Make me understand "Ensign" Kim as a "Senior Officer"??

[Non-Trekkie Trekkie]

This goes for other Trek shows too, I guess...But I just noticed it the most on Voyager...

Harry Kim was referred to as a Senior Officer, but there were officers with higher ranks running around that weren't considered "Senior".

Is this normal in the military? Can an ensign that mans a certain important station on a ship be considered "Senior" while higher ranking officers not manning such stations not be considered senior? Or is this just another Trek made-up thing that we have to live with?

(And while another subject...After 5, 6 or 7 years, didn't the dude earn a bump in rank??)

 

[Stormrage]

They needed the Token ethnic human. Tuvok was black but an alien.

 

[Cyke101]

Senior could just mean who the Captain feels is the most capable person for the job.

But I distinctly remembr that for at least the first one or two seasons of the show, Kim and Paris weren't senior officers. Yet Trek has this habit of confusing senior officers with main characters. At times, when Picard called for senior officers, Wesley would be there (or no Chief Engineer would be there, in Geordi's pre-Engineer days). Sometimes Sisko did the same with, say, Nog.

 

[Michael]

They needed the Token ethnic human. Tuvok was black but an alien.

What does this have to do with anything?

 

[HoundDog]

Senior could just mean who the Captain feels is the most capable person for the job.

But I distinctly remembr that for at least the first one or two seasons of the show, Kim and Paris weren't senior officers. Yet Trek has this habit of confusing senior officers with main characters. At times, when Picard called for senior officers, Wesley would be there (or no Chief Engineer would be there, in Geordi's pre-Engineer days). Sometimes Sisko did the same with, say, Nog.

That's indeed a problem with the Trek-shows.

Regarding our beloved Harry: I always thought he was "senior" because he was head of one of the ship's departments, though I don't remember which. Because of that, he was a senior officer, although there were Lieutenants aboard who were not (like Carey, who was "Assistant Chief Engineer" and thus not a senior officer). But I've never served in the military, so my assumption might be wrong

 

[evilnate]

Senior could just mean who the Captain feels is the most capable person for the job.

But I distinctly remembr that for at least the first one or two seasons of the show, Kim and Paris weren't senior officers. Yet Trek has this habit of confusing senior officers with main characters. At times, when Picard called for senior officers, Wesley would be there (or no Chief Engineer would be there, in Geordi's pre-Engineer days). Sometimes Sisko did the same with, say, Nog.

That's indeed a problem with the Trek-shows.

Regarding our beloved Harry: I always thought he was "senior" because he was head of one of the ship's departments, though I don't remember which. Because of that, he was a senior officer, although there were Lieutenants aboard who were not (like Carey, who was "Assistant Chief Engineer" and thus not a senior officer). But I've never served in the military, so my assumption might be wrong

A junior officer in the US Navy is usually someone who is a first or second tour division officer and is an ensign or LTJG. A senior officer is usually a LT and up. There are exceptions to this, such as Limited Duty Officers and Chief Warrent Officers, who are never referred to as junior officers regardless of rank.

That being said, Trek's rank structure is so screwy that a better definition of senior officer is simply one who's name is in the credits. My favorite would be Chief O'Brien, who, according to the show was some flavor of CPO, yet ran a division full of officers. It had to have been hard to get any work done!

 

[A beaker full of death]

That being said, Trek's rank structure is so screwy that a better definition of senior officer is simply one who's name is in the credits.

Let's limit that to modern Trek, shall we?

 

[evilnate]

That being said, Trek's rank structure is so screwy that a better definition of senior officer is simply one who's name is in the credits.

Let's limit that to modern Trek, shall we?

Oh, certaintly. TOS was written by people who's familiarity with military rank structure extended past watching a couple of episodes of M.A.S.H. back in the day.

 

[Michael]

^ Funny, I thought Gene Roddenberry was on TNG, too. And isn't RDM also a former officer?

 

[clever_username]

just position of authority crap. someone could be senior to you, but you're the best qualified for the job, so you get it.

what bothers me is why harry never got LT.

 

[evilnate]

^ Funny, I thought Gene Roddenberry was on TNG, too. And isn't RDM also a former officer?

Sure, and GR had the most input on S1 of TNG, which out of all of modern Trek was mostly grounded in what was established in TOS (which was in turn also based mostly on "reality"). Remember, in S1, Wesley was not a "senior officer", and wasn't even allowed on the bridge for a good portion of that season. It wasn't until later in TNG and beyond that the lead actors=senior officers thing really kicked off.

As a side note, I've often read that GR felt that starships would be staffed with the best and the brightest, and like the contemporary astronaut corps and would consist of all officers. However, I've often felt that once you reach the point where space travel was so routine and you had vessels that were as large or larger than our current naval vessels, that you would have to have a strong enlisted backbone to run those ships. The manpower required to operate and maintain the ships would be greater than the output of the one Starfleet Academy that we've seen.

As far as RDM having been an officer, I hadn't heard that, but it doesn't surprise me. BSG, despite the strange order of ranks that it inherited from it the original series, rings truer to this military person than any other (televised) science fiction that I've seen.

 

[scorpius1701]

I remember seeing Wesley in one briefing room scene inBOBW talking about the deflector. I never saw Ro in there. TNG did a good job of keeping the senior officers in. DS9 was pretty clear that the main characters were department heads. I have no idea why Kim or Paris would ever be in a briefing unless someone specifically wanted to hear from them. The only one i can picture is Paris because plotting a course in the DQ would be important. Any Harry dialogue can be passed to B'Elanna. Hell that could have been a character plot point for harry: getting into a briefing and his ideas heard. Instead hes just instant senior officer.

 

[Michael]

Remember, in S1, Wesley was not a "senior officer", and wasn't even allowed on the bridge for a good portion of that season.

What? Wesley Crusher became "acting ensign" by the fifth episode ("Where No One Has Gone Before").

 

[evilnate]

Remember, in S1, Wesley was not a "senior officer", and wasn't even allowed on the bridge for a good portion of that season.

What? Wesley Crusher became "acting ensign" by the fifth episode ("Where No One Has Gone Before").

Really? It's been a long time since I've watched those episodes. I thought it was more like half-way through.

 

[Michael]

^ No problem.

 

[Anwar]

That being said, Trek's rank structure is so screwy that a better definition of senior officer is simply one who's name is in the credits.

Let's limit that to modern Trek, shall we?

The Trek take on Starfleet Rank structure has never been 100% accurate to the USN, in any version Modern or otherwise. Nor should it. Starfleet isn't just America in space it's all of Earth and various other alien races as well so it wouldn't make sense for it to be exactly like the Navy of one country of one planet in an organization that's made up of hundreds of planets.

 

[Jptrekker]

Maybe I can help...

When I was first commissioned in the US Army I was a staff officer in a tank brigade. My boss, a Major, was a "senior officer." My job was to oversee training of the enlisted personnel in my section and various other duties equivalent to my position in the unit and rank as a 2nd Lieutenant (which is equal to the naval rank of ensign).

Now, there were rare occasions, that I reported to senior staff meetings with the General as a senior staff officer, these were times when the Major was away for some reason or another. I was expected to remain mostly silent and to report everything back to the Major when he returned, but I was reporting as the brigade S-1 to the General. Had we been deployed, if the Major had died, I would have taken his position on the General's senior staff until the Major could be replaced.

Harry Kim's position was at Ops on the bridge, more than likely he reported to a higher ranking officer on the captain's staff who was killed when Voyager was brought into the DQ by the caretaker--and there were no replacements coming from Starfleet. Harry by default became a senior officer because of his position in this case, not his rank.

 

[Alidar Jarok]

Harry technically makes sense. They tried to make Tom Paris the ship's pilot, but that's not exactly a department head (and, since TNG made any random ensign do it, shouldn't exactly be one person, just whoever's on duty). Same could be said for Mayweather in Enterprise (I can't remember if he was ever in a meeting, but I honestly can't remember meetings that everyone attended, just Archer, T'Pol, and Trip).

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

TOS screwed up rank references quite a bit as well.

 

[A beaker full of death]

TOS screwed up rank references quite a bit as well.

Such as?