Something I'd bee wondering about Dukat...

[indolover]

Cardassian society may condone extra-marital affairs, who knows? Dukat's wife may not even have cared, given the scenario. We never knew the specifics of Cardassian relationships, despite that being angry when one meets a woman is a come-on lol.

And Dukat most likely had the Cardassian equivalent of schizophrenia (or some other psychotic disorder).

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

I actually wrote him as bipolar, myself--something that can cause delusions under the right circumstances. (It's also a disorder that I would expect, in the 24th century, you could live with much better than Gul Dukat did, with better treatment and life choices.)

 

[Anwar]

I always just figured he was a major egomaniac who just got worse as time went on due to circumstances. I mean, you can be a megalomaniacal bastard and still be sane. Then after Ziyal died he just plain lost it.

 

[T'Mar]

I'm with Anwar. It almost seems a cop-out to me to give him a psychological disorder during his Occupation days, or even up through season 6. I mean, it's obvious that after Ziyal dies, he loses it completely, but before that...well, the Cardassians were written to be like Nazis, and "the banality of evil" comes to mind. It's easy to want to make people who do things that are THAT BAD a disorder of some kind, but it's not generally how real life works, and as a character arc, it's much more intriguing to me for him to be very clever, very intelligent, very charming, and very sane, and yet he can do so many bad things. How does he justify it? What are his excuses? That's what makes him an interesting character, not being balls-to-the-wall crazy. (Well, being crazy was interesting for one episode, but I wouldn't have liked it if that had been the official explanation for ALL of his behavior throughout the entire series)

 

[Anwar]

They don't even have to be Nazis, they can be a stand-in for any fascist or dictatorship movement. Any overly-Nationalistic movement as well.

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

But look at it another way, though. A psychological disorder doesn't make a person evil--especially in the Trekiverse where I think we can assume medicine is much more advanced and I am actually a lot LESS likely to let someone off the hook because of a chemical imbalance unless they get flat-out delusional and can no longer recognize reality. Many mental disorders still leave you with the power of choice even untreated--yes, you'll have tougher obstacles to face than most people, but you CAN choose. And choice is what makes a person evil, when they keep choosing wrong and keep choosing wrong and keep rationalizing and justifying themselves, and they get so ingrained in the habit of their own choices that that's all there is left.

The mental illness explains one thing: the delusions. All those cumulative choices that led to that point and beyond? Not a bit.

 

[DS9 Gal AZ]

Up until "Waltz," Dukat's only delusions were delusions of grandeur. I wouldn't conisder that a mental illness, though I don't doubt he went nuts after Ziyal died. Even the most well-adjusted people would have their breaking point were their mind snaps. Not all mental illnesses are genetic, some are situational. For example, my grandfather suffered some relatively mild post-traumatic stress disorder after fighting in the second world war - although I don't think they called it that at the time. Maybe Dukat has some PTSD?

 

[Cepstrum]

This is going back up a bit and concerns Tora Ziyal: isn't a more likely explanation for his embarrassment/disgrace with his illegitimate daughter was because she was half Bajoran? Most Cardassians despised them and considered them chattel. I'd think I'd first try to explain the problem with Ziyal because of her mixed heritage, not just because she was the result of an affair.

 

[DS9 Gal AZ]

I'd say having an illegitmate child was bad enough, but I'm sure the fact that said child was half-Bajoran made it about a million times worse.

 

[TerokNor]

I think Dukat, before Ziyals death must have had some "childhood trauma". Parents that were not very loving, but very demanding of what he should do, very authoritarian of course, no praise for the "normal things" only for the perfect things and duty/ orders that he followed well, lots of telling him how he has to be, that he is the son of someone important and therefore is important and better too and has to reach certain standarts.
Actually most of the Cardassians we see must have had a childhood trauma.

As for his wife, I agree with those who say, it probably was an arranged marriage between two powerful families with the meaning of gaining even more power and influence and producing children, but not out of love, only out of duty. However Dukat always wanted love, though I doubt he really knows what that it and confuses love often with something else.
Adultery...I guess was not allowed, but practized anyway, as it is in our todays world... maybe even worse, if a lot marriages were arranged ones, especially in the more powerful families and especially the males.

What I just wonder, as in Cardassia children are really really important, do you think they ever developed birth controll instruments or would that be a strange concept for them?

TerokNor

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

I imagine they would have birth control (after all, they definitely know about genetics, the conception process, and so forth)...though whether they used it as frequently as humans, I don't know.

 

[indolover]

Dukat may have had a genetic propensity to mental illness, or such symptoms were underlying and Ziyal's death was the straw breaking the camel's back.

I'd imagine in his military career, he witnessed and participated in a lot of carnage. He oversaw the Bajoran Occupation, his father (most likely IMO) was killed by Garak, etc. so maybe all of that took it's toll.

 

[Anwar]

I dunno, Gul Madred was an expert torturer who probably saw his fair share of carnage. Hell, he had the excuse of growing up in a particularly bad time on Cardassia and suffering childhood abuse. But he seemed perfectly sane.

I still say that Dukat was just a bastard who got what he deserved in the end.

 

[DevilEyes]

I dunno, Gul Madred was an expert torturer who probably saw his fair share of carnage. Hell, he had the excuse of growing up in a particularly bad time on Cardassia and suffering childhood abuse. But he seemed perfectly sane.

Really? He seemed perfectly sane to you?

What was the goal of his expert torture? It's not like he wanted to, or was going to get any relevant information from Picard. He was simply trying to break Picard's spirit. A man who is ready to tell you that he sees what you tell him to see, rather than what he really is seeing with his eyes, is a man ready to tell you anything you want to hear. That's certainly not the way to get information, you can only get disinformation and fabricated stories. It's a good tactic if you need justification for some action and you want to force a fake confession from the prisoner. But what kind of fake confession did the Cardassians need from Picard? I don't see what goal Madred was pursuing, apart from just getting his kicks from getting the better of a strong, principled enemy prisoner. It all seemed to be more about Madred's personal issues than any service to the Union.

Which is why that episode is such a great commentary on torture. As a means of extracting information, it sucks, it's almost useless. But as a means of breaking people's spirit, it's great.

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

Given the nature of the Cardassian "justice" system, getting Picard to say whatever Madred wanted him to say might've been exactly the goal. Remember, the conviction happens in the mind of a hardline Cardassian before the evidence for or against ever has a chance to be presented.

 

[T'Mar]

Wasn't it Dukat (sometime beginning of season 6) who said that the way to truly defeat an enemy was to have them admit that you were right? That was probably Madred's goal. I wouldn't be surprised if that view of winning a war wasn't just Dukat's, but Cardassia's in general.

 

[Anwar]

Cardassia's justice system is that you're always found guilty even before the Trial. If you're innocent, I'm guessing there is no trial.

Dukat's views on defeat are exactly as T'Mar said: To truly defeat someone you have to make them realize they were wrong to ever oppose you to begin with. To utterly break them and bend them to your will. Madred's goal was to break Picard, and then probably they could get whatever they needed out of him after he was broken.