 Ahoy-hoy. So the SCP Foundation can be difficult to categorize as fiction. The easy choice is to call it horror. The easy choice is to assume that, since it's horror, all the basic horror tropes all apply. There is a monster. We want to destroy that monster. But the truth is, the SCP Foundation Wiki is far, far more complicated than that. And I know that complexity does not lend itself to an easy tagline. Let's talk a little bit today about how that's wrong, and how the media tends to get their depictions of the SCP Foundation wrong. So first of all, it's actually perfectly understandable. When you look at the SCP Foundation, especially the articles that most people are, let's say, directed to by the site, or by the off-site fanbase, they're generally horror, or horror light, anyway. SCP 173, 682, and 106. Out of those three, you know, 106 is probably the one that's most likely actually horror. Throw in SCP 096 and a few of the others, and you start to see why people might get confused. But the truth of the matter is, is that focusing in on four articles, which represent probably 1% of 1%, maybe a little bit more, I don't know exactly the word count of the whole SCP Wiki, but what we're talking about basically is an open writing venue, so anyone can write anything. And people like me, who say don't even like horror and prefer science fiction, might find a place to write there. And to be fair, you can write contemporary fantasy on the SCP Wiki, and a lot of people do, without including any horror elements at all. It seems as though people off-site, and sometimes in the news when you see the SCP Wiki pop up, which is rare, but not very rare. It seems as though the SCP Wiki is always depicted as though it's in stasis, as though it's never changed from its origins. Like if you look back in 2008, yes, the SCP Wiki at that time had a focus on horror because SCP 173 is a light horror concept. The truth of the matter is, SCP 173 is more of contemporary fantasy. But the further depictions of those SCPs tend to, and especially the tales surrounding them, tend to focus in on the horror elements. And of course, there's been a streak of horror that runs through the SCP foundation from then till now. But ever since maybe the first, let's say, 1500 SCPs were out, there was already a movement to kind of include a bit of science fiction, because science fiction and horror have always been intertwined. But there's always been a move to include more science fiction in the SCP Wiki, and it really took off probably after the first, say, like I said, 1500 articles. If you see someone describe the SCP Wiki offsite, be it in the news or just a person describing it, the first thing they're likely to say is that it's a horror site. The second thing, and this is always considered secondary, is that it's a collaborative writing site. The focus is always on the horror. And I don't know if this is because people think that that is more interesting somehow, or if they just think that that's the thing that's going to get them the most clicks. And if we look at the SCP video games, I think all of them, I can't think of any of them that aren't in the horror genre. And to be fair, that's, you know, that's a current events sort of thing. I mean, horror games tend to do very well with younger audiences. That's, you know, Five Nights at Freddy's kind of not started that trend, but definitely solidified it for indie game developers. And so the most common type of SCP game you're going to see is a horror game. It starts with SCP, oh, I think it's 087, the stairwell might be getting the number wrong off the top of my head. But you start with that, and you work your way to, you know, containment breach. And now you've got the newer ones that all very, very well done, but still horror focused, which is interesting because the SCP foundation has so much there's so much opportunity there, you know, it's contemporary fantasy. If you limit yourself to just the horror aspects, you're kind of limiting your ability to tell stories in your games. Now, that's true as far as I've seen every game that I've seen out there. The story is very, very much secondary. I should say SCP games. The story is very much secondary. There's no, there's no version of the last of us, which is, you know, an amazing storytelling with a decent ish game thrown on top of it. It's always let's focus on the gameplay mechanics, let's make those as perfect as possible, let's make the graphics interesting, let's try and do the scares as best as possible. And the story is just kind of, oh, and also, I guess we need a story. And this has always bothered me a little bit because this is the kind of thing where current creators sort of reinforce the incorrect assumptions. That isn't to say that things can't be popular if they're not horror. I mean, look at any videos you can find about their Hero Dragons, for example. That's definitely a contemporary fantasy, and it's definitively popular. You can always make, let's just say, let's just make this point. You can always get a lot of popularity out of anything that elicits a strong emotional response. It doesn't have to be horror. And horror does the same thing, but it's a little cheaper, it's a little bit more transitory. Whereas if you have something like Hero or Dragon, this people will, that'll sit with them all day. That'll sit with them for weeks. That'll sit, you know, and when you remind people of it a little bit later on, they're like, oh, I do remember that. And it bothers them in a way that, interestingly enough, it bothers them in a way that you can never really get with horror. Horror is a quick one-two punch. Once it hits, that's it. I know some people probably let's, it probably sits with some people, but it's not the same. Not quite the same. And the SCP Foundation, even though public, let's say, most media gets it wrong, as I said, it does have an interesting take on horror. But the trick is, is that the SCP Foundation doesn't really tie into the normal trope you expect. That's the whole point of, that makes it sort of unique. And the reason why people have all these theories and ideas about how to beat an SCP or how to keep it contained, because it's all, it's re-examining horror from a scientific perspective. And more importantly than that, more often than not, not always, but almost every time, the SCPs in question, despite being sometimes world-ending or just incredibly horrifying creatures, are kept in a box in a way where they can't get out. And the SCP Foundation has kept them under control. That's the thing about the SCP Foundation. Even if the genre tends to be horror every once in a while, in those articles, the horror is incredibly muted because the SCP Foundation has essentially neutralized the horror. There is no horror because SCP 096 might be scary if you look at its face, but you know not to look at its face. And it's in a building and or containment cell where you can't look at its face. When they wrote this, when the story about the termination of 096 comes up, that whole story is predicated on the idea of subverting what the SCP article already says. And that's that, you know, SCP 096 is essentially neutralized. It cannot get out anymore. So you have to subvert that by saying, well, what if there was a picture of it out there in the world somewhere? And it's bothering me a lot whenever I see this in media. And, you know, because the standard horror trope is, let's destroy it. The SCP Foundation is supposed to subvert that trope, right? I did this on the Infographics Show video a little bit when I talked about how, you know, they constantly were focusing on how do you destroy it? How do you destroy it? How do you destroy it? Because that's the standard for horror tropes. You have a monster, of course you want to destroy it. Who would want to keep a monster around? But that's the whole point of the SCP Foundation's lore that they keep monsters around. That's their thing. And if you completely forget about that, you're really not that that's why everyone was pointing me at that video. They're like, Hey, look at this crap. I'm not saying it was or wasn't crap. The animation was well done. But that's, you know, you've got a team doing that. The research was not not on point. I mean, it was whatever, you know, but that's just a symptom of a greater problem. It's not just the Infographics Show. It's if you listen to the off site fan base, they'll tell you the same thing that that's what the SCP Foundation is about when it's not. It's not about horror genre anymore. Not at all most. Almost none of the SCP Foundations are I mean, not to say none, but almost none of the SCP Foundation articles that you read that are modern are going to be horror at all. And that's a big mistake that a lot of new writers come in and make because they'll come in and they'll be like, all right, let's write a horror article. But it's been done to death so much that now most of the modern articles are other things because well, if you're going to write horror, it needs to be better than the best that's already out there. Otherwise, why would I read yours? And instead of understanding that the SCP Foundation subverts the tropes of horror, everyone just assumes that it enforces and embraces them. And when they create secondary content around it, they embrace and enhance the horror. It's a it's a troubling trend, but it's not something that I think is, you know, like deadly or like, you know, would I prefer it if offsite fans and offsite media portrayed the SCP Foundation in a more nuanced light? Sure. But is it so important to me that I would prefer they either do that or do no recognition of it? I don't think that's true personally. Anyway, I would prefer very much that this continues. I just would like them to get it right. Anyway, that's a little bit of a rant. Thank you very much for watching. If you enjoyed the video, please hit the subscribe button. Please hit the subscribe button. I know you're thinking about it. You'd like, Oh, do I like these videos? Do I not like these videos? 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