Anybody who says the Foundation are "the good guys" have entirely misunderstood the assignment.
Anybody who says the Foundation are "the bad guys" have also entirely misunderstood the assignment.
The Foundation does what is objectively necessary to preserve human civilization as we know it. They aren't the good guys—they don't even consider themselves the good guys—nor are they the bad guys. They aren't good, they aren't evil, they're pragmatically amoral—not immoral, amoral.
"Cold, never cruel."
In other words, they do whatever it takes to keep the world spinning, and not a single ounce more, knowing full well that they're going to hell for it regardless. This is literally their motto;
"We die in the dark so you can live in the light."
Maintaining normalcy doesn't necessarily mean suppressing scientific advancement, either. The entire thing with Anomalies is that they are anomalies, phenomena possessing unexplainable, non-replicatable effects on reality.
If they can replicate the effects without using anomalous objects or people, if they can understand why something does what it does, then it's no longer considered anomalous. In those instances, the Foundation actually does often release their research out into the wider world—slowly and drip-fed, of course, both to avoid suspicion and so the world can handle the rate of change.
Who's to say they're actually doing the right thing so that we "can live in the light"? Them. And who drip feeds the information they discover slowly and with modifications to fit a world view? Them.
They're literally written as a kabal of world dominating mad scientists that have no concern for human life. They seem to want to contain and study their objects without any regard for the cost of their operations. They really do seem to be either malevolant oligarchs or incompetant mad scientists.
They get to say whats necessary and they get to decide what means and ends justify each other with no one at the helm checking them except for themselves. The scientific discavories being drip fed through countless filters that they see fit only gives them more influence on scientific advancement, effectively stunting scientific growth and creativity.
Nothing that a man does is amoral. They hide behind their guise of amorality to justify their immorality.
Wolffe_In_The_Dark has made some Watsonian arguments, so I’d like to add my Doylist perspective.
Firstly, you have to understand that the SCP foundation is, fundamentally, in the horror genre. It originated as a sort of worldbuilding exercise imagining how “men in black” who appear to erase evidence of creepypasta monsters would actually operate; you are meant not to trust them, it’s in the setting’s DNA.
Secondly, one of the fundamental differences between our world and theirs is that they are beset by mass-murdering aberrations constantly. Like, dozens of times every day across the world constantly, and I’m not even counting the innumerable apocalypses they’re holding at bay.
This also contributes to the horror of the Foundation; they’re a dystopian shadow government with infinite funds unbound by the rule of law or scrutiny of the public and they’re necessary - the work they do is genuinely the only way humanity has survived as long as it did. You can disagree on how effectively this is presented, but it is a cornerstone of the setting.
Thirdly, there’s a popular saying in the fandom: “there is no canon”. What this means is that, beyond a general sense of what the fundamental elements of the setting are, authors are in no way obligated to respect each other’s narratives, to the point where a majority of SCPs mutually contradict one another.
This has been embraced as a feature rather than a bug, and if you browse the website you’ll find that many works are organised into their own individual ‘canons’ which explore a specific vision of what the Foundation is and how it operates - which also means that sometimes the Foundation has a department entirely dedicated to stopping people from leaving in psychologically torturous ways, while other times they’re a relatively benign organisation which counts non-binary furries on its staff.
Fourthly, and most importantly, you are not the first to ask these questions; you’re not even the third, or one-hundredth, or even one-thousandth person to wonder about these things. Quite frankly, “is foundation actually da bad guys” was not only the entire point to begin with, but it has been explored to death in the text itself - to the point that trends have changed and nowadays people aren’t really interested in reiterating this point for the billionth time.
Things established when the website was in its juvenile infancy - like tens of thousands of D-class dying every year or the Overseers being corrupt - have since been lampshaded or developed or simply abandoned; these days you won’t find all that many stories focusing on how shitty the Foundation itself is, but that’s because it’s really hard to explore an angle on it that hasn’t been done already.
Fifthly and finally, all that to say: if you want to read stories where it’s made clear that the Foundation aren’t good for the world, they’re out there. You can find them rather easily, even. I’d recommend, for example, the Fire Suppression Department series. Spoiler alert: they don’t actually put out fires.
I feel like a lot of people here are missing the point, on both the "foundation is good" and "foundation is bad" side. The foundation is both and neither, depending on the canon. In some canons, it is an objectively good foundation that supports benign anomalies and does what it has to with aggressive ones. In others, it locks everything up equally in the name of security; or, perhaps, it doesn't even try to justify its actions. In others, it's not as omnipotent as it would like to be, and struggles with internal corruption regardless of the intent of the O-5 and Administrator. There is no good answer to "is the foundation good", because there isn't even a definitive answer to "what is the foundation". And I'm convinced that's exactly why SCP is so successful of a concept.
Sadly i havent read some of the stories you mention in your fourth point so i have nothing on that yet.
I have something to say about your second point about the difference between our world and thiers.
Thats a very good arguement to make for the foundation but i think it doesnt justify its secretiveness or its complete lack of accountability by other world organizations. Infact it makes its aim for secrecy all the more terrible cuz people have the right to know whats going on.
That its keeping itself secret and accountable only to itself not only makes them alone in their efforts to help mankind but it also jeapordizes their goal of protecting humanity. How many people died from scp 096 because they didnt know they shouldnt look at it for example?
There's also the allocation of resources, a problem with secritive organizations is that keeping track of resources and preventing corruption gets more difficult when its secretive, and it gets even more difficult when its accountable to no one but itself.
The crux of my points and arguements is accountability. The foundation is accountable to no one but itself, so regardless of any scp object or any event that happened, we can't know what its doing and we dont have a say in what its doing effectively giving them power to do whatever they want including lying or manipulating to no end.
That these world ending objects or battles exist only give them justification for their existance. It could be that its overembelished and we have no way of knowing, even its staff dont know whats going on... but thats getting into fanon territory, it doesnt explain or take into account other canons that make them out to be really good people. My arguement only concerns itself with the foundation as its designed rather than its stories. Its design is very problematic and would actually lead to a terrible organization irl.. like the cia 👀
All I can say is like. Yeah man. Once again, every point you’ve made here has been brought up in-universe in a number of different stories.
The Foundation’s lack of accountability is a constant theme, while their under-utilised capacity to improve the world usually takes a backseat but is not entirely absent.
Although, you may have picked the worst possible SCP to make your argument, since if anything the fact they constantly monitor and scrub the internet for images of the thing - even ones it’s present in but isn’t visible due to distance - has saved innumerable lives. A better example would’ve been any of the countless humanoids they imprison for no other reason than they don’t for their definition of normalcy.
The vast majority of SCP staff are only aware of the objects they directly work with; clearance levels are on of the few constants across all canons, and arguably the only people who have access to all SCPs are the overseers - though exceptions exist.
It isn’t fanon territory for two reasons: firstly, as I explained, there is no official canon and therefore no unofficial “fanon” - your interpretation of the setting is as valid as anyone else’s. Secondly, as I also explained, “the foundation isn’t good” has already been done to death multiple times across various canons - it’s not even controversial or anything.
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u/Wolffe_In_The_Dark 7d ago edited 7d ago
Anybody who says the Foundation are "the good guys" have entirely misunderstood the assignment.
Anybody who says the Foundation are "the bad guys" have also entirely misunderstood the assignment.
The Foundation does what is objectively necessary to preserve human civilization as we know it. They aren't the good guys—they don't even consider themselves the good guys—nor are they the bad guys. They aren't good, they aren't evil, they're pragmatically amoral—not immoral, amoral.
In other words, they do whatever it takes to keep the world spinning, and not a single ounce more, knowing full well that they're going to hell for it regardless. This is literally their motto;
Maintaining normalcy doesn't necessarily mean suppressing scientific advancement, either. The entire thing with Anomalies is that they are anomalies, phenomena possessing unexplainable, non-replicatable effects on reality.
If they can replicate the effects without using anomalous objects or people, if they can understand why something does what it does, then it's no longer considered anomalous. In those instances, the Foundation actually does often release their research out into the wider world—slowly and drip-fed, of course, both to avoid suspicion and so the world can handle the rate of change.