I agree - I think they would be affected by art, but would never admit it, and would never make any unless ordered to by a superior. The example you gave is great.

It's like Dalek poetry, I should do a video on that

@@dalekbumps Yes! Daleks seem to have war cries/chants that they normally utilize throughout the show as well, similar to human militaries. "Daleks conquer and destroy!" "Seek, locate, exterminate!" and others that to me screams practice and doctrine. Another example is in The Daleks (in colour) when Alydon is ambushed within the Dalek City - they chant in unison "All enemies of the Daleks must be destroyed!" which, again, due to it being in unison and seen as a regularly heard call to action later on in the series it leads me to believe that they must have internal propaganda/morale building exercises.

@@dalekbumps where do you think Dalek poetry ranks against Vogon?

That makes a lot of sense. Fascist governments tend to like art that glorifies the state and their ideals. Daleks are exaggerated fascists so if they have a culture it's a self-glorifying and boastful one

this is the first thing that came to my mind too

Indeed, followed by the Dalek PM's line "Does it surprise you to know the Daleks have a concept of beauty? "

Maybe they would see an invasion as an installation or performance piece...

No same 😭😭

Me too

Even worse: I was looking for Dalek concept art and thought this was the video for me

You and me both, bruv.

Yay!

it's actually a very interesting concept form an aesthetic philosophy point of view. I'm particularly reminded of the demons in CS Lewis' the Screwtape Letters and their "lowerachy"

great minds think alike

* interesting bit of lore

that was my thought always, that the Daleks had built a base below an old temple. I do like the idea that the designs resemble the eye sticks, I had never thought of that before

Welding and cutting torch not flame thrower

Pretty much every issue the Daleks have they got from him. The petty little narcissist tried making a species of Davroses...Davrosi?

I was just thinking of how cool it would be to see Dalek VS beholder in a death battle scenario. Also have a Dalek OC too but good Doctor who rp's are hard to come by!

I love this idea

It has long been a common misconception that Daleks have no society- or perhaps that Daleks have no society that is not based on brutal efficiency in service of Dalek expansion, completely free of concepts like culture, politics, religion and other social mores that the Daleks consider extraneous and inferior. It should, however, be noted that these traits and activities themselves are social mores and customs. The belief in absolute Dalek superiority is obviously itself a political ideology- rather than an objective truth- and it is expoused with religious conviction. The submission of everything that Daleks do and create, and obviously destroy, to the pursuit of genetic purity and expansion, is in itself a method of structuring society- one that like all idealised philosophical notions has been weathered by reality and forced to compromise- it is based not on fact but faith, and not on scientific efficiency but orthodoxy and custom- a twisted and eldrich culture that derives from the word “Exterminate” in same way that others derive from “Justice”, “Order”, “Equality” or “Freedom” I am not the first to argue that the idealised image of the Daleks and their civilisation as perfectly pure, efficient killing machines exists only in the delusions of Daleks and Dalek apologists who seriously suggest Yarvelling Davros was a great man. Do not mistake my meaning- the Daleks are certainly the greatest threat to universal life currently known and they are capable of wiping out all life in the galaxy in a single solar cycle if other species are not vigilant enough. However, this has less to do with actual evolutionary perfection and more to do with specialisation, luck, and it has been shown, utter hypocrisy in the actions of successive Dalek Supremes and Emperors. Dalek efficiency is a delusion and a propaganda myth that they must drum in to themselves as much as their victims. It has been argued by an exiled Sontaran philosopher comparing them to his own society that if Daleks truly were genetically the most efficient warriors in the galaxy they would need no Emperor, no supreme council and no hierarchy as all Daleks would already be innately aware of the best course of action and would strive towards this common goal of their own accord. The Dalek’s entire existence is based on an insane lie, a flawed understanding of evolution concocted by a dying, horrifically interbred lunatic scientist on an isolated planet that had been at war with itself for so long that the declaration of hostilities was ancient myth. Skaro was not an advanced society, and the fact that it’s brood where not snuffed out as soon as they developed space travel is probably the most compelling evidence that Davros actually was an unprecedented genius in purely scientific terms. The fact is that Daleks are not genetically uniform, and this is not just the reason for their hierarchy but also their survival. They are by their own standards genetically impure as hundreds of thousands of cycles of artificial reproduction have lead to a slow shift in their DNA away from that of the original creatures created by Davros in the Kaled bunker. As a result of this taking place over a very long period of time and the general inaccuracies of early Dalek genetic testing, the Daleks themselves only discovered this when deviation was already widespread, and this lead to a series of developments in Dalek hierarchy that continue to this era. The first Supreme Dalek was also one of the first to become aware of this deviance as a result of its own heightened intelligence and individual will, the very attributes that allowed him to dominate other Daleks and act as a mostly undisputed commander. The began with genetic impurities apparent in the first batch itself. It was this ability to reason independently that lead one of the first five Daleks to conclude that Davros, not being a Dalek, was therefore inferior and to be exterminated. It was this Dalek’s DNA line that the Supreme was grown from. If the Dalek race at large where to ever discover the fact that where essentially non-Dalek they would destroy themselves in purges and bouts of self loathing existential madness- on top of the fact that they had been created by an inferior Kaled, degenerate even by his race’s own standards who had then been exterminated. The first action the Supreme took was to prevent this was to use its heightened intelligence and its ability to act outside of usual Dalek behavioural conditioning to place itself in a position of unquestionable authority. Mainly this was achieved by exterminating any Dalek that questioned or threatened it, surreptitiously or otherwise and having a good enough success record that any similarly “degenerate” Daleks supported it out of pragmatism. Some more intelligent Daleks where in even more denial about their deviance where placated by the second act- The creation of the Eternal Caste, who monitored the entire Daley race for degeneracy, deviancy and disobedience. However, from the beginning their copy of the base line genetic code, already based on incomplete knowledge- in fact deliberately sabotaged by the first Supreme Dalek- even himself being mostly ignorant about the actually ancestors of the Daleks and the events of last few hundred years of their history. So the Supreme ensured that the methods were inaccurate and based more on a quasi-religious reverence for the holy (1) Dalek form- the travel machine that would become just as important as the creature- any deviation from it’s design would be monitored by the Eternal Sect not for any changes in actually equipment or means of propulsion but in design, number of panels on the skirt, number of bars on the midsection, eye stalk length, overabundance of the strange balls with a use lost to time that where now used to house completely unnecessary etheric beam locators. Even these would be subject to change as more forceful Emperors decided that certain designs created by Davros during his return would be of use no matter how heretical (2) they were and how low the life expectancy and high the degeneracy of the operating mutant was when sitting directly behind a gigantic nuclear cannon. Eventually this would lead to civil war or essentially, political tension between the Eternal Caste and the Emperor- there was no democracy, even on the supreme council, as Daleks considered rule based on majority to be utterly immoral (3) and instead preferred a system that can best be described as “when shouting reaches high enough volume, begin shooting, survivors win debate”. Considering the Emperor often ensures his travel machine is the most heavily armoured and lethal, or that his stationary casing is surrounded by fanatically loyal guards he almost always wins. The brutal methods of purging hatchery stocks of impurities would become just as much about the Dalek’s ill designed manipulator arm to avoid dropping the newly hatched mutant when transporting it to the travel machine as any of its actual traits. 1. 1. Daleks do not have a directly translatable word for Holiness, they simply refer to something as being Dalek. 2. 2. Daleks do not have a directly translatable word for Heresy, they simply refer to something a being Un-Dalek.

TL;DR: Daleks are not uniform and not perfect, and the more intelligent ones among them (like the Dalek Emperor) know that if this were not the case they wouldn't survive. As a result the Daleks actually have to have a culture of obsessing over Dalek supremacy to cover up this lie, especially to the rank and file. also dalek bumps have no fixed purpose but getting rid of them, though sensible, would be idolatry.

They are technically part of the self-destruct process, but they aren't self-destruct devices themselves. The bumps are, (for Time War-era Daleks at least) a component of the shield projection system. Notice how when the Dalek self-destructs in Series 1, the spheres detach from the casing and create a forcefield around the Dalek which contains the explosion. The explosion itself comes from within the Dalek itself

Art without Elegance is doable. Look at what the Humans have made lately