How does starfleet crew cope with their weekly adventures?

[at Quark's]

So, let's see....

They get captured and imprisoned by aliens, sometimes tortured or enslaved, phase-shifted into invisibility, they endure all kinds of transporter incidents, see their ships blown up in alternate realities or time loops, are forced to live out a lifetime of memories, devolve into animals and back, live backwards in time, get trapped in malfunction holodecks to such an extent they really don't know anymore what is 'real' and what is not, get locked in mindmelts, or in the most horrific conflicts between alien combatants ..

... and those are just a few randomly picked examples of things they have to endure on a weekly basis.

For any sane person, any one of those experiences would be enough to leave a (psychological) scar for the rest of their life. But not on starfleet crew. They will serve the Federation as happily as ever next week. Even when they are abducted and transformed by the borg, the pyschological effects seem to last only a week (Picard) or none at all (Janeway, Torres and Tuvok)

So my question is... HOW DO THEY DO IT ?

Are all starfleet crew members insane to begin with? Are starfleet applicants actively scanned for the type of psychopathic personality that thrives on kicks and adrenalin and nothing else?

Or do they get a very special kind of training at Starfleet Academy that desensitizes them to the most horrific experiences possible? If so, what would such a training look like ?

Or has therapeutics been advanced to such a degree that (almost) all psychological injury can be dealt with within one week and /or leaves (almost) no traces in everyday functioning? Does e.g. Troi spend a great deal of time on sessions afterwards with the hero of the week, that we never get to see ?

Or something else still ?

 

[Relayer1]

It only ever happens to the same few crewmembers. The majority of the crew are oblivious.

Admittedly, after seven years the 'few' affected crew are probably basket cases, but we don't really get to see them in the 'tricky' eighth year...

 

[Melakon]

So my question is... HOW DO THEY DO IT ?

Special programs available through certain civilian therapeutic establishments.

"Come to Quark's, Quark's is fun, come right now, don't walk - run!" *



* paid advertisement

 

[Bry_Sinclair]

All officers are tested, even before they get into the Academy, to make sure they are mentally and emotionally tough enough to handle life in Starfleet. For those times that are beyond just what they've been trained for, then they have fully trained Counsellors onboard to help them through and treat any psychological issues that may arise.

Failing that, they take a page from VOY and press the reset button on Janeway's console so everything is wiped clean for the start of the next episode.

 

[RandyS]

Booze?

 

[Jedi_Master]

Shore leave on Risa.

 

[Search4]

They use that MIB "forget" device,

 

[T'Girl]

Are all starfleet crew members insane to begin with?

You don't have be insane to join Starfleet ... but it helps.

 

[Richard Baker]

While we watch it week after week, we just see the exciting parts. There are probably weeks or months between each exciting episode where the crew is bored out of it's mind, sitting in the same chair all day, looking out the viewscreen at the moving starfield and wishing for something to happen so they could at least tap their consoles and make a little blip sound.

 

[Romulan_spy]

While we watch it week after week, we just see the exciting parts. There are probably weeks or months between each exciting episode where the crew is bored out of it's mind, sitting in the same chair all day, looking out the viewscreen at the moving starfield and wishing for something to happen so they could at least tap their consoles and make a little blip sound.

This. Plus we only see the voyages of one special ship like the Enterprise or Voyager. I doubt that every ship in starfleet is having the kinds of adventures that the Enterprise has.

 

[The Wormhole]

^^I don't know, I'd say you're lucky to end up on the Enterprise or Voyager or whatever. An alarming number of other Starfleet ships which aren't the hero ship end up getting destroyed in horrible ways with the entire crew killed. At least when the Enterprise D was destroyed, there were no deaths. Except possibly Picard's fish.

 

[Cyke101]

^^I don't know, I'd say you're lucky to end up on the Enterprise or Voyager or whatever. An alarming number of other Starfleet ships which aren't the hero ship end up getting destroyed in horrible ways with the entire crew killed. At least when the Enterprise D was destroyed, there were no deaths. Except possibly Picard's fish.

Even as a kid, I thought it was really odd how often the Enterprise came across the remains of a destroyed Starfleet vessel. Sure, Picard and Co. always came out alive by learning from the mistakes of the previous vessel, but after a certain point it struck me that innocent people frequently still had to die horrible deaths for our heroes to succeed.

These instances became fewer as the seasons went on, but then my memory was jogged at climax of The Pegasus. It had to happen at least once more before the series ended, after all. Tradition!

 

[MacLeod]

While we watch it week after week, we just see the exciting parts. There are probably weeks or months between each exciting episode where the crew is bored out of it's mind, sitting in the same chair all day, looking out the viewscreen at the moving starfield and wishing for something to happen so they could at least tap their consoles and make a little blip sound.

This. Plus we only see the voyages of one special ship like the Enterprise or Voyager. I doubt that every ship in starfleet is having the kinds of adventures that the Enterprise has.

^^I don't know, I'd say you're lucky to end up on the Enterprise or Voyager or whatever. An alarming number of other Starfleet ships which aren't the hero ship end up getting destroyed in horrible ways with the entire crew killed. At least when the Enterprise D was destroyed, there were no deaths. Except possibly Picard's fish.

Captain's Log stardate , erm anyone know what the stardate date is? Never mind it doesn't matter. We are now into or two hundrenth day of this mapping mission, It is getting increasing difficult to come up with new and novel ways of saying there is nothing intersting or novel to report. But here goes (sounds of anguished screaming then deathly silence.)

 

[YJAGG]

Even Scotty broke a bit in TWOK carrying his nephew's corpse up to the bridge

 

[Captain Rob]

This week on Star Trek: Nothing happens.
Except Ensign Ricky is sent out to clean and repaint the registry number on the primary hull. And paints it the wrong color.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Would it really be harder than it is for real soldiers who are sent out to war and have to deal with the constant threat of death? People are good at accepting roles, and they're trained in the Academy.

 

[at Quark's]

Would it really be harder than it is for real soldiers who are sent out to war and have to deal with the constant threat of death? People are good at accepting roles, and they're trained in the Academy.

Perhaps not, but even if a war would last that long and you would be a soldier for all that time, you probably still wouldn't be always at the front, under life threatening conditions. To be fair, neither are the starfleet crews, just 50 minutes a week at most

And let's face it, quite a few soldiers do return with significant psychological scars from their experiences on the front...

 

[Cyke101]

And let's face it, quite a few soldiers do return with significant psychological scars from their experiences on the front...

To add, that's precisely why breaks between tours (particularly when the last 10 years of war offered very little time) and military mental care/veteran health care in general are such important topics today.

 

[JeffinOakland]

This week on Star Trek: Nothing happens.
Except Ensign Ricky is sent out to clean and repaint the registry number on the primary hull. And paints it the wrong color.

You had one job!

 

[ZapBrannigan]

For any sane person, any one of those experiences would be enough to leave a (psychological) scar for the rest of their life.

They must have something in the Star Trek era for post-traumatic stress disorder. They're trying today with drugs:

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/261598.php

http://news.emory.edu/stories/2014/06/ressler_neuron_tac2_ptsd_target/

Given this much in back in 2014, it's not a stretch to say that Crusher hands out brain-curing pills after every major ordeal. Picard must take them like Rolaids.