Worf's Actions in Birthright

No community deserves to be protected if it requires maintaining the ignorance of its inhabitants to protect.

Individuals have an inherent right to all the knowledge necessary to make their own decisions in life.

 

That's not what worf provided. He gave them an idealized version of the Klingon way of life that he didn't really believe in himself.

Plus the secrecy and protection was necessary, even worf admitted as much when he made them swear to keep the place a secret.

 

But what if they went back 400 years, and finds Klingons living just like that, using those things as farming tools on a 20th Century Qo'nos. That would mean Worf may have been the ignorant one as well.

 

It would have a touch of irony that I like.


Plus Kor said that Kahless used his sword to plough a field, so it's not so far fetched.

 

The younger generation doesn't have to become Klingon warriors or Klingon anything. They can go anywhere now--that's what Worf really did for them. They can go to earth. They could try to join Starfleet if they want. They can go to Risa. They can go to a starbase, they can go to a frontier world/colony. They can look for jobs on trading ships. They can go to school, begin to study advanced specialties if they want with real instructors. They have had their horizons HUGELY expanded. Worf did that.

 

He did give an idealised version of the Klingon Empire as Picard has given an idealised version of the Federation in earlier episodes. But Worf didn't mislead them in any significant way. He's not wilfully trolling these kids to the degree that he'd mislead them into becoming outcasts. If that was going to be their fate, he would've probably let them be. Worf ain't a con-man.

 

Regardless, outcasts is likely what they're going to be, given how accepting Klingon society is in general and the fact that they are forbidden to say where they are from.

 

Here's a question.
Modern explorers/researchers happen upon a stone age tribe deep in the jungles of wherever. They are getting along ok.
Should the explorers expose them to the outside world, let them see what's out there and allow them to make their own choice? Or leave them in their bubble?

 

The "stone age people" should consider themselves lucky if the explorers leave them alone instead of destroying their way of life. Turning them into alcoholics and maladapted outcasts in their cities, as is historically the common MO in cases like this.

 

The Klingon Empire is ruled by an aristocracy of Big Houses who have access to a large network of patronage which allows members quick access to influential positions. But there's likely a mass of people with small houses and no houses at all, who whilst don't have access to that kind of patronage aren't necessarily outcasts either. Worf is very aware of issues of stigma and whatnot, he's not going to lead these kids into a state of destitution and isolation.

 

I still think that he sold them on a dream of Klingons singing song, hunting, and practicing martial arts. I am not sure how they'll react when they'll be hit by reality, or for example by the fact they are expected to give up their lives gladly at the drop of a hat. Kids who play cops and robbers have no idea that in the real world people die when they do that. Neither do these Klingons.

 

But shouldn't they have the freedom to make that choice?

 

The Federation would preserve the bubble with their non-interference provision in the case of that tribe. But there's complications in that these Klingons don't neat exactly fit into an ignorant tribe category. The elders know about but are concealing their history and Worf being a Klingon, we shouldn't necessarily transpose a human ethic on a Klingon situation.

But Worf was affording these kids a new perspective and forcefully arguing his own pitch. They are all still his people, he can make that intervention. Equally, other people in their colony can and do argue in defence of their own new system but it's ultimately Worf's persuasion that wins the day. These are young adults too, they have the authority to make that call even if it's the wrong one - which it may or not be.

This episode partially reminds me of the Paradise episode in DS9 where Sisko and O'Brien rebel against a Luddite colony and then they reveal to the shipwrecked they are there by the design of their leader rather than by an accident of circumstance, something the leader had concealed from them. In a similar way Worf - as Sisko did - believed that it was a moral imperative to confront a system that actually had alot to commend to it but a system that was based partially on a pointed lie.

 

Because the possibility for corruption is so much greater. This is the part of the prime directive that I actually agree with and it can be summed up like this: "If it ain't broke, then don't fix it, stupid!"

Why would you disturb the lives of people that are happy the way they are and never asked you for anything?

 

I just think of the reception the young woman with the Romulan father will get once she arrives on the Klingon homeworld.

 

He behaved pretty much how I imagine someone like Worf behaving in their situation in real life.

 

Does anyone else find it farfetched that Klingons and Romulans could mate and have kids? No way in hell would they look like that anyway.

 

They can still go back to their old life with those who wish to live that way. Why should they hate Worf for helping them assert their freedom to choose where to live?

 

A lot is possible in the world of Star Trek that we know to be impossible in the real world. Interspecies reproduction is one of the more obvious ones.

 

For some reason, I think of Picard's speech to Wesley in "The First Duty" about an officer's relationship to the truth. Couldn't it be argued that Worf was actually engaging in as much a Starfleet ethic of telling this colony the truth about their heritage and background, rather than just concealing it?

I believe the episode "The Chase" established several Alpha Quadrant powers being from one progenitor species, so some similarity and compatibility is to be expected.

Plus, it's a sci-fi staple.