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| “ | How do you think it is that I became a god to begin with? The freedom not to choose...The freedom not to think...If every person pushed the burdens of their lives upon others, nobody would have to act for themselves. And who should be there to receive the burdens? | „ |
| ~ Yaldabaoth referring to his role in the Antisocial Force |
The Antisocial Force are the main antagonists of Persona 5 and Persona 5 Royal. It is a secret cabal of wealthy and powerful individuals based in Tokyo seeking to replace the current government of Japan with their own, as well as hegemonically spreading their influence across the world. The organization is led by Yaldabaoth, who is impersonating the Master of the Velvet Room Igor to advance its goals as the conductor with Masayoshi Shido as its public face. The Antisocial Force also counts some of the Palace Rulers as members, most notably Ichiryusai Madarame and Kunikazu Okumura, alongside the assassin Goro Akechi ("Crow" and "Black Mask"). Thus, they play a significant role in causing great harm to the Phantom Thieves of Hearts and the world.
At the start of the game, the Antisocial Force is at the peak of its power and ready to elect Masayoshi Shido as the new Prime Minister of Japan to maintain its influence over much of Japan. However, a string of high-profile defeats by the Phantom Thieves brought an end to this organization.
History[]
Pre-game[]
The Antisocial Force was formed by Yaldabaoth at some point for the purpose of bringing all of humanity under his control, and to prove that they could not prosper without a powerful if not tyrannical ruler like him. The organization consists of corrupt public figures that control the Japanese capital of Tokyo. Their ultimate goal is to have United Future Party politician Masayoshi Shido implement his self-centered political ideology through winning the position of Prime Minister, which would turn Japan into a dictatorship that feeds and creates the suffering of its citizens. In order to ensure they remain unopposed, the Antisocial Force quickly brought or blackmailed the media, the Yakuza, the police, and the current government to solely serve them.
To achieve their goals, the Antisocial Force has Goro Akechi, otherwise known as Black Mask, trigger mental shutdowns and psychotic breakdowns on specific targets in order to discredit the current government administration and call for a general election, while Shido increases his personal popularity by calling out the Japanese government's supposed incompetence, and promises to create a greater Japan for all of its citizens. Usually, Shido will order Akechi to target anyone who sides with the current government, opposed him, or displayed incompetence or disloyalty and the killings will be used for his profit, such as additional connections and money. Members that Shido perceives will pose an obstacle for his route to power, no matter how fleeting the reason is, will also be executed by Akechi this way, such as Shujin Academy's Principal Kobayakawa and Kunikazu Okumura, and the same applies to others who had outlived their usefulness, such as the director of the Special Investigations Unit.
Shido screens his associates carefully, and he was capable of seeing if a person was a genuinely obedient lapdog to him just by observing them. Contrary to his empty promises during his speeches, only those who show complete obedience to him and only him are allowed to live a luxury in the country, should he reform it. For this reason, if the rigged election went well, Shido secretly planned to dispose of Akechi in spite of his competence and the benefits that Shido gained using him as a tool, as he would have outlived his usefulness and Shido knew of his dealings.
Lesser members of the Antisocial Force appear as cognitive existences in Shido's Palace. He and his close associates had transformed mental shutdowns into a business, having him carry out the assassinations and paying him with money and connections in return.
Prior to the formation of the Phantom Thieves, Shido also personally attempted to seize and ruin the lives of cognitive psience researchers. One such researcher was Wakaba Isshiki, who was executed by Akechi per Shido's orders and ordering an IT company president to encrypt the research without telling him what it actually is, then out of an unnecessary act of cruelty, read a forged suicide note aloud to her daughter Futaba to break her spirit and turn her into a hikkiomori.
Persona 5[]
When the Phantom Thieves of Hearts were formed by Ren Amamiya ("Joker") and began to fight against their conquest by stealing the treasures of their high profile members in order to reform them, the Antisocial Force decided to hunt every Thief down and put them on death row under the premise of treason. The group itself faced it's first setbacks when Ichiryusai Madarame is discredited for his plagiarism and Junya Kaneshiro is arrested for extortion, as both were the primary financial backers of the group, and their confessions deeply hurt the group.
Initially, a tech firm CEO poses as the online hacker activist group Medjed to threaten the Phantom Thieves into compliance, although the threat was actually blank, and their ultimate plan was to increase the Phantom Thieves' popularity and make them ideal scapegoats. After Futaba Sakura ("Oracle") successfully breaks into his server and defangs him, they decide to try a more subtle approach, using the story of how the Phantom Thieves destroyed an international hacking front to raise their popularity to abnormal and outright suspicious levels, then using it to artificially kick off a heist request on Kunikazu Okumura to the top of the list. The Thieves, although doubtful of the public, only got in to save his daughter Haru Okumura from being sold to Sugimura. In reality, the conspiracy had planned to assassinate him to kill two birds with one stone; after the Thieves steal his Treasure, Akechi would kill Shadow Kunikazu upon Shido's orders, which led to him dying the following night during his press conference. This allows Shido to go unopposed in the election, as he saw Okumura as a threat to his candidacy while discrediting the Phantom Thieves in the process. Kobayakawa, who was unable to get any intelligence regarding the Phantom Thieves, attempted to sell out the group but Shido is well aware of his intentions and has Akechi trigger a mental shutdown in him, killing the Shujin principal.
With these two cases, the Phantom Thieves' reputation took a steep drop, with their sudden treatment from saviors to apparent murderers from the public. This is when the Antisocial Force's true attack against the group began, using Akechi as a mole to lead them into the Palace of Sae Niijima so they can all be arrested. Thankfully, this was foiled as the Phantom Thieves were aware of Akechi's status and had a plan to foil him and have the protagonist evade his untimely death; although for it to be pulled off, he had to willingly shrug off the truth serum's effects, as he was drugged during his interrogation, with the interrogators making use of that as they attempt to gaslight him into believing he's a criminal. With the protagonist's "death," Shido has Akechi kill the SIU Director for having outlived his usefulness. Afterwards, the Phantom Thieves initiate a counterattack against Shido, who had begun to receive abnormal approval of the public, far beyond any sort of rationality.
When Akechi was dispatched into the Palace's Boiler Room to personally end the Phantom Thieves, he reveals that despite being a member of the Antisocial Force, he was not loyal to them at all; he simply worked for both the Antisocial Force and the Thieves for his own agenda. After the confrontation which ended in his defeat, Akechi was gravely assaulted by a cognitive copy of himself created by Shido, who views him as an obedient hitman. He seemingly sacrifices himself for the Thieves trying to fight against his cognitive self. Once the Thieves reach Shadow Shido, he reveals that he knew about Akechi's plans to dispose of him simply because he resembled his mother too much and is prepared to dispose Akechi himself if things ever begin to go wrong.
After Shido is defeated and experiences a change of heart, he confesses everything he's done live on election day. As such, the Antisocial Force was greatly weakened and rendered impotent politically. The remnants, consisting of a Shido crony appointed as the SIU Director, a psychiatrist and a Diet legislator started to scurry for plan as the public began to doubt Shido's credibility. They would be paranoid of Shido confessing and the potential consequences this would have for them legally, driving them to pursue with their attempts at controlling the public for their own safety.
However, Yaldabaoth begins to take actions of his own as he saw the protagonist's "rehabilitation" complete. He manipulates the Japanese public into inversely supporting Shido, increasing his popularity to cult-like levels, and the remnants of the Antisocial Force will use it for even more sinister plans, like ensuring both the control of Japan and to eventually take over the world. In order to make sure their plan ensues smoothly, they also manipulate the media to make the public believe that Shido is simply in poor health, and that there is no evidence that the Phantom Thieves actually changed people's hearts; additionally, the new SIU Director fires Sae, who was nearly successful in indicting him for his crimes.
In order to defeat the remaining members of the Antisocial Force and reform the public, the Phantom Thieves reach the depths of Mementos; only to find that the "reformed" Antisocial Force members are merely made one with the public, and the Holy Grail that Yaldabaoth manifests as is indestructible since it feeds on the people's apathy to endlessly regenerate itself. Once the Thieves can no longer fight, it exiles them back into the real world, and then merges Mementos with the real world and further manipulates the public to believe that the Phantom Thieves don't exist, causing all of them to be exiled from reality. Yaldabaoth now reveals himself to be impersonating Igor and to have been compromised the Velvet Room and transformed it into a prison where all of the Thieves are imprisoned in after they were exiled by him. Once exposed as an impostor courtesy of the protagonist restoring the Twin Wardens back to their original form of Lavenza, Yaldabaoth offers the protagonist a chance to join him, so everything outside will revert to normal and the Phantom Thieves will gain the fame they deserve. However, the people in Tokyo will still remain as "distorted masses." If the protagonist accepts this offer and has confirmed to seal the contract with Yaldabaoth, Lavenza will be disappointed at him, and it will lead to a bad ending where the protagonist starts using the Metaverse to sabotage people indiscriminately, and his teammates presumably remaining imprisoned in the Velvet Room forever. Should the protagonist refuse, Lavenza praises his resolve while Yaldabaoth promptly expresses disgust at being denied and retreats, which returns the real Igor and awaits confrontation on top of the Distorted Tokyo.
Throughout the exploration of the Depths of Mementos, the true purpose of the Antisocial Force is revealed to be in fact, chaotic elements implanted into society by Yaldabaoth in order to prove that if humanity are left to themselves, they will give away their future to the corrupt and incompetent out of sheer ignorance. Thus, they do not deserve freedom and the only way for them to be saved is for Yaldabaoth himself to be in charge of them, ignoring the truth that he is the one who manipulated the public into supporting an Antisocial Force to extreme heights of popularity. Supposedly, this is a "game" for Yaldabaoth to see that if the protagonist's desire for change or Akechi's desire for destruction is stronger by deliberately arranging the most foolish and corrupt of people into power for one of them to take down. In reality, Yaldabaoth had no intent to hold his own end of the contract; and regardless of whoever wins by dismantling the chaotic elements he set up, Yaldabaoth will enact his plan to make the public "distorted masses" who only desire safety and stagnation, so he can prove that the public do not deserve a free society for their sheer ignorance. That way, the only way there will be no more corrupt and foolish conspiracies like those is when he solely guides humanity.
The members of the Antisocial Force with a personalized Palace, are those whose desire for free will and control independent from the Prison of Regression are so strong that they broke out from their confines and locked themselves in their own Palaces. Said personalities also watch over the public who are still in the prison to keep them from escaping. Yaldabaoth also subconsciously manipulates the public into worshiping or enabling the undesirables as god-like entities on ever increasing severity to prove his point.
When the Thieves were freed from their Quarantine Cells, they return to Tokyo to climb the Qliphoth World and announce their true rebellion to the world, one that is not orchestrated by Yaldabaoth behind the scenes. They successfully destroy Yaldabaoth and erased Mementos from the surface of the world. With the source of all distortions being removed, people's opinion of Shido changed to an unanimously negative light, thus dissolving the Antisocial Force once and for all.
Members[]
- Yaldabaoth
- Masayoshi Shido
- Ichiryusai Madarame
- Junya Kaneshiro
- Goro Akechi
- SIU Director
- Sugimura
- Kobayakawa
- Jyun Owada
Trivia[]
- The Antisocial Force is only named in the Japanese versions of Persona 5 and Persona 5 Royal. In the English versions, it is simply known as "The Conspiracy".
External links[]
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 Villains
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SEBEC Route Takahisa Kandori | Nyarlathotep | Pandora Snow Queen Quest Victims of the Snow Queen Mask | Tomomi Fujimori | Night Queen
Innoncent Sin Masked Circle | Master Joker | Tatsuya Sudou | Junko Kurosu | Anna Yoshizaka | Ginji Sasaki | Akari Hoshi | Nyarlathotep Eternal Punishment New World Order | Tatsuzou Sudou | Kiyotada Sumaru | Takahisa Kandori | Chizuru Ishigami | Nyarlathotep
Strega (Takaya Sakaki | Jin Shirato | Chidori Yoshino) | Kouetsu Kirijo | Shuji Ikutsuki | Nyx Avatar Persona 3 FES
The Killer | Mitsuo Kubo | Izanami Persona 4: Arena & Persona 4: Arena Ultimax Sho Minazuki | Shadow Labrys | Hi-no Kagutsuchi
Suguru Kamoshida | Sphinx | Sae Niijima | Antisocial Force (Ichiryusai Madarame | Junya Kaneshiro | Kunikazu Okumura | The Traitor | SIU Director | Sugimura | Kobayakawa | Masayoshi Shido | Yaldabaoth) | Shiro Asakura Persona 5 Royal Persona 5 Strikers Alice Hiiragi | Ango Natsume | Mariko Hyodo | Shuzo Ubukata | Akira Konoe | Jyun Owada | Kuon Ichinose | EMMA | Lock Keepers
Teru Gojuin | Dark Yashiro | Yatsufusa Hatanaka
Persona Q Clockwork God Persona Q2 Kamoshidaman | Enlil
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