life in the empires

[Thor Damar]

Well, as the token Maquis here, I can attest that life on the former Federation colonies annexed by Cardassia could be quite dismal. We certainly didn't fare quite as poorly as Bajor, but the Cardassians were no friend to us.

Blowing things up is a rather odd way to cultivate a friendship, now, don't you think?





( )

Indeed, and we provided re-education centers free of change, not to mention our unparalleled legal and educational system which we exported to all the worlds that have been welcomed into the Union.

And of course there is the benevolent protection of the Central Command...

 

[Captrek]

I can't imagine the Federation would force Membership upon anyone, nor can I imagine that the Federation would accept as a Member State any state which has conquered a foreign population. The UFP would almost certainly demand that any new potential Member State liberate any conquered worlds before joining the Federation.

That would surely depend on how much the subjugating world has to offer as a member of the Federation. Politics is the art of compromise.

I imagine the subjugated worlds would count as three-fifths in determining representation on the council.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

I wonder if Star Trek will ever have an empire that expands to the point that it becomes too large to be ruled by one central government and then fall into halves or pieces like the Roman empire.

They did that already with the Maquis. Sort of.

I also am curious that if Romulus was rejoined Vulcan, would the their enslaved worlds be forced into the Federation, or would they be given the opportunity to decide for themselves?

In that remarkable situation, I'm pretty sure the Vulcanoid Union would go on a case by case basis, making the most logical choice for each of their former satellite planets. The Romulan Empire might break up the same way as the Soviet Union, with one or two small planets remaining under relatively temporary but necessary occupation until they stabilized (similar too but less controversial than Chechnya).

 

[Herkimer Jitty]

Federation - Futuristic Orwellian Retirement Home with 1960s-era Cold Warrior Starfleet.

Romulan Empire - Evil, because living in it isn't like living in a bizarre retirement home.

Cardassian Union - See above.

Klingon Empire - See above.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

Sorry, Herkimer, my cognitive dissonance won't allow me to see the Trekiverse as being that simplistic (though you're probably right).

Realistically, it seems to me each empire is probably a slightly warped version of the one next to it, each using a different balance of methods to achieve its goals. As Quark and Garrack put it--likening the Federation to a glass of rootbeer--"It's so bubbly and cloyed... and happy. And the really scary thing is, if you drink enough of it, you begin to like it. It's insidious." In short, the Federation wins over its opponents by numbing them into a calm submissive state in a sort of calculated pavlovian mass social conditioning; it's the Disney Channel of galactic empires.

Romulus, on the other hand, doesn't do sweetness or bribes, they just have their agents sneak around in the shadows so you're too scared of punishment to even think about opposing them; in this case, it's the social conditioning usually experienced by fundamentalists who end up policing their own thoughts in fear that they will somehow loose control of their actions and end up being controlled--or worse, confused with--"the enemy."

Klingons buy their empire, apparently, through convoluted family politics, business arrangements and legacy/debts; it's basically an oligarchy, so most of their empire is conditioned to simply accept their collective irrelevance and instead chase fake dreams of glory in some battlefield somewhere, without really thinking about what the battlefield is or who stands to profit from their sacrifice.

The center of all three empires is a single planet--and a single class inhabiting that planet--who rakes in all the spoils from the rest. In the Federation, it's Earth, which has basically become a "paradise" while evidently exporting its varied miseries to the farthest corner of the galaxy, dumping its social/political garbage on planets so worthless it willingly cedes them to hostile empires just for a peace deal. This differs from Romulus only in that it shares the benefits more uniformly among the population of Earth, with off-world humans left to fend for themselves.

 

[Herkimer Jitty]

So, in conclusion, the Star Trek Universe becomes GrimDark on close inspection.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

Well, as depicted it's a slightly less grim version of our own crappy universe: the powers that be still play games with other people's lives just because they happen to be in charge and are seldom held accountable when their assorted power plays backfire.

So what else is new?

 

[Herkimer Jitty]

Indeed.