Riker, repercussions and 'The Game'

I don't know how often this gets asked, so bear with me as I try to ask in a non-provocative manner.

1 - Do you think Riker faced any sort of reprimand for bringing the Game on board?

2 - Should he have?

I want to see it as just a mistake that could have roped anyone in as the target, but it just seems that Riker's rep and way of doing things made him almost a uniquely ripe target. Where in your opinions does the truth fall? I only ask all feelings about Wes be left at the door.

 

Probably not. This is yet another example, when one of the crew has a vulnerability taken advantage of. By the time he brought it aboard, he was already compromised

Just like when Data seizes control of the ship in "Brothers", yet suffers no consequences, because it's an incident wherein a vulnerability led them to be compromised, which they hadn't predicted or imagined ever coming to such an outcome

Picard was forced to aid the Borg & yet retained his command.

Even in space... Shit happens

 

Why would he face disciplinary actions? As far as he knew he was bringing aboard a harmless and entertaining game, and didn't know about its addictive, brainwashing properties.




It'd be like someone bringing a newly-developed video game system from another country back with them on vacation.


But you might make the argument that he should've had it analyzed by someone in the sciences department, but that might've seemed paranoid.

 

I think Riker's actions in "The Pegasus" are probably more worthy of a reprimand at minimum.

 

Don't think he'd be reprimanded, but if this happened IRL, policies on bringing previously unknown gizmos aboard would probably change as a result of this kind of incident.

 

I never thought Riker should be taken or sent away, to be certain. Do you think Picard had a word with him privately?

 

I agree with your last statement, except that it wouldn't be seen as paranoid. It seems there should have been protocols to examine anything alien item brought on board a starship.

Doug

 

It's like asking if an officer in the navy should be reprimanded for bringing the common cold on board ship.

No.

 

exactly

 

Let me change tacks, then, though I find the common cold analogy lacking. What would happen, on the E-D and Starfleet as a whole, as a result of an incident, that, while it never went very far, had some disturbing implications in the hands of a better-prepared enemy? Scanning alien tech ( or any souvenirs ) brought on board is one thing. Anything else?

 

I'm sure there has to be some kind of policy about bringing aboard devices which directly alter your brain chemistry. The difference, just like in real life, is who violated the policy. If Ensign Lavelle had brought this aboard, it would have been analyzed by Medical, found to be a danger, and turned over to Starfleet. In this case, however, the First Officer brought it aboard and shared it with his closest friends that he plays poker with. No different than the CEO of a company violating IT policy by letting his kid install games on his company laptop. You just don't call him out on it. Rank has its privileges.

 

Trek has a long-history of giving officers slack when under mind-control. This incident is no different.

 

You could cite the (at least) two time Geordi's VISOR was used by enemies, either to control him, or at least to spy with.

 

This just doesn't sound practicable.

There are a thousand people serving or living on that ship. All of them supposedly move back and forth at irregular intervals, on business, on leave, on missions. All of them supposedly have luggage. We've never heard of anybody being interested in examining that luggage: Guinan can bring aboard any liquid toxin she wants to, Admiral Quinn can bring along his favorite parasite, and nobody examines Beverly Crusher's tennis racket or her son's nanites for their weapons potential. And rightly so, for a number of reasons.

1) Odds are, 98% of everything brought aboard is "alien items" rather than Earth items. What difference would that make anyway? Why can't Earth technology be dangerous or evil? Why should alien technology be?

2) Starfleet's job isn't to examine consumer products to make sure they are safe for the consumers. Starfleet might be interested in stopping said products from being used in evil ways, but that won't be done by prohibiting the products - one doesn't confiscate kitchen knives from households, one patrols the streets for knife-wielding maniacs, or jails as a deterrent those who have already wrongfully wielded the knife.

3) Besides, the E-D is a warship. It would be a bit absurd to forbid people from bringing aboard penknives and the like when they can walk to the weapons locker, punch in their authorization code, and extract a handgun that can melt cities.

4) Even if one doesn't exploit the violence potential of a warship, one can exploit the manufacturing capabilities of a starship. There's no point in stopping somebody from bringing aboard, say, a spying sensor because one can build such a thing aboard just as easily, out of innocent components including ones that were already onboard. It may be practicable to stop somebody from arriving with a fully loaded phaser bazooka, but that can never stop a person from having a fully loaded phaser bazooka at his or her disposal later on. Anything is a potential weapon; something brought in by your trusted but adventurous First Officer is probably more likely to be a potential weapon than not, but at the same time it poses little or no risk to anybody, due to how it was brought aboard.

Timo Saloniemi

 

You'd think such a thing would already exist.

 

All large organisations only lock the stable door after the fact. Usually several identical facts...

 

Can you say TSA?

 

They usualy bolt several different stable doors, also with no horses behind them...

 

Riker goes for the pat-down whenever he goes through security just so he can get felt up.

"But, Trekker!" you say, "Wouldn't he just get patted down by a dude?"

You might think that given present-day practices at airport security but in the 24th century they use the androgynous species J'Nai so it kind-of comes out even.

 

we recently had an incident where i work , a stocker was taking frieght out to the floor on one of our green carts , on the aisle where he was working a older gentleman in a wheelchair came around the corner and a box fell off the cart and landed in his lap. after the company settled with him for about 800,000 dollars, they made a new policy that said all green carts cannot be stacked more than 4 ft high. so its a common thing that companys will not act until after an incident.