Further question about Yeerks.

[Chad32]

Usually, the Yeerks are really big on keeping things covert. When people get loose, they race to eliminate them. But does it really matter? For the most part, Humans don't believe in aliens. If some crazy person popped up once in a while to yell about Yeerks, would it have really been that big of a security risk?

In book 7, part of the reason the Anis don't see a bunch of people spreading the word about Yeerks is because they were silenced. In book 45, they tried to kill Marco and his dad when his dad escaped.

Now if they already control a large portion of the local media and police force, why would a handful of escapees getting loose over the course of a few years threaten security?

Of course then you have Karen, who is the exception to the rule. Judging from book 7, you would think she'd be taken again within hours of her return home.

I know the Yeerks need to be covert, but I think they take it a little too serious most of the time.

[DinosaurNothlit]

Yeah, that's a good point.  They were, sometimes, a little too stringent on security.

Part of it might be that you can't just discredit everyone as "crazy."  I mean, you might have a guy whose friends know him as a very sane, very rational, reasonable person.  And so, when he starts sanely, rationally, and reasonably explaining the existance of aliens, his friends, at least, might grow suspicious.  And then they'd spread the word to their friends, and so on.

And even if you actually do manage to write off all the whistle-blowers as "crazy," you would still have the problem that all these so-called crazy people are using the same terms over and over.  Hmm, how come all these different psychos are suddenly talking about Yeerks and Hork-Bajir?

There's plenty of conspiracy nuts out there in the good 'ol human race.  There are loads of people who would spot those inconsistencies, and leap to exactly the correct conclusion: that there's an alien invasion, and that it's being covered up.  Yeah, one or two conspiracy nuts probably wouldn't be a problem, but if you get enough of them, and they band together . . .

As a final note, I would like to point out the website in book #16.  As crazy-conscious as the Yeerks were about security, they apparently still managed to not even be careful enough.

[Adrian Malacoda]

Perhaps some of them don't "pop up" to talk about Yeerks. Any rational person would know that any other rational person would take a story about brain-stealing slugs with a grain of salt. Maybe they're sneakier than that. Maybe they have a smoking gun, something that can prove the existence of Yeerks. The location of the pool, perhaps, or they escaped holding a Dracon beam.

Speaking of which, maybe they were worried that one of 'em "Andalite bandits" could find out something from an escapee.

[musicman88]

It's better to be safe than sorry...

[Fwahm]

It boils down to this.

If one man escapes, shouting about aliens, you'd call him crazy.
If another man escapes, shouting about the exact same aliens, you'd get suspicious.

[Kelly]

I always wondered why Karen was never taken when she returned home.

[VisserZer0]

I think the reason for that is people are more likely to listen to an adult than an eight(?) year-old little girl. Little kids are always telling weird stories like that.

[Stephquiem]

Also, with Karen, she didn't necessarily go running around telling everyone about the Yeerks. She could've just gone home and lived out life like she would have if she'd never been infested in the first place.

The problem with the controllers in... I thought it was book 8?... is that they weren't being freed by choice (that is, their Yeerks were dying, not choosing to free them like Aftran with Karen), so they were out in the open, probably feeling pretty great about being freed and seeing the thing that had been controlling them die. The ones we saw weren't exactly quiet about it.

On that note--we only know about the controllers whose Yeerks died when they were in public. What happened to ones who could keep it hush-hush?

[powertrash]

I always wondered why Karen was never taken when she returned home.

KASU. It's the only logical explanation, if a screw up explains the need for a happy ending. It seems that's why the Animorphs didn't spend much time trying to free individual people, save the first few books. Because once they were free, the yeerks would know and re-infest/kill the host body.

[Dameg]

I always wondered why Karen was never taken when she returned home.

KASU. It's the only logical explanation, if a screw up explains the need for a happy ending. It seems that's why the Animorphs didn't spend much time trying to free individual people, save the first few books. Because once they were free, the yeerks would know and re-infest/kill the host body.

I wrote something about it in my fanfiction, to try to find an explanation. I supposed that she succeed to convince her parents to leave and "disappear", change their identity, all that stuff. How she actually would be able to do that, I really don't know lol But I tried to correct some KASU like that...

[Phoenix004]

It boils down to this.

If one man escapes, shouting about aliens, you'd call him crazy.
If another man escapes, shouting about the exact same aliens, you'd get suspicious.

Exactly. Especially if there was no connection between the two besides being Controllers. That would make anyone suspicious that something weird was going on. They aren't likely to think that brain stealing aliens are invading the planet, but it's perfectly reasonable for them to suspect some kind of underground cult, which could eventually lead them to The Sharing. How awesome would it have been if someone working for the CIA or something stumbled onto the conspiracy and managed to start an anti-Yeerk taskforce? 

One thing you might be forgetting is that in #17 a "crazy" man ranting about Yeerks was put in a mental hospital and the Yeerks never tried to silence him. I assume it's because he tried to kill himself and therefore was publicly labelled insane. Other Controllers were most likely in positions of power (or were at least known to be completely sane) so some people might have taken them more seriously than the ravings of a suicidal madman.

[powertrash]

You know that YouTube video, Jizz In My Pants? I'm reading through this post, thinking "Yeerks in my head" in the same tune.

 

[goom]

It boils down to this.

If one man escapes, shouting about aliens, you'd call him crazy.
If another man escapes, shouting about the exact same aliens, you'd get suspicious.

well-said. if enough people mention the yeerks, it'll arouse suspicion.
if everybody knew about the threat, it'd be rather irritating for the yeerks.
too many unneeded host deaths.

why didn't just take a few hundred controllers back to the homeplanet and breed like mad?
in a few centuries, it should be sufficient to cover a lot of yeerks.
i guess they got greedy. they wanted too many, too soon.

[Stephquiem]

It boils down to this.

If one man escapes, shouting about aliens, you'd call him crazy.
If another man escapes, shouting about the exact same aliens, you'd get suspicious.

well-said. if enough people mention the yeerks, it'll arouse suspicion.
if everybody knew about the threat, it'd be rather irritating for the yeerks.
too many unneeded host deaths.

why didn't just take a few hundred controllers back to the homeplanet and breed like mad?
in a few centuries, it should be sufficient to cover a lot of yeerks.
i guess they got greedy. they wanted too many, too soon.

They couldn't take them back to the homeworld. It was surrounded by the Andalite fleet.

Quantum virus = less hork-bajir (maybe they're slow breeders? I don't know)

Taxxons... how many yeerks REALLY want to be taxxons? Yeah.

So... 6+ billion humans? Works much better.

[voodooqueen126]

Was the yeerk homeworld blockaded by the andalites for the whole war? I mean wasn't Garoff and the council there?