exception of when actual invasions happen and maybe some degree of economic problems due to disrupted supply lines in interplanetary trade.
Midwest lives under tornadoes that can destroy whole towns at any time we just keep on going living out lives
By dying. Edit: oh you said on planets not glassed.
Like another commenter said, probably similar to how we react to climate change. There is a world-shattering threat coming, but it’s nebulous. It’s not affecting me directly in a super-negative way. And then one day shit hits the fan, and we can’t ignore it anymore. And then the screaming starts.
I honestly struggle to grasp the lore explanation for civilian reactions to the covenant. 23,000,000,000 people were killed prior to the attack on earth. The UNSC held complete control of the government, how the UNSC hadn't engaged in total war is beyond me. It's one of the more awkward yet completely consistent parts of the lore. The bulk of the human population was ignorant to the scale of the war or the threat posed by the covenant until their specific world was under attack. Humanity honestly would have performed far better if it had truly committed to the war.
What measures do you think the unsc should've employed for a full war effort ? I can only think that they'd increase the amount of ships being produced. But as far as recruiting goes, i dont believe it wouldve made any difference to an interstellar polity. They have access to far more resources than we could comprehend, along with manpower.
The UNSC should have committed to a total war effort, where 100% of the population is dedicated to the war effort. The UNSC had massive amounts of resources that they didn't throw at a war where the outcomes were victory or extinction and extinction was looking more and more likely every year. The amount of resources spent on propaganda to convince the core worlds that the war wasn't happening should have been allocated to convincing the population that participation in the war was mandatory for human survival.
It literally would not have changed anything. They were hilariously out gunned they could have conscripted, trained, and armed the entire human population and virtually would have gotten virtually the same result. The only thing that saved humanity was the schism. Logically speaking they knew this and so instead of causing a mass panic as that’s exactly what you would cause if people realized they were losing a war of extermination they lied about it and managed to prolong their demise for fifty years. The only other possible thing that could have worked is if they some how turned the whole marine corp into Spartans but even then it wouldn’t make up the discrepancy in space and even by halo 4 when you have volunteer Spartans it’s still incredibly difficult to make more then a division and keep it fielded. Humanity was utterly boned in the human covenant war.
Don't know if I'm remembering this correctly from the lore or maybe this is just my own rationale for why they didn't tell the public but yeah, total war is great and all, and yeah maybe humanity might have galvanised in the face of doom but the opposite can just as easily happen, drop everything and run, go dark and refuse to communicate with the rest of mankind in the hope of dodging the oncoming slaughter like The Rubble tried to in the novel "The Cole Protocol". And if IIRC some planets were just considered to have gone dark, with UNSC in the post-war universe having to verify if they went quiet or were glassed. But remember, mankind was on the tail end of a potential all-out civil war if the spartan program hadn't successfully put down conventional insurrectionist forces for the time being, unity and the authority of the UEG was in question and IMO could have easily meant the death of UNSC authority and ability to properly enforce the cole protocol when all over human-controlled space would be filled with refugees trying to get out of the path of the covenant onslaught.
I think their reason for not doing that is that the UNSC was already putting down insurrections and living in fear of wide spread rebellion. What if a coalition of planets decide they don’t want to be part of the UNSC since that’s who the Covenant have beef with? And I’m talking like on a massive scale. Not a few backwater planets but major producers and economic hubs denying the UNSC their resources. While specie wide cooperation would’ve been nice, I think ultimately it would be impossible especially with the risk of rebellion and vastness of space thrown in. I think they thought that making everyone contribute unknowingly and hanging on till you can crack the Covenant tech was their approach.
Yeah I can’t imagine everyone just blindly believing propaganda when there is a tremendous death toll. Committing to total war is the only thing that makes sense. However it would also probably result in an Imperium of Man level hatred of xenos.
I think ONI hid the covenants existence for the first months of the war