There's mess between your ears made by donkeys and monkeys?
Did the Voyager crew make the wrong call in Memorial? "
- Thread starter The Overlord
- Start date
Funny how discussions always go pear shaped on Page 3, just when I have time to log in and have a look.
So -- we've had this discussion before in another thread, haven't we? So I shan't entirely repeat myself, except to make the following points:
1. Reminding outsiders of atrocities, giving victims a voice, is inherently a Good Thing (see Auschwitz, Rwanda, Cambodia, Srebenica...). When an act of remembrance is carried out by the perpetrators as an act of genuine repentance, it is awesome.
2. Forcing yourself into someone else's head without their knowledge or consent is inherently a Bad Thing.
3. When #1 and #2 collide you have competing issues, of equal value, and it makes for an interesting script. (QED: I've only been on this board for a couple of months and this is the second time there's been a discussion on this.) This is a Very Good Thing.
4. Keeping the memorial functioning is important to maintain the intent and benefit of #1.
5. Warning incoming travellers of what it does mitigates the possible damage done by #2.
6. Not giving PTSD counselling to affected crew members, and forcing those who suffered most to restore the Memorial is a demonstration of shitty and insensitive personnel management.
There.
My $0.02.
So -- we've had this discussion before in another thread, haven't we? So I shan't entirely repeat myself, except to make the following points:
1. Reminding outsiders of atrocities, giving victims a voice, is inherently a Good Thing (see Auschwitz, Rwanda, Cambodia, Srebenica...). When an act of remembrance is carried out by the perpetrators as an act of genuine repentance, it is awesome.
2. Forcing yourself into someone else's head without their knowledge or consent is inherently a Bad Thing.
3. When #1 and #2 collide you have competing issues, of equal value, and it makes for an interesting script. (QED: I've only been on this board for a couple of months and this is the second time there's been a discussion on this.) This is a Very Good Thing.
4. Keeping the memorial functioning is important to maintain the intent and benefit of #1.
5. Warning incoming travellers of what it does mitigates the possible damage done by #2.
6. Not giving PTSD counselling to affected crew members, and forcing those who suffered most to restore the Memorial is a demonstration of shitty and insensitive personnel management.
There.
My $0.02.
1. Possibly. John Gill thought that with some tweaks that he could get National Socialism right. You can't guarantee that everyone will understand the message you broadcast in the right way.
2. They didn't plan on anyone stupid or ignorant enough to fly within range of their rape machine because they're morons.
3. Noobs always bite onto the same topics. Remember Bill Murray in Groundhog day? you get the chance to recompose the same arguments until no one can find a counter to your point of view.
4. If there's a memorial in space and no one knows it's there does it really exist?
5. Warning or inviting?
6. The psychological tests given to cadets during their education (re Wes in TNG season 1.) are supposed to make these invulnerable to such minor annoyances.
2. They didn't plan on anyone stupid or ignorant enough to fly within range of their rape machine because they're morons.
3. Noobs always bite onto the same topics. Remember Bill Murray in Groundhog day? you get the chance to recompose the same arguments until no one can find a counter to your point of view.
4. If there's a memorial in space and no one knows it's there does it really exist?
5. Warning or inviting?
6. The psychological tests given to cadets during their education (re Wes in TNG season 1.) are supposed to make these invulnerable to such minor annoyances.
TUVIX IS COMING.
Qutlunch is up to Tuvix as soon as she gets the dvd.
But.. what is my excuse?
Baiting noobs for a good whack.
Beisdes, you're still a noob to me.
Have some more Sherry.
Beisdes, you're still a noob to me.
Have some more Sherry.
Oh, well at least this time I've thought of a new counter argument.
Ah yes, splice euthanasia.
Q: If you commit acts of questionable ethic value in space, does anyone run to the press? Or get thrown in the brig?
A: Depends.
Foot fault!/False start!
Wait for the starters pistol ma'am or we'll have to scratch you from the race and take away your medals.
Wait for the starters pistol ma'am or we'll have to scratch you from the race and take away your medals.
Okay, how this for a solution? Repair the monument, but adjust it so that it's "mind rape" effect only works over a distance of a hundred metres. There is a clearly marked activation button, good for one play per push.
Place space buoys (buoies?) that describe the monument, it's location and how to activate it. Inform visitors what to expect in detail.
Both a warning and an invitation. Academic scholars and curious tourists alike will come and experience the monument, word will spread.
With consent, there is no rape.
Like someone suggested a month ago in this thread.. Janeway was still under the Memorial's influence. A touch of Stockholm. All that practicality you suggest Trannie-sylv didn't give her the same emotional hit as getting others to go through what she had been through. It's like when your friends want you to just try this illicit substance once or go on have another pint when you are clearly not going to cope with it. Your pain is cathartic of their pain. I think if they had just backed away for a couple months and then revisited this discussion Janeway would have gutted the place and turned it into a diorama.
Okay, how this for a solution? Repair the monument, but adjust it so that it's "mind rape" effect only works over a distance of a hundred metres. There is a clearly marked activation button, good for one play per push.
Place space buoys (buoies?) that describe the monument, it's location and how to activate it. Inform visitors what to expect in detail.
Both a warning and an invitation. Academic scholars and curious tourists alike will come and experience the monument, word will spread.
With consent, there is no rape.
Maybe they want the rape.
No one's looking after the memorial or even the planet, it's run down and abandoned.
Everyone has forgotten.
Or think they know better.
If not for the odd rape now and then this place would serve no purpose, and if it luckily rapes the right people, maybe they'll see how important it is and they'll fix up the memorial and maybe even staff it and start a package tour company?
Remember the Buffy where the Indian Ghost gave Xander VD (and smallpox)?
Apart from Christianity (If the Roman's had been nicer there wouldn't have been a Christianity as we understand it.), none of the billions of tons of monuments left behind by the Roman Empire say much else other than "Suck it! Suck it!" but the entire world gets behind their glory hogging still thousands of years after the fact.
Okay, how this for a solution? Repair the monument, but adjust it so that it's "mind rape" effect only works over a distance of a hundred metres. There is a clearly marked activation button, good for one play per push.
Place space buoys (buoies?) that describe the monument, it's location and how to activate it. Inform visitors what to expect in detail.
Both a warning and an invitation. Academic scholars and curious tourists alike will come and experience the monument, word will spread.
With consent, there is no rape.
Maybe they want the rape.
No one's looking after the memorial or even the planet, it's run down and abandoned.
Everyone has forgotten.
Or think they know better.
If not for the odd rape now and then this place would serve no purpose, and if it luckily rapes the right people, maybe they'll see how important it is and they'll fix up the memorial and maybe even staff it and start a package tour company?
Remember the Buffy where the Indian Ghost gave Xander VD (and smallpox)?Apart from Christianity (If the Roman's had been nicer there wouldn't have been a Christianity as we understand it.), none of the billions of tons of monuments left behind by the Roman Empire say much else other than "Suck it! Suck it!" but the entire world gets behind their glory hogging still thousands of years after the fact.
I think it comes down to the big question if memorials/shared memories can prevent history from repeating itself. I do not doubt that such a memory makes individuals aware of such situations. They probably will be more aware and stand up against discrimination and crimes against a minority. On the other hand you have always people who do commit crimes because of their ideology - be it nationalism, religion whatever. But in the end those that shared the memory of a past crime are important to fight the new one. They are the only thing to make a difference.
The "maintainance" of memory is important. I guess this is unquestioned.
So how to reach people?
Nations fix the aspects of their history in their education programmes in the schools to make sure the memory is not forgotten. Which is not the same as the mind rape in this episode, but it is a nonvoluntary experience in a way as well. Still it doesn't prevent Neonazism.
Would a memorial without the actual experience do the job as well?
Holocaust memorials show that people are exposing themselves voluntarily to a history that left nations traumatised.
IMO a voluntary approach of such a topic is much more successful to keep the memory and prevent a repetition of such crimes. You can't force it on people because this violation might cause the opposite of what shall be achieved.
So how to reach people?
Nations fix the aspects of their history in their education programmes in the schools to make sure the memory is not forgotten. Which is not the same as the mind rape in this episode, but it is a nonvoluntary experience in a way as well. Still it doesn't prevent Neonazism.
Would a memorial without the actual experience do the job as well?
Holocaust memorials show that people are exposing themselves voluntarily to a history that left nations traumatised.
IMO a voluntary approach of such a topic is much more successful to keep the memory and prevent a repetition of such crimes. You can't force it on people because this violation might cause the opposite of what shall be achieved.
So power wanted to move a dinky village, there was some shooting. 80 people died. Someone didn't want to go to jail so they started hiding/burning bodies... Um? Big deal.
This is all about 80 hillbnillies that didn't want to be relocated.
Chakotay is an Indian!
Either whitey moved his lot into the corner, or space man kicked his ancestors off the planet.
Economies of scale!
Meanwhile...
1/4 of that crew is Maquis.
When power told the Maquis to be good cows because the government wanted their homes, them picked up all the weapons they could find and almost brought two empires to their knees through political disobedience and terrorism.
What should the Maquis get from this experience?
How to be a wuss?
In theory every single member of the Maquis crew had been minding their own business eating dinner only to find 2 minutes later they're gutting a Cardie who just kicked their door down at least a dozen times.
They already lived the experience of this Monument, but with BALLS.
This is all about 80 hillbnillies that didn't want to be relocated.
Chakotay is an Indian!
Either whitey moved his lot into the corner, or space man kicked his ancestors off the planet.
Economies of scale!
Meanwhile...
1/4 of that crew is Maquis.
When power told the Maquis to be good cows because the government wanted their homes, them picked up all the weapons they could find and almost brought two empires to their knees through political disobedience and terrorism.
What should the Maquis get from this experience?
How to be a wuss?
In theory every single member of the Maquis crew had been minding their own business eating dinner only to find 2 minutes later they're gutting a Cardie who just kicked their door down at least a dozen times.
They already lived the experience of this Monument, but with BALLS.
And when their war is over I am sure they don't want their successors forget about it. There is the collective memory of the society and there is the memory of the individual. I don't see the conflict (as long as there is no mind rape involved).
And I don't think actual numbers are really relevant.
I'm sure the Maquis will be quite forgotten, they have already managed to completely wipe them out. Their settlements are gone, their cause is going to seem silly to humans full of the glories of the end of the Dominion war. On Bajor, some will remember because colonization by Cardassia is still a current generation thing. The Maquis communities are dissolved into the diaspora of post-Dominion war chaos.
The actual numbers are completely relevant.
The Maquis don't think of 80 bodies as needing a massgrave.
If you jump up and down on the corpses, you can fit 80 bodes into one regular sized grave, and call it a Tuesday.
If the numbers aren't relevant, then there's little difference between this and DS9's Move Along Home, when they wanted to open up one of the planets molten core in the Bajor system as a power station and that codgey old bugger said "hell no".
This wasn't about a war.
There was a war on and they... Fuck it.
I put the disk into my machine to watch it again.
(Awful.)
Hmmm.
A Starship needs a block of Dilithium the size of a ipad to run, and these days they can regenerate the stuff... Methinks that this was about commerce. I suppose selling natural resources is an end around on the non interference directive.
A little better than selling replicators.
Finished.
Solders were told to relocate a colony of 82 unarmed civilians. The soldiers were volunteers on the side of right. Considering they were about to go whore it up on a pleasure planet for two weeks after they finished moving the colonists, it wasn't even clear if there was a real war on with good vs bad. The Soliders, unless the were lying or had been lied to, were going to take the colony to a staging area for two weeks and then take them back home. No harm, no foul.
Um?
But the colonists decided to kill the solders?
The unarmed colonists somehow were all heavily armed?
UM.
This sounds more like Jim Jones or Waco, more so than the soldiers boys did anything wrong until they started burning bodies and that's just becuase they didn't understand what the fuck happened.
I bet half the planet was just heroin fields and it was madness to abandon them becuase it got between them and payday.
The episode didn't have enough informaiton.
Why did the colonists need to be moved for two weeks, and why would they rather kill or die than be moved for two weeks?
Kim and paris spent an afternoon blowing up stars once, wiping out untold dozens of civilizations, but 82 morons count in contention against some of Voyager's other fuck ups... Seven of Nine admits to having facilitated the assimilation of millions in this very episode.
To that girl, 82 people is Tuesday morning before breakfast.
"sigh"
Stupid episode.
The Maquis don't think of 80 bodies as needing a massgrave.
If you jump up and down on the corpses, you can fit 80 bodes into one regular sized grave, and call it a Tuesday.
If the numbers aren't relevant, then there's little difference between this and DS9's Move Along Home, when they wanted to open up one of the planets molten core in the Bajor system as a power station and that codgey old bugger said "hell no".
This wasn't about a war.
There was a war on and they... Fuck it.
I put the disk into my machine to watch it again.
(Awful.)
Hmmm.
A Starship needs a block of Dilithium the size of a ipad to run, and these days they can regenerate the stuff... Methinks that this was about commerce. I suppose selling natural resources is an end around on the non interference directive.
A little better than selling replicators.
Finished.
Solders were told to relocate a colony of 82 unarmed civilians. The soldiers were volunteers on the side of right. Considering they were about to go whore it up on a pleasure planet for two weeks after they finished moving the colonists, it wasn't even clear if there was a real war on with good vs bad. The Soliders, unless the were lying or had been lied to, were going to take the colony to a staging area for two weeks and then take them back home. No harm, no foul.
Um?
But the colonists decided to kill the solders?
The unarmed colonists somehow were all heavily armed?
UM.
This sounds more like Jim Jones or Waco, more so than the soldiers boys did anything wrong until they started burning bodies and that's just becuase they didn't understand what the fuck happened.
I bet half the planet was just heroin fields and it was madness to abandon them becuase it got between them and payday.
The episode didn't have enough informaiton.
Why did the colonists need to be moved for two weeks, and why would they rather kill or die than be moved for two weeks?
Kim and paris spent an afternoon blowing up stars once, wiping out untold dozens of civilizations, but 82 morons count in contention against some of Voyager's other fuck ups... Seven of Nine admits to having facilitated the assimilation of millions in this very episode.
To that girl, 82 people is Tuesday morning before breakfast.
"sigh"
Stupid episode.
Of course numbers matter if you want to compare quantities - how many are affected and need the monument. The more people that are killed the bigger the part of society that needs to deal with it. (That equation has its natural asymptote when there is no one left of course.) But I don't think it is really about how many people are affected but how much they suffer from this. And you are in a way right with the examples about the Romans and so on. The longer these things are in the past the less its possible to connect to what happened. And another problem is that you never know, if its just one side of the coin. Even if you are actually experiencing the memory - who tells you that that's the truth?
The rape machine.
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