Lack of Alien Diversity on the U.S.S. Equinox

[WarpTenLizard]

In "Equinox," Voyager meets another Federation ship taken by the Caretaker. Unlike Voyager, the crew of the Equinox has abandoned their principles and resorted to murdering sentient aliens for fuel.

Captain Ransom tries to justify his actions by claiming that his crew had it harder than Janeway's. I'm disappointed that Janeway never pointed out why her crew had the advantages it did. The Equinox noticbly has not picked up any new crewmembers on its journey like Voyager has. The reason Voyager had Seven's Borg nanoprobes, Neelix as a guide, and Kes's ESP to help them is because they showed compassion to these individuals, and it paid off. Allowing their EMH to expand his personality, rather than deleting half of it for short-term gain, also led to him becoming more creative. I'm disappointed that this point wasn't touched on in all the moral debates of the two-parter.

While it's brilliant writing that the Equinox hasn't taken on any newcomers, it's very lazy writing that it's entire crew is Human (and seemingly Westerners). I assume this is because the writers wanted to emphasize what human beings are capable of when we abandon our principles. But many of "Star Trek's" aliens are pretty on-the-nose symbols for aspects of humanity, so why not take advantage of that? Have a Vulcan who managed to concoct a "logical" reason for her heinous actions. Have a Bajoran twist his religious beliefs to justify murder. Naturally, keep the captain and probably first officer human. But the crew should've been more diverse. Even at the end when Janeway punishes the five surviving crewmen, we couldn't have a Bolian or a Napean or something in there?

I realize this is a nitpick, but it bugs me nonetheless.

 

[Tosk]

I thought the Equinox had made terrific strides towards home thanks to some useful aliens?

 

[Oddish]

Voyager was little better. Out of her 150 or so crew, maybe 10 were non-human.

 

[Ragitsu]

I thought the Equinox had made terrific strides towards home thanks to some useful aliens?

Womp womp womp.

 

[Tenacity]

resorted to murdering sentient aliens

Were they sentient, or merely intelligent animals?

 

[somebuddyX]

Were they sentient, or merely intelligent animals?

I thought they were sentient and the point was it was easy for that crew to get behind shoving the space dolphins into a warp drive because they looked different. If they were just straight humanoids it's easy to empathise with them but as this other worldly entity who gives a shit. Instead of a metaphorical dehumanisation of a subjugated being, it's a literal one. Or I'm reading too much into it.

 

[Oddish]

Were they sentient, or merely intelligent animals?

They were sentient. Janeway negotiated with them in Part 2.

 

[fireproof78]

While it's brilliant writing that the Equinox hasn't taken on any newcomers, it's very lazy writing that it's entire crew is Human (and seemingly Westerners). I assume this is because the writers wanted to emphasize what human beings are capable of when we abandon our principles.

Yes. And it works quite well.

 

[Jayson1]

They might have had aliens. Some of them might have been Betazoid and aliens might have died when those aliens started attacking them. We only saw, what I assumed was a small number of crew who was still alive.

 

[WarpTenLizard]

I thought they were sentient and the point was it was easy for that crew to get behind shoving the space dolphins into a warp drive because they looked different. If they were just straight humanoids it's easy to empathise with them but as this other worldly entity who gives a shit. Instead of a metaphorical dehumanisation of a subjugated being, it's a literal one. Or I'm reading too much into it.

Tuvok had a telepathic conversation with them. They were clearly sapient.

 

[Lynx]

Voyager was little better. Out of her 150 or so crew, maybe 10 were non-human.

Maybe many species simply prefer their own company in the first place.

In the DS9 episode Take Me To The Holosuite, the main characters on the station (who actually are a rather mixed bunch of Humans, Klingons, Bajorans, Trills and Ferengi) plays a baseball game against a bunch of Vulcans who obviously are from the same spaceship.

So maybe it's more convenient to have a majority of people from the same world on certain ships which is a reason why I would love to see a series about a ship where most of the crew are Vulcans or Andorians or some other Federation species.

That was my attempt to a Star Trek Universe explanation.

If we go for a Gray World explanation, my theory above might be plausible but it may also have something to do with sloppy writing and producing.

 

[Oddish]

An all-Vulcan starship would make sense, because Vulcans prefer a hotter, drier, and higher-grav environment than most other sentients. On a ship of their own, they could just set environmental settings to the norm on Vulcan.

 

[Ragitsu]

An all-Vulcan starship would make sense, because Vulcans prefer a hotter, drier, and higher-grav environment than most other sentients. On a ship of their own, they could just set environmental settings to the norm on Vulcan.

They also prefer the smell (or lack thereof).

 

[fireproof78]

Maybe many species simply prefer their own company in the first place.

In the DS9 episode Take Me To The Holosuite, the main characters on the station (who actually are a rather mixed bunch of Humans, Klingons, Bajorans, Trills and Ferengi) plays a baseball game against a bunch of Vulcans who obviously are from the same spaceship.

So maybe it's more convenient to have a majority of people from the same world on certain ships which is a reason why I would love to see a series about a ship where most of the crew are Vulcans or Andorians or some other Federation species.

That was my attempt to a Star Trek Universe explanation.

If we go for a Gray World explanation, my theory above might be plausible but it may also have something to do with sloppy writing and producing.

I mean, TOS had that going before DS9. So what's the big deal?

No "gray world" explanation required.

 

[ED-209]

The reason Voyager had Seven's Borg nanoprobes, Neelix as a guide, and Kes's ESP to help them is because they showed compassion to these individuals, and it paid off. Allowing their EMH to expand his personality, rather than deleting half of it for short-term gain, also led to him becoming more creative. I'm disappointed that this point wasn't touched on in all the moral debates of the two-parter.

I'm not crying you're crying!!

Seriously though that's a pretty good insight and one I've not had before, it would've been really good if they took that angle. I suspect the writers hadn't thought of it either.

 

[FederationHistorian]

They might have had aliens. Some of them might have been Betazoid and aliens might have died when those aliens started attacking them. We only saw, what I assumed was a small number of crew who was still alive.

This is what I figure happened. All the other aliens, that happened to have composed the rest of the Equinox crew, were the ones that died first.

 

[WarpTenLizard]

This is what I figure happened. All the other aliens, that happened to have composed the rest of the Equinox crew, were the ones that died first.

I get the feeling Ransom assigned all his non-Human crewmen to the most dangerous tasks.

 

[Jayson1]

I don't get the feeling Ransom was bigoted towards aliens or anything. He was someone who just gave up on his vales do the extreme hard time they had while being in the DQ. Especially when I think we know the main reasons we didn't see many alien, much like we mostly see humans on the Enterprise as well mostly likely has to do with it being more expensive or time consuming, and thus it is just easier to make all your extras be humans.

 

[Guy Gardener]

It's an undesirable shitty little ship with a shitty little Captain.

I imagine there's a draft where all the Captains pick the crew they want from academy graduates, and crew from other places who want to migrate, and crew who will do what they are damn well told because they don't have the rank to do do anything about it. The Captains with the most seniority, get exactly the crew they want, and then there's horse trading.

Ransom may not have had the influence to attract top tier crewmen and officers.

Neelix was originally written as a pirate looking for an opportunity to stab Janeway in the back.

In one timeline Kes wigged out during her job interview claiming to be from the future, and Janeway still hired her.

Seven was kidnapped and held against her will until Stockholm syndrome set in.

We saw Archer have dinner on a Vulcan Ship, but they probably lowered the Gravity for the dining room.

We saw Archer's crew fight Trellium zombie Vulcans to a standstill unfazed by any higher degree of gravity than Earth Standard.

A tiny earth Girl, Michael Burnham was living on Vulcan without once becoming crushed like a stomped on soda can.

 

[Oddish]

Maybe that's why she was strong enough to flatten guys twice her size.

According to Memory Alpha, Vulcan has 1.4x earth gravity. Means I'd weigh about 340 there. Ouch.

https://masstrek.fandom.com/wiki/Vulcan_(Planet)