# The Politics of "Avatar" **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [January 19, 2010, 8:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541 "2010-01-19T08:26:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Zephyurs](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/dfb087/32.png) [@Zephyurs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zephyurs)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 6:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541/41 "2010-01-20T06:24:30Z")
> [@Lantern](#): > > Yes, there is nothing to suggest that nuclear extermination is a realistic possibility in the context of the film. Remember this is just a corporation; there is no particular reason to believe they would be given access to nuclear weapons . And there isn’t much reason to believe that the Earth government or public would have much sympathy for the corporation. There was an interesting, subtle story in the forests of Pandora. It’s too bad Cameron didn’t bother to find it. We don’t really know the deal behind unobtainium, besides it’s worth a fortune. If something’s worth a fortune, that means it fulfills a genuine human need. Even if you’ve got something like cocaine, people are more than willing to look the other way and allow families and entire cultures to be destroyed over it (cf. Colombia). It might not be explicit celebration, but the modern world is amazing at conscious ignorance and rationalization. Imagine an Earth centuries from now, wracked by peak oil and global warming. Humanity seems to have split into a powerful super rich, with access to the remaining natural resources, and the vast mass of humanity, with little access to power or hope for economic advancement. But suddenly on a faraway planet a room temperature superconductor is found that offers a chance for the salvation of mankind (insert technobabble here). The initial human exploratory mission, however, ends in tragedy as a group of Pandoran aborigines slaughter the entire crew, including families and children, who mistakenly landed in the middle of some sacred spot or another. Weak attempt at a story, but I’m not being paid millions for it. Now, if you can’t see people feeling sympathy for being rough on the natives, who’ve rejected point blank all attempts at interaction or trade for a material we so desperately need, you don’t understand how people think when their own interests are at stake. It’s quite easy to come up with a story that has good motives on both sides that still ends in evil and bloodshed (which isn’t to say both sides have to be ultimately in the right). But Cameron took the easy way out and made one group devils and the other angels. Which is why the politics of the movie come off as so infantile. ---
**Author:** ![ShibbOleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/848f3c/32.png) [@ShibbOleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ShibbOleth)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 6:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541/42 "2010-01-20T06:40:14Z")
> [@Lobohan](#): > > To risk sounding like a broken record, we could destroy Saudi Arabia tomorrow and have their oil for our own. Why don’t we do it? Because the social and political costs are too great. And we don’t picture ourselves as viking raiders. No matter how valuable unobtanium is, people aren’t going to turn away from their self-image as good civilized people. There is also a belief that the Saudis have rigged their oil fields to be unusable in the event of an invasion. There’s a lot of stuff out there on this, but [here’s a link to a WSJ article that mentions it as matter-of-fact](http://www.globalpolicy.org/component/content/article/198/40211.html). FWIW, the place where I first heard this idea didn’t imply that it was rigged against the USA per se, but against competing local interests. Could also be untrue or even a rumor that the Saudis conveniently started. Since the Sauds are fairly ruthless, it wouldn’t surprise me if they didn’t trust our inherent good nature and self image. ---
**Author:** ![Lantern](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/d26b3c/32.png) [@Lantern](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lantern)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 6:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541/43 "2010-01-20T06:45:53Z")
Well it’s perfectly possible for something to be valuable without being essential to your economy. Gold, diamonds, pearls etc. So one could imagine a diamond company getting into a fight with some natives over a diamond deposit but that doesn’t mean the government will automatically back them up and and exterminate the natives. It really depends on the time and place and the nature of the government. ---
**Author:** ![Equipoise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/equipoise/32/151_2.png) [@Equipoise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Equipoise)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 7:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541/44 "2010-01-20T07:01:15Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > Who’s glued to the details? Why is it necessary to keep making up stuff that wasn’t in the movie? B (nah, never mind) ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 7:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541/45 "2010-01-20T07:36:35Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > They may not have had nukes, but their various aircraft were just bristling with guided missiles and whatnot, which stretches the word “defensive” pretty far. In a world with _dragons_ in it? Me, I wouldn’t leave that base without\* at least\* a minigun, _Predator_-style. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 8:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541/46 "2010-01-20T08:56:54Z")
> [@Zephyurs](#): > > It’s quite easy to come up with a story that has good motives on both sides that still ends in evil and bloodshed (which isn’t to say both sides have to be ultimately in the right). But Cameron took the easy way out and made one group devils and the other angels. Which is why the politics of the movie come off as so infantile. But he didn’t do that. Not all the humans were devils. And showing a corporation as being ruthlessly devoted to profit regardless of the cost to others isn’t showing them as devils; it’s showing them as they are; like they act all the time. And frankly, given human historical behavior if he wanted to make them look like devils, he could have made the humans far worse and still been able to point to history as justification. He could have had the humans hunt the Na’vi for sport, and had them make articles out of Na’vi leather and pointed to the historical British treatment of the Tasmanians for justification, for example. By comparison to the history of imperialistic behavior Avatar was fairly soft. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 9:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541/47 "2010-01-20T09:25:31Z")
The only reason I can see for hating it for being an Iraq parable (if that’s what it is, or resembles) would be _if you didn’t consider the whole business of Iraq to be one massive clusterfuck_. ---
**Author:** ![Condescending\_Robot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a183cd/32.png) [@Condescending\_Robot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Condescending_Robot)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 10:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541/48 "2010-01-20T10:17:12Z")
Eh, one can oppose US involvement with the Vietnam War and still roll one’s eyes at the whole black-and-white EEEEEVIL KKORPORATIONS vs. virtuous, upright natives depiction of the whole thing. I suppose if you read Avatar as an Iraq analogy, the same process could occur. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541/49 "2010-01-20T14:27:33Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > -There’s a ticking-clock element - the bulldozers will be at the big tree in a few months and if the Na’vi haven’t moved by then, there’s no indication that it’ll be “okay, we’ll turn around and go somewhere else”. > > -When things get bad enough, and with no consultation with (or indeed an evident consideration of) Earth-based authority, the corporation will (though perhaps not cheerfully) allow the marine/mercs to blow the crap out of the Na’vi. > > There is simply no point coming up with some reason why the corporation _can’t_ slaughter the Na’vi _because we see them trying very hard to slaughter the Na’vi_. I can buy that the corporation isn’t happy about this, but whatever sadness they feel sure ain’t stopping them. But if there is no downside to slaughtering the Na’vi, why would the corporation hesitate at all? Why are they bothering to include very expensive Avatar teams and scientists in their mission? Why do they even attempt to negotiate? Why wait a few months rather than go in right away? All this indicates that the corporation is under some form of accountability. It is pretty explicitly stated in the movie that the corporation is under some pressure from the Earth government and from the public to treat the Na’vi decently. The corporation is trying to get away with something they know won’t fly back on Earth. By destroying the Home Tree and Tree of Souls they are trying to establish “facts on the ground” that will allow them to continue to exploit the unobtanium there even after the news gets back to Earth. > [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > In lieu of a Na’vi-sympathetic news agency, how would the future American-equivalents even know about this? Vague stories might get back years afterward, when it’s too late to do anything about it. There are scientists with the team who are sympathetic to the Na’vi and who will at some point rotate home. The corporation may be able to censor communications from Pandora, but unless they unlawfully imprison the scientists (or murder them) word will eventually get back to Earth - and it won’t be “vague rumors,” it will be first-hand, eyewitness accounts. Some of the support staff, like Trudy, will also be sympathetic. Not everyone on Pandora is a corporation executive or member of the security forces; there must be plenty of technicians and other people who could potentially rat them out. Of course, once the Na’vi have won in the movie their human sympathizers who remain on Pandora have access to uncensored faster-than-light communications with Earth. They will have six years to broadcast word of what the corporation has done before the survivors return to Earth. As soon as they return they will be subject to an intensive inquiry. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 2:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541/50 "2010-01-20T14:41:29Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > But if there is no downside to slaughtering the Na’vi, why would the corporation hesitate at all? Why are they bothering to include very expensive Avatar teams and scientists in their mission? Why do they even attempt to negotiate? Why wait a few months rather than go in right away? > > All this indicates that the corporation is under some form of accountability. It is pretty explicitly stated in the movie that the corporation is under some pressure from the Earth government and from the public to treat the Na’vi decently. The corporation is trying to get away with something they know won’t fly back on Earth. By destroying the Home Tree and Tree of Souls they are trying to establish “facts on the ground” that will allow them to continue to exploit the unobtanium there even after the news gets back to Earth. Wasn’t this explained (briefly) in the movie? - I thought someone said (something to the effect that) it would be easiest to wade in and wipe them out, but that would be bad PR, and the stockholders were wary of that. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541/51 "2010-01-20T15:11:07Z")
> [@Mangetout](#): > > Wasn’t this explained (briefly) in the movie? - I thought someone said (something to the effect that) it would be easiest to wade in and wipe them out, but that would be bad PR, and the stockholders were wary of that. Yes, I’m pretty sure that was explicitly stated in the movie (or something to that effect). This sort of thing happens all the time today where mining or oil companies are operating in remote areas, especially in the tropics. The local operatives find it convenient to wipe out or otherwise come down hard on the natives, even though it is against government or company policy. They hope to cover it up and get away with it. But often enough word gets out and then the shit hits the fan. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541/52 "2010-01-20T15:43:24Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > But if there is no downside to slaughtering the Na’vi, why would the corporation hesitate at all? Why are they bothering to include very expensive Avatar teams and scientists in their mission? Why do they even attempt to negotiate? Why wait a few months rather than go in right away? Well, they’re very explicitly _not_ “waiting”. The delay is just the time it takes to get the heavy mining equipment to the tree site. Actually, on reflection, it’s kind of odd that the nature-attuned Na’vi are caught by surprise by the giant slow-moving bulldozers crunching their way through the forest, but I figure that’s just another plot hole overlooked for dramatic purposes. So the corporation guys waited, hoping the problem would just go away before they got there. It didn’t, and things got nasty. As for the reason there are anthropologists and avatars at all, fine, we can assume there’s some kind of reason the corporation supports them. But the anthropologists aren’t running the show, clearly, nor are whoever or whatever forced their inclusion. > [@](#): > > All this indicates that the corporation is under some form of accountability. It is pretty explicitly stated in the movie that the corporation is under some pressure from the Earth government and from the public to treat the Na’vi decently. The corporation is trying to get away with something they know won’t fly back on Earth. By destroying the Home Tree and Tree of Souls they are trying to establish “facts on the ground” that will allow them to continue to exploit the unobtanium there even after the news gets back to Earth. We don’t clearly know at all what will or won’t fly on Earth. I could buy hemming and hawing and such and denouncing speeches made by elected officials, but simultaneously I could buy considerable pressure brought to bear by whoever’s profiting from unobtatnium mining. An analogy far more more accurate than the “nuke Saudi Arabia” guff is various mining projects in North America that have displaced or caused environmental contamination for aboriginal populations. Sure, there’s a lot of “That’s terrible!” observations, but the projects, by and large, went through anyway. > [@](#): > > There are scientists with the team who are sympathetic to the Na’vi and who will at some point rotate home. The corporation may be able to censor communications from Pandora, but unless they unlawfully imprison the scientists (or murder them) word will eventually get back to Earth - and it won’t be “vague rumors,” it will be first-hand, eyewitness accounts. Some of the support staff, like Trudy, will also be sympathetic. Not everyone on Pandora is a corporation executive or member of the security forces; there must be plenty of technicians and other people who could potentially rat them out. Let them. We’re given no firm information that anyone on Earth will care, or at least anyone who matters. > [@](#): > > Of course, once the Na’vi have won in the movie their human sympathizers who remain on Pandora have access to uncensored faster-than-light communications with Earth. They will have six years to broadcast word of what the corporation has done before the survivors return to Earth. As soon as they return they will be subject to an intensive inquiry. And the sequel might take that route, showing how the bad guys get punished in a series of trials and lawsuits. That’s boring, though, so I’ll speculate that the twin brother of Colonel Quaritch will travel to Pandora, seeking revenge. He’ll also have an avatar, a _big_ one, and it’ll be all “Hulk smash!” and whatnot, and the film will end with the humans having the upper hand. But Sully, though he’s lost a hand, has been training in the Na’vi ways of the Jedi, and he will return… ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541/53 "2010-01-20T16:58:46Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > Well, they’re very explicitly _not_ “waiting”. The delay is just the time it takes to get the heavy mining equipment to the tree site. Actually, on reflection, it’s kind of odd that the nature-attuned Na’vi are caught by surprise by the giant slow-moving bulldozers crunching their way through the forest, but I figure that’s just another plot hole overlooked for dramatic purposes. Did you see the same movie I did? They explicitly waited six months to give Jake a chance to negotiate with the Na’vi. They could have moved the mining equipment in at any time. > [@](#): > > So the corporation guys waited, hoping the problem would just go away before they got there. It didn’t, and things got nasty. As for the reason there are anthropologists and avatars at all, fine, we can assume there’s some kind of reason the corporation supports them. But the anthropologists aren’t running the show, clearly, nor are whoever or whatever forced their inclusion. Of course you can speculate on what _might_ be the case based on what is explicitly shown in the movie, but we don’t really have to do that. A great deal of background material is provided in [Avatar: A Confidential Report on the Biological and Social History of Pandora](http://www.amazon.com/Avatar-Confidential-Biological-History-Camerons/dp/0061896756/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1264006060&sr=8-1), which was produced in cooperation with Cameron. The corporation, RDA, operates under a mandate from the Interplanetary Commerce Administration, which stipulates that “they abide by a treaty that prohibits weapons of mass destruction and limits military power in space.” It’s certainly also the ICA that has insisted on the inclusion of the Avatar teams and on decent treatment of the natives. It’s also clear that they could revoke RDA’s permission to operate on Pandora if they violate the terms of the treaty. > [@](#): > > We don’t clearly know at all what will or won’t fly on Earth. I could buy hemming and hawing and such and denouncing speeches made by elected officials, but simultaneously I could buy considerable pressure brought to bear by whoever’s profiting from unobtatnium mining. An analogy far more more accurate than the “nuke Saudi Arabia” guff is various mining projects in North America that have displaced or caused environmental contamination for aboriginal populations. Sure, there’s a lot of “That’s terrible!” observations, but the projects, by and large, went through anyway. > > Let them. We’re given no firm information that anyone on Earth will care, or at least anyone who matters. The book also indicates there is a strong environmental movement on Earth that is already highly critical of the RDA and its operations on Pandora. One can also point to mining and other projects on Earth today that have been stopped or at least delayed due to pressure from indigenous-rights activists and environmentalists; this includes a huge copper mine here in Panama that has been stalled for decades over such issues. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541/54 "2010-01-20T17:39:17Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > Did you see the same movie I did? They explicitly waited six months to give Jake a chance to negotiate with the Na’vi. They could have moved the mining equipment in at any time. Evidently I didn’t, because I recall them saying it would take months for the bulldozers to get there. > [@](#): > > Of course you can speculate on what _might_ be the case based on what is explicitly shown in the movie, but we don’t really have to do that. A great deal of background material is provided in [Avatar: A Confidential Report on the Biological and Social History of Pandora](http://www.amazon.com/Avatar-Confidential-Biological-History-Camerons/dp/0061896756/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1264006060&sr=8-1), which was produced in cooperation with Cameron. Fuck the supplementary material. If I need it to explain away plot holes in the movie, then it’s a failing of the movie. ---
**Author:** ![Red\_Barchetta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/da6949/32.png) [@Red\_Barchetta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Red_Barchetta)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541/55 "2010-01-20T17:41:56Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > Evidently I didn’t, because I recall them saying it would take months for the bulldozers to get there. I too do not recall them saying this line, having seen it twice. I could be wrong, but it seemed clear the delay was political in nature. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541/56 "2010-01-20T17:55:49Z")
> [@Red\_Barchetta](#): > > I too do not recall them saying this line, having seen it twice. I could be wrong, but it seemed clear the delay was political in nature. I’m prepared to admit error (though not to pay to sit through the movie again), but I recall them showing a nifty holographic map of the (rather lengthy) dozers’ path, and since large-scale mining operations in reality are planned months (if not years) in advance, I don’t buy that getting to the big tree is something they could do in a day, or even several days. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541/57 "2010-01-20T18:03:13Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > Fuck the supplementary material. If I need it to explain away plot holes in the movie, then it’s a failing of the movie. You don’t have to explain them away, because they are not “plot holes” in any reasonable sense of the word. You are reaching for explanations based on your own particular viewpoint; other explanations are just as reasonable. A science fiction movie doesn’t have to explain the entire political and social system of its universe. The fact that there are very significant constraints on the actions of the company is both explicit and implicit in many parts of the movie. That’s really all that needs to be conveyed, not the details of the RDA mandate. ---
**Author:** ![Gangster\_Octopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a8b319/32.png) [@Gangster\_Octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gangster_Octopus)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541/58 "2010-01-20T18:32:55Z")
This movie should have been more like “There Will be Blodd” with some power hingry conman coming in and negotiating with the naive Na’vi and then knowoing there is Unobtanium under the tree he takes it illicitly. The end could be, “I DRINK YOUR MILKSHAKE!” Only in Na’vi of course ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Angel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d26b3c/32.png) [@Johnny\_Angel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Angel)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541/59 "2010-01-20T19:03:34Z")
I didn’t find the message-mongering nearly as cringingly bad as that of Ferngully, but I’m sure we got a look at what was really at stake for the humans. Yes, yes, corporate greed, the need to have something impressive to put on a quarterly report, ect. But at the end of the film we hear “They went back to their dying world.” Woah, hold on there. On the one hand, this may buy them out of the obvious problem with the ending (they’re just going to come back with bigger guns, claiming to have been provoked), but it opens up the possibility that the humans might have had a good reason to need this precious material with the stupid name. I don’t think that throwing out “shock and awe” should invoke the Iraq War and its issues so much as that certain attitude that comes with the expression – a notion that everybody everywhere seems to have: when we hit them, they’ll realize whom they’re fucking with, but when they hit us, they only strengthen our resolve. This is an ongoing problem in the real world, because everybody everywhere believes this. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541/60 "2010-01-20T19:16:36Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > You don’t have to explain them away, because they are not “plot holes” in any reasonable sense of the word. You are reaching for explanations based on your own particular viewpoint; other explanations are just as reasonable. It’s not reaching to figure the corporation _can_ exterminate the Na’vi, when we see them _trying_ to exterminate the Na’vi. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-politics-of-avatar/525541.md?page=4)