#Fallout 4 has a FEW mentions of the strife but not nearly enough. The country was on the edge of boiling over by the time the bombs drop

[media-illiterate]

Its so weird. And it only gets weirder when you consider that according to the world bibles (which are. tbh. full of their own issues) America seems to be right on the edge of collapse.

There are massive food and fuel riots happening when the bombs drop. The military is deploying power armor against American citizens. Soldiers are defecting, sometimes en masse like with Capt. Maxson and what will go on to become the BOS. There's an active Canadian resistance spreading the army thin. The public is protesting the Canadian annexation and the accompanying atrocities.

Add in the strife later games sneak in and it seems like the American government was on the verge of collapse before the war. If the bombs hadn't dropped its quite likely that America would've collapsed anyway from the strain.

And yet, Fallout 4 still gives us suburban bliss as its opening. No mention of rationing or riots or civil strife. Just white picket fences and the american dream.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

A devastating and confusing thing about the Fallout setting, when you explore the pre-war aspects, is what the creators think about pre-war America. In the first games we only get hints of the pre-war world, but they seem to be some sort of wild fascist nation invading Canada. In Fallout 1, the first thing we're introduced to of the pre-war society is seeing a soldier shoot civilians and laughing.

Now, for the first 2 games and New Vegas we don't really know much. What we know is that there's a fascist military group known as the enclave who were a sort of US deep state even before the war, and that the government teamed up with corporate interests to preform vaguely MKULTRA-ish experiments with the Vaults. Basically, the government was an extreme version of the 50s American jingoism and McCarthyism.

This is well and dandy, I guess issues come up more when we get to the later games, especially 4, where it seems like none of this extreme plotting and societal civil unrest which would exist is seen. The society as presented in 4 also seems quite progressive, gay people are featured in the opening, and none of the baggage of say, civil rights not existing are included. Now on a baseline, I don't want settings to be more conservative, homophobic and sexist etc., but it becomes a very confusing setting when it's displayed both as this jingoist extreme thing with fascist tendencies aswell as a progressive place where everyone is seemingly equal. If you're focusing on the 50s as your setting, and American nationalism in the 50s, then you can't have McCarthyism spoofs and anti-communism as a societal paranoia norm while also general equality is the norm without misunderstanding why McCarthyism and nationalist jingoism is bad. A massive harm done in anti-communist paranoia is how it degrades and vilifies any progressive movements (women's rights, civil rights, homosexuality) as being morally un-American and therefore connected to communism. To ignore this just makes any critique of MacCarthyism and jingoism weird!

Basically, pre-war America in Fallout 4 becomes this both sides thing where America is both pure and equal and white fences in every instance that we see as the player (the intro), while also supposedly being this dystopic MacCarthyist hellscape that's broadcasting gladly about their war crimes in Canada, and wants to root out communism. I guess the only fix for this issue without getting into the fine print like they had to do is just not to focus too much on the pre-war world.