Would the Zero Requiem work in Real Life?

For those who don't know, after successfully killing the former emperor Charles Di Britannia, Lelouch Vi Britannia took over the Britannian Empire, destroying the culture of Britannia, pulling a coup de-tat over the UFN(United Federation of Nations), and then successfully acquired the power of nuclear weapons(Damocles) over the entire world, declaring a true world dictatorship.

He then imprisoned those who went against the regime, and for a moment it looked like Lelouch, who once espoused the philosophies of freedom and the future, was going to lean towards Hitlerism. But then, something awe-inspiring happened.

He had his best friend, Suzaku play the part of Zero as he had a sword ran through him. Lelouch purposefully became the image of all that was evil incarnate, while building up zer0 as the messiah. This allowed the world to work towards the future and peace.

So I pose the question to everyone: Could the Zero Requiem work in real life? Could a leader become the symbolism of all that is evil, and lead to humanity rejecting said evils?

Well, the first two parts(becoming a symbol of evil) and a staged suicide would be easy to accomplish. The hard part is the aftermath, the people leaning towards the future.

IRL, we're just too opinionated(Religiously, etc) and somewhat bigoted in our own thoughts. Even if someone played the role of martyr, it wouldn't lead to anymore than at best "remembering him"(See:Martin Luther King Jr.)

So sadly, the Zero Requiem wouldn't work in my opinion.

The only reason it works in CG is that they're not making a sequel.

they are making a third code geass anime actually

I could have sworn there was a "we need more leaders like hitler" post.



No, because no matter how evil or wrong a leader was/is, some people will think he was/is in the right all along. Hell, Stalin an Hitler (again, as evidenced by the deleted "we need more leaders like hitler") still have supporters.

So for example a leader in the US rises and declares all blacks/jew/homos/insert-minority-here to be exterminated? A portion of population will support him. Not all of humanity will reject him.

[color=#2e1a6b]This is something I've been thinking about ever since I watched Code Geass 2 years ago. Back then, I really had little understanding of politics, so my opinions of it have changed since then.

Initially, I thought that the zero requiem would work. I thought it was the most effective means of creating world peace. I especially liked his saying "the only ones who should kill are those prepared to be kill". This quote basically prevents selfish people from taking power, since only those who sacrifice themselves can sacrifice others, which a selfish dictator wouldn't do. I thought the real world didn't have the political problems of code geass, so the zero requiem wasn't needed in the real world

As time passed, a started to learn more about politics, and I learned how corrupt government is/is becoming. In particular, I noticed that the US government is very similar to Britannia. For example, Brittania invaded and oppressed Japan for their
Sakuradite mines; the US invades countries for their oil. Since I realized that the world is a a situation similar to Code Geass, I really thought the the zero requiem would be successful in real life.

And now, I realize that the zero requiem could be attempted, but even if successful, it will not result in world peace. I used to think a global government was good because it meant no war, but now I realize that global government has many horrible problems. It can easily be manipulated by lobysist, it is too big to be accountable to the people, and it destroys anyone who doesn't surrender to it. There aren't any wars with a world government because it's not called war, it's called slaughter. There have been world governments in the past, such as the Greek empire and the Roman empire, but those were oppressive empires, which eventually fell apart. And these nations were lucky to obtain a world government; billions of people have died over the centuries due to nations trying to create another Roman empire. World government doesn't create peace; it destroys peace, both in achieving it, and after it is achieved.

Despite my negative opinion of the zero requiem, there is a concept within the requiem that I believe can be successfully used. This concept can be explained through my favorite quote ever, the quote in my sig:

"What do you do when there is an evil you cannot defeat by just means? Do you stain your hands with evil to destroy evil, or do you remain steadfastly just and righteous even if it means surrendering to evil?"

after hearing this, C.C. said "in either case, evil remains"

But Lelouch found a loophole. by staining his hands with evil to destroy evil, he indeed became an even greater evil, and evil still remained. However, the evil he became was not "an evil you cannot defeat by just means". He became an evil and was defeated by just means.

I can't think of any evil in the real world that cannot be defeated by just means, but I can think of evils that are in the making. If it ever gets to the point that they cannot be stopped by just means, then becoming evil to stop them should be successful, as long as you become an evil capable of defeating by just means.

The interesting thing about Zero Requiem is that it has both a high and low chance of success. The central reason that it works in the anime is that Lelouche's supporters are either in on his plan or brainwashed by Geass, which minimizes the risk of someone picking up the pieces. In addition, the world population was traumatized by multiple wars of escalating scale and was left with the symbol of justice, Zero, who was tasked with keeping the peace.

Granted that it would be excessively difficult, the premise is not impossible, just highly improbable. Without lasting symbols which clearly define good and evil, at least in a public perspective, the effects of a real life implementation would likely fade after a few generations. The reason I predict this is the standard time gap between war; often the gap is just long enough for a newer generation to begin taking charge along with it's new leaders with little or no war experience.

For a lasting effect, you would have to alter human lifestyle down to the way children are raised, an unlikely scenario. Human beings naturally gravitate towards finding the simplest of reasons to fight with one another. An interesting thing to note is that the only religious references in the game are done with C.C., and given her age, it could be inferred that organized religion was in decline, most probably due to Britania's Darwinist social policy. If this were true in life, Zero Requiem would have a much higher probability of success.

The truth of the matter is that Zero Requiem was meant to alter social policy in such a way that certain expenditures and beliefs would skew towards the common welfare, which is attainable, but difficult to sustain.

In our world, the Zero Requiem would never work, there is too much differences in our cultures, politics, and firepower, but I understand why it worked in CG. In CG, the world is a much different place, in many ways, it became a global world even before the internet, except with less freedom involved. We have Britannia who controls the entire Western Hemisphere and many colonies around the world, we have the Euro Universe which is a much more powerful and united European "state" in which they truly became one country and joined armies and currencies, and then we have the UFN, which is pretty much, the rest of it. By the end, there are only two of these entities left, guess which ones?

With the EU gone, it's now even easier. The UFN is a very binding contract between many different countries, in many ways, it is similar to how the US was created, the states (in this case countries) subdue themselves to a central government and relinquish all rights to an army. In the short time after the UFN was founded, it created a much more powerful bond between the global community unlike the UN we have now, especially since there was no Cold War and no veto power. With the world skewed between two entities, it is easy to see why this was possible.

By just attacking the UFN, Lelouch was able to get the ENTIRE world to hate him. The UFN isn't a spineless organization, it has some big cohones, and since this world has been such a world of hate, dictatorship, and power struggles, I am pretty sure people did not take freedom and peace for granted. With the UFN uniting everyone against him, Lelouch can pull this off, to top it off, he even abused his own country, putting his previously loyal subjects into jail and killing entire families of dissenting people. Therefore turning even Britannians against the almighty Emperor.

The Zero Requiem works, but very specific things must happen before it can be effective for a long period of time.

Also, as a side note, the UFN is a boss system and I wish this world had it.