The Revolution Will Not Be Civilized: Difference between revisions

* In ''[[The Baader Meinhoff Complex]]'', the Red Army Faction morphs into this trope over time. They start as a motley collection of political activists, juvenile delinquents, left-wing youths, and journalists who mainly participate in protests and rallies and undertake some occasional arson and vandalism with a political message. Eventually, they become brutal terrorists, robbing banks and bombing American military installations. Later "generations" of the group get progressively more radical and violent, taking and executing hostages, hijacking aircraft, bombing a newspaper, and assassinating and kidnapping public figures.

* In contrast to the rebels of the later films, the Separatists in the ''[[Star Wars]]'' prequels are almost entirely shown as being evil. Their rebellion against the republic is little more than a big business backed attempt to rule the galaxy in the name of profit, with all of the big names fully aware of this. Being controlled by a [[Evil Overlord|sith lord]] and a [[Cybernetics Eat Your Soul|homicidal cyborg]] certainly didn't help their causes reputation either. It's only the planets that revolt against the Republic in hope of receiving Confederacy assistance that actually believe in the moral cause beyond lip service.

* The Bolsheviks in ''[[Doctor Zhivago]]''.

* Franco's revolutionaries in ''[[Pan's Labyrinth]]''.

* AVALANCHE in the ''[[Final Fantasy VII]]'' games are the protagonists, but certainly not civilized -- ''[[Final Fantasy VII]]'' itself starts with these rampaging eco-terrorists committing a massive bombing, killing a lot of innocent people -- and then the next day, they do it all over again! Not to mention the fact that some of the members (read: Barret) act thuggishly when ''not'' on the job too.

** That's the revived AVALANCHE. The original incarnation of AVALANCHE seen in ''[[Before Crisis Final Fantasy VII]]'' was far more ruthless.

* ''[[Armored Core]]'' is filled a bunch of extremely violent rebel movements who are either a) A fake movement or b) plans to start their rebellion by causing as much destruction.

* ''[[Just Cause (video game)|Just Cause 2]]'' has The Reapers led by Bolo Santosi and the Ular Boys led by Sri Iriwan. The path to "revolution" for both is to get Rico Rodriguez to, in Bolo's own words, turn Panau into a "smoldering ruin".

* The revolution in ''[[Valkyria Chronicles II]]'' is essentially a racial purge led by racist nobles opposing the Archduchess for revealing her Darcsen ([[Fantasy Counterpart Culture]] equivalent of Jews) roots. Later on, it's revealed that {{spoiler|it's really just a coup for Count Gassenarl to usurp the throne.}}

* The mage revolt in ''[[Dragon Age 2]]'' is very brutal, and when [[Only Sane Man|Thrask]] goes down the hotheads take control and run away with it.

* ''[[Tech Infantry]]'' has various rebel factions, from the Christian Federation and their penchant for suicide-ramming freighters into enemy vessels, to the Liberation and their campaign of terror-bombings. Even the Resistance has as their main gripe the fact that supernaturally-powered humans are forced to serve in the Tech Infantry [[Space Marine]] forces. These forces are fighting against [[Bug War|alien Bugs]] that want to eat everyone, other aliens that want to kill all humans and take their planets as living space, and still other aliens who want to enslave humans and work them all to death. This makes their occasionally violent tactics seem a bit extreme.<br /><br />Although the Earth Federation and the Middle Kingdom that replaces it are both quite nasty, the aliens -- especially the Bugs -- are usually worse, and the endless rebellions, mutinies, and civil wars make it darn hard to fight the Bugs as a united front.

* ''[[A World of Laughter, A World of Tears]]'' sees the nonviolent Civil Rights Movement collapse thanks to a drastic misreading of the political climate by President Disney. Martin Luther King, Jr. gets publicly egged, destroying his credibility, and the movement falls under control of the Nation of Islam. One word: ''jihad''.

* Both this trope and it's inverse characterize the Red May Revolution in ''[[Reds]]!'' While the communist revolution in America doesn't lead to a Soviet style nightmare, it is far from a tea party. The revolutionaries may have the moral high ground in the face of the dictatorial reaction by the old regime, but they still have their own Red Terror and [[Kangaroo Court]] system. Anti-authoritarian currents in American society appear to have won out by the present day, as the Red Terror seems to be pretty universally regarded as a mistake.

** Jet's Freedom Fighters are not a particularly nice bunch. Despite being a charming group of kids who initially help out Team Avatar, they're actually willing to do pretty terrible things to wipe out the Fire Nation. At one point, they attempt to flood a town filled with innocent civilians, simply because the Fire Nation was occupying it. To their credit, the group realizes their mistake and makes a [[Heel Face Turn]] shortly after the flooding fiasco. Despite [[The Atoner|efforts to do the same]], Jet himself ends up stuck in the [[Heel Face Revolving Door]], though he eventually ends up on the right side.

** The Omashu Resistance also does some unscrupulous things in their efforts to drive out the Fire Nation occupying their city. The first thing we see them do is attempt an assassination of the governor's family, including his infant son. Again, they perform a [[Heel Face Turn]] shortly afterwards.

* The Decepticons from ''[[Transformers]]'' are occasionally this, depending on the incarnation.

* The Supertrooper riot in ''[[Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers|Galaxy Rangers]]''. They were [[Super Soldier|created from birth to be living weapons]]. A [[Corrupt Bureaucrat]] circulates [[Psycho Serum]] in the barracks, and the Troopers go berserk, believing that their creators are out to kill them. With the sole exception of the youngest (who was at the shooting range at the time), they all go [[Phlebotinum Rebel]], ''kill'' one of their handlers on-screen (possibly more off-screen), and escape.

* The Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka.

* The [[English Civil War|"English" "Civil Wars"]]. The romanticized view paints this as a falling-out between King and Parliament leading to several battles and ending with the King's unfortunate execution followed by an "interregnum" during which England is ruled by the firm-but-fair Oliver Cromwell before eventually ending in an inevitable restoration and the new King and Parliament making peace. The actual history has an incompetent, tyrannical King dragging his country into a bloody, fractious civil war and who refuses to compromise with Parliament despite his eventual defeat (after seven years of warfare!) leading to his execution, the abolition of the monarchy and the institution of a republic.<br /><br />The republic leads to an autocracy, then the republic again, then a monarchical restoration followed by further political upheaval, another King overthrown, a parliamentary-appointed monarchy and the overthrown line seeking to regain the throne at which they make two serious attempts. All in all, the civil strife started in 1642 continued to have repercussions, on and off, well into the next millennium if one includes Cromwell's [[Reign of Terror]] in Ireland.<br /><br />England did get this nicely out of the way early however. During the Victorian/Regency period politicians made a point of creating a revolution slowly and bloodlessly through the changing of government policy. They'd seen what happened in France and really didn't like it.

* During the Iranian Revolution in 1979, almost everyone from communists to religious fundamentalists worked together to overthrow the Shah. As soon as they won, control of the country boiled down to who had the largest number of organized thugs out on the streets. The Islamic socialists having lost their main leader, Ali Shariati, to a [[Secret Police|SAVAK]] assassin's bullet in England in 1978, they couldn't organize their thugs well enough to enforce their will, and fanatical Khomeinist Islamists won the day. The Khomeinists promptly purged the country shortly after they clinched power.

* A lesser known part of Japanese history: United Red Army and Japanese Red Army. URA was a domestic terrorist group, who ended up [[We ARE Struggling Together!|killing mostly its own members during a siege at a mountain hotel]]. JRA is mostly known for its affiliation with the Popular Front for Liberation of Palestine.

* The [[Spanish Civil War]]. Full stop. While atrocities of Nationalist Spain and the supporting forces sent by Nazi Germany and Italy to fight against the Republic are well-known (especially as popularized by Picasso's Guernica) such as the bombing of Guernica by the [[Nazi Germany|German]] Condor Legion and the [[Fascist Italy|Italian]] Aviazione Legionaria along with the alarmingly casual views the Nationalists had on massacring those who had, or had been accused of collaborating with the Republicans, the Second Spanish Republic and its supporters were not angels themselves. The Republic's habits of violently enforcing its secular, anti-clerical policies (by destroying churches and murdering priests in particular) are generally not as well-known. George Orwell, who served in the International Brigades, commented in his works about how he found himself frightened of his own allies in the conflict. The late era of the Second Republic in particular was defined by an increasing move towards the Republic's biggest supporter: the Soviet Union with all the red terror that entailed. The Soviet [[State Sec|NKVD]] (the secret police and intelligence service, the predecessor of the KGB) in particular were busy little bees during the Spanish Civil War and provided their services as interrogators and counterespionage agents extensively for Republican Spain. Ultimately, a deeper study of the Spanish Civil War doesn't give a very clear case of "good guys and bad guys" as one would think.

* The Egyptian government attempted to [[Invoked Trope|invoke]] this during the Revolution of 2011, by withdrawing the police forces and opening the prisons, causing violence and havoc. The people weren't fooled: they formed local defense associations to fight back the criminals, and virtually all of the actual protesters calling for the downfall of the regime were entirely peaceful.

* Syria teeters to this and civil war, the Syrain opposition are armed with whatever weapons they can get against the Syrian army, who ruthlessly gun down anyone who opposses Assad's rule. Meanwhile Assad seems oblivious as to all of the fighting that's going on.