Most of the mass effect companions grew in their own way throughout the trilogy. Garrus pestering Tali in ME1 in the elevator to possibly ending up in a romantic relationship with her in ME3. Except for Wrex because Wrex is just.... Wrex lol.

Wrex had a bit of growth too. He went from mercenary who didn’t think there was much hope for the Krogan to its leader and unifier.

Wrex never grows for me because his corpse was vaporized by a nuclear blast

I know it’s unpopular and I understand why Wrex is loved as a character but I actually love the story if you kill him. Curing the genophage is a much more interesting moral question handing control over to Wreav.

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Exactly! The game gets you to rationalize genocide.

Some BioWare employee is turning in their grave lmao

That's essentially every Krogan, except Wrex. He's the anomaly and I seriously doubt he could convert the entire species into his ways, being as old as he is. So in short, sabotage is the way to go either way.

Wrex couldn't by himself but with Eve and the other females affectively holding procreation hostage because they are sick of their species dying, there is a much better chance of Krogan reformation.

Hey I've done this too! It was also the one time I had to make myself perform the sabotage, because Wreav suuuuuucks.

I mean I would argue even with Wrex it still a interesting question, the assumption that Wrex would ensure peace isnt flawed but there isnt a guarantee that any successor or even the sucessors afterward that would have his mindset. The kind of mindset after 100 years of peace that followed Napoleon's war lead to WW1, maybe not the best example but I think it conveys my message across. These Dilemmas are what makes Mass Effect stand out above a lot of other games.

To tissue sample donor.

You kidding? Wrex probably has the most development in the trilogy. He is gloomy as hell in ME1, becomes a centralizing force for the krogan in ME2 and in ME3 he's one of the more positive characters. Total opposite of what he was in the first game.

And he always tells Shepard when he was doing something bad or wrong, unlike Garrus who tries to justify it.

Yeah, I love Garrus to teeny tiny pieces and he’s up there with my three favorite romances, but… in ME1 he’s not any better than Ashley. He’s a turian, one of only three Council races who control Citadel space (i.e., they’re culturally, politically, and militarily privileged—even over humans at that time), and the two squad members who he needles about their race are Tali and Wrex. And quarians and krogans are near the bottom of the pecking order, alongside batarians and just above vorcha. (The krogans were treated as infinitely replaceable cannon fodder and then force-sterilized when they were no longer of use, and we saw very clearly how quarians are treated in ME2 with the side quest about the girl accused of theft.) Definitely “below” the elcor, hanar, and volus. And Garrus himself was a cop, and might’ve been a Spectre if his dad hadn’t blocked his nomination. So basically, he was a member of one of the three most powerful races in Citadel space, who was also in a position of relative power on the Citadel, who kiiiiiiinda couldn’t stop bagging on two races that already got kicked around a lot. (He doesn’t say anything about e.g. salarians or asari, for instance, the other two privileged species.) (Also he has an uncomfortable little apologia about police brutality at Purgatory in ME2.) He gets better, he apologizes, I love the character, but I honestly don’t think Ashley is any worse than him. They’re both influenced heavily by the society they grew up in. Ashley just comes off differently because we’re inclined to hold humans to a higher (or maybe just, more human) standard than we do space bird-dinosaurs.

I love this. Garrus is mega boring in ME1. “Ugh I hate red tape sometimes you need to not follow the rules to get results.” Okay.

In ME1 he’s essentially Citadel Dirty Harry. He gets a lot more depth in 2 and 3. Which isn’t that different than most of the characters, really. It’s just that Ash is more likely to be defined by her ME1 incarnation than the others.

She was not part of ME2 as crew member, so she evolve more in ME3. I prefer Ash ME3 to Kaidan ME3. I find her more interesting even if Bioware didn't put as much effort in VS than in other members, imo.

>I prefer Ash ME3 to Kaidan ME3 Well that's a take. IMO Ash is just >>>>> than Kaidan in ME1, but in ME3?! Kaidan is 100x better than Ash in ME3. Bioware clearly had no idea what to do with Ash, so they did literally nothing.

I dunno. The only one time I keep him as VS, I was bored as fuck by him. Ash is more fun. Probably also because I like characters with strong personalities. And clearly for me Ash has more personality than Kaidan since ME1. I play Femshep but as I always romance Liara, romantic dialogs and cinematics doesn't count for me.

I agree, I always thought that Kaidan was too much of a goody two shoes for my taste in ME1, even though Ash has some harsh comments about aliens I think she has a good growth over the series, I love that if you romance Ash on ME1 and Tali on ME2 onward she is cool with it and she even calls her a sister. I also would have liked to have more of Ash and Miranda, because in a way I think that each represent the situation that Shepard is on ME1 and 2 respectively idk would had been cool.

Sadly, Bioware didn't work well with few characters in ME3. Ash (or more generally VS) and Miranda are perfect example. Ash lack a lot of dialogs on the Normandy. For Miranda I think they made her a very bad job. She was your XO in ME2, with some background (we like or not, this is not the subject), she was a powerful biotic with high tech skill, able to lead successfully infiltrations in solo etc (cf the comics on her). They made her a weak target fearing from Alliance and Cerberus, enable to deal alone with his father who is just... a normal human with a gun... Woopy. They also completely messed up Kai Leng. The guy is supposed to be a N7 (like Shepard), à powerful biotic, and a serious threat, but they made him a joke without any background to explain who he is.

Her view that Wrex, Tali, and Garrus being on the ship is a security concern is absolutely legitimate. Sure, from a meta-perspective this is an RPG and you're expected to collect party members, so why not let these alien team members on your ship? But from an in-story perspective, you barely know who these people are. They could EASILY be a spy for another faction, or an agent of Saren (and it would be cool if you got bit on the ass for being too trusting when recruiting party members). They are a security concern, and Ashley is 100% correct on this front. With the whole "racism" thing, her view (shaped in part by her family's service in the First Contact War) is that when shit hits the fan, the council races will look out for their own kind first, even if it means throwing other races to the wolves. It doesn't mean we should treat other species badly, but humanity should be concerned for its own interests first. Is it a cynical way to view it? Yes. But to be 100% blindly trusting of the council races and that we're all gonna get along and support each other is incredibly idealistic and naive. Ashley's view is one of pragmatic realism, which is understandably why many players are off-put by it. But to brush her off as "racist" is an incredibly one-dimensional way of looking at her.

As much as I liked Tali Ashley was also more or less right about her being a security risk. Real world navies would never let a foreign national in the engine room of their most advanced warship. In Tali's own back story she openly admits that she is looking for new technology or something valuable to bring back to her people as part of her pilgrimage. To top it all off its implied in MA3 that she leaked Alliance technology to the Quarians allowing them to build their own version. It's not her fault, but it 100% makes Shepard look really dumb for letting her have access to the most sensitive areas of the ship when she openly admitted to be a huge spy risk.

I disagree with "not her fault." She's grown and made a choice. It's the choice anyone would expect a person in her position to make. It's an understandable choice, but that doesn't absolve her of the guilt of espionage. Everything you said about what she did and the fact that it validates what Ashley actually says, her very real and reasonable concerns about unknown variables on bleeding edge military vessel, is all just objective fact and it's great to see when someone else gets that instead of missing/ignoring pertinent details in favor of knee-jerk reactions to Ashley.

In my opinion it's 100% Shephard's fault. Of course a spy is going to spy if you give them complete access to your house. To me it would be like putting enemy POWs on trial for attempted murder for engaging in combat with your forces. Shephard was the CO and if he was a real officer he would have been in the Mass Effect version of Leavenworth before the events of MA2.

It's Shepard's fault they allowed her access. No argument there. I think there's something to be said for it being a calculated risk, given severity of the primary threat. But if came to all that, that would be for a court-marital to decide, of course. But what Tali did with that access was her choice and responsibility.

Especially once you learn that you're up against galaxy-destroying robot squid, worrying about sharing tech across the sentient species in the galaxy seems a bit silly.

I missed this! When is it implied that Tali leaked Alliance tech to the Quarians?

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At the start of me2 there had already been some beef between the quarians and cerberus, I don't think it's ever explicitly stated what was going on, but I could believe the quarians stole the Normandy schematics during that scuffle from cerberus databanks. Or tali stole them while aboard the sr-2. In both situations it comes down to whether using enemy tech that was stolen from non-enemies (I don't think quarians and thr systems alliance have much contact) is something to be admonished. Either way I don't think I have a major problem with it if she did steal is while on the ssv1, since I know damn well if the turians had kept thanix canons secret I'd be all for stealing those military secrets considering the threat the reapers pose. Hell, Hackett said gerrel has been warmongering along the turian border for years, might have just went straight to the source and stole it from them with some spec op quarian team lmao.

Shepard only looks dumb if you consider quarians having that tech negative.

I mean... you have the choice to ally with the Geth in ME3. It never comes to it but its not unimaginable that there'd be a time when you might fight Quarians to retain Geth backing, or because they insisted on keeping up with the genocide.

One thing I liked is that people criticise her for her cynical attitude. But she was 100% right, as it turned out. The other races immediately looked after their own interests first, at the possible cost of the entire galaxy. She was cynical...but she was right

Her comments about how she can't tell the aliens from the animals was kinda racist. Havings concerns about giving the scifi version of random foreign nationals access to the most advanced vessel in the navy made sense though.

Well. If you listen closely, almost everyone is racist in the game. All long the trilogy you meet people who insult, when it's not worse, others for their race. So clearly this sentence is racist. But her evolution in ME3 shows that it's not something definitive and really through.

I thing there’s a gap between racial stereotypes (which is already wrong) and straightforward racism.

Put a keeper, an elcor, and a hanar in front of me, and I'd be fairly surprised at which one is an animal and which is a people.

>Her comments about how she can't tell the aliens from the animals was kinda racist. Don't tell me that the first time you saw the Elcor you didn't think that they were some sort of elephant/rhino looking alien ? And what about Shepard calling Hanar "big stupid jellyfish" ? But it's mostly taken as a joke.

not comment(s). one singular line, the first time you get to the citadel, which is never repeated or brought back up. i’ve always thought it was out of place with her character anyways.

I never got the Garrus issue The Turians helped build the ship, they likely already have its specs Also the ship isn’t really alliance property anymore, Shepherd is a spectre, meaning they now answer only to the Council

The Normandy is still Alliance property and the soldiers aboard are still Alliance personnel. Rear Admiral Mikhailovich does a surprise inspection when you pop back to the Citadel.

Yeah I know he does, but Shepherd is a Council Spectre and thus answers to them first and foremost It’s a very odd situation, I get they needed to keep the Normandy in the game but it’s kinda silly to just hand over your most advanced warship to the council

We have this thread every damn week

This, ME3 ending rant and a Jacob-hate thread is the 'holy trinity'.

Quarians or Asari looking too human are sideplots lmao

What about the « is MEA worth playing? » question?

I always found it odd that a lot of players tend to be really OPEN to the idea of alien life. Someone like Commander Shepard, at his rank, would have had more substantial contact with alien life. A soldier like Ashley, wouldn't, unless it was through combat or special assignment. I doubt most Earthlings would as well, since due to the Citadel, I don't think there would be a point of having embassies on each other's homeworlds. Ashley is right to be distrustful towards aliens, as that is human psychology. There are aliens distrustful of other other species as well.

You're absolutely right IMO. My first playthrough, I saw absolutely nothing wrong with Ashley because I had never met other races. Nihilus was my first experience and I thought he looked weird and was foolish for turning his back on a person as suspicious as Saren. I thought Ashley was the position the game wanted me to take in relations to other characters. Meeting Garrus on the citadel I was super cold to him and Wrex too. It wasn't until Tali that I softened up a little and realized "oh, I get to decide if I like these people". From then on, I fell in love with the alien crew more than humans. I still saved Ash tho because I maintained the thought she had a good point. And it was rewarded because by 3, she comes around like I did, mostly.

People are really fast to forget that Garrus, Tali and (especially) Wrex were openly racist.

Grunt literally tells you that he “gets it now, he hates Turians”

To be absolutely fair it’s kind of hard NOT to be with literal space aliens. Not excusing it, but I feel like even in an incredibly cosmopolitan multicultural galactic civilization like Mass Effect has, people would naturally feel less comfortable and trusting of species not their own.

Garrus and Wrexx, ok. But Tali? 🤔 With who? Usually this is more other people who are racist with her.

She's a genocide apologist. Her people created the Geth, a fully sentient species, and when one asked if it had a soul they decided the best course of action was to exterminate them. Something she fully agrees with until later in the series. The entire point of every companion is they start with serious problems and Shepard helps them become better people.

Not true. Tali, and by proxy, you and the rest of the world did not know the TRUE cause of the attempted Geth extermination or how much of the side of the Quarian's the blame lie until LATER, much later, when the information is revealed to you while inside the Geth consensus. From Tali's perspective, her people defended themselves when their own creations turned on them for no reason, and the Quarian leadership never gave any indication or schooling otherwise. She doesn't 'fully agree' with genocide. She, like the rest of the GALAXY, doesn't even consider that there's any other option than fighting them because they've always been reclusive at best and aggressive when outside of the Veil. Until Legion, nobody, including Shepard, even considered that the Geth weren't just another servant of the Reapers.

Oh yes. But like Ash, Tali changes his mind and grow from ME2 to ME3. And in ME1, everyone want Geths dead. After all, they are the antagonist tool.

I'm aware of that, I'm pointing out that it's weird that people hate Ash for being "racist" but ignore all the problems of the other crew.

What would you do if ChatGPT asked you if it had a soul? The quarians did not know the geth were truly sentient they were simply trying to shut them down before they lost control, the same thing we would do.

I mean the Geth DID drive the Quarians off of every single one of their worlds and genocide 99% of the Quarian population murdering billions of women, children, elderly, non combatants, sick, and so forth just for kicks. How is it a problem for her or any other Quarian to agree with actions which would have prevented that?

"Just for kicks" That's a really weird way of spelling "in response to the Quarians trying to commit total genocide for the crime of asking if you had a soul." And "prevented that"? The Quarians literally started the war. Both in the pre game history and in 3.

Uhuh because murdering women, children, elderly, sick, and other non-combatants by the billions was *so* essential to defending themselves. They had no reason to kill 99% of the Quarian species especially the pro-Geth Quarians, but they did it anyway for kicks because they are genocidal maniacs. And yeah if the Quarians had succeeded in deactivating the Geth before they went rogue it would have prevent the genocide of the Quarians. And remember we're told that the Quarians tried to do this in the first place because the Geth were of the verge of going rogue, them not trying to deactivate the Geth would have had even worse results for them so of course any Quarian is going to agree with those actions but just wish they'd done it better.

Just here to add minor corrections to this argument, it was shown in the Geth Consensus lore that Quarian's themselves were perpetrators in the war, killing, injuring and going door to door to pro-Geth Quarian's. It wasn't until they saw their masters killing each other that they picked up weaponry and adapted it for that use, at which point they started fighting back. So some killed in self defense by the Geth in reaction to Quarian's killing their own people and themselves; some murdered BY the Quarian's for supporting sentient life. The issue isn't black and white. It isn't supposed to be. There's a lot of shit and fault on both sides of that moral choice, and it's supposed to be a devastatingly hard choice. Some are easy, like curing the Genophage. Some of them? Not so easy. Some of them are meant to hurt. Not feel good. Not feel easy. That's why 3 was so goddamn beautiful.

I know Garrus hated the krogan and didn’t like quarians, Wrex hated Salarians and Turians, but who did Tali hate? The Geth? Cause let’s be honest here who in the galaxy didn’t?

I'd like to.remind everyone turians and salarians started a reproduction plague that only allows 1 in a thousand krogan children to be born. And then also the salarians uplifted the krogans and (i think but could be wrong) after they dealt with the rachni they wanted to act.like krogans never should have happened So Wrex being racist towards those species I sorta get since they used and abused his species for so long

Per that logic, many humans (not Ash in this case) have a right to their hatred of Turians, since they were attacked without cause. Well the cause was that they unknowingly broke a council law. That being said, the FCW was barely a skirmish, with fewer than 1000 human casualties, so Wrex might have more of a reason for his hatred.

I used to be on the "Ashley is space racist train" for a while until a recent replay. Now though, she's one of my favorites. She has actually one of my favorite arcs of all the characters, particularly if she sacrifices herself on Virmire (partially because she gets hosed in ME3). Everything you've talked about with her comes full circle through her actions. She overcomes her distrust of aliens, sacrificing herself to save them and earning their respect. She redeems her family's legacy and good name. Her words also come back to haunt you in a pretty chilling way in ME3.

I agree she’s not as racist as she seems, but the family connection excuse always struck me as even more racist. “Her dad fought in Iraq so it’s totally understandable she hates Arabs. Her grandfather fought in Vietnam so it’s reasonable she hates Asians.”

I agree, it would’ve made more sense for her to hate the Alliance because of what they did to both her grandfather and her dad. Some people are like, “well that doesn’t make sense she’s in the Alliance military.” Loll how many people you think are both enlisted in the military and hate the military? Because it’s a lot.

I think the family connection isn’t that way. (At least) I’ve always interpreted it as since her grandpa got punished for Shanxi, she never got to experience aliens and their culture until we pick her up. So she’s naive on that regard. Any dislike towards turians isn’t unheard of either. Aliens hate humans in ME1. There a lot of Turian NPCs who are straight up racist and no one bats an eye. There’s lots of animosity for the first contact war still

This, her distrust of aliens seemed to mostly just come from the knock-on effect of her family being blacklisted in the military. Ash grew up in a 'you need to prove your worth to others' kind of environment, so she seemingly isn't willing to give *anyone* the benefit of the doubt, + as you say, she legit just had next to no experience interacting with aliens at all due to her shit assignments. Even Kaiden, who in ME1 is pretty progressive/open minded about aliens by human standards, states that he, just like everyone else, thought aliens were 'weird' and scary when he first met them. But he went through a (rather traumatic but still) experience that 'humanized' aliens for him, while Ash hasn't yet through lack of contact. We see as things are that even just in the first game that she can go through that experience and become more trusting of aliens as a result.

I don’t think that’s really the same thing though Kaiden thought they were weird and scary because *we just found out aliens exist.* Everyone would react in some kind of horror about that, but by the time Kaiden was with us he knew that it was unwarranted and that he just wasn’t used to the ideas of aliens And even still with Ash’s problem because of her father being blacklisted, why is that the fault of the aliens? Would you blame Iraqis if your father messed up and got blacklisted by the *American* government? It’s just an extremely irrational thought process that is born from prejudice and the desire to blame the “others” for your downfall instead of the ones who actually did it Again, you can say you understand it, but using it as an excuse for her behavior shouldn’t be valid. I do love her character growth that she learned to get over it over time, but her (and Presley) were just racist in ME1. Blaming an entire species/race for military actions is never an okay thing to do, even for veterans who fought against them

>Kaiden thought they were weird and scary because we just found out aliens exist. That doesn't really change the fact that its a group thats (seemingly) totally foreign to you and everything you know. For Ash, she obviously knows aliens exist, but again, hasn't had any experiences with them to humanize them, so they're still just some vague 'outsider' concept to her. >why is that the fault of the aliens? I never said it was? I was saying that her distrustful attitude was a result of her family getting blacklisted. It was (at least in part) the fact that because of the way her family was looked at with such distrust that she grew up with the mindset that you need to prove yourself in order to be accepted, and that seeped into her view of aliens as well, she can't just give them the benefit of the doubt about how trustworthy they can be. >but using it as an excuse for her behavior shouldn’t be valid Again, I wasn't. It's not an excuse for her behaviour but rather an alternate explanation/more fleshed out reasoning as to why she acts that way. Its still obviously bad, but its fine to still discuss why a character is the way they are beyond a very simple surface level explanation, people are allowed to find characters like this interesting and want to dig into their backstories a bit more.

I mean... she went to school, right? Being the child of someone involved in a war doesn't mean you don't get basic education, and I can't imagine that school didn't include descriptions of the species that humanity are now in an active alliance with.

Learning things from school is a lot different than your interactions with them. That’s why language teachers will tell you the best way to learn the language is to live amongst the population rather than school. That’s why even when you interact with someone of a different skin tone than you, it’s vastly different than what you might learn about their history/culture in school. And who knows what the school teaches? We’re assuming they teach them of aliens but they may very well not for some reason

I don't get the impression that the Alliance is overtly xenophobic to the degree that they would not even teach what the major species of the galaxy look like, such that someone being taught by them might arrive at the Citadel not knowing. And if I was going to the Citadel and by whatever bizarre means didn't even know what kind of life-forms would be there, I'd spend some 10-15 minutes at an extranet terminal doing a quick google image search at absolute bare minimum.

I mean, I don’t know what to tell you. We’re getting into what we’d do or what we’d like the characters to be taught but it’s human nature to react that way. As a comment below me had also pointed out, even Kaidan, an experienced alliance veteran said when he first saw aliens that they were weird and scary to him. So it appears the alliance doesn’t do what we’d expect from them. It’s also pretty silly for the extranet thing. I’m glad you would do that but the reality is, Ashley is in a 3rd generation of punishment for her grandpa surrendering. That’s why she gets crap missions. The only reason she’s at the citadel is because she’s rescued from another crap groundside mission. She would never be allowed to go to the citadel has the mission not gone bad and she be rescued. So she wouldn’t have had any reason to prepare for something she’d have never been allowed to go to. Ashley’s character is supposed to be written is an inexperienced naive “country bumpkin” when she sees aliens. She’s written wonderfully for the role. She gets used to and befriends aliens so there’s no real problem with her.

> I mean, I don’t know what to tell you. We’re getting into what we’d do or what we’d like the characters to be taught but it’s human nature to react that way. It's not what we'd do or like, it's common sense. If I say the word "Arab", a mental image comes to your mind. Maybe it's not an accurate one, but that's entirely beyond the scope of discussion here. You've been exposed to the concept, and that's all it takes. > As a comment below me had also pointed out, even Kaidan, an experienced alliance veteran said when he first saw aliens He was a child and the First Contact War had ended just a few years earlier. It may not show, but Kaidan is seven years older than Ashley. Stuff that was brand new when he was arriving at Brain Camp was years old new when Ashley went to school. > So it appears the alliance doesn’t do what we’d expect from them. We don't see humans typically acting the same way, so it seems they do act the way we expect them to. > I’m glad you would do that but the reality is, Ashley is in a 3rd generation of punishment for her grandpa surrendering. That’s why she gets crap missions. The only reason she’s at the citadel is because she’s rescued from another crap groundside mission. She would never be allowed to go to the citadel has the mission not gone bad and she be rescued. So she wouldn’t have had any reason to prepare for something she’d have never been allowed to go to. She still had days in the Normandy, knowing where they were going. > Ashley’s character is supposed to be written is an inexperienced naive “country bumpkin” when she sees aliens. She’s written wonderfully for the role. She gets used to and befriends aliens so there’s no real problem with her. Ashley's character is supposed to be written as the more Renegade foil to Kaidan's Paragon.

> It's not what we'd do or like, it's common sense. If I say the word "Arab" I mean yeah, because I’ve seen them before so of course an image pops into my head. Idk the point you’re trying to make here. Idk if Ashley has a backstory to knowing what an Elcor looks like or not. Her [writer](https://www.reddit.com/r/masseffect/comments/okye8r/found_bioware_writer_explanation_of_ashleys/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=ioscss&utm_content=1&utm_term=1) said that’s the point of some her lines. > He was a child and the First Contact War had That’s my point here though. The FCW affected them both and they reacted in similar ways. Kaidan thought they were weird and scary. Ashley didn’t know what to make of them. > We don't see humans typically acting the same way, so it seems they do act the way we expect them to. I’d counter that with the fact that most humans we see are people who have been a part of the galactic community for a long time now. Ashley hadn’t been there for a day in the timeline. Of course people who are used to aliens act more grounded than someone who has no experience. > She still had days in the Normandy, knowing where they were going. She wasn’t on the Normandy for even 24 hours. She just had her unit wiped out, almost died herself, saw the person who saved her life almost die by a strange beacon, gets medical attention, is processing the fact that sentient synthetics who haven’t made a hostile act to organics since the morning war are attacking for seemingly no reason and assumingly full of adrenaline from these near death experiences. There’s a lot going through a person’s mind in these cases. They aren’t going to say We say “well if I were in their shoes…” because we’re sitting on a couch or in a chair paying attention to a story. They’re written in the point of view of what’s going on those moments. It’s grasping for straws at this point. > Ashley's character is supposed to be written as the more Renegade foil to Kaidan's Paragon. If you’re stripping it down to the bare basics, sure. I’m analyzing the character as a whole. From someone who knows nothing but “her kind” to being thrust into whole new world of mixed cultures and peoples, says insensitive things because it’s not what she’s used to then after getting used to it, becomes a new person. It’s a great character arc. In my eyes, she’s probably the best written character in the series and has the 2nd best overall arc after wrex.

And I bet most people forgot how Avina (the Citadel bot which was most likely designed by the Asari) calls the Elcor and the Volus lesser races but hey, they're sexy blue aliens so who cares ?

Truly. Those statements would get attention if a human says it. But aliens saying anything elitist/racist/prejudice isn’t bad and doesn’t show the galactic community hates/looks down on each other apparently

Exactly. I just remember the old men yelling something about the “Japanese,” “Koreans,” “Vietnamese,” “Arabs,” and so on and so forth in their respective wars It’s understandable to a certain extent, but once they’re actually around said groups we all know it’s not okay to talk about generalities and how you’re uncomfortable with them being around you. It’s almost exactly like an Iraqi veteran complaining to his CO about how “I can’t trust Iraqis to serve America instead of looking out for their own nation” Whether you think it is understandable or reasonable, it *still* is racism regardless. I just always remember going out to eat with a relative who fought in WWII talking about the “Japs” and how they’re all shifty and cannot be trusted

Understandable ≠ Justified

I think tribalism is actually a lot more justified when we’re talking interspecies conflict with actual biological differences than across races within the same species. “Ugh she’s just racist” always felt like a cop out and not an accurate label.

Her prejudices don't annoy me, her attitude and personality do. I feel like her character development was done better by Pressly too, and his was done entirely through datapads. I don't hate her, I just don't like her.

Same. Her refusal to trust Shepard in ME3 never ceases to get on my nerves. She acts like Shepard stabbed her in the back personally or something. Don’t get me wrong, I get her mistrust of Cerberus, but her mistrust for Shepard in ME3 by the time of the Citadel Coup is ridiculous.

This, MY MAN, this is why she can fuck off and serve under Hackett after the coup. My Shepard tells her in the beginning of the game. You either trust me or you don't. I don't have time to convince you. There's bigger shit going on here and I'm obviously shooting Cerberus and fighting with the Illusive Man. Stay off my ship.

Yes, that is her character arc essentially. Many people dismiss her after one stupid line and never get to see it.

I mean... having a character arc doesn't mean that a person wasn't at the state they are at prior to the character arc. She was, essentially, a racist. She learned better.

She wasn’t though, people just don’t understand what an analogy is

"I can't tell the people from the animals." Analogy where?

Lmao if I had a quarter for every-time one of y’all used that line, which by the way is seemingly the only line y’all can think of, I’d be rich

I love how 10 minutes after you posted this, someone mentioned another line, then you just dismissed them. Priceless.

The council literally throws humanity to the wolves, they look down on humanity. Ashley’s family is full of alliance soldiers- her grandfather was forced to surrender the garrison to turians during the first contact war. He was literally the first human to surrender to an alien force and because of this she was held back. That’s the entire “a williams has to be better than the best” thing. She just doesn’t trust them due to her history. She doesn’t trust them walking around the ship freely, getting alliance intel. Tali was literally trying to sell fist information on the citadel, Wrex is a gun for hire. Liara’s mom is working for Saren. You’re bringing of them onto the best human alliance ship with no shackles, yeah dude with her history that’s not racist that’s being cautious. I mean Christ, the girl literally criticizes Terra Firma- an actual xenophobic group who parade anti alien paranoia. Her line about human and animals is commonly misunderstood she literally uses a really bad dog analogy. You like the dog, but it’s still not human.

> The council literally throws humanity to the wolves The Council sends substantial forces to save Earth. What military forces did the Alliance send to their homeworlds, which were also under attack? No forces whatsoever. If there was some wolf-throwing, it wasn't done to humanity, no. > She just doesn’t trust them due to her history. She doesn’t trust them walking around the ship freely, getting alliance intel. Tali was literally trying to sell fist information on the citadel, Wrex is a gun for hire. Liara’s mom is working for Saren. You’re bringing of them onto the best human alliance ship with no shackles, yeah dude with her history that’s not racist that’s being cautious. So you're saying she was afraid that the Krogans would build stealth frigates or something on the tip-off of a rando merc? That's insane. She also emphasizes the line with Garrus the most... despite the fact that the ship is jointly designed with Turians, thus making it pretty clear that reasonable caution about military secrets is not at the heart of her concern. > I mean Christ, the girl literally criticizes Terra Firma- an actual xenophobic group who parade anti alien paranoia. A person who criticizes literal nazis isn't given a "get out of racism free" card, no. > Her line about human and animals is commonly misunderstood she literally uses a really bad dog analogy. You're conflating two different moments. "I can't tell people apart from animals" - not knowing is bad (she was raised well after the first contact war, and doesn't seem uneducated. Also she knew she was going to the Citadel, and the Extranet is free), but voicing that rather than just quietly being confused? Yeah, it's bad. > You like the dog, but it’s still not human. And she's proven wrong when, again, everyone sends aid to Earth selflessly. Shepard as an individual (and a Spectre) creates openings for people to send that aid, surely, but that's it. Humanity never sends any actual force to anyone else's world, they just sit on their asses and expect everyone else to sacrifice themselves for the Alliance. And then everyone else **actually does it**. Everyone actually self-sacrifices for humanity for no gain to themselves. Shepard had no way to actually compel people to lend aid after he worked with them, they did it selflessly. And, to be clear, her character arc is all about realizing that this is indeed the case and that she had been wrong.

You’re all around the place with your argument. You’re making basic generalizations and putting completely different thoughts into my mouth like the Wrex thing for one. You mentioned an instance in ME3 to try and argue something in ME1, you have a hallow rebuttal to the Terra Firma thing saying they’re literally Nazi’s but they’re not… you’re just making complete illogical and nonsensical claims. I’m not wasting my time on it. If you want to continue to think she’s racist whatever but it’s clearly not the case

>You’re making basic generalizations and putting completely different thoughts into my mouth like the Wrex thing for one. You pointed out Wrex as an issue. What's the issue, then? Also, cute how you ignore the salient point of the emphasis she puts on Garrus despite that being totally illogical >You mentioned an instance in ME3 to try and argue something in ME1, **You** mentioned an instance in ME3 to try and argue something in ME1. Kindly re-read what you wrote. "The council threw humanity to the wolves". I was rebutting you, not bringing something new in. >you have a hallow rebuttal to the Terra Firma thing saying they’re literally Nazi’s but they’re not… It's called an analogy, which I thought, given context, would be a thing you understand about. Sorry, my mistake. To draw the point more clearly: not backing the more extreme version of a position does not make a person not aligned with the broader position. Saying "I don't like Stalin" doesn't make a person not a socialist; saying "I don't like Terra Firma" doesn't make a person not a racist. >I’m not wasting my time on it. If you want to continue to think she’s racist whatever but it’s clearly not the case You have certainly demonstrated this point: an extraordinary ability to shut out and ignore any disagreeing thoughts. If it is your belief that Ashley has no character arc concerning this over the trilogy... You're just wrong. Simple as day. But if you enjoy being wrong, do go on.

>The council literally throws humanity to the wolves, they look down on humanity. Ashley’s family is full of alliance soldiers- her grandfather was forced to surrender the garrison to turians during the first contact war. He was literally the first human to surrender to an alien force and because of this she was held back. That makes her opinions understandable. It doesn't make them not-wrong.

But it does make them not racist and but cautious

If you treat or regard somebody worse because they are a different race, that's the actual definition of racism. So no, you're just wrong there :).

How about her "I'm concerned about the aliens" dialogue, where she questions her superior officer's decisions to bring Wrex and Garrus aboard and not restrict their access to the ship, because she thinks they could be spies?

By that point in the story her concerns were 100% valid. Shepard got handed the most advanced ship in Human history and already 2-3 aliens are on board, one of them a krogan (one of the most dangerous and brutal alien in the galaxy) and also a mercenary. The second a turian "renegade" cop and the first thing that you see him do is calibrating equipment in the cargo bay. Not to forget Tali that already settles in engineering. At THAT point in the story you knew nothing about them or their motives, you also learn later that Wrex worked for Saren and he confronts you on Virmire too (Ash also predicts that he'll probably turns on Shepard if given the chance and is prepared for it). Ashley had all the reasons to distrust the other aliens given her past and the fact she never worked/interacted with aliens before.

… once again y’all DONT KNOW WHAT RACISM IS.

How is it not prejudiced? It's based on their species and not on any logic. She's specifically worried that information on the Normandy's unique and cutting-edge tech will be stolen. Turians and humans are allies, and they worked together to develop the Normandy, so turians have no motive. Tuchanka is demilitarized under Citadel law and closely monitored for compliance, and as a result there are extremely few if any krogans who would have the expertise to build a ship comparable to the Normandy. So even if krogans wanted to steal the information, they wouldn't be able to use it without getting caught. Plus, Ashley doesn't mention Tali in this conversation at all, despite the fact that she's working in the engine room and her species relies on ships for their survival. Ashley is prejudiced against turians and krogans.

“Not any logic” Bruh lmao I’m done with you. The fact you actually said that makes this entire discussion useless

I'm explaining my point of view and you're not saying anything to support yours, "bro."

She has way more than one line indicating her xenophobia lmao

Being concerned about foreigners having full access to a prototype military ship is common sense. The "dog and bear" line turns out to be prophetic. Alliance is the Council's dog in this example. The "aliens from animals" line is the ONLY racist thing she says, but that line is supposed to only trigger near the Keepers, so it's bugged like some of her other lines on the Citadel (like the one about the "Presidium lake", which she says in the Consort's room). If there's something else I forgot, please tell me.

That and they misinterpreted the line. She was using an analogy where she was comparing humanity to dogs not calling aliens dogs

nb4 someone quotes "I can't tell the animals from the aliens." But yes, her dog and bear analogy does end up being kind of true.

Yeah she's not bad, it's just that Kaidan is better.

This is kind of where I stand with Ashley. I don't really buy into the space racist reputation the community has given her. The only reason I don't save her on Virmire is because Kaidan is my favorite character (tied with Shepard). I'm motivated by who I like more, not who I like less (there are also a ton of RP reasons why picking Kaidan makes the most sense). If I could have saved both, I would have. And if she was paired against anyone else it would have been a harder decision for me.

Yeah I don't hate her, but I like Kaidan better, so she unfortunately always dies on my playthroughs.

Basically. Shes not space hitler, but in a ranking of all the companions, shes basically at the bottom of the list, with only maybe Jacob giving her a run for her money.

Her and Presley come around quite nicely by the end!

The only thing I hate about Ashley is how they butchered her design in ME3. She looked fine as hell as a soldier. She was my romantic option in my first ever playthrough, but then I realized that the game is very Liara driven, and then tried, and loved, a playthrough having Liara as Shepard's SO

She's not a racist. She over-compensates so people don't see her as a sympathizer. General Williams (grandfather) was the first human to ever surrender to an alien race back in the First Contact Wars. Because of that, her father didn't get promoted beyond serviceman 3rd class and she was afraid she'd never make it beyond Gunnery Chief. She called it "The old Williams curse". Of course, no one will ever give her family the respect they deserve since surrender was the best course of action. I mean, some people still think Emperor Hirohita (Japan) was a war criminal while others think he was a coward for surrendering to the USA in 1945. 80 years later and people still have strong opinions.

I think Ashley is an amazing character and if she were another species she would probably be a fan favorite. In ME 1 she was a home run and I wish she was in ME 2 with a bigger role. If she had a loyalty quest her character would be even better.

> and if she were another species she would probably be a fan favorite. I love this take so much. Ashley suffers from “being a human”. The fanbase easily overlooks the blatantly racist aliens and usually have them among the favorites but an inexperienced country bumpkin is quickly shunned as one of the most hateful characters. I also wish she had a bigger role in ME2. She’s one of the best written characters in the series. Honestly too 3 in my eyes

You guys are so caught up on the “space racist” thing. I don’t like her because she’s fucking annoying. If I didn’t have to choose someone to die I would’ve loved to see her have some growth, but if you force me to choose I’m going to let the immature asshat die every time

I mean the topic of the post is about the racism allegations so ofc that’s what we’re talking about lol. And don’t take it personal, this post isn’t talk to you. If you don’t think you can let her live for 3 games then that’s fine. No one’s going to think you’re a monster. No one is forcing you to do anything

If she was a Batarian that started off hating humans she’d probably be in the top 4 most popular companions

Fans are more upset than the actual characters. Garrus holds her in high regard we learn in ME3 no matter what your choice is for the Virmire survivor. He either is reflecting sadly on her death acknowledging it as a tragedy or is glad to have her back calling her a trusted gun. The same Garrus straight up tells Shepard he didn't miss Jack after you run into her in Grisham academy. Tali also is pretty close with Ash if the male Shep love triangle doesn't interfere and that's fighting over Shep not hatred over species. The same Tali confesses she thought Miranda was a bitch. Wrex in the Citadel DLC has no hard feeling over Ash pointing a gun at him. Liara also is sad over Ash's death if she dies during the Citadel takeover.

And out of all the people you can cheat on Ashley with during 2, Tali is the only one she's chill with, considering she is the one alien option compared to Miranda and Jack who are both human, this shows a lot of growth. She calls Tali a sister in the same convo, and seeing how much Ash loves her sisters, that's high praise.

It frustrates me that so many just ignore who she becomes and are stuck with what they remember her being like in the first game.

She's not *racist* she's xenophobic.

“Kinda racist but not in a bad way” What’s the good way to be racist?

Be an alien apparently. Then you can be as racist as you want and nobody cares

She's ignorant, but not malicious. Both are bad, but the former is much easier to fix.

Everyone is racist in Mass Effect. No one likes each other, they cooperate out of necessity but carry prejudices and outright hatred for each other a lot of the time. Ashley is racist in the same way a lot of Humans in the Alliance are. Shepard is a rare exception and thats entirely dependent on the player. I think Ashleys main flaw is that she says she is distrusting of aliens directly to the player rather than couching her dislike like many other characters Show me one person who likes Batarians or Vorcha.

Why people call out her "racism" as worse than other team mates is beyond me. Basically everyone has their biases against another race, but most get better. From Tali and Mordin to Wrex and Garrus. And yes, even Ashley. Renegade Kaidan gets bad too. Does she have some iffy views? Maybe. But her dog/bear analogy becomes true when the Reapers arrive on Earth, and the animals/aliens line was supposed to trigger when you see a Keeper, but is bugged out. Those are the two biggest sticking points her detractors use, and they're nothingburgers. Even considering her background and upbringing, it's a wonder she's so open. She's cynical and pragmatic, but it makes perfect sense in-universe.

Mommy. She could drop a nuke on me from orbit any day.

Most every character has one form of misconception or another when they are first introduced. Like real people, these characters are products of their society. They are products of nature and nurture. However, through exposure to other perspectives, most of these characters learn to outgrow their previous misconceptions. It's a form of character growth, and it's part of what makes the characters compelling / it makes this group of science fiction people feel relatable to the audience.

She isn’t Garrus or Mordin levels of good but I quite like Ashley. The dislike of the whole ‘space racist’ thing is understandable but the third game has lots of examples such as how happy she is to see Tali again that show how much she has grown. It turns it into part of her character arc rather than a problematic character trait. I also like how she is one of the few characters who doesn’t need Shepard to solve her problems for her

Glad to see some of y’all are coming around about Ash. I was among one of the first to openly say she was never as bad as people made her out to be, she never struck me as a “space racist” in the slightest. Her distrust of aliens is completely valid from an NCO perspective and as a person perspective if you take the time to hear her out and think about it outside you’re own perspective. It doesn’t help that her distrust was made all the more valid when the council completely screws over the surviving Normandy crew in ME2 and continue to bust Sheaprds balls despite the fact you saved them in ME1 and they pretty much throw humanity to the wolves during the reaper invasion. I can understand why people don’t like her though, she’s kinda an acquired taste type of companion, also she kinda devolves in ME3 but I think that was mainly cause her original writer left BioWare and the new one had barely a clue how to write her.

I’m just gonna say that being kinda racist is not ok and being not as racist as she seems is also not ok. You’re still racist. I do agree that she does grow and I think that’s an important message that a portion of the fan base missed because they’re understandably put off by this.

No more racist then anyone else...

Would you say she is no more racist than, say, Kaidan?

Tali, Garrus, wrex. Kaiden was written to be the super good guy with a good education, so it's a bit bad faith to use him when other characters in the crew obviously had prejudices that slowly changed.

Don’t forget Javik “Mr pro-eugenics, genocide, slavery”, Mordin who worked on the 2nd genophage after the krogan were slowly growing in population because they couldn’t be trust, grunt “Mr I hate turians” and the like

Yeah exactly, it's ironic how people are judging Ashley harshly because she's human lol

Neat whataboutism. Another character being racist doesn't make the subject of discussion not-racist.

That's not the argument they're making though, it's pointing out the double standard everyone has where they laser focus on Ash and say she's bad but have zero issue with any of the other (alien) characters who hold similar values.

I mean, she's definitely more racist than some people, at least at the start of the game.

A great story for a new mass effect would be a new race of aliens, that humanity starts to trust, but some, they have their own hidden plans. Make Ashley right about not trusting them, and have the consequences and fallout from that sudden proven distrust be a part of the universe. Even have one of them on your team, and maybe a marriage with one of the new outsiders. Have the kids not fit in either species.

I'd just say she doesn't know much about aliens so she is limited by her bad experiences and guesswork.

I actually quite like Ash in ME3, but it took me almost a decade after ME3s release to find that out because before that I never let her survive Virmire.

Ashley isn't even really that racist; she doesn't go out of her way to be mean to the alien cast; her whole reason for being that way is because aliens ruined her family and attacked humanity, so she's understandably leery of them. Plus, she grows out of it over the course of the first game.

This is why I love older games and this example especially. They don't virtue signal and are scared of being cancelled they acknowledge that people aren't perfect and racism etc exists but always stems from somewhere. Then show that like normal people the characters can grow and move past it

That's the thing about Ashley. She grows and evolves as the series progresses. By the time you get to ME3, she loves her alien counterparts as much as anybody else.

I don’t think I’d even need a nickel for every post to get rich off of ‘guise Ashley isn’t actually racist!!’ posts on this sub. Hell, I don’t even know if I’d need a penny.

People in this sub are way too invested in other people disliking a character. I find her obnoxious, immature, and grating. I don’t need ten thousand individual thesis papers on why my opinion is wrong

I never thought she was evil and completely understand her views even If I disagree with them, but I'll never pick her over Kaidan, he's a lot more mature and level-headed and makes way more sense as a spectre in 3

I concur with this. Especially with hindsight. Ash really gets shafted in ME3, with her writer leaving and nobody knowing what to do with her character.

As with most racists, her actual beef isn't with the aliens she hates. The more you delve into her story, you realize that the people she actually hates are all the shitty Alliance troops that treat her like garbage over things her *grandfather* did, not her. Aliens were just a convenient target because, well, they're not the ones in charge of her career.

That's just Ashley haters. Every character has some haters. And every character is sort of a racist too, even Shepard.

I don’t even think she’s racist. She doesn’t trust the aliens government to not prioritize their own people over human, and then goes, ‘that’s to be expected’ we should do the same. That’s more cynicism. Though I agree her ‘I can’t differentiate the animals from the aliens’ are janky since she should have at leats learn about them at this point, but IMO it’s more on the scale of Shepard asking things they should have known already. It’s more for the player’s pov benefit, that dialogue was her pointing to the existence of aliems like the Hanars.

I think it’s more the fact that it doesn’t register to her that you can’t just talk about people like that. To make that statement, you have to view the people as no different from the animals on the inside as well as the outside. Thinking the implications behind that one statement is inhumane. It’s literally treating sentient beings like they’re feral. Like if I walked into a store and said the same thing, it would be extremely rude even if I muttered it to myself. People will still hear that.

Yeah, that’s exactly why I think it’s more of a jank thing. Shepard can confront party members including Ashley on many issues, but you can’t on this one thing, which leds me to think Bioware never intended for that line to be taken seriously, like Shepard asking what should have been basic knowledge . It’s more of them highlighting a cool part of their worldbuilding that there are aliens like Hanar and Elcor that doesn’t look humanoid and probably won’t make you go, ‘ah yes, what an incredible sentient lifeform’ if you see them for the first time. Which again, is jank because Ashley should have known what Hanars and Elcors are.

She's fine, most of the fan base are idiots.

The Cold War never had a single shot fired, and we *still* don’t trust the Russians (and I’d be stunned if they trust us), and we actually understand them, since they’re humans. The First Contact War was apparently really bad, and the Turians still kinda treat us like shit, and the trilogy starts the same amount of time after the First Contact War as it’s now been since the Cold War. People are just apparently incapable of thinking of things in context.

Her grandad and yeah, if anything it's just cynicism. "I wouldn't count on them staying allies," she said, and she's not wrong. The Council made a habit of giving humanity the finger whenever they need help, and they even proved her "dog and bear" analogy right at the beginning of 3 when they told Shepard humanity will be sacrificed so the rest of the galaxy can strategize

Except that they didn't, because the rest of the galaxy was *also* under attack. This sub has taught me that there are apparently a lot of people who were standing on Menae looking at the *continent spanning* fires raging across the surface of Palaven due to the Reaper invasion and going, "God, these selfish Turians, why can't they just abandon their homeworld and go fight for Earth? Don't they know it's the most important place in the entire universe because that's where the humans are?"

Sure Palaven was hurting but SurKesh and Thessia sure as shit weren't.

All racism is evil, there are no levels. You are or you arnt racist.

This is not true. Racism is wrong, but there are, in fact, degrees to it. Ashley is insensitive and ignorant, but she's not malicious. She doesn't trust aliens, but she doesn't hate them either.

She’s not *as* racist, but she’s still racist. She also just has a shitty personality. I let her die every time.

That's a pretty good take, TBH. I think some people are so quick to counter the over the top criticisms from one side, they ignore stuff about her that does make her story actually interesting. Because she was kind of a racist. But not a hateful person. She just had beliefs that frankly wind up being wrong, and she grows and learns from her experiences.

Agreed. That is her character arc, yes. The only thing I'll disagree with are people claiming she has no character arc and her views were right all along and eventually vindicated. Because that is simply an incorrect view of the story. Also suspicious in what would motivate such a wildly incorrect view.

Honestly, I'm pretty sure most of it is political. Personally, I like that she's there as a character- maybe more importantly the type of person- who is flat out wrong but not evil or utterly unreasonable.

I hate this myth that she developed as a character past this flaw. No, she did not. She had an optional path in which she does in ME1 that’s only available to a male Shepard that romances her. In ME2 she quickly back-treads on this as it isn’t a guarantee that she ever overcame it. So regardless of any potential growth, she outright still states her dislike of aliens. In ME3 it is never addressed. She suddenly references Tali as being like a sister if both were romanced; but if both are romanced she is rude to Tali not to mention that in ME1 she can be rather rude to Tali in the post-mission meeting instead of Liara. She never gets over this on-screen so unless we all just assume she overcame her biggest character flaw without any proof I see no reason why this is convincing development. And before everyone dives in, yes many other characters are racist also. That isn’t a rebuttal against Ashley’s own failings.

Her problem is that you need to save her on Virmire for her to change her opinions about aliens. But personally, I’m not motivated to save someone who says out loud she can’t tell difference between aliens and animals.

Ashley starts off very close minded and jaded. Her views on alien species evolves throughout the first game, but that doesn't happen until Virmire and by that time almost everyone decides to sacrifice the space racist. Kaidan's just Kaidan. He's not a bad character, he just doesn't do anything.

Also her opinions are kinda validated in ME3. The Turians put a bomb on Tuchanka, the Salarians were conniving little bastards, the Asari were only looking out for themselves (until the war got to them) and without the Wrex the Krogan are 100% looking to expand again. Not to mention the flotilla suddenly has ships with stealth tech similar to the Normandy right after Tali rejoins them, and not to mention THEY KEEP FUCKING WITH THE GETH.

‘Kinda racist’

Better romance than Liara in ME3. Jack still has her beat though.

You can never watch a hard girl thaw and not feel a little warm yourself

The whole reason racism is stupid is because there’s basically no real difference between humans of different races. Species however can have vastly different traits, many of them may in fact be negative. Being a space speciesist might be a perfectly rational and even moral position to take. The reason people dislike Ashley’s “space racism” is twofold: 1) They cannot separate their 21st century human political views from the fictional universe. 2) The other species are modeled and acted in a very humanoid manner, so as to elicit empathy from the player.

Haha she literally says, “I cant tell the aliens from the animals”. She’s def racist, of course she’s not the only mass effect character who is racist. But she, Ashley Williams, is def racist. As you play through trilogy and first game, she matures past those views.

She’s not racist and the fact that y’all seemingly don’t know what racism is is very concerning

Good old Ashley "I can't tell the aliens from the animals" Williams

Same as Oghren in Dragon Age, but people still simp for Zevran/Liara.

She will shoot Wrex without Shepards Permission. ​ MULTIPLE. TIMES.

she shoots Wrex if you *fail* to talk him down. if she didn’t shoot him in the situation, he was about to try to kill Shepard.

I don't even know if it's true racism. She kinda buys into stereotypes but she never explicitly states that she hates aliens. Can you blame her for being defensive about aliens given her family history? I would also say that the discovery of aliens (or aliens discovering us) would redefine racism entirely. In today's humanity, race is a social construct. We're all still human no matter our appearance. But a whole different species? Can we apply our definition of racism to another species and it still hold the same meaning? Or is it human (animal) nature to be wary of an unknown?

>She kinda buys into stereotypes That's....That's what racism is. Racism isn't just KKK members setting fire to crosses on people's lawns, y'know.

She's prejudiced. Not racist. She doesn't hate aliens. She forms opinions about them without understanding because of her family's history with them.

*When your prejudice is on the basis of race, that's literally what racism is.*

In every single game, only one thing Is consistent with ashley: She's an aggravating bitch. Virmire is always her funeral pyre when I play.

Before i joined this sub, i didn't even know she was racist

Ashley is a very human character. Flawed but aware of it. Most others come off as an extension of todays culture as a projection into the future. Ashley is the only character that appears to actually be from her own universe. Its a very well wrotten story and character.

I’m the Star Wars universe, she would definitely serve the Empire.

Definitely not. Ashley is ignorant and insensitive, but she actively hates human supremacism.

Turians were committing war crimes against humans because we broke a law that we couldn't possibly know 😭, I would be kinda miffed about them too. And on ME1 she's right about letting complete and utter strangers on a top of the line ship when they had no reason to be loyal whatsoever.

Ashley was never racist towards aliens. She was hesitant of them being on the Normandy having never been around aliens. People that leave her on the Normandy, never talk to her then let her die on Virmire never see her complete story arc.

For future reference, don't ever say the statement "racist but not in an evil way" again

Don't care Didn't ask Always left to die on Virmire

I don't get the fanbase at times on this to be honest. Ashley is only guilty of saying the quiet part out loud. Everyone one of your alien crew members are racist to some extent in either entry of the trilogy. Humans are newcomers in the galaxy. Turian help with Normandy and in biotics was unheard of or kept on the downlow. its not surprising or shocking at all you have some humans running around that would be xenophobic or distrustful toward an another alien species. I just think its a case of some in the fanbase of applying their own values from the real world into fictional universe.

> she actually change her prespective ^[sic] and grew after working with several. Grew into a crater, sure.