Poll: Janeway & Gender

[Cheile]

^ considering those same posters' anti-Janeway attitudes that i've observed elsewhere on this forum (as i already said once), it's not really a stretch.

 

[AuntKate]

As others have mentioned, my problem with Janeway comes from the incredibly inconsistent way in which she was written. I went into Voyager looking forward to seeing how she was going to handle things, but it did not take long for bad signs to start showing up.
The blustering at the Vidiians about how they would regret it if they ever harvested another member of her crew (after they took Neelix's lung) was completely ignored in all subsequent encounters with them. They murdered one of her crew members and tortured several others and all she did was carry out a rescue with no retaliation at all. Never make threats unless you plan to carry them out.
Her refusal to trade her library to the people who were willing to give Voyager a device that would shave thirty thousand light years off of the trip home because a local law would not allow it indicates a strict adherance to the regs. I mean this was a pretty minor point to get hung up on for shortening a seventy year trip by almost half. If she was a consistent "by the book" officer I could buy it, but roughly a year to a year and a half later she violated the the space of a culture that had clearly warned Voyager off and killed dozens if not scores of these aliens merely to save twelve to eighteen months on the trip home.
Inconsistencies such as these made it hard to take the character seriously, and there are plenty of other examples over the course of the series.
Picard's "by the book" attitude was annoying at times, but when he broke the rules it was always with much soul searching and debate with the crew. That kept his characterization internally consistant.
Sisko was never a "by the book" Captain. He believed in the regs, but when they were wrong or otherwise lacking he did what he thought was necessary. He occasionally came close to being cavalier about the regs (see For the Uniform) but again, it was a consistant part of his characterization.
My point is that my problems with Janeway are entirely due to the poor consistancy of the writing of her character rather than her character itself.
So in answer to your question I would have to say that I did not like her character and I am a guy, for whatever that's worth.

The "blustering" with the Vidiians doesn't mean that Janeway will risk her ship and crew to take revenge. That would be stupid on her part. However, we did see her "other half" take care of a whole shipload of Vidiians in "Deadlock." That seems to be pretty severe, don't you think?

And you're mistaken about the trading of the library. Janeway was more than willing to trade the ship's library for the transporter device, but the aliens had a sort of "prime directive" that prevented them from doing so. I think you're a bit confused about that plot.

And the other episode about violating a region of space to save time--are you talking about Year of Hell? Counterpoint? It's hard to know from your vague description, but I'm not sure you really make a valid point. She probably realized that some groups claim huge regions of space just because it's close to their home territory, rather like some countries deciding that their territory extends a hundred miles into the ocean. It's just "blustering" and most other ships just observe the twelve-mile limit and take a chance that they'll get by with it.

What's odd here is your own inconsistency--it's okay to give away the library to cover thirty-five light years, but wrong to ignore a vague threat to save 18 months. Is it just the length of time that a captain should consider?

I've found that Janeway breaks the rules only when she thinks it's truly necessary, just as Picard and Sisko did.

 

[aelius]

The aliens were not willing to trade the library, but there was a group of them who were willing to circumvent their own law to get the library. Janeway said no because it would be wrong, and against regulations to break the local laws. I remember the plot quite well.
I could live with this answer if the writers had made her this hard nosed about the regs all the time. And it was thirty thousand light years, not thirty five light years.
I cant remember the name of the episode (perhaps "The Swarm" because that's what the aliens called themselves) but they assaulted a shuttle crew and left a map in the computer with a message that said KEEP OUT. They also had a detector grid around their space to spot incoming ships that they had to figure a way to fool. That is not some vaguely defined border, but a clear military obstruction. During Voyagers violation of their space they sent vessels to deal with the invaders, as is their right, during which Voyager destroyed dozens of their 2 to 4 person ships.
Saying that Janeway realized that some groups claim huge regions of space without cause is basically saying that she feels she can violate other peoples territory whenever she wants. Your twelve mile limit comment is spurious because she had nothing on which to base a judgment like that. She knew nothing of these aliens beyond what the map said. I believe that Neelix mentioned thier aggressive territoriality, but I am not sure about that though.
Starfleet regs do not permit a ship captain to violate the space of other races with impunity, thus the deaths of those aliens are directly attributable to the actions of Capt. Janeway. This makes her guilty of mass murder.
This was actually the B story of the ep. It was primarily about the EMH losing his program integrity and having to be repaired by Kes using the diagnostic program to reinforce the EMH. Hope this helps identify the episode for you AuntKate.
As to the retaliation against the Vidiians for harvesting more crew after being told there would be consequences for it, I would have beamed a high yield antimatter explosive into the facility with the rescue team for them to leave behind when they left. It would have made a point to the Vidiians that Voyager was not to be trifled with, while at the same time giving all those poor aliens who were being worked to death until they were harvested a quick and clean death. I also noticed there was never even a mention of trying to rescue any of those other aliens, not even the ones that helped the Voyager crew members. This was the episode where B'Elanna got split in two by the way.
As to Deadlock, blowing up your own ship when you have already lost the battle to deny your enemy the prize is only what you would expect from a Starfleet Captain. After all her crew was being harvested and Voyager was all but overrun.

 

[Kirk1980]

Aelius, again...socks were rocked.

Your memory is legion.

 

[DimesDan]

For goodness sakes.
Maybe it should be broken down by culture, height, and religion as well.

Count me in as a male who liked her.

As I've already asked, does ones sexuality have any relevance on the original question?

I assume you mean sex rather than sexuality. No, I don't think it means a lot but that was the original question the poster decided to ask.

Nope, I did mean Sexuality, I can understand the relevance of why the OP asked for ones gender, even though it may seem a bit, well pointless as what's the point? To prove that all men hate her and all women love her? But no, as a man who is very open minded about his sexuality and counts himself just about straight, I don't see why if one is heterosexual, bi sexual or homosexual has any relevance.

And that may be a moot point now, but I felt like answering this before reading a further three pages on the topic

As to Deadlock, blowing up your own ship when you have already lost the battle to deny your enemy the prize is only what you would expect from a Starfleet Captain. After all her crew was being harvested and Voyager was all but overrun.

As Kirk demonstrated in Search for Spock and Picard in First Contact (to name but two examples) when a Starship is being invaded and no chance of saving said Starship, you engage the auto destruct and run like hell as Starfleet really dosn't want their tech falling into the wrong hands, something to do with the Prime Directive.

 

[Gorf]

But as it stands now, the poll suggests that women are sexist because they are more likely to not like Janeway.

Actually you're wrong, but you have to work out the numbers yourself to discover that. You can't base your conclusion on the procentages listed on this page as these are based on the total count of voters.

To find the actually number you have to separate the answers into men and women and yes and no like this.

Female voters: 38
32 says yes equalling a procentage of 84.2% (32/38*100).
6 says no equalling a procentage of 15.8% (6/38*100).

Male voters: 59
41 says yes equalling a procentage of 69.5% (41/59*100).
18 says no equalling a procentage of 30.5% (18/59*100).

Which means that a larger procentage of women right now votes yes for Janeway than men. To be exact 14.7% more women. Which also means that 14.7% more men say no to Janeway.

Edit...hmm...looking at the automatically generated numbers on this page, I'd say you're still wrong. These say that 6.19% of women dislike her where as this number is above 18% for men. However, these numbers don't show the real procentages as I've stated above.

 

[captcalhoun]

the other stupid thing about Janeway and territoriality is she refused to go around The Swarm's space, yet when politely told to bugger off in the end of 'Year of Hell part 2' by the Krenim, she then does so. yet in the other timeline, she refused.

they couldn't even make her consistent in the same sodding story!

 

[DimesDan]

the other stupid thing about Janeway and territoriality is she refused to go around The Swarm's space, yet when politely told to bugger off in the end of 'Year of Hell part 2' by the Krenim, she then does so. yet in the other timeline, she refused.

they couldn't even make her consistent in the same sodding story!

You know, on the whole, I rather liked Year of Hell but then again I rather like the alternate universe/timeline stories when everything hits the fan. It's just a shame that being so far from home, we didn't see what happened to Voyager in Year of Hell over the course of the entire series and that's why I really liked Christophers Myriad Universe story so much. For anyone wanting a good solid Janeway, a Janeway/Chakotay relationship and an even more solid Kes, go and read it

 

[wew]

In terms of how she's written I don't like her and in real life would not like to meet someone like this.

 

[Lynx]

I'm male, I'm straight and I like Janeway.

I think that she's a great character. It's a close call between her and Picard for "best captain" in my poll but I do think that Janeway wins because I always liked the way she did seem to care for each crewmember and that she was ready to sacrifice herself to save each one of them.

I can agree with those who criticizes some of her behavior in the later seasons of Voyager but I blame that on bad writing, which actualy affected all characters in the later seasons of the show.

I still think that Janeway lives up to her premise and no, I have no objections against a strong, female character in charge. On the contrary, I think that Voyager was the show who did have strong female characters who were very unique, not only the usual cardboard cut-out female heroes.

If I had been a real-life "Ensign Jimmy" and have had the opportunity to choose on which ship or station I wanted to serve, then I would have chosen Voyager, much because of the way Janeway did run the ship.

 

[SiorX]

I can understand the relevance of why the OP asked for ones gender, even though it may seem a bit, well pointless as what's the point? To prove that all men hate her and all women love her? But no, as a man who is very open minded about his sexuality and counts himself just about straight, I don't see why if one is heterosexual, bi sexual or homosexual has any relevance.

And that may be a moot point now, but I felt like answering this before reading a further three pages on the topic

Not the OP, but fwiw I do think there's more to be gotten out of threads like this than gender-blaming that 'all men hate her and all women love her". (I hate sentences that start with 'all men' or 'all women' anyway, because with the exception of tautologies they're almost always going to misrepresent somebody).

What I think could probably be argued from the numbers is that it's worth looking at how important Janeway is to the subset of Trek fen who are women as opposed to the overall numbers.

We live in a patriarchal society. That's simple fact. 'The patriarchy' != 'men'. It's simply a cultural system in which we all live and to which we all contribute where we accept it as standard (even better than average) that in the forty years of televised Trek, of the 50 leading characters across five crews, only 14 were women. (And more of them failed to last the whole run of their series than their male counterparts, slightly widening the discrepency.)

Janeway's the only woman at the big captain's table along with four men. Given that, combined with the fact that Voy aired to a real-world audience where gender is a significant problem in advancement to top positions in so many sectors, the writers dropping the ball on Janeway is a bigger deal than bad writing for Archer. (Point illustrated by xkcd)

So I think now and again talking about how the audience received Janeway is worth doing. It probably is easier in general for men to be unaware of all the extra baggage connected with 'Janeway-bashing' than it is for women. That's not to say that there aren't plenty of legitimate reasons for disliking Janeway as a character. Just that there's nothing wrong with now and again calling attention to the elephant in the room that is the gender-imbalance in televised Trek, and examining the place of vocal Janeway-hate in that context.

 

[Thrawn]

SiorX, thank you for your thoughtful and intelligent post. You make a lot of very good points, and I agree almost completely.

The place where I have a problem with that reasoning (and I'm not saying this is you!) is when it's used to say that the writers that killed off Janeway did so for sexist reasons, just because she is the only female captain. I don't think that follows from "calling attention to the elephant in the room", which as you say, is worth doing from time to time.

And for the record, the gender imbalance isn't as bad in the novels; certainly a solid half of the main characters of Destiny were female.

 

[Count Zero]

But as it stands now, the poll suggests that women are sexist because they are more likely to not like Janeway.

Actually you're wrong, but you have to work out the numbers yourself to discover that. You can't base your conclusion on the procentages listed on this page as these are based on the total count of voters.

To find the actually number you have to separate the answers into men and women and yes and no like this.

Female voters: 38
32 says yes equalling a procentage of 84.2% (32/38*100).
6 says no equalling a procentage of 15.8% (6/38*100).

Male voters: 59
41 says yes equalling a procentage of 69.5% (41/59*100).
18 says no equalling a procentage of 30.5% (18/59*100).

Which means that a larger procentage of women right now votes yes for Janeway than men. To be exact 14.7% more women. Which also means that 14.7% more men say no to Janeway.

Edit...hmm...looking at the automatically generated numbers on this page, I'd say you're still wrong. These say that 6.19% of women dislike her where as this number is above 18% for men. However, these numbers don't show the real procentages as I've stated above.

The absolute numbers were different when I posted that, and I calculated the percentage myself the same way you did.

 

[aelius]

As to Deadlock, blowing up your own ship when you have already lost the battle to deny your enemy the prize is only what you would expect from a Starfleet Captain. After all her crew was being harvested and Voyager was all but overrun.

As Kirk demonstrated in Search for Spock and Picard in First Contact (to name but two examples) when a Starship is being invaded and no chance of saving said Starship, you engage the auto destruct and run like hell as Starfleet really dosn't want their tech falling into the wrong hands, something to do with the Prime Directive.

That's what I said. It's what any Starfleet captain in that situation would do, thus it's nothing special.
I do wish to make clear that I am in no way attacking Janeway in these posts. That would be silly, she is a fictional character. My problem is with the writers who were unable to come up with a consistent personality or set of core values for her character. A real person who behaved in such a staggeringly inconsistent manner could only be described as crazy.
In the examples above (leaving out the Vidiians) it was break a very minor local law where no one gets hurt in order to get 30 years closer to home and the answer is no. But it is ok to break Starfleet regs, Federation law and local laws to violate someones space and kill many of their species to save a few months. That is crazy, and the writers should have figured that out.
Actually I think the writers problem with the Swarm was that it was the B story. They were so caught up with writing the EMH story that they just wanted some action for the background and to distract the rest of the crew so that Kes had to deal with the problem herself. This, however, only points up their laziness. What, they couldn't come up with a threat to Voyager that was not instigated by Janeway breaking all the rules!!! That's crazy again.
I also noticed that nobody, not even Chakotey who normally was very sensitive to others beliefs and rules, even seemed to feel bad about casually murdering these aliens. Oh well, they were just bugs anyway.
While the A story was rather entertaining, the B story turned this episode into a mess.
Just to be clear. I actually enjoyed Voyager and have not jumped on the "Voyager bashing bandwagon" that some people talk about. With that said however the writing, particularly for Janeway could be uneven. I realize that could be said for any of the series which is why I am not one of the slam Voyager crowd.
The writing for most of the cast was reasonably consistent in characterization, there were exceptions but for the most part they were the same character from week to week. But the writing for Janeway was so inconstant that you never knew how she would react to an issue. Would she her A personality where the rules must be followed no matter what, or her B personality where the rules were...eh what rules.
I wanted to like Janeway, just like I wanted to like Picard and I wanted to like Sisko. Picard I didn't much care for at first, but he slowly grew on me. At first I thought his style was a bit too restrained, but I got used to him.
Sisko I very quickly grew to like. In fact he is my favorite captain.
As for Kirk, well he's The Kirken and I grew up watching him so he kind of sets the standard.
Janeway, for the reasons I have listed above I never could get to like. And I think that is a shame.
It's been said that Voyager did not live up it's potential, and that is true. But it could also be said of the other series as well. But the most unrealized potential was the character of Janeway who the writers could apparently never define in any kind of rational manner.

 

[kimc]

Clarification: This poll is not part of some "clever plot" to make people admit this, that or the other thing. As previously stated it isn't even my original idea but I agreed with ktek that the results would be interesting - if only to see if certain assumptions made around here are true or not.

As for sexual orientation the question isn't about whether or not you'd do her it's quite simply do you like her?

'Nuff said.

 

[Praetor]

I'm male (gay, if anyone cares), and I like Janeway.

I do wish they had written her more consistently from the beginning.

 

[Starbreaker]

Male. I like Janeway. Not going to gush over her or anything...

 

[LutherSloan]

I said yes (and I'm a man), but I'm mostly indifferent towards her.

 

[William Leisner]

Clarification: This poll is not part of some "clever plot" to make people admit this, that or the other thing. As previously stated it isn't even my original idea but I agreed with ktek that the results would be interesting - if only to see if certain assumptions made around here are true or not.

As for sexual orientation the question isn't about whether or not you'd do her it's quite simply do you like her?

'Nuff said.

My problem with the poll -- and the reason I have no intention of taking part in it -- is because there's no distinction between "I like Janeway," "I have no particular problem with Janeway," and "OMG Janeway is the most awesomest character ever!" Also missing from this poll is the entire question of whether one's like or dislike is so strong that it impacts the person's reaction to Janeway's death. Some may love the character but recognize her death is just a dramatic device in a fictional universe; others may despise they way she was portrayed on TV, but also view the decision to kill her as creatively bankrupt.

And in the end, I don't believe this poll is going to reveal a damn thing.

 

[Gorf]

I cant remember the name of the episode (perhaps "The Swarm" because that's what the aliens called themselves) but they assaulted a shuttle crew and left a map in the computer with a message that said KEEP OUT. They also had a detector grid around their space to spot incoming ships that they had to figure a way to fool. That is not some vaguely defined border, but a clear military obstruction. During Voyagers violation of their space they sent vessels to deal with the invaders, as is their right, during which Voyager destroyed dozens of their 2 to 4 person ships.

It's true that a shuttle with Tom and B'Elanna is attacked at the beginning of the show, but they do not leave a map or a message that says 'keep out'.

The two attackers do talk amongst themselves, but their language is so different that the universal translator can't understand it.

Voyager does seem to have a map of the region and I'm guessing they scanned the area because the show mentiones absolutely nothing about the map you mention (yep, I had to watch that episode yesterday just to see which of this was correct).

Janeway does decide to cross their space, but I don't think you can call it an invation or that she's invading. She tries to communicate, but without much luck. There is a place that will only take them 4 days to cross and that's what they intend to do. Invading implies meaning to cause harm and she doesn't. In fact when they are attacked she orderes a warning shot, but specifies not to destroy any of the ships.

You also mention that these alien ships carry 2-4 people. They are definitely small ships, but the show does not specify how many are on it. There could be one, two, three...or none. They could be completely automated. You're assuming here, not stating fact.

Janeway does finally defend herself, but again she has little choice. It was either that or die, and it would have been an awfully boring last 5 seasons if Voyager had been destroyed at the beginning of the third season.

Most of the episode is actually about the doctor's program suddenly malfunctioning. His memory is degrading and their only initial solution is to restart him. Kes refuses to let that happen and Janeway agrees that they owe him to try to find another solution first, and in this she shows one of the sides that I love so much about her. She cares!!!

*steps off soapbox*