User blog comment:AdmiralPedro1stFleet/Goodbye Indoctrination and Hello Beings of Light/@comment-153.107.33.156-20130616234559

"I know you thought about destroying us", says the starchild. The starchild considers itself as a synthetic. No evidence whether reaper or not. --- Regarding this comment, what if you saved the Geth? You never wanted them to be totally destroyed. And if it references all synthetic life forms - what about EDI? There's NEVER been a time where Shep wanted to fry EDI's circuits.

Starchild is a Reaper, or at least the collective minds of the Reapers gathered together in one 'body' like how the geth are linked together through their consensus. It even says something along the lines of 'I'm the collective minds of the Reapers'. Even if it's not a Reaper, it possesses some sort of Reaper influence. It sucks up to Shep's thought process - taking the form of the child - How else would you explain why the frick the Catalyst takes for of the kid that Shep saw die in Vancouver?

The options Starkid gives to Shep also are proof Shep's indoctrinated. In all 4 possible endings, the Reapers HAVE SOME SORT OF BENEFIT. Destroy: They're still around for the next cycle and live on. Control: They live on. Synthesis: They merge with organics, and EFFECTIVELY live on. Refusal: There's no need to even explain this. Harbinger indoctrinated Shep in the first place because it was only Shep who was needed and able to get up to the Crucible in almost one piece to be able to activate the controls. Shep needs to believe he/she's doing good for the galaxy (save Refusal ending) to make one of the decisions for the ending. Throughout the game, we as players have seen what a perceptive and interrogative mind Shep has and we know his/her capabitilies of thinking about the bigger picture. Shep would have to have known that each decision still ended up with the Reapers surviving. But why did he/she question it? Was it a shoddy game design element? Or was it something else bigger hmm I dunno maybe... The Indoctrination Theory?

Anyhow, as you've probably deduced, I'm a heavy contender in the IT, but not just because it beats the crap out of the last 20 minutes of pure bs Bioware shot out at us, but it's the most logical answer to ALL the plot holes, ALL the inconsistencies, ALL the questions that could be asked by players. I don't think Bioware purposefully made absolutely magnificent games that have made such deep notches on video game history only to end it with complete utter bs. So this whole encouragement of player interpretation lead to the IT. Don't know if it was the intended effect or not but sure makes for a mind blowing ending fitiing for the trilogy.