History Main / WorldOfSilence

Usually, this is what happens when the antagonist is certain that the world is a [[CrapsackWorld sick and twisted place]] and that there is no way to make it any better without a complete overhaul. HumansAreBastards is often a main theme in the story. Either way, it is up to the protagonists to try to stop the antagonist before it all goes to hell by showing that people is as cruel and evil as the antagonist thinks they are. If a final battle is involved, it can sometimes be seen as a HumanityOnTrial kind of scenario.

What happens when the WellIntentionedExtremist villain with a UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans thought pattern thinks that the problems of the world lie in TheEvilsOfFreeWill. This is a unique kind of {{Dystopia}}: a world with no conflict and no infighting, but in which people have no emotions and [[AssimilationPlot no sense of self]]. Usually seen as a FateWorseThanDeath for the ''entire world''.

Usually, this is what happens when the antagonist is certain that the world is a [[CrapsackWorld sick and twisted place]] and that there is no way to make it any better without a complete overhaul. HumansAreBastards is often a main theme in the story. Either way, it is up to the protagonists to try to stop the antagonist before it all goes to hell by showing that HumansAreSpecial after all and that not everyone is as mean and cruel as the antagonist thinks they are. If a final battle is involved, it can sometimes be seen as a HumanityOnTrial kind of scenario.

* This was the goal of the Alliance in ''Film/{{Serenity}}'': they pumped happy gas into a planet's air supply, hoping that everyone would become completely docile. What they got was [[spoiler:a planet full of death, as everyone became so docile that they just [[GoneHorriblyRight gave up on living]]. The only survivors suffered the exact ''[[GoneHorriblyWrong opposite]]'' effect, becoming the AxCrazy [[AlwaysChaoticEvil Reavers]]]].

* In ''VideoGame/KnightsOfTheOldRepublicIITheSithLords'', this isn't precisely the goal of [[spoiler:Darth Traya]]. Her ''apparent'' goal ([[UnreliableExpositor which is debated]]) is the [[RageAgainstTheHeavens total destruction of]] the Force as a result of her belief that galactic conflict is [[SentientCosmicForce fueled by it exerting its will on individuals]]. Unfortunately, life pretty much runs on the Force, so the net result would probably be the total destruction of all life in the galaxy, which would lead to this. At ''best'', it would result in all sapient life becoming as [[ReligionOfEvil messed up in the head]] as the [[ScaryDogmaticAliens Yuuzhan Vong]] from ''Literature/NewJediOrder'' who went through exactly this (on a smaller scale) [[SenseLossSadness and never recovered]]. [[spoiler:She was aware of the risks and willing to take them as she saw [[PlayerCharacter the Exile]] as proof that life without it is possible, although failed to take into account how ''desirable'' such a life actually is.]]

What happens when the WellIntentionedExtremist villain with an UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans thought pattern thinks that the problems of the world lie in TheEvilsOfFreeWill. This is a unique kind of {{Dystopia}}: a world with no conflict and no infighting, but in which people have no emotions and [[AssimilationPlot no sense of self]]. Usually seen as a FateWorseThanDeath for the ''entire world''.

What happens here is that the world becomes an empty and silent place. Maybe all humans are extinguished. Maybe they're all put in a stasis or turned into [[EmptyShell mindless beings]]. Maybe the [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt whole world]] is put in a kind of temporal stasis. Whatever happens, it isn't good.

Usually, this is what happens when the antagonist is certain that the world is a [[CrapsackWorld sick and twisted place]] and that there is no way to make it any better without a complete overhaul. HumansAreBastards is often a main theme in the story. Either way, it is up to the protagonists to try to stop the villain before it all goes to hell by showing that HumansAreSpecial after all and that not everyone is as mean and cruel as the antagonist thinks they are. If a final battle is involved, it can sometimes be seen as a HumanityOnTrial kind of scenario.

''Fanfic/ADevilAmongstWorms'': What happens in the BadFuture 3 years from now witnessed by the Simurgh should Makima succeed in TakingOverTheWorld, where conflict and suffering have been eliminated, but so have all traces of individuality and personality among humanity, with the humans of this new world being described as "biological machines", moving in orderly lines and patters without a hint of deviation, akin to ants.

* ''VideoGame/NappleTale'' demonstrates this trope in its HubLevel, Napple Town. Normally bright and cheerful, it gets a creepy, dimly lit makeover, and the normally diverse cast of characters suddenly looks homogeneous, carrying on about how they're "[[HiveMind complete]]" now. [[spoiler:It's all thanks to an AssimilationPlot enacted by a character who seemed like a TricksterMentor up until this point.]]

** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2aSK2JPEBVI The inverse is also true]]; the Chaos Gods are the personification of ''all emotion'', and thus the ForeverWar against them could never truly end (without a massive DeusExMachina from the GodEmperor) as killing them would more or less leave all sapient life {{Empty Shell}}s.

* ''VideoGame/ArTonelico2'': [[spoiler:Infel's]] goal is to sublimate everyone into a LotusEaterMachine where everyone will "live forever inside a dream". Croix points out that this is little different from death.

* Creator/DCComics:
** ''ComicBook/{{Batman}}'': Ra's al Ghul's philosophy has shades of this. He states that he dreams of a world "as clean as the wind-swept dunes" he came from.
** ''ComicBook/NewGods'': The GodOfEvil Darkseid's primary goal is this on a universal scale. He's a HopeCrusher who wants nothing more than to crush people's hope so thoroughly and utterly that there is nothing left but to surrender their free will and give in to him. His plan to accomplish this is to obtain the Anti-Life Equation, a BrownNote that takes the form of [[FormulaicMagic mathematical proof that life is meaningless]], destroying its victims' wills and ensuring none would be left but Darkseid's.
** ''ComicBook/TheSandmanUniverse'' has the title ''The Dreaming'', which gradually reveals a conspiracy to colonize the DreamLand to stamp out "irrational" superstition and fantasy and [[SleepLearning replace dreams with lectures on STEM courses]] in a [[WellIntentionedExtremist well-intentioned but misguided]] attempt to save humanity from itself. As this plan advances the loss of dreams show a loss of passion for living, and people die en masse, either [[DrivenToSuicide actively]] or passively from apathy towards self-preservation. The protagonists call out the perpetrators on so wildly missing the mark in their endeavor, as the entire point of the Dreaming is to ''feel something'', because that's always better than a numb nothing.