How can the JemHadar live from only the White?

[Deckerd]

If the tube goes into the bloodstream, the Jem'Hadar must have very robust hearts! A human heart would seize immediately at receiving such a barrage of giant air bubbles...

One thing you can usually depend on in an army is loyalty to whoever they are fighting for.

But that's the point: the dead man's switch is necessary in case the loyalty gets misplaced. After all, the Jem'Hadar on the field have no cues as to what the Founders want of them, and can develop dangerous ideas either all on their own (they are capable of independent thought, but are aggressive idiots by philosophy) or because their immediate masters don't serve the best interests of the Founders unquestionably (as is often confirmed).

The average Jem'Hadar won't have seen a Founder, ever. He doesn't know who he is fighting for, he only believes he does.

In any case, the loyalty of an army to you is hardly something you can depend on, unless you pay them well enough. You might depend on them being loyal to a cause you have propagated into their thoughts (say, protect the homes and the apple pies), but even then it's not uncommon for the army in the field to decide that the best way to do that is to ignore your orders because the cause alone suffices for leadership.

Timo Saloniemi

I hate to bring up SG-1 again but from what the Vorta say on several occasions, the Dominion are gods to the Jem Hadar as well as to the Vorta. That would have been bred into them in the same way it was bred into the Vorta. It is explicit, in the same way as the Goauld control the Jafa by making believe they are gods. No other control is needed once you have that kind of obedience (the standard brutality for transgressors will suffice).

 

[trash80]

I always thought the White was more to ensure the Jem'Hadar's loyalty and obedience to the Vorta (whom they seem to despise) than to the Founders.

 

[Deckerd]

I always thought the White was more to ensure the Jem'Hadar's loyalty and obedience to the Vorta (whom they seem to despise) than to the Founders.

That would make more sense.

 

[Jono]

If the tube goes into the bloodstream, the Jem'Hadar must have very robust hearts! A human heart would seize immediately at receiving such a barrage of giant air bubbles...

One thing you can usually depend on in an army is loyalty to whoever they are fighting for.

But that's the point: the dead man's switch is necessary in case the loyalty gets misplaced. After all, the Jem'Hadar on the field have no cues as to what the Founders want of them, and can develop dangerous ideas either all on their own (they are capable of independent thought, but are aggressive idiots by philosophy) or because their immediate masters don't serve the best interests of the Founders unquestionably (as is often confirmed).

The average Jem'Hadar won't have seen a Founder, ever. He doesn't know who he is fighting for, he only believes he does.

In any case, the loyalty of an army to you is hardly something you can depend on, unless you pay them well enough. You might depend on them being loyal to a cause you have propagated into their thoughts (say, protect the homes and the apple pies), but even then it's not uncommon for the army in the field to decide that the best way to do that is to ignore your orders because the cause alone suffices for leadership.

Timo Saloniemi

I hate to bring up SG-1 again but from what the Vorta say on several occasions, the Dominion are gods to the Jem Hadar as well as to the Vorta. That would have been bred into them in the same way it was bred into the Vorta. It is explicit, in the same way as the Goauld control the Jafa by making believe they are gods. No other control is needed once you have that kind of obedience (the standard brutality for transgressors will suffice).

Yes there is. The Goa'uld further control their Jaffa armies by implanting them with symbiotes, which is very much like the White. It gives them strength, focus as adds immunity to illness, great healing power, long life and the need not to sleep (sort of). Plus if you take it away they die. So the Jaffa warriors are not just tied to their masters by belief but by the fact without them they would die.

So their Goa'uld symbiotes (and later the liquid Tretonin) are pretty close to being the equivalent of the Jem'Hadar's Ketracel White.

 

[DonIago]

Really, why have only one means of control if you can have two?

 

[reversepolarity]

From what I know of science and biology you [probably] can't engineer thoughts and feelings- you can only engineer the way the brain works (in the same way you can build a car engine but you can't control what the driver will do with it) - hence to go to the cliche if you cloned a thousand Hitler's I'd have thought most would turn out well with the right up brining. This suggests to me the Jem'Hadar must go through some education [propoganda] process - which, as we know from human revolutions on Earth is most definatley not fool proof.

 

[Timo]

No other control is needed once you have that kind of obedience.

But again, it's not just a matter of control. It's a matter of who is doing the controlling.

The comparison of the Founders to God is apt: humans follow the will of God, but God never speaks to humans - priests and assorted other manipulators do in His name. The loyalty-ensuring kill switch is necessary because of the free will of the middlemen, not because of the free will of the cannon fodder.

The Vorta by and large are selfish creatures who don't give the Founders more than lip service - probably a necessary evil in their upbringing because blind obedience would make for poor diplomats and spies. So even the Vorta don't get to hold the kill switch, save for small rations of it that won't see them through a mutinous campaign.

A Vorta in turn doesn't need a kill switch, because any Founder can kill one without physical effort...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Deckerd]

The Vorta are their lieutenants. It's not as though the founders are following them around, ready to strike if they misbehave.

 

[JB2005]

And a Vorta does have a kill switch...a termination implant...

 

[Timo]

It's not as though the founders are following them around

Exactly. Which is why the Founders can't give them Jem'Hadar troops that lack a kill switch...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[T'Girl]

From what I know of science and biology you [probably] can't engineer thoughts and feelings

It might be possible to gene engineer in basic instincts, a pack mentality, aggression and the need to follow a authority figure.

the Jem'Hadar must go through some education [propoganda] process

Something ongoing, this makes sense.

The Vorta are their lieutenants. It's not as though the founders are following them around, ready to strike if they misbehave.

The impression I got was that the Vorta's were also the generals in the war with the Federation. Making the majority of the command decisions.

 

[Marie1]

It always struck me as self-defeating to produce a race of warriors with such an obvious weakness. The Vorta were perfectly happy to serve the Dominion without any similar engineered flaws, aside from the limitations of cloning. I don't know how the Jem Hadar were generated but since they were all apparently individuals, cloning doesn't seem likely.

I think because they're such a powerful force, partially because they're so intelligent, the Founders decided not to bother hampering them as much as the Vorta. They know that the Founders and the Vorta must be obeyed or they will face execution. Instead of being convinced to obey, the White is used- not only do they die without it- their deaths are very slow and painful without it, giving them time to be either an example to keep others in line, or for them to recognize the errors of their ways.

They seem to need a steady stream of White for optimum performance, so it's probably a super concentrated amount of what their efficient systems need.

 

[Deckerd]

And a Vorta does have a kill switch...a termination implant...

Yes but only they can activate it.

 

[Avon]

semen is highly nutritious, just sayin'.

 

[Marie1]

semen is highly nutritious, just sayin'.

I consider that... debatable... but not here.

 

[indolover]

White might be more the just a drug. The white would be the food that the Jem'Hadar "eat." The adult Jem'Hadar don't eat solid food apparently, The Jem'Hadar infant might have consumed solid food because it was the only thing being offered and also because of it's rapid growth

Much of what we eat, our bodies turn into glucose (liquid sugar) which is then introduced into our blood, that how the food in your tummy get out to the cells at the ends of your fingers. The majority of white might simply be a concentrated glucose solution, with the drug being a minor component mixed in. This would account for the color too, glucose solution is milky white.

I wonder what actual in the white drug component? We know that it is an addictive drug that the Jem'Hadar suffer without the constant replenishment of. It seems unlikely that the drug gets them high, the Founders would want them clear headed at all times. Beyond simple control, obey or we'll cut you off, the white might have effects upon the Jem'Hadar that the Founders find to their benefit.

A general effect of simulation and increased awareness perhaps. Like chewing certain leaves has on Humans.

This.

In a way, the White may contain all required nutrients for the body. All proteins, carbohydrates, etc. So the Jem'Hadar do not need to eat, as in actually putting food in their mouths, ingesting it and digesting it.

Perhaps drug is the wrong term to use, since I don't think sustenance can be viewed as a drug as such. The Founders must have made it addictive just to ensure their loyalty.

 

[T.Geiger]

I always thought the White was more to ensure the Jem'Hadar's loyalty and obedience to the Vorta (whom they seem to despise) than to the Founders.

I seem to recall a Jem'Hadar implying this rather unsubtly to Weyoun 4 in To the Death.

 

[Marie1]

I always thought the White was more to ensure the Jem'Hadar's loyalty and obedience to the Vorta (whom they seem to despise) than to the Founders.

I seem to recall a Jem'Hadar implying this rather unsubtly to Weyoun 4 in To the Death.

I'm with Worf, it insures obedience in general, but it isn't true loyalty.

Perhaps as shown by the end of that episode.

 

[Nightdiamond]

As some of the other posters have said, it looks like it makes them more dependent on the Vorta- and the Founders as a result.

Having withdrawals like a severe drug addict would probably make them fanatically loyal to the Vorta.

The Founders were almost a myth to them, yet they were still loyal them.

I never looked at it this way before, but it looks very similar to a dealer/junkie relationship - they keep them supplied with a drug that keeps them sane-otherwise they hate the Vorta.

The difference is there's some genetic engineering at the thinking level too...

 

[Myasishchev]

White might be more the just a drug. The white would be the food that the Jem'Hadar "eat."

I always thought this was a pretty funny, probably unintentional implication. "Those Founders sure are jerks for addicting their creations to food."

Maybe White is a kind of DRM for clones. If you could figure out what hard-to-replicate compounds permit Jem'Hadar to live, you can make your own Jem'Hadar.

Although what value a Jem'Hadar would be to anyone other than the Dominion is unclear. For the anti-Federation, a completely separate species which you have created and which you control, and which has no ties with any subject people, makes sense. They can police and administer and feel nothing for the police and administered. But for a defending power, you already have several billion warm bodies. What do you need admittedly great warriors for? You either have starships capable of standing up to a Dominion fleet, or you don't, and your race's capabilities in a knifefight are somewhat moot.

So, given that they live only a few years, does this mean that the Dominion is in a constant state of warfare back in the Gamma Quadrant, like the early Mongol Empire, or like the Borg seem to be in the Delta Quadrant?