Janeway and Starfleet

Why was Janeway so keen to follow starfleet regulations in the Delta quadrant even if it meant her crew going Hungry? I look forward to some replies.

 

Because Starfleet is a cult, and they spend 4 years at the academy brainwashing you.

 

Are you thinking of any specific instance (and if so, which one), or just the more general 'we're Starfleet, we can't just go mess with the locals, upset local power balances, and do whatever we like'?

 

Hunger never seemed to be an issue on Voyager.

 

Can't really recall that, either, that's one reason I asked for the specific instance (if there was one). Replicator rations, yes. Neelix' Leola root stew and food foraging missions in early Voyager, yes. But hunger? Not to my knowledge.

Well, perhaps in some alternate timelines, like Year of Hell they suffered from hunger.

 

If you can't hold onto core principles in lean times, those principles aren't worth much.

 

The Void?

Trapped in a pocket dimension where power runs out quicker.

That's the one where Kathy says she read and reread the Starfleet Charter all night long trying to look for a loop hole to justify piracy.

 

An earlier Starfleet captain didn't bother.

 

She, especially or at least early on, seemed to think that every regulation was a core principle.

 

Except when she didn't.

 

Even though they are on the other side of the galaxy, they still held on to core values. This was emphasised by the fact that they decided to return home.

Had the crew decided that returning home wasn’t worth the effort, there would be little reason to continue upholding Starfleet values, unless the goal was to establish a second Starfleet in the Delta Quadrant.

 

One of the dumbest decisions of the show, I thought, was to have every single person on the ship (even the Maquis) prove so committed to getting home that they were willing to turn down life on a relatively safe and prosperous human colony to make the journey (70 years on a tin can, and possibly a prison cell for some of them when they got home). It gives Janeway a "cult leader" vibe. We sort of see the same in "Resolutions", when crew morale goes down the crapper because they have to leave the captain behind (Chakotay being an afterthought).

 

Most of the crew left behind families and friends that they'd like to get back to- most of them wouldn't have been in jail long, and those without attachments back home like Suder (most likely) or Gerron...wouldn't be able to fit in at that colony. They might want to return to an area familiar to them, unless they are up to being hermit deep in the wilderness on that planet.

I think a part of B'Elanna knew she was BSing herself when she used to say she had nobody back home missing her.

 

That's a generalization, and would explain why 140 of the 150 Voyager crew stayed aboard, or 142, or even 145. But by laws of averages, a few of them would be expected to opt out.

 

I don't think I'd expect crewmembers to be jumping ship and settling down on a Delta Quadrant planet very early in the proceedings - even humans in this time are living over a hundred years as standard so 'giving up' and abandoning all hope of returning to your family after only a few years seems unlikely. I think people with life expectancies over a century would give it 10 years before throwing in the towel, maybe more than that.

 

How can a crew go hungry... when they have Neelix' Leola root stew to eat?

 

But I would expect a few of them to leave. Especially after hearing about what happened to Lt. Durst.

 

^I'd bet they kept that part from the crew. They aren't gonna announce that one of the Viidians showed up with Durst's face with B'Elanna.

 

Because Voyager was a show about goodies being wholesome and heroic. It was not Battlestar Galactica.

 

I must admit that sometimes I find Janeway's Starfleet priciples obsession a bit rigid.

OK, in order to keep some sort of discipline on the ship and in order to focus on the main goal which was to get back home, I guess that the idea of a Starfleet crew was correct.

But trying to make the Maquis members perfect Starfleet role models, like in the otherwise great episode Learning Curve was a bit over the top.

I actually think that Chakotay was right in the episode Alliances when he proposed a more Maquis-oriented strategy for the ship and the crew. Unfortunately it didn't work out in that episode.

As for that episode, it's great and I really like it, except for janeway's speech about Federation principles at the end. It was actually a little pathetic, especially considering what happened later when they became stranded on the planet Hanon IV in Basics.