SCP Global Occult Coalition Explained

The Global Occult Coalition, better known as the GOC, are a group of bloodthirsty, gun-toting cowboys who shoot first and ask questions later.

Whether it's a helpful sentient chair or a little girl whose only anomalous quality is manifesting flowers and ice cream, the GOC have only one response: Destroy. Burn it, crush it, shoot it in the face with extreme prejudice and be home in time for dinner.

Or at least, that's what plenty of SCP Foundation Devotees would have you believe. But if we only judged an organization by the words of its greatest opponents, we'd be dealing with an extremely one-sided picture.

Are they gung ho morons who regularly blunder into complex situations, and make everything worse with either plain ignorance or outright malice? Or are they humanity's true defenders, working on behalf of the world's democratically elected leaders rather than the unaccountable mystery of The Foundation? As with most things in life, the answer is often found somewhere in the middle.

That's why today, we're going to take a closer look at the United Nations' answer to the anomalous threats that inhabit our world.

Who are they? What do they believe? And what are some of their greatest victories and failures? The inception of what we now know as the Global Occult Coalition began during the Seventh Occult War, which occurred during World War II. The Nazi SS Ahnenerbe and the Thule-Gesselschaft attempted to complete a ritual known as the Rite of Solomon, which would have given them terrifying supernatural power.

This was the first time that a number of world governments understood the true scope of the paranormal threat out there, and after the war concluded - with many dead - they wanted to make sure this could never happen again.Of course, the SCP Foundation works in cooperation with all world governments, but ultimately, they still have autonomy.

And no one nation could ever shoulder the responsibility of protecting all of humanity, either, lest nationalism and self-interest get in the way of the mission. The United Nations needed their own organization, that was completely accountable to them and them alone in order to protect themselves from paranormal threats - or "Parathreats". And thus, the Global Occult Coalition was born.

As the "coalition" part of the name suggests, the GOC is an umbrella term for 108 different paranormal organizations - all gathered under the shared goal of protecting humanity from parathreats and fostering continued positive relationships between paranormal groups.

Its member groups include, but are in no way limited to: The Bavarian Illuminati, The International Center for the Study of Unified Thaumatology, The Reformed Holy Order of the Knights Templar, Servants of the Silicon Nornir, The United Church of Satan - Science Division, The World Parahealth Organization, and The Universalist Order of the Æsir. Yeah, it's a lot to take in. But don't worry, there won't be a quiz later.

These groups and many more unite under the Global Occult Coalition's "Fivefold Mission." Understanding these five missions is vital to understanding why the GOC works in the way it does, and why it differs from the Foundation. Mission One: Survival - This is the primary directive of the GOC, ensuring the survival of humanity in the face of parathreats.

Mission Two: Concealment - Much like the Foundation, the GOC seeks to conceal knowledge of parathreats from the public that could cause mass panic or loss of life. Mission Three: Protection - In an interesting departure from the somewhat colder Foundation perspective, the GOC also prizes the safety of individual humans, including its own personnel.

Mission Four: Destruction - This mission is perhaps the biggest difference between the GOC and the Foundation, and is often what defines them in the public eye. The GOC considers the very existence of parathreats to be a danger to the survival of humanity, so no risks are taken to ensure their survival.

And finally, Mission Five: Education - The GOC seeks to expand their knowledge base in regards to the parathreats they face across the globe. Clearly, the Global Occult Coalition knows where they stand. Many have positioned the GOC as villains to the Foundation's more level-headed approach, but arguments could also be made in the GOC's favor when it comes to killing off rather than studying anomalies.

The number of deaths caused in containment breaches of parathreats that could have been executed immediately after being captured is one persuasive argument, as is the continued potential threat of parathreats currently sitting in containment. And while the GOC has been called inhumane for its desire to murder parathreats, ask any member of D-Class Personnel whether the SCP Foundation is a more ethical organization in comparison.

While the Foundation are generally far more considerate with anomalies than the GOC, their attitude towards their human cannon fodder is just as cold. Of course, we're not saying either organization is right or wrong in this instance - more that it's a nuanced issue that's difficult to look at in terms of morality.

Later, we'll take a look at two of the most famous case studies to see how the GOC's methodology plays out on the field. But first, let's take a look at how the actual organization is structured. At the top of the tower is the Council of 108. Much like the United Nations, this Council is made up of representatives from each of the 108 member organizations of the GOC.

Below that is the High Command, headed by the mysterious Under-Secretary-General D.C. al Fine - believed to be a woman who is living somewhere in Europe - as well as The Nexus. The Nexus directs a network of Command Central hubs to coordinate and support local operations. Below that, the GOC is separated into three prongs: The PHYSICS Division, the PSYCHE Division, and the PTOLEMY Division.

The PHYSICS division is the action arm of the GOC, made up of Assessment Teams and Strike Teams. It's their job to investigate and capture or neutralize parathreats. The PSYCHE Division is the diplomatic sector of the GOC, and consists of Special Observers and Ambassadors - these personnel maintain relationships between paranormal groups, and keeps things smooth between normal humanity and the Occult.

The PTOLEMY Division is known as the support arm, and is home to the Quartermasters and the Research and Development department. This division helps the other two divisions do their work - from managing logistics and resource distribution, to developing state of the art weapons and equipment for GOC personnel.

One more quick note before we move onto two of the GOC's greatest hits: It's important to know that the GOC classifies anomalies different to how the SCP Foundation does. Rather than SCPs, the GOC refers to them as TEs, or Threat Entities. While the GOC employs a frankly baffling number of code words for various groups, ideas, or concepts that we don't have the time to get into right now, we can tell you the main types of TEs.

There are KTEs - or "Known Threat Entities." UTE - or "Unknown Threat Entities." PTEs - "Potential Threat Entities." And LTEs - or "Liquidated Threat Entities", which are Threat Entities they have confirmed to be destroyed. Now, you should have a pretty good idea of who the Global Occult Coalition is - their member organizations, their mission statements, their major ideological differences from the SCP Foundation.

But it's a common truism that actions speak louder than words, so we need to talk about two of the most infamous incidents in the organization's history. First, there's the chair. Known as KTE-0937-Velveteen or "Sixth Chair" to the Global Occult Coalition, and SCP - 1609 to the SCP Foundation.

This is an incident that the Foundation and Foundation supporters love to cite when criticizing the GOC. From their telling, 1609 was an innocent, if a little spooky-looking chair with a harmless anomalous property - It teleports behind people who want to sit down.

In spite of how helpful and benign this is, the Global Occult Coalition did what they always do and decided to neutralize it by forcing it into a woodchipper.

However, this didn't actually kill the chair, it merely transformed it into a collection of sentient wood chips with an understandable chip on its shoulder.

Now, when angered - typically by mentions of things related to the GOC, or by the sound of motors running - these chips teleport into people's lungs, causing fatal organ damage. Surely this shows that the GOC are a bunch of haphazard idiots - they transformed a harmless anomaly into a killer! Well, it's not that simple.

According to their own telling of the incident with the Sixth Chair, it was exactly that: Just the sixth in a number of other parathreats being destroyed because of their relation to a dangerous parathreat creator known as The Carpenter.

All five other items were successfully incinerated - the chair was only unsuccessfully neutralized with the woodchipper due to a machine error with the incinerator.

In other words, what is often painted as a prime example of GOC brashness and incompetence could just as easily have been a total accident that occurred during an otherwise logical action. No different from the fatalities that often occur during an SCP Foundation containment breach.

But let's look at another example: SCP - 1522, known to the GOC as LTE-4201-Velveteen, or the "Ghost Ships." The Foundation often cites this as being another textbook example of the GOC taking things too far, and murdering a completely innocent anomaly minding its own business. This anomaly was two apparently sapient boats in the middle of the ocean that showed compassion for one another, giving them the reputation of being literal love boats.

The GOC apparently objected to this union and blew one of the boats to kingdom come, leaving the other to self-terminate in grief. How can the GOC possibly come out as anything but monsters in this scenario - harming two wholesome anomalies that would never hurt a fly? Well, don't be so sure about that.

From the GOC report, we can first see that the boats were already encroaching into human territory, leading to reports of "ghost ships" from fishermen trawling in that area.

And while the GOC did admittedly fire the first shot, it cannot be denied that the surviving ship's retaliation was equally if not more violent than the initial attack. Upon attacking the first of the two ships, the second wilfully collided with the GOC vessel, manned by the Strike Team Ocean Thunder, at hypersonic speeds.

This killed the entire GOC team present. While it's easy to say that this attack was in self-defense, it also shows that the boats always had devastating combat potential if provoked. If the parathreat had performed this same act on a larger Navy ship, or on a cruise ship or any kind of commercial vessel, hundreds of lives would be lost.

Doesn't seem so innocent now, does it? What conclusion can we draw from all this? Is the Global Occult Coalition a gaggle of bloodthirsty idiots looking to kill off anomalies for the sake of it? No.

Are they a morally perfect organization, protecting human survival and the quality of human life from a Foundation that couldn't care less? The answer is "no" here too.

While the SCP Foundation and the GOC have been known to squabble, and have caused even more damage to one another in alternate realities, they're ultimately two sides of the same coin.

The two have even been known to reluctantly collaborate when necessary. Perhaps they don't always see eye to eye, especially on some of the smaller and more contentious anomalies, but in a world where cosmic nightmares are lurking just behind the fabric of our reality and some are preparing to strike, it feels comforting to have both of them at the ready.