You save a civilization from natural disaster. Instead of all perishing, you manage to save half of them; but in so doing, expose them to the existence of aliens, the Observer Effect tainting their entire culture from then on, and of course, the discrimination of your captain over exactly whom on the planet to save. This tribe? That tribe? Both tribes? You make an indelible mark on their survivors, in order to avoid the discomfort of armchair moralists with internet access.
Ok, fine.
Now the survivors of the planet recognize your inextricable presence before, during and after the event. It is simplicity itself to then attribute said catastrophe to a) your interference, or b) your non-interference. Now you have created an enemy, who, immediately upon developing warp tech, comes gunning for you. They slaughter your citizens by the billions.
Still bound by blind moral obligation?
That's the problem with navel-gazing. You set up a system of ideals and moral/ethical standards, you lay them out and do your best to abide by them - and honor the social contract they embody. Super. Only, now others are free to exploit those rules, free to take full advantage of your largesse, giving all due lip service - but have no intention, in the long run, of being restricted by that set of rules. They simply use the "peace" as a period for arming, for gaining intel on you, and for scheming their eventual takeover - and utter disposal - of your blind ideals. Now your morals have come at a high price - the existence of your own descendents - for your failure to recognize that you can only extend those liberties that others are prepared to extend themselves. Not in lip service - but in fullest actuality. You don't stop barbarians at the gate with violin music. And if you want to hear violin ever again - you'd better get tough fast. Uncomfortable?
Good.
Now, this is a choice. It is not a standard, nor clear mathematical boundary. Do you allow an enemy to kill every member of your society to avoid the repugnance of taking up arms? Or do you become a pragmatist - and do your best to preserve those values, to transmit them to your descendents - along with the bloody stain of hypocrisy necessitated by predators? All it takes is one guy to sneeze all over the salad bar. Do you wait, and ban him after the fact? Or do you instruct your security guard to bar his entry? That's not very nice - where does your security guard get off throwing his weight around? He could use a salad you ask me!
Anyway, all along the process of intervening in a catastrophe with a non-Fed world, you are inviting disaster. Pretending to be a moral player while ignoring the very real consequences is putting your own pride and face ahead of the welfare of both your society and the local one's. Survival takes overcoming crisis after crisis. If you can't manage that, as a people, then deus ex machina ain't gonna ennoble your species. You give a man a fish, now are you going to teach him how to fish, and build warp engines and phasers? Or just make sure he learns that you're the ones with all the fish? Now you've got a cargo cult dressing like you. Feel good about that, do you? Is your own culture that worthy of emulation, is it? Warts and all?
Extinction is a cold, hard reality of existence. It is also that threat which makes a society more likely to behave responsibly with the power to destroy planets.The threat of extinction is, in-universe, what helped to create the possibility for a Federation in the first place.
Now you're gonna sit there and point a finger and say "Your refusal to help those people makes you an immoral, bad person." I get that. Really, I do. I mean, how hard is it to lift a finger to save a species from extinction?
Well, another could ask us, who are you to judge? Are you morally superior, just because in your rush to be "moral" you end up destroying two civilizations instead of just one? And because you have the luxury of willful blindness to that, everyone else is just supposed to accept your word that saving a penny and losing ten million pounds is the right thing to do ? The worlds don't have your luxury of ignoring the consequences.
Another could ask us, What kind of person puts their own personal moral ego ahead of the welfare of others? All it takes is a simple extension of the premise. You swoop in, you save some tribe from a wildfire, and now - how about saving them from common diseases, or from being attacked by wild animals, or from a mythology that YOU have the luxury of dismissing as hokum, but that THEY rely on for critical social cohesion that ensures their very survival?
And then what do you do? Drive your car off the mountain to avoid hitting a squirrel, and kill your entire kazoo-ukelele club? How is that AT ALL morally superior??
It is not. It is self-deluding narcissism, and that's all it is.
Oh and by the way - the Prime Directive is a legal directive before it is a moral dilemma. If it is a law on the books, then ignorance is not an excuse. The question, at the time, is not "why does it exist" but "how will a tribunal interpret the circumstances. Are they clearly circumscribed?" Let's see: Pre warp civilization: check. Involvement: check. Crime: check. Sentencing: see page 3. And there's your moral fate. Oh and - you knew that before swearing an oath to uphold that law.
Yes, you want to be nice and help people. You want a just society. You don't like to stomach turning your back on suffering. These are nice, noble characteristics. But they do not protect you from actual, real enemies, who exist outside and inside your own society. Denying their existence is not particularly noble, it is deliberately myopic. There is a wolf beside your lovely picnic lunch. You certainly don't have to bring a gun to a picnic. I'm sure the wolf would pause to appreciate high-minded morality.
Or, we could learn to live with condemnation of armchair moralists. The keyword here being "live".
Yes we want our descendents to favor the violin over the sword. But by denying them swords, you deny them the elevation of music. You turn them into regurgitant-spoonfed robots and slaves threatened by their own extinction.
You have not saved them. You have condemned them. Pat yourself on the back.
Liberty is earned. Giving it away doesn't change that.
Ok, fine.
Now the survivors of the planet recognize your inextricable presence before, during and after the event. It is simplicity itself to then attribute said catastrophe to a) your interference, or b) your non-interference. Now you have created an enemy, who, immediately upon developing warp tech, comes gunning for you. They slaughter your citizens by the billions.
Still bound by blind moral obligation?
That's the problem with navel-gazing. You set up a system of ideals and moral/ethical standards, you lay them out and do your best to abide by them - and honor the social contract they embody. Super. Only, now others are free to exploit those rules, free to take full advantage of your largesse, giving all due lip service - but have no intention, in the long run, of being restricted by that set of rules. They simply use the "peace" as a period for arming, for gaining intel on you, and for scheming their eventual takeover - and utter disposal - of your blind ideals. Now your morals have come at a high price - the existence of your own descendents - for your failure to recognize that you can only extend those liberties that others are prepared to extend themselves. Not in lip service - but in fullest actuality. You don't stop barbarians at the gate with violin music. And if you want to hear violin ever again - you'd better get tough fast. Uncomfortable?
Good.
Now, this is a choice. It is not a standard, nor clear mathematical boundary. Do you allow an enemy to kill every member of your society to avoid the repugnance of taking up arms? Or do you become a pragmatist - and do your best to preserve those values, to transmit them to your descendents - along with the bloody stain of hypocrisy necessitated by predators? All it takes is one guy to sneeze all over the salad bar. Do you wait, and ban him after the fact? Or do you instruct your security guard to bar his entry? That's not very nice - where does your security guard get off throwing his weight around? He could use a salad you ask me!
Anyway, all along the process of intervening in a catastrophe with a non-Fed world, you are inviting disaster. Pretending to be a moral player while ignoring the very real consequences is putting your own pride and face ahead of the welfare of both your society and the local one's. Survival takes overcoming crisis after crisis. If you can't manage that, as a people, then deus ex machina ain't gonna ennoble your species. You give a man a fish, now are you going to teach him how to fish, and build warp engines and phasers? Or just make sure he learns that you're the ones with all the fish? Now you've got a cargo cult dressing like you. Feel good about that, do you? Is your own culture that worthy of emulation, is it? Warts and all?
Extinction is a cold, hard reality of existence. It is also that threat which makes a society more likely to behave responsibly with the power to destroy planets.The threat of extinction is, in-universe, what helped to create the possibility for a Federation in the first place.
Now you're gonna sit there and point a finger and say "Your refusal to help those people makes you an immoral, bad person." I get that. Really, I do. I mean, how hard is it to lift a finger to save a species from extinction?
Well, another could ask us, who are you to judge? Are you morally superior, just because in your rush to be "moral" you end up destroying two civilizations instead of just one? And because you have the luxury of willful blindness to that, everyone else is just supposed to accept your word that saving a penny and losing ten million pounds is the right thing to do ? The worlds don't have your luxury of ignoring the consequences.
Another could ask us, What kind of person puts their own personal moral ego ahead of the welfare of others? All it takes is a simple extension of the premise. You swoop in, you save some tribe from a wildfire, and now - how about saving them from common diseases, or from being attacked by wild animals, or from a mythology that YOU have the luxury of dismissing as hokum, but that THEY rely on for critical social cohesion that ensures their very survival?
And then what do you do? Drive your car off the mountain to avoid hitting a squirrel, and kill your entire kazoo-ukelele club? How is that AT ALL morally superior??
It is not. It is self-deluding narcissism, and that's all it is.
Oh and by the way - the Prime Directive is a legal directive before it is a moral dilemma. If it is a law on the books, then ignorance is not an excuse. The question, at the time, is not "why does it exist" but "how will a tribunal interpret the circumstances. Are they clearly circumscribed?" Let's see: Pre warp civilization: check. Involvement: check. Crime: check. Sentencing: see page 3. And there's your moral fate. Oh and - you knew that before swearing an oath to uphold that law.
Yes, you want to be nice and help people. You want a just society. You don't like to stomach turning your back on suffering. These are nice, noble characteristics. But they do not protect you from actual, real enemies, who exist outside and inside your own society. Denying their existence is not particularly noble, it is deliberately myopic. There is a wolf beside your lovely picnic lunch. You certainly don't have to bring a gun to a picnic. I'm sure the wolf would pause to appreciate high-minded morality.
Or, we could learn to live with condemnation of armchair moralists. The keyword here being "live".
Yes we want our descendents to favor the violin over the sword. But by denying them swords, you deny them the elevation of music. You turn them into regurgitant-spoonfed robots and slaves threatened by their own extinction.
You have not saved them. You have condemned them. Pat yourself on the back.
Liberty is earned. Giving it away doesn't change that.
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