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Best Mom in Trek!

I don't see Lwaxana Troi as a "good" mother.

"Good" parents don't ignore and trivialise their adult children's opinions and choices. They don't attempt to manipulate (and bully) their children into what the parent feels is the "right" choice (especially over relationships). They don't turn up at the child's workplace, insult the child's managers and interfere with the work the child is doing.

Lwaxana Troi's background might explain why she does this, and I don't think that she doesn't want to be a "good" mother but good intentions aren't the same as good parenting. Parents want to be good parents and it's hard to imagine anyone who deliberately sets out to be a "bad" parent nevertheless there are bad parents out there.

If intentions are the thing that makes someone a "good" parent then it's hard to see why Worf gets such a bad rap.

Lwaxana did her best and that must be chalked up as a point in her favour. "Good enough" yes: "Good" no.

Yes, because I was totally serious and not being sarcastic at all.

;)
 
Definitely Spock's mom. Always handling herself with grace.

Surprised nobody's mentioned Samantha Wildman yet. Separated from her husband by a quadrant, losing her daughter and raising her "twin", facing the reality that she may never go home.

Also Tasha Yar. Despite the circumstances of Sela's conception, Tasha loved her baby daughter enough to bring her when she tried to escape her life as a consort, as much as Sela didn't see it that way.
 
Definitely Spock's mom. Always handling herself with grace.

Surprised nobody's mentioned Samantha Wildman yet. Separated from her husband by a quadrant, losing her daughter and raising her "twin", facing the reality that she may never go home.

Also Tasha Yar. Despite the circumstances of Sela's conception, Tasha loved her baby daughter enough to bring her when she tried to escape her life as a consort, as much as Sela didn't see it that way.

Samantha Wildman just seemed like an absentee mom. She didn't appear again after season 5's "ONCE UPON A TIME" (not counting the time travel in "FURY"). That means we never saw her with her daughter for all of 2 seasons and a vast majority of another. We know she was there because no one mentioned her dying... but she might as well have died after that episode.

It is true we have even fewer examples of moms in the franchise than dads.

Because of SNW, I have to go with Amanda. Pretty much for reasons already stated.

Right behind her is Helena Rozhenko, also for the stated reasons in this thread.

Lwaxana Troi would be my close third place pick, because while good intentions don't equal good actions (as has been said here), particularly after we learm about Kestra, she can get a pass for a lot of that behavior. She did eventually see Deanna as an adult... it just took a long time. There's many parents who do that with their adult children... doesn't mean they weren't good parents. Look at Deanna... she clearly grew up fine. She went into Starfleet and she specialized in helping people.
 
- Beverly Crusher seems like a good mom... aside from the time when she gave many fans catharsis by smacking Wesley.
- Must disagree about Samantha Wildman. The fact that her actress was chronically unavailable didn't change that she seemed like a caring parent when she was there.
- Deanna Troi was a good mom to Kestra. Probably her brother as well. Lwaxana was just obnoxious.
- Keiko was mostly good... good enough that I'm willing to count "Time's Orphan" as a catastrophic bit of character assassination. I liked how she handled her time as foster mama to Rugal. Miles needed a verbal slap across the face, and she delivered one.
- And will agree about Carol Freeman, who is doing the best she can with an offspring who has a complete wild streak.

- Special mention to hologram Janeway as surrogate mom to the Protostar crew.
 
I wouldn't nominate Lwaxana in the best mom arena, but as obnoxious as I once found her, it all started making sense, in a very sad, lost & lonely kind of way. You can explain away pretty much all her objectionable behavior when you realize Deanna is the only family & in some ways purpose she had left in life, after some gut busting tragedies.
 
Not even one person gonna bring up poor Beverly Crusher. Y'all hate that kid so much.:guffaw:

I didn't bring her up not because I didn't like Wesley (which I did like Wesley), but for other reasons.

Putting Jack in danger when her whole reason for not telling Picard about him was because it was dangerous to be around him?

She came across really badly in this season.

Also, I get that she wanted to have Wesley with her and the Enterprise was a ship with families, but why would you want to bring your child to an assignment that is inherently dangerous? I never liked the idea of children aboard starships because it's just too dangerous for them. Especially after you already lost your husband to Starfleet duty.

(Before anyone mentions Sisko, we don't know how long Jennifer and Jake were on board the Saratoga. Also, Sisko wasn't a single parent until Wolf 359 happened. He was ready to leave Starfleet because he was sent to DS9 at first, and one of the reasons was it's not 'an ideal environment to raise my son'.)
 
Not even one person gonna bring up poor Beverly Crusher. Y'all hate that kid so much.:guffaw:
Nope. I don't think she was portrayed as a very good or even a particularly caring Mom. Ben Sisko said (as he often does to so many people) "Hold my beer."

- Special mention to hologram Janeway as surrogate mom to the Protostar crew.
This! ALLLL of this!
 
Nope. I don't think she was portrayed as a very good or even a particularly caring Mom. Ben Sisko said (as he often does to so many people) "Hold my beer."
Comparing any Trek parent to Ben Sisko will yield near-inevitable results.
BTW, that's a real shame. The concept of the show was that this was a ship that was going SO FAR INTO where no one had gone before that they brought all of their loved ones WITH them. So not only is there only one family unit in the main cast, they don't really dwell on them very much as a family.

It was actually a pretty neat idea. But I don't know who we can say didn't commit to it. Some of the writers? All of the writers? Whoever came up with the idea didn't do a very good job of defending it.
 
BTW, that's a real shame. The concept of the show was that this was a ship that was going SO FAR INTO where no one had gone before that they brought all of their loved ones WITH them. So not only is there only one family unit in the main cast, they don't really dwell on them very much as a family.

It was actually a pretty neat idea. But I don't know who we can say didn't commit to it. Some of the writers? All of the writers? Whoever came up with the idea didn't do a very good job of defending it.
Picard's first log entry in "Encounter at Farpoint" sure gave the impression that Enterprise was heading into the "great unexplored mass of the galaxy" after stopping at Deneb IV. But they turned right around and spent their entire mission largely within the confines of the Federation, thereby making the reasoning for having families on board largely moot.

I think the idea might have been dropped entirely if Roddenberry hadn't wanted Wesley as a main character, so it had to stay to justify his existence. They should have just made him a midshipman wizkid that entered the Academy really early, all of his story beats would have remained nearly the same, while at the same time losing all of the dopey "acting ensign" nonsense.
 
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Ok, but have y'all considered Neelix? His parenting style comes a lot closer to traditional mothering than fathering, in my opinion.

Worf's adopted mother raised a great man. She probably deserves the vote.
 
Dr Gabrielle Burnham, time travelling for decades to save her child and the universe. Top that!
 
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