Why didn't the Yeerks ever use religion?

[Blazing Angel]

You wanna bet? their was that time I ran up on stage in the middle of an assembly and I ran up on stage and screamed "EVERYONE! DANCE!" and nothing.

[Saphire]

XD Well there's quite an easy explanation to that:

Nobody followed you. =P

[Blazing Angel]

but I was wearing my hypno glasses that i ordered off of a superman comic!

[ko ko]

i was under the impression it doesn't hurt for the yeerk to enter if it doesn't want it to.

i think a better place than baptism, at least for catholics, would be in the confession booth.

[Hikaru]

I dont think many people would do that (And where in revelations if this found?) Then they would be forced to do it

People rewrite the bible all the time in some branched off faiths and cults. If we're talking about every religion though, look at where the sacred writings come from, Mormons he pulled it out of the ground, Islam from that prophet, etc. If the religion angle was done well enough and all resources exhausted, it would have been a great way to 'pull the wool over humanities eye's so to speak.

They would just need to infest some high ranking leaders such as the Pope, or religious branch offices. Have them say that the yeerks are a messenger sent from 'so and so prophet,' and that by accepting one they are now closer to god or can directly talk to him, or will go to heaven, or whatever else we can come up with.

I mean look at Jonestown as example in history, they convinced everyone to suicide with kool aid in order to go to heaven. Now replace suicide with infestation.

I only thought of this question because at those conventions it's like 10,000 people that go a year. If at every convention people were led to be infested... Well my state would practically be half empty.

[Chad32]

I would think to stop readers from think KA believes religion is evil. If people think the series is supposed to be a big anti religion metaphor, then it would be really bad PR.

[Hikaru]

But I'm not trying to say religion is evil. I'm trying to say if the evil guys used it for evil purposes, they could have gotten further in their invasion.

[Blazing Angel]

You are amking very good points but I dont think people are gullible enough to let a slug crawl in their heads

[Aquilai]

To be honest the Yeerks definitely could have taken a more active approach to infestation. It just suited the story that the Yeerks weren't "too" powerful. Unlike government positions, religious leaders would be ideal targets since they're less protected. Once you control the leaders and the followers don't notice the difference then you control the followers. I can't imagine it would be difficult for the Yeerks to convert a confession booth into a Yeerkification booth. They don't have to be so obvious as "Put one of these in your ear! Your chosen deity demands it!"

The idea of incorporating the Yeerks as a part of religion/belief system may attract unwanted attention from law or intelligence agencies (home grown terrorism). Even science background civilians might be inclined to examine how a slug can help you become spiritually enlightened. Don't get me wrong I'm not saying this couldn't work I am already picturing several tv/movies scenes where a whole town is under control by a cult or alien influence. They'd just have be very cautious.

Something that the Yeerks should have done early on was to infiltrate the medical institutions (doctors, dentists, etc). Except for those incredibly fortunate (or unfortunate) virtually everyone who is capable of seeing a doctor eventually does. It wouldn't take too much to restrain a single patient at a time to infest them with a Yeerk. Of course perhaps the Yeerks only want "healthy" humans but almost everyone goes to the doctors eventually. You would also expect that the Yeerks would have studied human physiology for compatibility so they wouldn't or rather shouldn't be squeamish using such an effective host harvesting technique.

[Blazing Angel]

nope

[TobiasMasonPark]

     Um...what do you mean, nope?

     THAT'S your argument to his above adequate response? 

     You aren't going to try to refute his ideas? Just nope? We're supposed to take your word for it?

[Blazing Angel]

I dont even remember what I was syaing nope about.

[NateSean]

Visser One had a good bean on human psychology. If we take the focus away from KA Applegate and keep it within the story universe, if Visser One had never handed the planet over to V3 she may full well have explored the religion option as well as developing the Sharing.

Alas, it probably wasn't entirely her decision since there were thirteen people who were kind of above her and she had used Earth as her "Please Don't Kill Me for Going Awol" card.

Early Stargate and the early seasons of Stargate SG-1 explored the idea of an alien species using religion and human fear of a higher power to control and subjugate the human species. It made for some very interesting storylines.

It's too bad the writers got so bored that they had to call in the Farscape cast to save it.

[RAFrukh]

There isnt pain when a Yeerks crawls in your ear, it secrets a sort of anesthetic.

I'm actually going to a Convention of Jehovahs Witnesses this weekend, and I can promise you that enough people will be going to give the Yeerks a small ARMY. if every controller taken was armed with a dracon, they could make them their special task force and the Animorphs wouldn't stand a chance - way too many people.

I do agree that the reason it's probably not in Animorphs is probably very basic; KA did t want to offend any particular religion, because the vast majority of them have the time, money, tempers, and will to sue her into her grave. Otherwise, she probably would've.

[crystalclear]

The thing is I think Christianity is the only religion that baptizes people, especially with that water thing. I don't think any other religion use that method.