General Trek Questions and Observations

[Verteron]

Perhaps there's some headcannon to be had here, that when Ardana joined the Federation, it met all the membership criteria and had an egalitarian society, but as soon as Zenite was discovered along with its many uses, Ardanan society gradually backslid into the situation we saw in The Cloud Minders.

I am sure the Federation has great difficulty in working out what to do with members who backslide like this, its probably a very difficult decision to take to expel a member once they're in, particularly if such an expulsion would likely lead to them losing access to the Zenite permanently, and perhaps would precipitate an immediate invasion of Ardana by a competing great power.

We've seen issues like this occur with Hungary in the EU. Everyone agrees that Hungary has backslid away from the norms of democracy, but no-one can figure out what to do about it, and there's no formal process for expelling a country from the union.

 

[Shawnster]

Also, this does beg the question... who dropped the ball in the petition for Ardana to join in the first place?

Perhaps there's some headcannon to be had here, that when Ardana joined the Federation, it met all the membership criteria and had an egalitarian society, but as soon as Zenite was discovered along with its many uses, Ardanan society gradually backslid into the situation we saw in The Cloud Minders.

Ooh, that's a thought I had not considered. Nice.

Another possibility is that the nature of the Federation's membership status changed between TOS and DS9. In the TOS day a caste system or any other type of government could be a Federation member but, 100+ years later all Federation members must be democratic with full recognition of equal rights for all.

And Droxine is no douche!

No, but she is a bit vacuous.

 

[Nyotarules]

Perhaps there's some headcannon to be had here, that when Ardana joined the Federation, it met all the membership criteria and had an egalitarian society, but as soon as Zenite was discovered along with its many uses, Ardanan society gradually backslid into the situation we saw in The Cloud Minders.

I am sure the Federation has great difficulty in working out what to do with members who backslide like this, its probably a very difficult decision to take to expel a member once they're in, particularly if such an expulsion would likely lead to them losing access to the Zenite permanently, and perhaps would precipitate an immediate invasion of Ardana by a competing great power.

We've seen issues like this occur with Hungary in the EU. Everyone agrees that Hungary has backslid away from the norms of democracy, but no-one can figure out what to do about it, and there's no formal process for expelling a country from the union.

With Hungary its easy, stop the EU subsidies, they are not a major player in the EU. With Ardana because of the resources it looks like they had the upper hand. In the novelverse it is suggested during this period the UFP Presidency was corrupt so they looked the other way when Ardana joined.

 

[flandry84]

If Ardana was a member of the Federation then you would at least expect some sort of UFP presence there,or at least semi-regular visits.
Any Roddenberryesque Federation citizen would be appalled at the goings on there and report back eh?
Fed members should be held to some standards or what is the point?

 

[kkt]

As DS9's "ACCESSION" made clear, caste based discrimination, which was exactly what was happening on Ardana, is against the Federation charter. As a Federation member, they would definitely be investigated and likely told, "Stop this, or lose membership." Or something to that effect. (I know my example is from an episode made 25 years after TOS, but there is no dialogue that says this wasn't always a part of the Federation charter.)

Also, this does beg the question... who dropped the ball in the petition for Ardana to join in the first place? What was going on there was certainly happening LONG before the Federation even existed. The Federation representatives didn't investigate well enough.



Agreed.

"THE CLOUD MINDERS" is actually a really good TOS episode. It raises a lot of questions. My opinion as a kid is pretty much the same as an adult rewatching... the city dwellers are douches. They didn't deserve that high society lifestyle.

I liked The Cloud Minders for the questions that it raised, but the ending was unsatisfactory. Maybe in the tag we could have had Kirk dictating a report to Starfleet Command about the caste system on Ardana? It couldn't have completely solved the problem, but it at least indicates that it WAS a problem and gotten started on it.

(Also Spock was wildly out of character with Droxine.)

 

[Markonian]

I just tried to play Star Trek: Alien Domain on Facebook but the game won't load. Have the servers been turned off for AD?

 

[kirkspoke]

I'm the only one who noticias that the main theme of Star Trek TOS (especially in S1E14) sounds exactly like Lisa singing the peach tree "song" in spanish??

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[fireproof78]

A podcast got an interview with Ira Stephen Behr, Ronald D Moore, and Robert Hewitt Wolfe for those interested. Link here.

 

[at Quark's]

I wonder whether in the Mirror Universe, they'd have a Star Trek franchise too?

Star Trek TOS (The Onslaught Starts)
Star Trek TNG (The Next Genocide)
Star Trek DS9 (Deep State 9)
Star Trek Dowager

and so on.

 

[fireproof78]

I wonder whether in the Mirror Universe, they'd have a Star Trek franchise too?

Star Trek TOS (The Onslaught Starts)
Star Trek TNG (The Next Genocide)
Star Trek DS9 (Deep State 9)
Star Trek Dowager

and so on.

Yes.

It's heavily propagandized.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Was talking about Trek with my best friend today, as we are wont to do when we get together. Conversation turned to when we first began watching as children. He mentioned that his dad started watching with him in the 70s. He also mentioned a theory that his dad had about Jefferies Tubes. His dad was of the opinion that the Jefferies Tubes were inside the nacelles pylons. That was a thought that had never crossed my mind. Made sense since they and the pylons are at an angle. His dad later changed his mind, but I'm curious if this idea has been floated before?

 

[comsol]

Was talking about Trek with my best friend today, as we are wont to do when we get together. Conversation turned to when we first began watching as children. He mentioned that his dad started watching with him in the 70s. He also mentioned a theory that his dad had about Jefferies Tubes. His dad was of the opinion that the Jefferies Tubes were inside the nacelles pylons. That was a thought that had never crossed my mind. Made sense since they and the pylons are at an angle. His dad later changed his mind, but I'm curious if this idea has been floated before?

I think that was Franz Joseph's take as well in his blueprints.

 

[Shawnster]

Was talking about Trek with my best friend today, as we are wont to do when we get together. Conversation turned to when we first began watching as children. He mentioned that his dad started watching with him in the 70s. He also mentioned a theory that his dad had about Jefferies Tubes. His dad was of the opinion that the Jefferies Tubes were inside the nacelles pylons. That was a thought that had never crossed my mind. Made sense since they and the pylons are at an angle. His dad later changed his mind, but I'm curious if this idea has been floated before?

Which leads back to the original idea that the nacelles were the actual engines that provided power to the ship instead of power provided by the warp core inside the engineering section.

 

[Finn]

I wonder whether in the Mirror Universe, they'd have a Star Trek franchise too?

Star Trek TOS (The Onslaught Starts)
Star Trek TNG (The Next Genocide)
Star Trek DS9 (Deep State 9)
Star Trek Dowager

and so on.

Star Trek; Strange New Conquests?

 

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

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Anybody else think the actor who plays the son would be a good Vulcan? (in particular, when he turns his head to look at his parents)

 

[Mojochi]

The last person to interact with her. Had a conflict during that encounter. He was assuming authority over her project... That guy Gillian Taylor slapped is probably still under police investigation for her disappearance.

 

[at Quark's]

Star Trek; Strange New Conquests?

How about Star Trek: Strange new wars ?

As for the remaining series

Star Trek TAS (Terran Abomination Stories)
Terrorize
Star Trek DIS (Discourtesy, Discommendation, Discombobulation, take your pick, there's probably more)
Short Wrecks
Hit Hard
Lowered Necks
Pathology
Star Trek Calamity

 

[tharpdevenport]

Star Trek Strange

Where they learn how to tame a horse on another planet.

 

[Tenacity]

100+ years later all Federation members must be democratic with full recognition of equal rights for all.

In what episode was it said that all members must be democratic?

In the shows and movies we never see or hear of most of the members, we lack knowledge of their governmental types, social systems, we largely don’t even know their names. Democratic members could be in the minority within the Federation.

KOR: You of the Federation, you are much like us.
KIRK: We're nothing like you. We're a democratic body.

I’ve always took Kirk’s statement to mean that the Federation body operated using democratic methods. And not that every world in the Federation had a democratic governing system.

When the Andorians were one of the founder of the Federation they possessed a Imperial governing system. That based on terminology used in the Enterprise series.

As DS9's "ACCESSION" made clear, caste based discrimination, which was exactly what was happening on Ardana, is against the Federation charter.

But from what we see in Cloud Minders, mining looks more like a trade than a caste system. Troglytes aren’t solely miners, they also work agriculture.

As a Federation member, they would definitely be investigated and likely told, "Stop this, or lose membership."

Would the Federation membership dump a world that was the only source of a important natural resource? How would that help the Federation?

The Federation representatives didn't investigate well enough.

Or the world was fully researched, everything was discovered, and nothing was against the world becoming a Federation member’

 

[Henoch]

But from what we see in Cloud Minders, mining looks more like a trade than a caste system. Troglytes aren’t solely miners, they also work agriculture.

Ardana was an early Federation Member, more that 100 years prior to DS9's "Accession". Perhaps, the Federation Charter was changed after and due to the incident on Ardana in TOS's "Cloud Minders".