What you're essentially saying is that 'they aren't on the same scale.. therefore taxes are not slavery' which is a relativist argument. At the core of taxation is this... if you do not have a right to every last dime you produce you are not in command of your own destiny, you do not own yourself. If any other organization claims to own -by right- some portion of your wages (which represents your labour and your -life-) then it claims to own you. Scale has no place in argument, because once the principle is accepted you can see the percentage of taxation move up or down without real principled resistence and you can see the encroachment of government in various walks of life (the food fascists anyone?). Note that this is only an argument against income taxes. Sales taxes are different as they only tax the -contract- of purchase between the seller and buyer, which requires government backing so that if the contract is violated in someway the consumer is protected.


As to the spoiler (sharecroppers) that is an excellent example as to how the NCR is fascist. The farmers aren't at fault, but because they can't produce they are forced to keep working but to move into farms together and work the land and work as they may the NCR continues to push them to try to get metaphorical water from rocks.


As to the last bit, I don't disagree Caesar certainly legislates morality, just as the US does today but it is very likely that the NCR will move in the same direction.

I don't really see how, he never asks you to kill the president, or anything. The only 'dirty' thing I saw him do was

the most evil faction to ever be in any fallout game is the Enclave by far

Well they did still have a goal which in their eyes was the right thing to do, and who knows, maybe it was.
I would think Beastlords from Tactics were more evil.
All they wanted to do was murder everyone for no reason IIRC.

No. Taxes and slavery are not on the same scale. I don't know how I can elaborate any further or be any clearer. Hell, I would rather pay taxes than be a slave. But here... I will elaborate again.

Governments need incentive to function. In a nationalist society, it's pride (modern China). In a free-society, it's money (United States/NCR). In a military dictatorship, it's force (Soviet Union/early China/Legion). In order to function and provide services that the people want, a free-society needs money to fund those programs. Now ideally, no money would be needed. However, in order for a nation to not need that money, those programs could not exist. By electing officials that want to establish programs that require large amounts of capital to run, citizens are allowing themselves to be taxed. If a people do not want to be taxed, then they need to do without the programs that those taxes fund. In this sense, the NCR would need to do without their large military, which is suicide in the post-apocolyptic world. They needed to be able to defend themselves so they established a military. So if you're suggesting that in order to be better than the Legion in terms of slavery, then by your standards they would need to abolish taxation and scrap their military, leaving them open to attack... By the Legion. Real smart.

The Legion on the other hand doesn't have taxes. Why? Because they can just enslave people. If there is something the Legion wants or needs, they just take it. If there is opposition to them taking it, they destroy it.

So again it boils down to taxation or slavery. Your position says that both are slavery. Mine says that real slavery is the absolute lack of rights and freedom. I would rather pay some taxes, as would the majority of the human beings on this planet (mutants in the wasteland would probably agree too) than be a slave to a society of bloodthirsty psychopaths.



You're generalizing in favor of the sharecroppers. Hardly an un-biased opinion. Neither side knows why the crops are doing badly.



So the Legion does legislate morality and the NCR might legislate morality and your arguement is that they're the same?

A lot of people keep talking about Bitter Springs and how it's an example of how the NCR is no better than the Legion.

Not quite true. The Bitter Springs massacre is a black mark on the NCR's occupation of the Mojave. The soldiers involved like, Boone and Vargas, were discharged from the service, and Bitter Springs is pretty much used as a rallying cry by the opposition to NCR rule. According to Boone, they were given orders only to keep shooting, even though they themselves tried to respond to their commanders that they were firing on civilians. It's clear that Bitter Springs is not a common occurrence and traumatized Boone (and the others involved) pretty heavily.

Compare that to Nipton, where legionnaires knowingfully (and gleefully) crucified almost the entire town (there were two survivors, if I remember correctly.) Nipton wasn't the Legion's version of Bitter Springs, it was their standard operating procedure.

As i belive, in my heart, that ceaser is bad, and the NCR is good. But i love the NCR. I'm part of first recon, me and my spotter, Boone. Tho i talked to people that have diffrent opinions. Here are a few.

One says (Bad NCR)
-NCR steals water from westside, that is why Tom Anderson had to kill Colonel White... This meaning the NCR only cares about produce and expansion, not its citizens.

One also says (Nuetral Ceaser)
-The ceasers legion may do there share of bad things, but shrink them down to size and there just as bad as any of the other gangs out in these waste. The Ceasers legion was started from a guy that was part of the Followers of the Apocalypse. He wanted to restore the old world. He set off leaving and later became knownas Ceaser, towering over populations known as the legion. His mission, take the lands away from the corrupt and restore order to the wasteland.

One also says (Good Ceaser)
Cass:Yes Ceaser has his share of bad things. But they protect there few caravans, unlike the NCR. I somtimes wish i worked for ceaser, only because he protects his roads, but he treats the women horibbly. I just wish the NCR would use it's hundreds of forces and protect our carvans. I lost alot of caravans because they could not guard themselves... and all just outside New vegas... You could practicly see over the walls.

Those are not quotes, as i forgot the words, but these are summaries of what they said.

Overall Ceaser's Legion is known as evil, but NCR could be evil, or good... It is all about perspective.

Yes but as i have said, they are trying to bring back old rule to the world. Not Democarcy, even further back. The town of Nipton was a town of evil. Ceaser's Legion made a deal with the mayor, to Destroy NCR squads in a trap, in exchange for 8,000 caps. When the powder gangers were ready they began to head to the mojave outpost. That is when Ceaser's Legion surrounded them. Ceaser's Legion shunned the powder gangers for doing somthing so bad just for money, they were teaching them a lesson.

They then decided that slaughter was unfair. They found lottery tickets, and passed them around. Whoever was drawn first, were killed. Then antother group Crucified, then one guy got his legs broken, but was let to live. The winner got to run free (Even tho i shot him cause, i thought he meant like Caps Lottery), That is who you see run out of nipton. The mayor, for leading the entire organization, was burnt on some tires... (What a horrible smell, Burning rubber and flesh)

This may sound evil, and i agree it is... But they were teaching them a lesson.

One of the only things i would say that is showing the NCR as a bully, would probably be when the mercenaries are sent to harass Jacobstown.

They also bully Freeside a little bit, but Freeside sort of asks for that...

NCR are only clear-cut "good guys" if you're trying to force them into that mold.

Two words: Bitter Springs.

Repeated references are made to how NCR expands, they bully towns into compliance, numerous highly corrupt NCR exist, including the Crimson Caravans.

Ceasar's legion is outright anarchist burn/slash/destroy evil. But NCR is much more subtle fascist evil, just like they were in FO2.

Even Mr. House is bad in his own way.

The BoS gets darker in New Vegas as well.


moral grey area is not a matter of them being all good, it's that everyone is bad in their own unique way. Like a bunch of little jackbooted snowflakes.

I already addressed this in a previous post.

The Bitter Springs massacre wasn't intentional. If it had been, Boone wouldn't have been discharged from the NCR military because of the Bitter Springs incident.

Besides Bitter Springs was nothing compared to how I personally dealt with the Khans in game.



NCR wouldn't do that, nor could they have pulled it off if they wanted to. "Veteran Rangers" my ass.

The Legion and by extension Caesar is delusional. He wants to replace one corrupt government with a smaller, more easily corruptible dictatorship. Who's going to run things when Caesar dies? The Auto-Doc? Their Hypocrisy doesn't end there though. No wine or medication? Romans drank more Wine than they did water and since the Romans stole most of their medical practices from the Greeks and Persians, this Neo Legion, should be embracing medicine, not ignoring and forbidding it. Caesar and the whole Legion are just stupid raiders that know a few Latin words. The NCR is about as corrupt as the current US government. The Legion is obviously the "Bad guys".

Yes this is all correct. So when a nuke hits us, dont side with the NCR, dont side with the Legion, Dont side with Mr. House. Side with Dustin Flagon, the new ruler of vegas, and the leader of the free people.


Vote Dustin Flagon, no corruption, not a druggie, and the best bet we have to restore a peaceful country as we once were.

Dustin Flagon, Speech:
"I know how all of you wastelanders, feel. I came from a background of good and evil. My Pa, a butcher named, George, was a fine gentlman, but then a caravan outside our shack was attacked by strange men. My dad got his shotgun and handed me my first gun too. He said, son, those here thieves won't not kill ye. Just pull this here trigger, and the gun will do the rest, i will teach you how to reload later. Well that lesson on reloading never came around. Just as my dady walked out of the shack, he was murdered brutaly. My ma screamed from the bedroom, that is when i saw, a sickining sight. My mother was being dragged out by a group in red and black skirts. These came to be known as Ceaser's Legion. At this time i knew only one thing could happen... I was to be a slave, for the rest of my life. Then a thunderous sound rang out, jolting even the Legion. Two men, Black armoured with red eyes glowing from their goggles, ran down. One had a sniper, he cocked it back and hit a Legion in the shoulder. The Legion fled at the sight of the men. I went to flee with them, when they caught me and told me to hold. I was stunned, there voices made me crack in two. Years later, i was one of the top sharpshooters in 1st Recon. As i learned the ways the NCR treated its citizens, you guys. I began to learn about a corruption. Not likeling this i seeked out Mr. House for help. He wanted me to rid the waste of the NCR. I said i couldn't. He sadly said, i can't let you walk out of here with out my trust. The next thing i know, robots are arming themselves. I had one choice...I jumped right out of the lucky 38...." (Assassinated)

I thought Boone wasn't "discharged" so much as simply never reenlisted, due to psychological trauma? Ditto Manny? It's not like Boone is blacklisted amongst the NCR because one of his endings has him reenlisting.

I forget which NPC says it but they say they "claimed" it was a miscommunication. The implication is they were playing CYA.


Plus that doesn't account for the many other dialogue snippits amounting to "they just take what they want"

I think they also pushed Caesar's Legion a bit too far on the evil scale unfortunately. But there are interesting points about them still. And while Caesar may die at one point, at this point in the game we really don't know what *his* plans are for the future of the Legion. If he were to die unexpectedly, then yes, it would cause instability to be sure. But he is very well-protected in the game and does not seem to be all that old. I'm pretty sure he would devise a plan for a successor before he goes.

NCR feels like the better guys but I still can't call them good. If you step back and look at the context of the game-world, you see that this is a group that is aggressively pushing forward through the country to gain resources. And clearly this is done at the expense of the people who get "conquered", and they are most certainly not above "bullying" tactics or even downright assassinations to further their goal.

I still see you haven't responded to my post so by default, the legion wins.

I'll just throw this into the cesspool:

I recently completed a run-through with Caesar. Here's what happened:



Those are the only one I thought were worth mentioning. The Legion definitely aren't white but they do have some decent traits.

Also for those of you wondering what would happen after Caesar dies; Lanius would take control.

That's kind of the point, isn't it? The majority of the populous is pro NCR, but are the NCR good? Just because they like NCR makes them good? No. If everyone else says 2 + 2 is 3, is it? Caesar's Legion just piss me off. NCR doesn't piss me off any less, though.

It's morally gray because you have to decide what's good or bad without being biased by the opinions of others.

Good point on the Boone ending. One the discharge thing: If you ask Boone about General Oliver, Boone states that Oliver was one of the names on his discharge papers.

I haven't had that specific convo, but I'm pretty sure that the CO has to sign off on any all discharges, even honorable ones, and even if you're mustering out at the end of your stint.

My whole point is that you called my position relative, but it is your argument which is based on making 'graduated' moral decisions instead of principled ones. In principle slavery and forceable taxation on ones income are the same.




Governments incentive derives from the incentives of those that control them, the drive of modern China comes from its authoritarian government which uses big businesses (and allies with them) in order to provide people with sustinance and keep them on the government teat, and to enlarge their power base both at home (by controling what products reach their people) and abroad (by backing financial investments made by these firms and providing subsidies).

Force is never an incentive, it is a method. The incentive of the Soviet government or the Legion is made up of the motivations of their leadership (the politburo and Caesar respectively), the Soviet government wanted to maintain its power base and so sought to establish satellites immediately following the Second World War so that it wouldn't be invaded again, the US misread this and countered by establishing a significant military presence in Europe... the Soviets countered and ad nauseam triggering the beginning of the Cold War, with short term goals changing with the change in dictators.

Now you state that in a free society the government provide services that 'the people want'. This is where the real issue begins. Is there any such organization as 'the people'? Can you point out a monolithic unitary being that we know as 'the people'? Of course not it doesn't exist all you have are individuals which organize themselves into groups which look out for their members mutual benefit. So if government begins providing 'services' instead of simply gauranteeing rights it stands that it must provide services that some people (or some of those groups...the majority if you will) want, while others do not want them. But does the government only take taxes from those people who want certain services? No they take them uniformly from the general populace whether or not that individual wants a specific service. What about the people that must provide the service? If the government declares that that particular service is a 'right' (which they invaraibly do) then they are in essence declaring that every individual must have that service free and that the provider of that service has no right to charge what they will for it is no longer their own product but everyones 'property' or 'right'. That is slavery. The Soviets declared that everyone had a 'right' to a job, and since this is not a natural freedom, but one which requires interferences on the part of a specific government (i.e. it incurs a cost) no one had a right to demand a specific wage since all the jobs belonged 'in common'. Workers were not allowed to request what they wanted for their labour, but had to go to work for a price dictated to them. That is slavery. Is this an extreme example? Yes, but it extends even to smaller examples because the principle holds true. If the government should tommorrow declare that everyone has a 'right' to own a vehicle, what do you think will happen? The government will set a price (which violates every law of value and nature) for the vehicle and control the price being asked for by a private enterprise, essentially enslaving the auto-manufacturers. Of course that tiny minority may complain but the majority are satisfied because they get the 'service' or 'product' they desire. That is slavery.




Really? You don't think people (if they truly believed the Legion to be a threat) wouldn't willing donate some money to the NCR's cause of raising a military and also willingly join the military in order to defend their homes? That is the problem with the NCR in this region, they are unwanted and their people at home don't believe in the cause that is why they have to turn to conscription and to forced taxation (slavery) in order to support their military machine. SInce you are so keen on comparing the NCR and the US just look at the US's own history, when did the Republic (the US) begin falling apart? About the time of the Civil War I doubt it is a coincidence that Lincoln had to enforce conscription and suspend Habeus Corpeas and institute what would later be declared an inconstitutional income tax in order to wage his vastly unpopular war of aggression against the seceding southern states. We again see another huge loss of freedom about the time of the First World War when Wilson enacted many of his fascist policies and increased the income tax rate in order to wage his war across the Atlantic, which would come back to bite he and his war-mongering progressives in the (censored) when the Senate refused to ratify the League of Nations. And we can see the radical change that has happened post World War 2 when America began to keep a large permenant standing army, something it hadn't done before.

Republics (that is true republics) do not need a barbarous income tax, because their people will rise up and fund and fight a war effort if it is truly an effective and proper government. We saw that again and again in the US, which is why there was not a large standing army up until after the Second World War. The same would be true of the NCR, when word of Nipton got around (and if the NCR were truly just) the people of the Mojave would probably be more than willing to donate significant amounts of money and enlist in the NCR to defend their homelands, but once the threat passed would probably donate less and would not enlist. Again a sales tax ,in order to 'insure' contracts which is the legitimate purpose of government, is completely acceptable and would be more than enough to pay for legitimate government services.




You have made my argument for me, sir. If taxes and slavery were not the same, how then could one replace the other? This isn't a substition. If taxes are taken forceably to pay for whatever the government wants to spend those funds on, how is it in principle different from their taking the labour straight from the source? There is no difference in principle.




Mine does the same. You just can't seem to realize that if a government or any group of people declare that they have a right to your property regardless to whether or not you want them to have it you have no rights and no freedom. That government or group may decide to throw you a bone and 'grant' you some rights but at the core you have no rights under such a system you only have the illusion of rights which they purposely weave to make you accept your chains with a smile.



No the NCR legilates morality all the same ( I should've been more specific). If taxation is slavery (which it is), and the NCR still declares that it recognizes rights then all it is doing is declaring those specific things 'moral' and that they should be observed because the government says that they should be observed. It isn't actually saying the rights are to be found objectively in the people, remember it has denied this by claiming it has a right to the fruits of their labour (i.e. their life), but just that it grants certain favours because they are 'good'.



If the NCR (government) is following the opinions of those few, which they are or there wouldn't be sharecropping, then this proves the rule of the mob and the selection of winners and losers which is a key defining mark of fascism.






You are correct, as any of you who have served in the military know (and to any of you who may be looking to do so in the future will discover) any time a service member gets out of the military it is refered to officially as a 'discharge'. Even if you are just not re-enlisting it is still recorded as an 'honorable discharge' and has to be signed off by various officers.

I wish people would stop bringing up Bitter Springs as an example of NCR being horrible. When I talked to the people who were involved in the operation they were constantly moping about what happened. I honestly got the sense that they felt terrible about the incident. However when you talk to the Khans about what led up to the event they casually mention how they preyed upon NCR Caravans and in general had no regard for the people they killed. The Khans are/were little more than egotistical hypocritical punks who brought Bitter Springs upon their group. It's unfortunate that the members of the tribe who were least guilty had to suffer for the actions of their warriors.

As for the Legion, it does tend towards the irredeemable, which is somewhat disappointing as it makes the choice of who to side with less challenging for those who want to genuinely help the people of the Wasteland. Perhaps in the future, when Caesar is canonically dead, an Augustus can rise from the resulting civil war and keep the ruthless military efficiency but make the Empire a more nuanced entity that has clear advantages over the NCR and other civilizing groups despite their imperialism and commitment to "purity". Heck, it may be an interesting expansion that deals entirely with the aftermath of the invasion and the Legion's future.

If you remember Nipton, you have to remember WHO it was they were slaughtering. They were, in fact, not slaughtering innocent civilians, but instead Powder Gangers, morally despicable people who were trying to trap the PGs in a trap to murder them, wh*res and other raiders. If the Legion had did it to, say, Goodsprings, your point would be completely justifiable and accurate, but in the case of Nipton it isn't. The Legion doesn't slaughter innocent civilians, just raiders and people of morally corrupt standings.

I point to Bitter Springs as NCR command being no better than the Legion in many respects. Sure the actual men on the ground hated "just following orders" (nurnburg defense anyone?) and gunning down women and children. But I get the impression that there was no radio miscommunication, NCR command decided the khans had to be killed to the man and they used the rangers to do it.

NCR also, as I pointed out, has apparently been taking what they want all across california and nevada, numerous NPCs comment that NCR really isn't into asking, be it farmland, technology, a power reactor. The Brotherhood of Steel have been one of the true actual "good guys" of the series, very rarely if ever being actually "evil" and the NCR just slaughtered them, both in the war over technology and on the smaller scale at the Battle of Helios.