Starfleet and Burnham

[Charles Phipps]

Anyone think Starfleet's reaction to the conscription of Michael is over the top? You'd think it'd be fairly straight forward with an ex-criminal working off her sentence but they seem really determined to make an example of her.

Which is weird in any form of Star Trek (especially one which is clearly NORMALLY about peaceful exploration given only Lorca seems to be actually crazy--and he's not even an Admiral) but doubly so since her mutiny lasted all of five minutes and could easily have been done as a mental issue given her past trauma.

Should Starfleet be in the habit of scapegoating?

 

[Timo]

The thing here is, they are. Despite fighting in a battle at the far end of nowhere, with no witnesses to her key actions, Burnham is apparently a public figure known to all sorts of civilian rabble. Somebody somewhere chose specifically to tell the public that Burnham started the war, apparently so that Starfleet overall wouldn't look so guilty for starting that war.

Lorca trying to undermine this important piece of Federation propaganda could undermine the entire war effort.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Charles Phipps]

The thing here is, they are. Despite fighting in a battle at the far end of nowhere, with no witnesses to her key actions, Burnham is apparently a public figure known to all sorts of civilian rabble. Somebody somewhere chose specifically to tell the public that Burnham started the war, apparently so that Starfleet overall wouldn't look so guilty for starting that war.

Lorca trying to undermine this important piece of Federation propaganda could undermine the entire war effort.

Timo Saloniemi

Which is weird because Starfleet DIDN'T yet Mudd representing the common spacer seems to think the Klingons had some justification.

It also makes me wonder if the fact she's "back" in Starfleet is somehow common knowledge as well among the fleet. I suppose it could just be the rumor mill in action but you'd think the people on the top secret prototype ship would be a bit more hesitant about revealing those kind of details.

 

[cultcross]

Anyone think Starfleet's reaction to the conscription of Michael is over the top?

It was mentioned once and not really pushed. If anything, I'm surprised they were so OK with it.

Somebody somewhere chose specifically to tell the public that Burnham started the war,

Well there were thousands of people involved in the battle, must be an easy couple of hundred from the Shenzhou alone now scattered across the fleet. The grapevine would be working overtime. Add to that a prosecution for mutiny, and the story wouldn't need any official help to get around.

 

[Big Data]

This seems to be the one issue where everyone in starfleet just turns their brain off

 

[Timo]

Well there were thousands of people involved in the battle, must be an easy couple of hundred from the Shenzhou alone now scattered across the fleet.

But why would anybody out of those thousands or even hundreds know anything, or have a reason to think they know anything?

The Shenzhou was not the first ship to fire, nor the first Starfleet ship to fire. People aboard other ships would witness the Klingons firing first, and then witness USS Unfortunate fire second.

Aboard the Shenzhou, only the bridge crew was around to witness Georgiou point her phaser at Burnham. A few of those got killed. None got to see Burnham do anything that might have made the Klingons to what they did, which was to fire first. (That is, she wanted the Klingons targeted, but Georgiou had targeted them several hours earlier and that had had no adverse consequences.)

Basically nobody but Saru would know what happened aboard the Klingon ship afterwards, except that the Captain died and the First Officer survived.

So where would the rumor start that Burnham had started the war? And who would launch it? Every witness to the events would be inclined to point fingers away from Burnham, unless somebody took it to his or her business to make them give a different witness statement. Which of course would be trivially easy once Burnham became a convicted criminal: naturally everybody would then remember her as the "menacingly odd person, in a quiet Vulcanian sort of way, always arguing with everybody and yes, wanting to fire first, I swear I heard her do that at least sixty-two times, and she had an evil goatee, too".

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Charles Phipps]

To be fair, I think MICHAEL may be the party responsible as she almost certainly confessed to everything out of guilt.

 

[Timo]

...But would a prisoner like her be allowed to make public statements that would propagate her self-imposed guilt?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[cultcross]

If something like that happened in a tight knit organisation like Starfleet, everyone would know in about a week. The grapevine in military and paramilitary organisations is only matched by the grapevine in teachers. Plus, as I said, everyone from the Shenzhou will be spread across the fleet having been rescued and then reassigned, and the biggest battle in century will be hot topic of conversation number 1. You've got to imagine that the first conversation they have on their new ship is going to be "So, tell me about this mutiny!" Not to mention the media wanting a narrative to run with for the start of the war and reporting on the trial and any rumours with their usual speculative flair. The Federation is at war with the Klingons - it's the story of their careers.

It would astonish me if anyone didn't hear a version of the story within a few weeks.

 

[GeekUSACarl]

Anyone think Starfleet's reaction to the conscription of Michael is over the top? You'd think it'd be fairly straight forward with an ex-criminal working off her sentence but they seem really determined to make an example of her.

Which is weird in any form of Star Trek (especially one which is clearly NORMALLY about peaceful exploration given only Lorca seems to be actually crazy--and he's not even an Admiral) but doubly so since her mutiny lasted all of five minutes and could easily have been done as a mental issue given her past trauma.

Should Starfleet be in the habit of scapegoating?

Though I hear what you're saying, I would say it's not over the top.

In fact I think their response is less than I'd anticipate. Should Starfleet be in the habit of scapegoating?

Mutine is a super serious offense, even if everyone in SF accepted the fact that she did not start the war, her Mutine, and an assault on a serving captain is intensely serious and giving her any sort of reprieve or redemption IMO, even among a civilized culture sends the wrong message.

This is why I don't write TV shows, because I already side with SF and if it were my show, it'd be completely uninteresting

But if I was SF I'd have Burnham removed from Discovery and have her mind put to work in a prison facility. Sure maybe on these same advanced sciences but, from a prison facility in prison,

 

[Timo]

If something like that happened in a tight knit organisation like Starfleet, everyone would know in about a week.

So everybody would know Burnham didn't start any wars? Because that's what actually happened in front of all these witnesses.

We're missing the bit where the rumors take a U-turn. How does that happen, and why? By design or accident?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[XCV330]

It's a democracy with free press of some sort (hard to imagine any democracy without one) so all sorts of discussions are flying back and forth to billions of interested people about her actions/sentencing/etc. For Starfleet having her return to duty is awkward at the very least.

 

[cultcross]

So everybody would know Burnham didn't start any wars? Because that's what actually happened in front of all these witnesses.

We're missing the bit where the rumors take a U-turn. How does that happen, and why? By design or accident?

Timo Saloniemi

There are people on this board who 'witnessed it' who think Burnham's actions were responsible, so it's down to interpretation. At the very least, they will be witness to a mutiny and their Captain pointing a phaser at their first officer, followed by a mission with just the Captain and said first officer in which the Captain happens to die, and in between all hell breaks loose. If that can't be passed down as 'it was Burnham's fault' I'd be shocked.

 

[Timo]

...Hmh? What person aboard any of the participating Starfleet ships would be in a position comparable to the audience? We saw bits nobody but the late Georgiou did, and bits only the Klingons ever saw. Out of the things the actual characters saw, it's very difficult to form a picture of Burnham being associated with the Klingons attacking. Either she's not seen doing anything (the evidence available to those on the other ships, assuming any survive) while Klingons fire first, or then she's seen doing things that cannot possibly have affected the Klingons (the evidence available to those bridge officers who already saw Georgiou lock weapons on the Klingons to no ill effect).

It's not necessarily Burnham getting a bad reputation for her actions, though. It may simply be Burnham being the only name to emerge out of the mess overall. As far as we can tell, only some select few from the crew of a single starship survived, and e.g. Saru is unlikely to be a household name afterwards. Even if Saru very specifically launched the war by insulting the Boss Klingon's mother and then shooting him in the knee and laughing, the public would only have one name to associate the whole incident with...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[ralfy]

The reason for conscripting here does not sound convincing, as well as the punishment.