What happens to the voluntary human controllers after the war post #54?

[Acalio-Laron-Jaham]

surely they would be in some kinda strife with the law.......I mean, what they did was technically treason, wasn't it? Most, if not every country, has a law against treason, and penalties are quite severe. very severe. And these voluntary controllers (excluding those who were working with the yeerk peace movement i.e. tidwell), they were not just being treasonous against their nation, but against the whole planet - and their species.

Would it be too far fetched - or reasonable, to presume or suggest that they get execution or life sentence like what other people throughout history who were guilty and charged with treason got?

[Cloak]

Again with the topic with a subject that I would normally not give a second thought to!  You are starting to remind me of Terenia, Acalio. 

Anyway, on-topic, this is real iffy.  True, that some can call it treasonous.  Others could just claim simple gullibility on the voluntary Controller's part.  I mean, it could, in a way I suppose, be considering kind of a cult.

I don't know.  There are people more familiar with the law than I am.

[MoppingBear]

it being like a cult was pretty much the point.  have you read visser?  that makes it pretty hard to call it treason, at least for all.  what about people like chapman who became voluntary to save his daughter?  but most, like tobias in megamorphs #whatever just joined to be part of something to escape their crappy life, and had no idea what it meant untill after it was too late.

[DinosaurNothlit]

Yeah, it's a fuzzy issue.  There were the occasional person (like Taylor, and the first voluntary controller from Visser) who knew what they were getting into, and went voluntary anyway, in exchange for whatever they thought they got out of it.  Those people were really traitors, and should be treated as such, but how do you tell the difference?  With so many people who didn't know what they were getting into, even the people who really did act as true traitors could just plead ignorance, and nobody would be the wiser, so how could anybody be penalized for it?

And then there are the people who may have started out involuntary, but then eventually just gave up and stopped fighting it, because they figured 'what's the point?'  Should those people be punished too?

I dunno, though.  In the end, what difference did any of those people actually make?  An involuntary controller and a voluntary controller both contribute equally to the invasion.  For all practical purposes, there's no difference.  Versus traitors in real-world situations, actually actively help the enemy, and contribute to their efforts.  But once you're a controller, you can't possibly help the Yeerks any more than you already are, so what's even the point of prosecuting the voluntaries?

[anijen21]

I'd kind of hope after an ordeal like that, we'd just offer amnesty. Move forward, not back you know?

[Acalio-Laron-Jaham]

All of you guys had great points in your replies. True, sometimes its not always black and white, such as those who were forced to be voluntary/go along with it for someone else sake etc. i.e. Chapman, and those who stopped resisting cause their spirits were crushed. But there are some who seem to know exactly what it/they were about - the yeerks and becoming controllers, and volunteer cause they are scum.

what made me think this was in book #29, when cassie morphs the yeerk peace movement member illim and goes into his host, mr. tidwell's head in order to be able to get into the yeerk pool unnoticed to dave aftran from interrogation by visser three. As cassie goes into the yeerk pool, she hears the desperate, sorrowful shouting, screaming and crying of the host bodies, temporarily themselves again for a couple of hours as their yeerks feed in the pool. And then in her narration, she goes she hears something that horrifies her even more - the sound of laughter. In a room were a bunch of people watching 'full house'. They, according to her, were the voluntary controllers.

So I think those people that cassie saw laughing and said were voluntary, deserve to at least face some sort of trial/questioning to explain themselves/their actions. They seem just as bad as that andalite traitor Captain Samilin from #18.

[MoppingBear]

All of you guys had great points in your replies. True, sometimes its not always black and white, such as those who were forced to be voluntary/go along with it for someone else sake etc. i.e. Chapman, and those who stopped resisting cause their spirits were crushed. But there are some who seem to know exactly what it/they were about - the yeerks and becoming controllers, and volunteer cause they are scum.

what made me think this was in book #29, when cassie morphs the yeerk peace movement member illim and goes into his host, mr. tidwell's head in order to be able to get into the yeerk pool unnoticed to dave aftran from interrogation by visser three. As cassie goes into the yeerk pool, she hears the desperate, sorrowful shouting, screaming and crying of the host bodies, temporarily themselves again for a couple of hours as their yeerks feed in the pool. And then in her narration, she goes she hears something that horrifies her even more - the sound of laughter. In a room were a bunch of people watching 'full house'. They, according to her, were the voluntary controllers.

So I think those people that cassie saw laughing and said were voluntary, deserve to at least face some sort of trial/questioning to explain themselves/their actions. They seem just as bad as that andalite traitor Captain Samilin from #18.

but how would you tell them apart? have investigators morph yeerks and go into their head to look at their thoughts and check?

[Acalio-Laron-Jaham]

Not a bad idea russianspy, not a bad idea at all. It may seem unethical, but hey, governments have crossed the lines into the shady gray area for the greater good.

The ends justifies the means. Having human CIA agents or the FBI being morph-capable and morphing into a yeerk and go into the suspects head for a couple of minutes until they learn the truth is a fool proof way and could prove once and for all if that person is 100% innocent or 100% guilty. They could use it for other crimes too. Law enforcement would have a great deal of uses for the yeerks abilities. People have been suggesting it for use in psychology and psychiatry anyway. Why not law enforcement too? It would bring 'beyond reasonable doubt' to a whole new literal level.

[goom]

not about the treasonous aspect, but do you think anybody would mind if a human kept their yeerk after the war?
i think that as long as it was a mutual thing that they should be well-allowed to.

oh, and as for the voluntaries being traitors? i'd say it would vary with each person.
you can't classify all of them one way or the other. each did it for a different reason with different intentions.
(might have been mentioned before in the thread; i kinda skimmed it )

[Acalio-Laron-Jaham]

thats interesting goom. There can be some very lonely people out there and whose to say that one can't become friends with a yeerk? if the yeerk is good and can get along with its host, then i reckon both of them would have great conversation topics. So some may enjoy having a yeerk, like how tidwell and illim eventually enjoyed eachothers company.

[Chad32]

There were some cases like with Tidwell, where the person is voluntary because they like the Yeerk, but still oppose the war. I don't believe that all voluntary controllers are automatically scum, because some people may have personal agreements, or may have lucked out and have a Yeerk that doesn't like the invasion any more than they do. But the Yeerk can't do much of anything because rebelling openly means death. And there are Humans whose lives are so crappy that being a contrller would be a step up.

[Terenia]

Again with the topic with a subject that I would normally not give a second thought to!  You are starting to remind me of Terenia, Acalio. 

I'll take that as a compliment. 

There is no real way to discern whether or not a person was voluntary for a 'good' reason or not. It would be very easy, post-54, to just claim that you were involuntary, even if you were voluntary. Even if you were successfully marked as a voluntary, you could claim that your Yeerk was really a part of the Peace Movement, or had made some sort of pact with you that existed outside of the movement. If you bother drawing the hard line of, voluntary is treason regardless of reason (hehe, that rhymed), then you have to contend with the possibility of a large number of people being convicted - and this isn't like any other large conviction. These people are from all walks of life. Old, young, rich and poor, influential and not, mothers, fathers, brothers and sisters. It's a hard line to draw when it's a war that no one else knew about but the victims/collaborators.

I suppose you could always enlist a few Yeerks to infest the former hosts and find out the truth. But that has its own moral implications.

[Aluminator (Kit)]

Man, the Yeerk defeat would test human morality and established human legal systems on so many levels already... would a US court really try them for treason? I mean, they betrayed all of humanity, not just their home country... somebody with legal knowledge or more Google search motivation than I have at the moment- does that even legally constitute treason anymore? Even if it does, it becomes very difficult to convict along clear-cut lines one way or another, like Terenia's saying...

[Chad32]

I don't like calling it treason. mainly because I think in order to betray someone I think you actually have to swear allegiance first. I mean in realistic terms, if I speak out against illegal immigrants does that mean I'm betraying those people?

I guess you could say it's a betrayal against friends and family, but in that case it's a personal issue. There could be lawsuits, but aside from that I don't think the legal system would be involved much.

[Acalio-Laron-Jaham]

its still traitorous, even if it does not technically fall into the steps of what is normally charged as treason i guess.

As for the 'can one nation, i.e. U.S court try them for treason, "I mean, they betrayed all of humanity, not just their home country..."

I reckon its simple - get a U.N court to try them then, or something similar which represents all of the nations or something. Like how those evil world leaders/dictators (dunno his name, but it was in the 90s, i think he was russian) he was tried by a U.N  court under international law and they called it a international court of something.

So yeah, something along these lines or similar to it could work.