Jake Sisko in a Time to Stand

He's a teen. Even more than adults, they do stupid, impulsive things sometimes. (Okay, not Wesley, but he was totally unbelievable.)

 

Wesley is an outlier, Jake seems to make the average American teenager look intelligent with a well developed frontal lobe.

 

Phrenology? Why am I not surprised you would reference a discredited, amoral pseudo-science?

 

The frontal lobe controls impulse and instinct does it not? Has is not been confirmed with recent research that this region of the teenage brain is less developed?

 

Jake is acting like a typical journalist. They are always pushing against governments in the name of "freedom of the press" because it is, rightly, an important issue that they not only have to fight for, but they need to fight for. Even in countries where press is very controlled it doesn't stop from people pushing for it.

It has to be noted that Jake has been reporting on the station for 3 months before Weyoun even mentions that his reports are being censored. It is clear that it when we see them talk in that episode it isn't the first time they've talked to each other since the "occupation". So he believed he had a far greater freedom than he really did so he is shocked when Weyoun reveals that he's been deceived for a substantial time. In the end this revelation turns out to be a mistake as it leads to aiding in turning the tide in the war.

 

Jake thought he'd be blocked on the spot when the Dom first arrived. But Weyoun humoured him for months as part of his nicey-nicey "we're all friends, we just want peace" campaign. He probably gave Jake a few interviews and given that he wasn't arrested, it all seems cool between them until W admitted he wasn't letting any of his stuff through.

The scene of course is set up not to make Jake look the joke but to illustrate to the audience that the Dominion are going miles to give "good optics" but behind the layers of velvet and diplomatic embroidery, the Dominion are just doing their expected thing, unapologetically manipulating circumstances for their own interests.

 

Ask the average American child their current understanding of Christopher Colombus.

This is how sheltered children understand the outside world. Federation children believe war is a symptom of cultural misunderstanding and enemies are just future allies.

 

Jake did a stupid thing, but his reasoning on his relative safety in "CALL TO ARMS" with Rom showed he at least thought it through somewhat. He had a point that since the Dominion just made a Non-Aggression pact with Bajor, they likely wouldn't jeopardize that by harming the Emissady's son.

One thing I will say about the Dominion... as far as we have seen, if there were any treaties or pacts made, they were honored. Weyoun was quite serious and adamant when reinforcing that to Dukat when he wanted to conquer Bajor again.

Maybe they only show their evil side when crossed, betrayed, or just think it is easier to conquer than trade.

 

I'm thinking that the writers simply didn't know what to do with the Jake character in later seasons with the Dominion story arc to keep him relevant.

Really, I never quite understood why he was in the main cast and not simply a recurring character. Garak deserved main character status more than Jake did.

 

Jake was safe from the Dominion. His Pa is the Emissary. They aren't gonna throw him in a camp. They don't care about his little "reporter" gig. He's not even a minor annoyance to them.

Now Abe Lincoln would've thrown his butt in prison if he used that kind of language.

 

Which is precisely why it's so comical.

And somehow I doubt in the long run the dominion would have cared about the Bajoran's religion and the sanctity of their messiah.

 

You think the Dominion's treaty with Cardassia included leveling their cities?

The Female Changling saw no problem offering post-victory Earth to both the Breen and Weyoun.

 

At that point in the war, the Dominion was suffering. They had no support from the Gamma Quadrant.

In the beginning, when DS9 was Terok Nor again, they wanted to show the Alpha Quadrant their sincerity by keeping to their agreements.

 

I can't honestly imagine in a dominion victory they would have kept any promises.
They would promise Cardassia and the Breen the same things and then for all we know play them against each other.

Much less would they care about accomadating the Bajorans and their religion.

 

Diplomacy is not a logic test. Policies and strategies evolve as situations change. For the most part, it is in the interest of any power to show that they honor their treaties because they tend to have a plethora of such agreements. Yes, Hitler wanted to conquer Europe (mostly Eastern Europe), but he tried to keep some semblance of credibility, lest otherwise neutral powers join the allies. The same applies here: the Dominion must show other powers that they can believe the Dominion would honor its agreements (especially if they intended to break them in the future). We know quite well that the Dominion wanted to isolate the Federation and Klingon Empire by signing neutrality agreements with other powers, like the Romulans. They did not want to fight all the Alpha Quadrant powers at once. And the Cardassian genocide emerged as the alliance with the Cardassians became less politically expedient for them.

 

If the Dominion had achieved victory over the Klingons and Federation they would have begun conquering or subjugating other powers. Bajor given its location would not be exempt.

Furthermore Bajor is a basket case and about the opposite of a "power."

 

Bajor is a basket case?

 

And why does this mean the Dominion would not do what is temporarily expedient?

 

Why did the Federation need to aid them in Emissary if they weren't?

 

Because they'd been occupied by a hostile power that had stripped their planet of natural resources with no regard to the indigenous population for 40+ years.