One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers inside*

[The Rock]

Re: One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers insid

So the Borg attack was instigated by a human being? It was a counter attack to an attack on them? Janeway is probably one of the greatest mass murderers in history, at least indirectly.

No. That's like saying that the Allies in WWI were responsible for the Holocaust because Hitler used their mistreatment of Germany after WWI as his excuse for stirring up hatred and fervor for war. Or saying that the United States was responsible for 9/11 because Bin Laden used US policies in the Mideast as his excuse for bombing the towers.

People who do bad things always try to blame them on other people. Abusive spouses or parents or governments always tell their victims that they brought the abuse on themselves. But it's a lie. You are always the one responsible for your own actions, your own choices. If you lash out at someone who wronged you and say they're responsible because they wronged you, that's a lie, because you could've chosen to react differently.

The Borg have been a clear and present threat to the galaxy for thousands of years. The Janeways acted in defense against that threat. The Borg chose to react with a wholesale attack. Their choice, their responsibility.

I love the way you think. I completely agree.

 

[JarodRussell]

Re: One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers insid

So the Borg attack was instigated by a human being? It was a counter attack to an attack on them? Janeway is probably one of the greatest mass murderers in history, at least indirectly.

No. That's like saying that the Allies in WWI were responsible for the Holocaust because Hitler used their mistreatment of Germany after WWI as his excuse for stirring up hatred and fervor for war. Or saying that the United States was responsible for 9/11 because Bin Laden used US policies in the Mideast as his excuse for bombing the towers.

People who do bad things always try to blame them on other people. Abusive spouses or parents or governments always tell their victims that they brought the abuse on themselves. But it's a lie. You are always the one responsible for your own actions, your own choices. If you lash out at someone who wronged you and say they're responsible because they wronged you, that's a lie, because you could've chosen to react differently.

The Borg have been a clear and present threat to the galaxy for thousands of years. The Janeways acted in defense against that threat. The Borg chose to react with a wholesale attack. Their choice, their responsibility.

If someone travels back in time and "suddenly" there happens World War III, then the time traveler is responsible for that. And that directly, not indirectly.

 

[SicOne]

Re: One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers insid

...You are always the one responsible for your own actions, your own choices. If you lash out at someone who wronged you and say they're responsible because they wronged you, that's a lie, because you could've chosen to react differently.

And yet, turning the other cheek frequently only results in bruises on both cheeks. Disproportionate responses are subjective. Ask the Israelis and the Palestinians, but I'd advise you to do it fairly quickly. You might think me harsh for, say, advocating someone burning down a supervisor's house with him in it, but from your point of view you don't see that, subjectively speaking, the employee believed that the heartless bastard deserved it. For me, I'd never, ever, ever DO such a thing, but I can certainly see it occuring in these trying economic times with people losing jobs left and right due to management incompetence. I'm just sayin'.

Yes, a court of law and a jury of your peers might and in all likelihood would agree with your assessment of responsibility, Christopher, but the lasher-out'er in the above example might whistle jauntily with the self-satisfaction of a job well-done (yes, pun intended) as he is escorted to death row.

 

[JarodRussell]

Re: One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers insid

...You are always the one responsible for your own actions, your own choices. If you lash out at someone who wronged you and say they're responsible because they wronged you, that's a lie, because you could've chosen to react differently.

And yet, turning the other cheek frequently only results in bruises on both cheeks. Disproportionate responses are subjective. Ask the Israelis and the Palestinians, but I'd advise you to do it fairly quickly. You might think me harsh for, say, advocating someone burning down a supervisor's house with him in it, but from your point of view you don't see that, subjectively speaking, the employee believed that the heartless bastard deserved it. For me, I'd never, ever, ever DO such a thing, but I can certainly see it occuring in these trying economic times with people losing jobs left and right due to management incompetence. I'm just sayin'.

Yes, a court of law and a jury of your peers might and in all likelihood would agree with your assessment of responsibility, Christopher, but the lasher-out'er in the above example might whistle jauntily with the self-satisfaction of a job well-done (yes, pun intended) as he is escorted to death row.

And that still doesn't involve time travel.

If in 2030 there is world peace, and someone travels back in time to attack a party in 2010, and by 2020 there is a war that ends the world, who is responsible? Right, the time traveler! In the case of Destiny, it's Admiral Janeway. And indirectly Captain Janeway, for helping a time traveller from the future to commit the crime of timeline violation. Negligent homicide of 65 billion people.

Janeway cut the brake tube of a car. And even though the driver went clearly too fast, she is responsible for the accident that killed him.

 

[Allyn Gibson]

Re: One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers insid

So the Borg attack was instigated by a human being? It was a counter attack to an attack on them? Janeway is probably one of the greatest mass murderers in history, at least indirectly.

Directly, actually. "Endgame"'s Admiral Janeway destroyed an entire timeline on a personal whim. She wasn't restoring anything, she wasn't reacting to anything. She just said, "Fuck history, I think my friends got a bum deal so I'm going to fix it." That was a selfish, unjustified action.

 

[Sci]

Re: One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers insid

...You are always the one responsible for your own actions, your own choices. If you lash out at someone who wronged you and say they're responsible because they wronged you, that's a lie, because you could've chosen to react differently.

And yet, turning the other cheek frequently only results in bruises on both cheeks. Disproportionate responses are subjective. Ask the Israelis and the Palestinians, but I'd advise you to do it fairly quickly. You might think me harsh for, say, advocating someone burning down a supervisor's house with him in it, but from your point of view you don't see that, subjectively speaking, the employee believed that the heartless bastard deserved it. For me, I'd never, ever, ever DO such a thing, but I can certainly see it occuring in these trying economic times with people losing jobs left and right due to management incompetence. I'm just sayin'.

Yes, a court of law and a jury of your peers might and in all likelihood would agree with your assessment of responsibility, Christopher, but the lasher-out'er in the above example might whistle jauntily with the self-satisfaction of a job well-done (yes, pun intended) as he is escorted to death row.

And that still doesn't involve time travel.

If in 2030 there is world peace, and someone travels back in time to attack a party in 2010, and by 2020 there is a war that ends the world, who is responsible? Right, the time traveler! In the case of Destiny, it's Admiral Janeway. And indirectly Captain Janeway, for helping a time traveller from the future to commit the crime of timeline violation. Negligent homicide of 65 billion people.

Janeway cut the brake tube of a car. And even though the driver went clearly too fast, she is responsible for the accident that killed him.

So, if Future!Janeway and Our!Janeway are both responsible for the Borg Invasion for their having defeated the Borg in "Endgame," does that mean that Picard is also responsible for having defeated the Borg in Star Trek: First Contact, and that Riker is also responsible for having defeated them in "The Best of Both Worlds?"

And meanwhile, in Future!Janeway's timeline -- which, by the way, let us remember is not our timeline, but is someone else's alternate future timeline -- how many billions more sentients than the 63 billion who died in 2381 would have died in the long run because the Borg Collective hadn't been dissolved?

 

[Christopher]

Re: One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers insid

...You are always the one responsible for your own actions, your own choices. If you lash out at someone who wronged you and say they're responsible because they wronged you, that's a lie, because you could've chosen to react differently.

And yet, turning the other cheek frequently only results in bruises on both cheeks. Disproportionate responses are subjective. Ask the Israelis and the Palestinians, but I'd advise you to do it fairly quickly. You might think me harsh for, say, advocating someone burning down a supervisor's house with him in it, but from your point of view you don't see that, subjectively speaking, the employee believed that the heartless bastard deserved it. For me, I'd never, ever, ever DO such a thing, but I can certainly see it occuring in these trying economic times with people losing jobs left and right due to management incompetence. I'm just sayin'.

Even so, right or wrong, the responsibility for your decision to act should be your own. You shouldn't hide from it by trying to blame the other guy for your own actions. I'm not saying it's impossible for an act of retaliation to be ethical; I'm saying that part of being ethical is accepting responsibility for your own actions and choices. (Consider the principle of Civil Disobedience advocated by Thoreau and practiced by Gandhi, Dr. King, and others: if you decide a law is unjust and are morally compelled to break the law, nonetheless you do not try to deny that you broke the law but admit that you did so and accept the penalties freely. Deny your responsibility, try to hide from it, and you compromise your own integrity.)

 

[kkozoriz1]

Re: One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers insid

Janeways primary reason was to get her crew home. Taking out the trans-warp hub was her secondary objective, She was trying to get everyone home, to avoid the death of Seven.

From Memory Alpha:
"Admiral Janeway angrily responds that she did not spend the last ten years looking for a way to get Voyager home sooner so her past self could "throw it all away on some intergalactic goodwill mission!" Captain Janeway retorts that she cannot believe she will become so cynical. She is resolute: if her future self got Voyager home, that means she will too. If it takes a bit longer..."

http://memory-alpha.org/wiki/Endgame_(episode)

She wasn't looking to stop or cripple the Borg. Destroying the trans-warp hub was to hopefully prevent the Borg from following Voyager. She upped the ante by killing trillions of drones. When the Borg responded in kind, it was their fault? Does that mean that America is responsible for killing the Japanese after Pearl Harbor? Germany didn't attack America but they were attacked due to being allied with Japan. Is America responsible for the deaths of Germans too?

Janeway upped the stakes. She had no reason to think that the Borg wouldn't respond in kind.

 

[JarodRussell]

Re: One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers insid

And yet, turning the other cheek frequently only results in bruises on both cheeks. Disproportionate responses are subjective. Ask the Israelis and the Palestinians, but I'd advise you to do it fairly quickly. You might think me harsh for, say, advocating someone burning down a supervisor's house with him in it, but from your point of view you don't see that, subjectively speaking, the employee believed that the heartless bastard deserved it. For me, I'd never, ever, ever DO such a thing, but I can certainly see it occuring in these trying economic times with people losing jobs left and right due to management incompetence. I'm just sayin'.

Yes, a court of law and a jury of your peers might and in all likelihood would agree with your assessment of responsibility, Christopher, but the lasher-out'er in the above example might whistle jauntily with the self-satisfaction of a job well-done (yes, pun intended) as he is escorted to death row.

And that still doesn't involve time travel.

If in 2030 there is world peace, and someone travels back in time to attack a party in 2010, and by 2020 there is a war that ends the world, who is responsible? Right, the time traveler! In the case of Destiny, it's Admiral Janeway. And indirectly Captain Janeway, for helping a time traveller from the future to commit the crime of timeline violation. Negligent homicide of 65 billion people.

Janeway cut the brake tube of a car. And even though the driver went clearly too fast, she is responsible for the accident that killed him.

So, if Future!Janeway and Our!Janeway are both responsible for the Borg Invasion for their having defeated the Borg in "Endgame," does that mean that Picard is also responsible for having defeated the Borg in Star Trek: First Contact, and that Riker is also responsible for having defeated them in "The Best of Both Worlds?"

And meanwhile, in Future!Janeway's timeline -- which, by the way, let us remember is not our timeline, but is someone else's alternate future timeline -- how many billions more sentients than the 63 billion who died in 2381 would have died in the long run because the Borg Collective hadn't been dissolved?

Why Riker in BobW? Did he travel through time? Riker's actions in BobW are part of the naturally developing timeline. There's no violation.

Picard in FC, yeah, well, a bit. He watched the Borg commit a crime, and interfered. Whatever changes that caused in the timeline in the aftermath... he isn't responsible for that, the time traveling Borg are. Picard only acted in self-defense and first-aid of the timeline.

 

[Sci]

Re: One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers insid

She wasn't looking to stop or cripple the Borg. Destroying the trans-warp hub was to hopefully prevent the Borg from following Voyager.

No, Our!Janeway wanted to destroy the transwarp hub in an attempt to deal a crippling blow to the Borg Collective. Which, y'know, is pretty much a good thing, since the Collective had proven itself on numerous occasions as being out to assimilate the Federation and untold other cultures throughout the galaxy.

She upped the ante by killing trillions of drones. When the Borg responded in kind, it was their fault?

Who is "their?" You mean, is it the Collective's fault? Obviously it's not the drones' fault -- they're just slaves without control of their own bodies.

And we do not know that Janeway actually killed trillions of drones in "Endgame;" the only victims we can verify would be those drones manning the Borg sphere from which Voyager escaped and those drones manning the six transwarp hubs.

Does that mean that America is responsible for killing the Japanese after Pearl Harbor?

Of course the United States is responsible for its own decision to go to war with the Empire of Japan. The idea that it's not responsible for its decision to retaliate is absurd. That retaliation was perfectly justified, but that doesn't mean that the United States was not responsible for its own war decisions. "Responsibility" is not a concept that only applies to bad decisions.

Germany didn't attack America but they were attacked due to being allied with Japan. Is America responsible for the deaths of Germans too?

Yes. The United States had every right to attack the German Reich because of its decision to declare war upon the United States first, but the decision to so attack remains the United States's responsibility.

Janeway upped the stakes. She had no reason to think that the Borg wouldn't respond in kind.

I don't think that the Borg's decision to invade is consistent with prior behavior; the idea that the Borg would engaged in pure genocide, or invade en masse, is utterly new. And I don't I think the idea that they'd even be able to invade in the wake of the loss of their transwarp drive was anything anyone could anticipate. So I don't think it's reasonable to say that they should have anticipated a mass invasion.

EDITED TO ADD:

And that still doesn't involve time travel.

If in 2030 there is world peace, and someone travels back in time to attack a party in 2010, and by 2020 there is a war that ends the world, who is responsible? Right, the time traveler! In the case of Destiny, it's Admiral Janeway. And indirectly Captain Janeway, for helping a time traveller from the future to commit the crime of timeline violation. Negligent homicide of 65 billion people.

Janeway cut the brake tube of a car. And even though the driver went clearly too fast, she is responsible for the accident that killed him.

So, if Future!Janeway and Our!Janeway are both responsible for the Borg Invasion for their having defeated the Borg in "Endgame," does that mean that Picard is also responsible for having defeated the Borg in Star Trek: First Contact, and that Riker is also responsible for having defeated them in "The Best of Both Worlds?"

And meanwhile, in Future!Janeway's timeline -- which, by the way, let us remember is not our timeline, but is someone else's alternate future timeline -- how many billions more sentients than the 63 billion who died in 2381 would have died in the long run because the Borg Collective hadn't been dissolved?

Why Riker in BobW? Did he travel through time? Riker's actions in BobW are part of the naturally developing timeline. There's no violation.

That's irrelevant. The issue is not the Temporal Prime Directive, the issue is whether or not someone's defeating the Borg makes them in some way responsible for subsequent attacks from the Borg.

The Collective's decision to invade and exterminate in 2381 was not simply the result of Janeway's destruction of their transwarp network in 2377. It was the result of the cumulative defeats of the Borg by the Federation; it was undertaken because the fact that the Federation defeated their cube in 2367 and liberated several cubes with Hugh's individuality in 2368 and defeated their cube in 2373 and prevented them from assimilating Voyager in 2374 and rescued Seven of Nine from under the Queen's nose in 2375 and liberated hundreds of drones from Unimatrix Zero in 2377 and destroyed Unimatrix 01 and the transwarp network and in 2377.

In other words -- it wasn't retaliation for just one defeat, it was retaliation for the cumulative defeats of ten years.

So, logically, if you're going to blame Janeway for the Borg Invasion of 2381 as a result of the destruction of the transwarp network and of Unimatrix 01 in 2377, you have to hold every single Federation captain who defeated them before then responsible, too.

 

[Christopher]

Re: One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers insid

I think a couple of folks here are missing the point because they're equating "responsibility" with "blame," thinking of it as something bad that should be avoided. That's not true. Responsibility isn't a negative. Responsibility is what mature people choose to take upon themselves, an acknowledgment that their decisions are their own.

 

[Hartzilla2007]

Re: One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers insid

Indeed, we may discover in future novels that the events of "Destiny" were ultimately necessary to prevent other and much worse latter disasters in the Trek universe.

For example, the events of "Destiny" led to the Typhon Pact, and we may discover that events in the Typhon Pact miniseries may conclude with closer relations with the Cardassians, Romulans, Klingons, et al, that prevent or ameliorate a future conflict with a powerful foe that otherwise would have wiped out the entire Federation or Alpha and Beta Quadrants, rendering the deaths of 65 billion the lesser evil.

Actually The Good That Men Do's back cover described the early 25th century as soom kind of golden age, so theres that.

 

[kkozoriz1]

Re: One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers insid

The future that OldJaneway came from looked fairly Borg free. Paris was writing holo novels. B'Lanna was an ambassador of sorts to the Klingons. Earth looked pretty much non assimilated. Janeway went back and changed time to save a few years travel time. She didn't think that the Borg would retaliate? Nothing previously that the Federation had done to the collective was on the scale of destroying the transwarp hubs. Because of that we got a future with billions dead. I'm sure glad she wasn't stuck behind me in traffic.

 

[JD]

Re: One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers insid

I'm sorry, but we never saw any where near enough of the alternate future to decide which is better. And like someone else said up thread, by causing the Borg Invasion they were able to free all of the drones who had been assimilated and prevented anyone else from ever being assimilate again. If you ask me that would definitely lead to pretty good future, even if the present isn't too good right now.
And besides, like several other people said upthread it was a cumlulative effect leading to the invasion, so for all we know it could have been something that would have happened later on anyways, and then we wouldn't have had the future tech from the alternate Janeway, and Seven would have been dead and unable to provide help.

 

[kkozoriz1]

Re: One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers insid

So the universe after McCoy changed history in City on the Edge of Forever may have been a better one that what had existed? Sure, the Nazis conquered the world but who's to say something better wouldn't have come out of that? Should Kirk & Spock not have changed history back?

 

[Sci]

Re: One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers insid

The future that OldJaneway came from looked fairly Borg free.

No, it wasn't. The Borg were still out there in the Delta Quadrant, killing or enslaving God only knows how many innocent people.

Paris was writing holo novels. B'Lanna was an ambassador of sorts to the Klingons. Earth looked pretty much non assimilated. Janeway went back and changed time to save a few years travel time. She didn't think that the Borg would retaliate? Nothing previously that the Federation had done to the collective was on the scale of destroying the transwarp hubs. Because of that we got a future with billions dead. I'm sure glad she wasn't stuck behind me in traffic.

I'm sure the trillions upon trillions of enslaved persons freed from the Collective by the Caeliar, and the untold numbers of people who would either die or be enslaved at the hands of the Collective in the timeline where the Invasion does not occur, would be perfectly happy to continue their suffering in the name of the Alpha Quadrant's benefit.

63 billion is a horrible death toll, but let's not pretend it's Janeway's fault, and let's also not pretend that the galaxy is not ultimately better off with the Collective gone for good.

 

[Sci]

Re: One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers insid

So the universe after McCoy changed history in City on the Edge of Forever may have been a better one that what had existed? Sure, the Nazis conquered the world but who's to say something better wouldn't have come out of that? Should Kirk & Spock not have changed history back?

I'm not arguing whether or not Future!Janeway should have changed history, because I think it's an irrelevant argument. She's someone from an alternate timeline, and ultimately whatever divergences in time she encounters are her problem.

But if I'm Present!Janeway? I'm under no obligation to preserve someone else's possible future.

The Temporal Prime Directive is about preserving the subjective past of the Federation, not about preserving some alternate future that hasn't come to pass.

 

[TerraUnam]

Re: One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers insid

See, Destiny didn't have just one Predestination Paradox, it has two. The second one is that we are condemned to relive this thread again and again and again.

Anyway, what is somewhat irksome/interesting is the fact that Starfleet will pick apart tech with wanton abandon. A Singular Destiny has a top-secret research lab aimed at deconstructing Borg tech, first for the regeneration capability and anything else after that. The Doctor in Unworthy is devoting his time to analyzing catoms.

Six novels later, Starfleet will have Borg-like regenerative ships. Who knows about the catoms.

Speaking of which, the best thing about Destiny is that if you replace "Catoms" with "Pixie Dust" and Caeliar with "Pixie", the story doesn't change one iota.

 

[Sci]

Re: One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers insid

See, Destiny didn't have just one Predestination Paradox, it has two. The second one is that we are condemned to relive this thread again and again and again.

You win the Internet.

 

[ProtoAvatar]

Re: One thing that irked me about the Destiny trilogy. *spoilers insid

It's clear that the massive borg attack on the alpha/beta quadrants and their change in their modus operandi from 'assimilate' to 'kill' were directly caused by Janeway destroying the borg transwarp hub.

In a previous thread, people were arguing whether or not the people of the beta quadrants will blame humanity for the borg attack because humans had a role in creating the borg.

No need to go so far back.

The people of the alpha/beta quadrants will most definitely blame humanity and the Federation for the massive borg attack because the actions of an Earth born human, starfleet captain - Janeway - directly caused the borg attack.