: It's only been 50 years since first contact (or not even 50 years) between
: humanity and the Covenant. I don't know if it's fair to compare the Halo
: universe with the ME universe in that manner as we're just figuring each
: other out and still reeling from a interplanetary war and the Flood.

: - MacGyver10

I'm not saying Halo should be like Mass Effect, just that it would be nice if these things got addressed one way or the other. ME was just an example of a popular work that actually dips into the nitty gritty details of life in a multi-species civilization.

That, and it's already been established that there are places where Covenant species live alongside humans so they'll have to figure these things out anyway sooner or later. I doubt there will be Jackals serving as Catholic priests anytime soon, but Covenant species discovering the internet is something that might plausibly happen in the few years' time that's passed since the war. In fact it's pretty much inevitable.

I can still see there being a lot of hatred for the Covenant aliens going on with the human civilian populace, even without the UNSC's jingoistic "We are the giants" policy. One can't expect people to just immediately put the last 30 years behind them, so I could see that being one reason other species might not want to venture into the net; they'd simply get flamed out of a lot of places if they told people who (or what) they are. They could always pose as humans, though, and no one would really know. There would also inevitably be niche communities where people would want nothing more than a real alien to answer their many questions about their society, culture, history, worldview, biology, etc.