Crusher Out of Control in "The Enemy"

[JarodRussell]

If a black racist doesn't want a bone marrow transplant from a compatible white racist, who in turn refuses to give it to the black one, the DOCTOR is to blame for trying to convince both to save a life? What kind of messed up world view is that? Shouldn't the racists be blamed for their stubborn bigotry?

Yes, they should. But the problem with your analogy is that both parties in your example are human and have been raised with human values. It's not difficult to see who's in the wrong when applying human values to a scenario involving only human participants. But the same values can't be applied to a situation involving Klingons and Romulans, who've been enemies for decades.

The idea "don't be a stubborn bigot" seems pretty universal to me. I don't care how long they've been enemies. Your "human values" don't exist in that way either. A black racist grew up with other values than a white racist. Or an American and a Soviet. Or an Israeli and a Palestinian. And so forth.

I blame her for continuing to raise the issue after he'd made his feelings clear, and for apparently failing to consider the Romulan's wishes, as he didn't want Worf's help any more than Worf wanted to help him.

I see no problem with that either. It's her job to save lives after all.

 

[Clark Terrell]

In a medical situation, I'd say it is. Worf's body, Worf's choice. Do you think a present-day doctor would have you meet face-to-face a man you refuse to donate blood for or donate a kidney or part of your liver to?

I could see it happening, albeit in a less passive-aggressive way than how Crusher arranged it. It's sometimes helpful for people to be able to put a face to a problem because it helps make the problem seem more real. I think Crusher went too far, particularly since the Romulan didn't like idea either.

 

[Trekker4747]

Unless your Doctor is Dr. House there's no way he'd arrange for you to meet the person you're refusing to make a donation to. Privacy and ethics would prevent that.

 

[Clark Terrell]

Unless your Doctor is Dr. House there's no way he'd arrange for you to meet the person you're refusing to make a donation to. Privacy and ethics would prevent that.

As I said, I think it would be handled differently than what we saw with Crusher, who staged an ambush to guilt Worf into donating. If both parties agreed to meet, there's no dilemma.

 

[HaplessCrewman]

I blame her for continuing to raise the issue after he'd made his feelings clear, and for apparently failing to consider the Romulan's wishes, as he didn't want Worf's help any more than Worf wanted to help him.

I see no problem with that either. It's her job to save lives after all.

Yeah, but she has to respect the wishes and rights of her patients as well. She can't force her beliefs on them.

Did you ever see the Babylon 5 episode where an alien family had an ill child and ended up on the space station's infirmary? They refused medical treatment for their sick child for religious reasons; the doctor ignored their wishes and saved the child's life - with horrific consequences.

Same thing here. Saving lives is not the end all and be all of everything. There is a more nuanced way of seeing things.

 

[Grant]

After the Romulan says that he would rather die, we never see Crusher insisting again.

The next reference to it is Picard pleading with Worf to agree, then the Romulan dies. So should Picard discipline himself?

Please don't bring facts into this argument.

 

[Nightdiamond]

[And yet she can be so 'enlightened' that she sometimes comes off as naive, like in Chain of Command.

I don't know that she was naïve so much as bitter. Her comment to Jellico about having sickbay ready for casualties was priceless.

The great naive was DaiMon Solok. (And I'm jealous of this naive.)

It was a bit unfair to single Beverly out since some of the other crew were also reluctant. But Beverly herself admitted that she thought the Cardassians were developing weapons of mass destruction.

A fake lure, she barely escapes, Picard is a hostage, and the Cardassians are demanding the Federation give back the system they're in right now.


Despite all of that, she still persisted on believing that the Cardassian fleet hiding in the Nebulae was there just for 'scientific research', which you have to admit, sounded very unlikely.

She didn't want to risk any confrontation or lives at all.

The problem was the target was a Federation planet occupied by 2 million Federation colonists-- Troi pointed that out.

If Jericho's plan worked, no lives might have been lost at all, but if they did nothing at all, over 2 million lives could have lost or captured.

It kind made Beverly go from looking like a concerned, caring professional to something of a 'bleeding heart' type.

 

[jimbotron]

Sucks for that Romulan guy. Not only did he die a slow death, but he had an unfortunate name - Patahk.

Just three episodes later, petaQ/p'tahk became canonized as a Klingon swear word. Since the name was never spoken in The Enemy, I wonder if the writing team liked the sound of it and adapted it as the swear word. It certainly sounds dirty.

 

[Clark Terrell]

Sucks for that Romulan guy. Not only did he die a slow death, but he had an unfortunate name - Patahk.

Just three episodes later, petaQ/p'tahk became canonized as a Klingon swear word. Since the name was never spoken in The Enemy, I wonder if the writing team liked the sound of it and adapted it as the swear word. It certainly sounds dirty.

Reminds me of something that happened when I was in college. My girlfriend at the time worked at a summer camp for underprivileged children. One of the boys at the camp was named Shithead (pronounced Shi-thead).

 

[The Old Mixer]

^Maybe his Mom was a Steve Martin fan....

 

[Clark Terrell]

^Maybe his Mom was a Steve Martin fan....

Maybe...

 

[Jerikka Dawn]

To be fair to Crusher, we have no idea when or even if she found out that the Romulan didn't want the donation from Worf. He may have been all for the idea until he found out a Klingon was the donor.

It kinda irritated me how she gave Worf a snide look a few episodes later in "The Defector". If I was Worf, I'd have been like "shut up bitch, he didn't want the treatment anyway."

As an aside, Tomalak is awesome and I liked the interaction between him and Picard. I can also see validity to the idea that Picard was being a bit unreasonable in this situation with regard to returning the prisoner.

It's cool to see both perspectives on the situation -- it's entirely possible that the Romulans were on Galorndon Core because they really did have a navigational error and Tomalak was really just trying to get his man back and here's Picard being a complete dick. Regardless though, and even if Picard bought the navigational error story, if the Flagship of the Federation spots a Romulan incursion in progress, the Captain probably has no choice but to not let it stand.

In this episode's semi-sequel, "The Defector", I really loved the smirk on Tomalak's face when he delivered the line "Captain Picard, I hardly expected to see you again so soon. It seems this time you are the one who has made an aggressive move across the Neutral Zone..."

These are my two favorite episodes from season 3, way better than BOBW IMO.

 

[Clark Terrell]

As an aside, Tomalak is awesome and I liked the interaction between him and Picard. I can also see validity to the idea that Picard was being a bit unreasonable in this situation with regard to returning the prisoner.

It's cool to see both perspectives on the situation -- it's entirely possible that the Romulans were on Galorndon Core because they really did have a navigational error and Tomalak was really just trying to get his man back and here's Picard being a complete dick. Regardless though, and even if Picard bought the navigational error story, if the Flagship of the Federation spots a Romulan incursion in progress, the Captain probably has no choice but to not let it stand.

In this episode's semi-sequel, "The Defector", I really loved the smirk on Tomalak's face when he delivered the line "Captain Picard, I hardly expected to see you again so soon. It seems this time you are the one who has made an aggressive move across the Neutral Zone..."

I agree and wish we'd seen more of Tomalak during TNG's run. His next appearances weren't entirely real, as he was part of Riker's hallucination in "Future Imperfect" and was later part of the alternate timeline created by Q in "All Good Things..."

 

[Mojochi]

I agree and wish we'd seen more of Tomalak during TNG's run. His next appearances weren't entirely real, as he was part of Riker's hallucination in "Future Imperfect" and was later part of the alternate timeline created by Q in "All Good Things..."

I always felt the Romulan in The Pegasus should have been Tomalak

 

[Clark Terrell]

I agree and wish we'd seen more of Tomalak during TNG's run. His next appearances weren't entirely real, as he was part of Riker's hallucination in "Future Imperfect" and was later part of the alternate timeline created by Q in "All Good Things..."

I always felt the Romulan in The Pegasus should have been Tomalak

I don't know. I liked the Romulan from that episode. He appears in one of the stories for the New Frontier anthology, and his name is Sirol.

 

[Mojochi]

I'm not saying he was bad. The actor made him cool & intelligent, but if they would have had any interest in bringing Tomalak back, that would've been a good time

 

[Clark Terrell]

I'm not saying he was bad. The actor made him cool & intelligent, but if they would have had any interest in bringing Tomalak back, that would've been a good time

I understand. I was merely pointing out that we got an interesting Romulan character out of that episode, even though Tomalak didn't appear.

 

[Vandervecken]

As an aside, Tomalak is awesome and I liked the interaction between him and Picard. I can also see validity to the idea that Picard was being a bit unreasonable in this situation with regard to returning the prisoner.

It's cool to see both perspectives on the situation -- it's entirely possible that the Romulans were on Galorndon Core because they really did have a navigational error and Tomalak was really just trying to get his man back and here's Picard being a complete dick. Regardless though, and even if Picard bought the navigational error story, if the Flagship of the Federation spots a Romulan incursion in progress, the Captain probably has no choice but to not let it stand.

In this episode's semi-sequel, "The Defector", I really loved the smirk on Tomalak's face when he delivered the line "Captain Picard, I hardly expected to see you again so soon. It seems this time you are the one who has made an aggressive move across the Neutral Zone..."

I agree and wish we'd seen more of Tomalak during TNG's run. His next appearances weren't entirely real, as he was part of Riker's hallucination in "Future Imperfect" and was later part of the alternate timeline created by Q in "All Good Things..."

Tomalak was awesome. As you say, a real pity Andreas Katsulas didn't do more eps. I felt like he was introduced to become a serious Romulan antagonist/opposite number for Picard, an enemy to be taken very seriously, one with whom Picard had better not assume his own cleverness is carrying the day, and then...nothing.

 

[2takesfrakes]

Too many great ideas and characters are like that, in STAR TREK. I don't know why this is, but it's not occassional, by any means. Whether it's a budgetary thing, or copyright thing - whatever the case, the facts are undeniable. And this franchise has suffered very much over the past decades, because of it. Sometimes, an extraordinary idea, like the Genesis Torpedo, is brought up for no other purpose than as a plot point. It was there to give Khan the Ultimate Weapon. In the next movie, the product of it is just there as a metaphor about Man's folly and as a mcguffin and that's it. Dropped because it served no entertainment purpose. Oh, how it breaks the heart ...

 

[HaplessCrewman]

^^ It seems to me that the reason concepts like the Genesis torpedo are forgotten about (and relegated to the realm of the novels) is to maintain the status quo in the Trek world.

Remember that time on TNG when they discovered the "cure" to aging ('Rascals') and promptly forgot about it the next episode?

If Trek truly explored the ramifications of the ideas presented to their logical conclusion - it would no longer be Trek.