Question Intelligence Cadet Corps

Maybe I'm missing something here, but the group isn't necessarily inept as they appear, but are A. easily misled by people who have an agenda that is useful and B. is led by people who force their views on the others despite their better judgement.

Case in point: when they are trying to get dirt on Imp they are doing so under the guise of her trying to steal from the school. This information is supplied by someone they respect: T-Rex. They have no reason to believe that Imp isn't completely on the up and up and T-Rex is a respected(if hated) member of the faculty. So why wouldn't they believe him.

Then there's Ace, Holdout, and A-Plus forcing their views on the others. Reach and Rez are too new to be stand up to them, Kew has confidence issues, and Interface isn't serious enough. So the older trio force the other four to do whatever they want even if it's clearly not what they need to do or is not making sense.

Their hearts are in the right place and they did do good by stopping a catastrophic event at the school in the 2005/2006 school year, but the bigotry, arrogance, and egos of the trio as well as naivety of the group as a whole undo all of the good they may do during their investigations.

Did I get them wrong or were they simply the classic Keystone Kops among the students and are like the Cape Squad and Betas- playing the part but not as good as they think they are?

Efindumb wrote: Case in point: when they are trying to get dirt on Imp they are doing so under the guise of her trying to steal from the school. This information is supplied by someone they respect: T-Rex. They have no reason to believe that Imp isn't completely on the up and up and T-Rex is a respected(if hated) member of the faculty. So why wouldn't they believe him.

They have no evidence, only an unsubstantiated allegation from Mr. Williams. The school makes no secret to the students and staff that many of the teachers and staff are retired villains/criminals. Why should this one be different? Because she has GSD that makes her look more evil than Ms. Dennon?

Efindumb wrote: Their hearts are in the right place and they did do good by stopping a catastrophic event at the school in the 2005/2006 school year, but the bigotry, arrogance, and egos of the trio as well as naivety of the group as a whole undo all of the good they may do during their investigations.

"Guilty until proven innocent but still guilty because we feel that way about them" is NOT having their prejudiced little hearts in the right place. Besides, the previous year's bust was accomplished only because Sahar found out about the plan. (Whether or not that was arranged by Freya? Unreliable narrators for the confusion)

What truly undoes the negligible good they might achieve is the fact that they can't be bothered to pay attention to rules of evidence, or any other rules that get in the way of having their way, so they destroy any criminal case they touch unless someone actively keeps them leashed.

Efindumb wrote: Did I get them wrong or were they simply the classic Keystone Kops among the students and are like the Cape Squad and Betas- playing the part but not as good as they think they are?

Even setting aside Ace's and Kew's inability to face the truth that "reals trump feels", and Holdout and A-Plus' tendency to go along to get along, they aren't as good as they think they are. They are high school children playing at a game that requires adult skills and experience far more than gadgets and exotic powers.

It just happens that the Bad Seeds and Masterminds need to practice their counter-intel skills on someone, and at least at school there's a limit to what they can do to the Spy Kidz in retaliation.

null0trooper wrote: They have no evidence, only an unsubstantiated allegation from Mr. Williams. The school makes no secret to the students and staff that many of the teachers and staff are retired villains/criminals. Why should this one be different? Because she has GSD that makes her look more evil than Ms. Dennon?

In their defense, most of the retired villain teachers have been around for a while. Imp is new this semester, quietly retired over the summer to absolutely no one (most heroes presumably retire publicly), her previous work history doesn't match up at all with her classes from their perspective (most students and their superhero relatives know her or by reputation as a thief, not as a forger). She was also a bit of a loner, even if she's been very professional, but many of those colleagues are still in the biz. Her act of coming off as insane doesn't help either.

They're misguided, 100%, but they have plenty of third-party account information to find her sudden presence very suspicious.

What made them foolish was to continue to play this game after she had already proven herself to much of the student body via classes, advice to GSD students, and many of her new professional peers. So she taught them the consequences of doing what they do, as badly as they do it.

Her act of coming off as insane doesn't help either.

Act???

Astrodragon wrote:

Her act of coming off as insane doesn't help either.

Act???

Well insanity is a legal term, not a medical one and as you pointed out there's a rule of law and all that so it's an act until the courts rule otherwise

Plus it really is an act, one that she carefully constructs as she says so herself. She enjoys toying with people as a way of keeping them off guard and as an act of self-defense since the superheroes and villains after more powerful than she is. Since she has both a reputation and private life to maintain, she has to do it 24/7 with only Songbird, Carson, and Fubar knowing the truth about her and even then Songbird is kept farther away than the other two.

It's also a nice case study in "Galahad Syndrome".

The Quixotic behaviour leads to them tilting at windmills, as the underlying reality is at odds with the models of reality inside their heads.

It's one of the reasons that Whateley was created. It reduces the collateral damage to the rest of society, while they're growing out of it,

It's the same reasoning that Lady Astarte tolerates The Syndicate influence in Whateley, as they channel the idiots that haven't learned how to live in a civilised society, into situations where they can cause the least amount of damage.

When Mrs Carson is seen lecturing them over their behavior she gives them applications to the syndicate. Not just one of the members but all of them, essentially implying that she considers that their talents (such as they are) are being employed in a criminal manner.
I give them very little leeway when they persist in persecuting Imp because basically they don't like her. This is not about any legal standard but about prejudice.

That was Imp, with the rap sheets and the applications, and the warning that anywhere else several of the kids would be in juvie.

Not really the point of the thread, but I would argue that Chickenhawk has seen the real Imp under the smartass armor. And a whole lot more...

Sir Lee wrote: Not really the point of the thread, but I would argue that Chickenhawk has seen the real Imp under the smartass armor. And a whole lot more...

That's also true of the others she encounters a lot and respects. It grew over time through countless encounters, it's not hard to see through if you aren't too focused on her appearance and the fact that she's a villain, she only really gets that way when you act like a total jerk or mistreat her professionally

null0trooper wrote: That was Imp, with the rap sheets and the applications, and the warning that anywhere else several of the kids would be in juvie.

Given that they were harassing her and Mischief to the point of stalking her, it was well over the line of being detectives and was directly akin to things the Syndicate do...and it was about the only thing that she could do that would scare them off of Imp, short of expelling them.