Maybe
Why not, that is an old humancentric concept. You cannot expect unattached humans, (or any race) to spend five years or more away from home and be celibate.
That's a bit of a generalization if not ism. For example, many people in real life are voluntarily celibate (not to be misconstrued as "involuntarily celibate" aka "incel", for which huge and unpleasant differences tend to exist). Like me. Big difference to "everyone has sex", and very much possible. And I know I'm not the only such person out there who is voluntarily in that way. It's not a big deal even if the urges to go swap fluids with a consenting adult exist. Heck, for a silly parallel that TNG "Outcast" episode makes more sense to justify celibacy (of a rather different sort) than the other claimed reason (which I also could qualify for FWLIW.) Test tube babies would bypass various risks in many sorts of ways... And if I were asked "Let's build a life together" instead of "Let's go have sex, I'm clean, honest!" after mentioning being on disability with "special medications, hint hint" several minutes earlier that's been way too often in my life and not just chatted up on by them but before I mention any other personal examples, or make generalizations as remarkably extravagant as "you cannot expect any unattached species to be celibate" (condensed), let's get to the next point:
Plus there were never any official 'must never fraternise with the crew' rules in the franchise.
Oath of Celibacy being confirmed, per Lt Ilia, being another issue though one of admitted fascination. Why that concept was brought in, as everyone knows Kirk may be teaching love to scores of beings but he's never done it with his crew while on tour together, which is actually interesting. Though Picard had "Lessons" and also realized why you don't jump into the same sleeping bag with the crewmember that's the only available specialist and who might turn into a marshmallow by the planetary-size campfire she's analyzing by the end of the next scene... still an engaging story actually, it's in my top 40 of TNG, but I digress...
The Vulcan adults have to mate every 7 years,
Or they go insane or die, so says the script. The only times I know of when a species dies for not copulating is when it performs the deed and then gets literally eaten by the mate just afterward. But the melodrama was shoveled in high. ST3 also states explicitly "Vulcan males", upping the ante by suggesting Vulcan females don't go through this.
Amok Time, if memory serves, didn't discuss sex that deeply. Just that if Spock doesn't get jiggy Spock will die. Makes one wonder how energy efficient it is to traverse the galaxy only to not have a convenient mate or adequate (um, "robot doll"?) nearby. The jokes I want to make involving a hand now, because, using the episode's same example as a(n amusing) correlation, salmon don't have hands and would probably do it in any stream if they wanted to, but as horny teen salmons they never found a place by the salty seashore to try doing it, too bashful and/or frightened I suppose... maybe that's where the phrase "Chicken of the Sea" came from?
The "Spock is a glorified salmon" analogy used in the 1967 story wasn't a complete adaptation of one of Darwin's more interesting real life species, but it's a fun one nonetheless...)
in ENT Andorian Shran had a relationship with a crew member,
For audience jollies, nothing more?
the Klingons seems to manage.
I'll admit, Worf had a couple moments early in TNG that were amusing for the
intended reasons (considering early TNG is usually amusing for all the wrong ones), but they didn't put emphasis for sex as entire episodes or, far more dreary, entire seasons. A little can go a long way.
Kirk, Picard and Riker and most of the main crew chose to be everlasting bachelors taking their kicks where they could.
Which a lot of people like and would defend them more than:
The O'Briens and Sisko were a breath of relationship realism and fresh air.
100% agreed on that!!
If I had to choose, they're my favorite TV family (if not Ben and Jake), in part because they were given some actual depth and not the "Let me teach you about 'loooooove'," (character starts to undress very slowly), (commercial break starts, commercial break ends), (character looks at stopwatch) "Oh it's been 42 minutes, time for next episode, beam me up Scotty, I don't care how prematurely! (redresses as fast as possible and balls up the rest in arms as the transporter beam initiates) -- We didn't need to see them engaging in foreplay every minute or week to be interesting, though it doesn't hurt since every every other character got to do that almost every week or so (except for Geordi, even Data got more
), and we saw them in some intellectually intriguing sci-fi situations.
Situations better than wearing modified headphones to become mind-controlled with Wesley figuring it out with one hand while repairing Data's broken wire with the other. "Time's Orphan" is one of my favorites, even if it's a little contrived as to which timeline is right and who has rights (what, the Molly who lost 10 years due to an anomaly has no rights but the one who came back 10 years late has more and is going to suffer more? That's a bit iffy, but that aside since without that we wouldn't see the rest of the story, which makes up for its setup and without the setup we wouldn't get various moments of greatness, even the art by Molly of anthropomorphous take on the
sky, which was a surprisingly cute moment on the part of whoever wrote that script to come up with that tidbit instead of the usually bland smiley-on-the-sun routine. It's an oddball story but a legitimately great mix of sci-fi, drama, and everything else, while not feeling phony - apart from the who-has-rights fluff shoved in.) Maybe I liked it more for the old trope of the kid raised by wolves (or "feral humans", there's a parallel that was done more interestingly in DS9 than in a certain season 4 TNG story...) At least they didn't try to update "Lord of the Flies". Imagine if VOY or ENT had.
This is still a show that uses aliens as crude allegory and not as a documentary as such, so it's not unfair to treat the show as nothing more as allegory about the human condition until should extra-terrestrial beings in real life actually televise their introduction and ask "Hi there, do you have a cup of sugar or Grey Poupon?"
