Why It's Hard to Take Shinra Seriously

REASONS IT'S HARD TO TAKE SHINRA SERIOUSLY
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-Shinra started out as a weapons company, right? Considering their only two real successes, it's a good thing they went into Mako energy-Sephiroth destroys them and just about wipes out all life on the planet, and the Sister Ray almost destroys Midgar.
-The Proud Clod. Weapon would probably scare Godzilla. The Proud Clod was built to defeat Weapon. So why is it such a pushover? I have beaten the Proud Clod using only physical attacks and one casting of All=Cure2.
-They sent Sephiroth, who probably wasn't all that mentally stable in the first place, where he would have to discover that he was the product of an experiment, and not even somewhat human like he had thought before. (Of course, there's the little theory that Hojo knew that would happen, and wanted to "advance his experiment". Even so, the rest of the Board of Directors was not let in on the little Reunion plan, but at least the President knew that the Jenova Project started in Nibelheim, and knew what Sephiroth would find there...)
-They started the Jenova project before they knew what Jenova was.
-Let's review this situation: Sephiroth has killed their president, his own partner, everybody who worked in the HQ building, burned an innocent village to the ground, and released a very dangerous specimen. AVALANCHE bombed two reactors, snuck into Shinra HQ, stole one harmless specimen and one specimen that could care less, and has been nearly wiped out trying (and failing) to stop Shinra from destroying Sector 7. Sephiroth is planning on destroying all life on the planet. Your group is planning on stopping Sephiroth. Do they go wholesale after Sephiroth, and worry about you later? No, they waste a lot of time and energy trying to kill you and/or stop you from stopping Sephiroth.
-Rufus orders Cloud to guard the cargo ship from himself. (Port Junon, when Cloud's in costume)
-Yuffie's dressed as a sailor, yet she spends the entire trip throwing up-and noone notices. Red XII's tail sticks out of his uniform, and noone notices. Noone notices Barret. (How did Cloud put it? A bear wearing a marshmallow?)
-How the heck does Sephiroth manage to sneak on board the cargo ship, anyway? Especially considering how sane he is at the time, I just can't see him wearing a disguise. While he seems perfectly capable of appearing out of thin air (and vanishing into thin air), he isn't that subtle. They chase him around Junon for a few days, have an alert on the cargo ship, and yet he still sneaks on board. Worse, they don't notice him until they get a ways out, and he decides to kill most of the crew!
-They rely on a technology that will probably render their planet uninhabitable within one or two generations, yet they cut the space program.
-Who was driving that Shinra truck that hit Palmer, Barret?
-Let's go over how the Shinra board of directors is destroyed. Old President Shinra: Killed by an "extremely successful" experiment. Scarlett+Heidegger: Killed because their fantastic anti-Weapon artillery robot didn't come with an escape pod or an ejection seat. Hojo: Goes nuts and almost destroys Midgar City. Rufus: Killed by Weapon, which he had an indirect hand in waking up. Reeve: Arrested by Scarlett and Heidegger, because he disagrees with them. Not because he's a spy-they've known that for a while-but because he disagrees with them.
-How Cloud winds up in that Shinra uniform in Port Junon in the first place. ("Hey you! Hurry up and get in uniform! You'll make us all late!") From what I gathered, the officers were all told to keep an eye out for "Cloud and his group". So why does one of the officers mistake Cloud for a Shinra soldier?
-Cid seems to be the only person ever to work for Shinra who includes escape pods in his work.
-Having gone through all that, there are two sets of opponents from Shinra you should take very seriously: SOLDIER, 2nd Class; and the Turks. The SOLDIER people are worse, but you only see them around Port Junon during your escape in early Disc 2. They can reduce your party to little bitty scraps mind-bogglingly fast if you're not very, very careful. As noted before, each individual Turk is more powerful than your most powerful party member, so just two of them are an even match for your party. When you face all three Turks, you'll be barely scraping out a victory. (Admittedly, they don't seem very tough early on. If you watch, one of them-usually Rude-will not do anything for tens of turns at a time. They're holding back.)