From the Salt Mines: Stargate SG-1

I decided to take a page out of Merrin’s book and go on a dig in the salt mines. I, too, have things that stick under my craw for various reasons. We all have a lot of feelings about certain things, not all of them are good, and sometimes you just have to let the world know about them.

In the case of this particular bit of saltiness, it comes in the form of Stargate SG-1. I suppose I should clarify, because I love the show and its spinoff, Stargate: Atlantis. But lurking within those shows, like the most annoying damned pebble in my shoe, is an organization dubbed the IOA: the International Oversight Advisory.

This is the dumbest group of people on the planet.

Spoilers below.

The IOA came into being late into the Stargate SG-1 series (thank God), though it started to get more prominent in Stargate Atlantis, to my utter panic. They’re tasked with overseeing the Stargate program, which includes funding, expeditions, and even appointing/demoting personnel. The members include people from all over the globe. The main goal was to let more countries have a say in what’s happening regarding the Stargate, considering the planet has been in danger on more than one occasion because of humanity’s willingness to skip back and forth through it (okay, mostly the United States).

In theory it’s not a bad idea, but the execution is horrible. Maybe the writers needed another form of roadblock to place in front of characters in order to make their various missions more difficult. But instead it only makes the IOA completely incompetent, as well as an incredibly irritating entity that fails every time it makes an appearance. That appearance is sometimes in the form of an actual person who is a part of the IOA (most notably Richard Woolsey), or just a message coming down the pipeline about a decision they made.

Three IOA members (Woolsey on the far left)

The Stargate Wiki does an excellent job of describing them:

IOA personnel are generally portrayed as being nothing more than arrogant, selfish, greedy, close-minded and xenophobic control-freaks, typically presented as attempting to force the Stargate teams and offworld operations to proceed according to their views and attempting to pass the blame when operations go wrong.

Honestly, that about sums them up. The IOA fails on a regular basis, which has led to numerous deaths and even the endangerment of Earth itself. Some of these failures include:

• Allowing a cloned enemy to nearly achieve god-like powers (people died because of this)
• Willfully ignoring known incoming alien attacks and then attempting to oust the person that stopped them
• Attempting to use a form of AI that has been known to take over entire worlds (leading to more death, almost the destruction of an entire Earth spaceship, and possibly spreading the AI form across the galaxy)
• Attempting to perform research on an alien ally

Perhaps they wouldn’t annoy me so much if they faced actual consequences. But just like any governmental-type power, they never do. No one ever takes responsibility for their screw-ups. No one is ever removed from power. They probably don’t even pay for any of the funerals they’ve caused. All that happens is they say they’re sorry. Sometimes. They don’t even come out and fully admit fault.

James Marrick: IOA member now merged with AI creatures called Replicators. HE HAD A BAD TIME.

If there’s one thing I can’t stand in the world of fiction, it’s clandestine government organizations. Especially the kind that never get their comeuppance. It doesn’t matter if they’re evil or just incompetent like the IOA — I despise this trope with a fiery passion. I never think it’s useful, interesting, or surprising. Like the Smoking Man and all his secret cabal doings in the X-Files. Or even the first season of Stranger Things. I almost didn’t watch the series when I found out the big, bad scary government was doing experiments and then started killing people who bumped into Eleven when it was completely unnecessary. At least that group got their just desserts. The NID (National Intelligence Department) was another group in Stargate SG-1 that got really annoying for a while, because they magically had access to all kinds of fancy alien tech our heroes didn’t, and were doing all sorts of things that shouldn’t have been possible in the first place. I just don’t hate them as much as the IOA because they got stopped and vanished from the series.

In a nutshell, the IOA sucks, and every time they appear I groan and either deal with it or find something else to watch (depending on how ingrained the IOA’s stupidity is in the episode). My father and I rant about them all the time if they show up; he even goes so far as to say that they almost ruined the show. I’m inclined to agree. Had the writers used the IOA more often and if they continued to be this ignorant, useless, antagonist crutch, I’d declare the show was dead and move on to something else, because there was never any winning against them. The show’s main characters would argue and yell at the decisions being made for them, but the IOA would stand firm in its idiocy, the characters would have to overcome it, often almost dying or something important getting destroyed, and then the IOA would go, “Oops,” before moving on to another dumb idea.

Leader of SG-1 after getting nearly killed by Replicator James. IOA said, “Sorry.”

This is why I can’t stand politics in my spec fic. Yes, I know there are a lot of politics ingrained everywhere in speculative media, and that’s fine. But when it’s shoved down your throat in the form of a spooky/all-powerful/super-secret government organization that controls all the things and no one can do anything about it, that’s different. Set that garbage on fire and move on to something else, please. Looking right at you, IOA.