Spoilers STAR TREK BEYOND

[Crazy Eddie]

Whether these attitudes are racist is very arguable

This is what always confuses me about these discussions: that isn't even "arguable." Kirk begins TUC with an explicitly racist attitude. Just because it's BASED on something that actually happened to him doesn't make it NOT a racist attitude.

The reason it is a racist attitude -- and not, say, an antimilitarist attitude, or an anti-imperial attitude, or an anti-war attitude, or an anti-immigration attitude, or even an anti-reconciliation attitude -- is because he extends his emotions to include the entire race and not just the particular people or even the faction with which he's had bad experiences.

This is important to note, because when Kirk does his heel turn at Rura Penthe he realizes that his judgement of ALL KLINGONS was flawed in the first place. Not, as one might otherwise expect, his judgement of Gorkon in particular or of SOME Klingons. As he even tells Spock later "Gorkon had to die before I found out how prejudiced I was."

He's not genocidal, not even close.

No, he simply believes -- deep down -- that the galaxy would be better off if the Klingons just went extinct on their own. Given the opportunity to speed things up on that score, he would probably decline, which more than anything is why they didn't ask him to join the conspiracy.

 

[wayoung]

If anyone interested Rogue One has now beaten Beyond with 357m after 5 days.

Star Wars is Star Wars. It's always gonna make the big bucks.

Like Mag 7 in September, I'm interested in Passengers take. As a $100 mil movie starring two of the biggest movie stars in the world it's success / failure might mean more mid budget sci fi. Especially after Arrival's box office and critical sucess, which the director is already using to try and make another version of Dune.

 

[Paradise City]

You guys can work away with as to whether he's racist or not. As I've said above, people are complex and defy easy categorisation. But that's by no means stated to absolve Kirk because the sentiments expressed are damnable. It's a great film though because he works through his pathology and even at this late stage he's comes out of this film the more seasoned man for it. The film makers weren't afraid to portray him as a brute initially and in a aroundabout way, that's why I like this film. Even at this stage Kirk as a character is growing.

The Klingons weren't going extinct here. They would suffer a 'Klingonitarian' disaster which does mean faminiseesque casualties certainly and they were going broke -- which probably means that they would be relegated from a galactic power to being a 4th rate power struggling to repair the damage done using their entirely own means. "Genocide" isn't at play though, even with Cartwright's hawkish position.

"Let them die" is Kirk communicating his disgust at the Klingons and trying to subdue Spock.

Kirk did have the option of resigning his commission or even embarking on a conspiracy of his own. He didn't do that. He dragged his feet but he went ahead with the peace mission in good faith. That's the sentiments of a guy who wants to retire quietly and in good standing as a matter of priority. Moreover of he's a guy who 's content to let the Federation do its thing whilst he enjoys that retirement.

 

[BillJ]

To me, I always read Spock's "they're dying" as that they're dying in a political sense. The Praxis explosion is on par with Chernobyl, devastating but something that is recoverable from.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

You guys can work away with as to whether he's racist or not. As I've said above, people are complex and defy easy categorisation. But that's by no means designed to absolve Kirk because the sentiments expressed are damnable. It's a great film though because he works through his pathology and even at this late stage he's comes out of this film the more seasoned man for it. The film makers weren't afraid to portray as a brute initially and in a aroundabout way, that's why I like this film. Even at this stage Kirk as a character is growing.

And his final position at Khitomer is a huge contrast from where he was at the beginning. Kirk clings to his hatred of Klingons because he's comfortable with it, because it's safe for him, and because dealing with David's death as "Klingon bastards murdered my son!" is a lot simpler than dealing with the complexities of Klingon politics, trying to understand their internal dysfunction and paranoia and the massive inferiority complex that still motivates them even as their empire comes crashing down around their heads. Hatred is ALWAYS easier than understanding.

But as Kirk says, "People can be very frightened of change."

To me, I always read Spock's "they're dying" as that they're dying in a political sense. The Praxis explosion is on par with Chernobyl, devastating but something that is recoverable from.

It's recoverable IF they drastically reorganize their budgets and dump all of their resources into containing the Praxis disaster, something they can't do while still fighting a cold war with the Federation. I also got the impression that, at the end of the day, the Klingons would have needed a lot of help from other galactic powers to help clean up this mess, and that help would have involved the (temporary?) evacuation of Qo'nos and later resettlement, which is one of the reasons I think that the end of the Klingon Neutral Zone would have opened a few dozen disputed and very habitable worlds to Klingon settlement on terms the Klingons wouldn't have accepted before (e.g. "Yes, we'll accept Federation rule on those worlds, just let us move a million of our people there, they've got nowhere else to go.") Khitomer was probably one of those planets under dispute; Azetbur calls it a "neutral site" when 60 years later it's a Klingon colony under Romulan attack.

 

[BillJ]

It's recoverable IF they drastically reorganize their budgets and dump all of their resources into containing the Praxis disaster...

Recoverable as a political entity, the Klingon race would survive. The disintegration of the Klingon Empire would be a disaster for the Federation. Much as we see the disintegration of certain Middle East countries has become a disaster for the rest of the world.

"Sometimes the devil you know..."

 

[Captain of the USS Averof]

Nobody in TUC is talking about the physical extermination of the Klingon people. That's not even implied. They're simply discussing the political survival of the Klingon Empire. In real world terms, the Klingon Empire is the Soviet Union and the UFP is USA at the end of the Cold War.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

What about the situation in Pen Pals?

Picard was willing to let that whole planet die till Data managed to persuade him otherwise based on the Prime Directive and his standing by that as Captain.

I wonder how many Starfleet captains have had similar situations where they could have intervened but instead had to let them die? Isn't that genocide in absence?

 

[Crazy Eddie]

Recoverable as a political entity, the Klingon race would survive. The disintegration of the Klingon Empire would be a disaster for the Federation. Much as we see the disintegration of certain Middle East countries has become a disaster for the rest of the world.

"Sometimes the devil you know..."

I'm not sure about that, frankly. In my interpretation (and also headcannon) the Klingon Empire is a top-down oligarchy where noble families basically hoard all the resources among themselves and membership in the ruling class (the High Council and its satellites) is based purely on nepotism with only the thinnest veneer of legality. This was my take on the opposition to Gowron in TNG: he was a commoner and an outsider, but he had basically used the High Council's bullshit protocols to make a grab for power at a time when they were too busy arguing amongst themselves to stop him.

That take being, the Klingon Empire keeps the vast majority of its citizens in something not far from abject poverty while the wealthy and connected in their society grow fat off the largesse of their exploitation. The whole reason they push this rabid militarism on everyone is because it's easier to keep people united and loyal when they can easily direct their frustrations elsewhere, raping and pillaging abroad as they see fit. This means that in time of economic struggle the Empire will ALWAYS choose war over peace; they will either start the war themselves, or they'll sell weapons to their citizens and then manufacture provocations for them to take matters into their own hands. And even should that fail, the High Council would sooner throw their entire species under the bus to preserve their own wealth and privilege, even if it means starting one pointless war after another just to profit off the arms sales.

While it is naive to think that a more egalitarian government could emerge from a crisis like this, fragmenting the Empire might actually pay off if some of their poorer colonies were given the opportunity to join the Federation. It is possible, in fact, that political isolation of the oligarchs could be affected if enough of the outlying colonies -- those usually exploited or ignored by the High Command -- could be persuaded to apply to the Federation. Once more and more Klingon communities see the benefits of membership, the self-interested once-great Empire might jump on the bandwagon, assuming it is better to be humble and rich than proud and poor.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

What about the situation in Pen Pals?

Picard was willing to let that whole planet die till Data managed to persuade him otherwise based on the Prime Directive and his standing by that as Captain.

I wonder how many Starfleet captains have had similar situations where they could have intervened but instead had to let them die? Isn't that genocide in absence?

Picard's interpretation of the Prime Directive differs dramatically from Kirk's. We see the latter's on full display on Nibiru and in TOS in the deconstruction of Landru and the Eminar-VII battle computers. He even single handedly re-shapes the political landscape of three different planets by appointing world leaders to rule them, ostensibly for their own good. So Kirk's interpretation of "non-interference" basically boils down to "Charity and good advice but nothing with strings attached."

Picard's interpretation is way more conservative, but it is an INTERPRETATION and there's clearly a lot of wiggle room in there considering he never actually gets in trouble for the few times he apparently violates it. From a moral standpoint, it's pretty clear to me that he has no real obligation to to help ANYONE; it would be BETTER if he helped everyone, but he isn't actually responsible to do so. More to the point, it would be irresponsible for him to put himself in a position of responsibility for the people he would prefer to help, knowing as he does that he (and the Federation) will not be able to live up to that responsibility in any meaningful way. So Picard's preference is to avoid becoming responsible at al and giving out help only as a one-time thing. He differs from Kirk only in his interpretation of what a "one time thing" really looks like and to what extent the Federation is responsible for the consequences.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

Picard's interpretation of the Prime Directive differs dramatically from Kirk's. We see the latter's on full display on Nibiru and in TOS in the deconstruction of Landru and the Eminar-VII battle computers. He even single handedly re-shapes the political landscape of three different planets by appointing world leaders to rule them, ostensibly for their own good. So Kirk's interpretation of "non-interference" basically boils down to "Charity and good advice but nothing with strings attached."

Picard's interpretation is way more conservative, but it is an INTERPRETATION and there's clearly a lot of wiggle room in there considering he never actually gets in trouble for the few times he apparently violates it. From a moral standpoint, it's pretty clear to me that he has no real obligation to to help ANYONE; it would be BETTER if he helped everyone, but he isn't actually responsible to do so. More to the point, it would be irresponsible for him to put himself in a position of responsibility for the people he would prefer to help, knowing as he does that he (and the Federation) will not be able to live up to that responsibility in any meaningful way. So Picard's preference is to avoid becoming responsible at al and giving out help only as a one-time thing. He differs from Kirk only in his interpretation of what a "one time thing" really looks like and to what extent the Federation is responsible for the consequences.

Yeah but there's lots of hand wringing in that episode and I never felt comfortable with his initial refusal to help.

 

[BillJ]

He even single handedly re-shapes the political landscape of three different planets by appointing world leaders to rule them, ostensibly for their own good.

Picard did the same thing on Ligon II ("Code of Honor").

 

[Crazy Eddie]

Picard did the same thing on Ligon II ("Code of Honor").

First of all:

Second of all, I feel like that isn't entirely true in this case, but having to explain why would force me to actually think about and remember that episode and that is not something I am willing to do.

Yeah but there's lots of hand wringing in that episode and I never felt comfortable with his initial refusal to help.

Neither did I, frankly. Even less with all the handwringing. It shows the Federation approaching the situation with a patronizing, overly superior attitude, as if primitive civilizations are basically children who can't take any real responsibility for their own choices. This is the reason I really liked "Who Watches the Watchers?" Picard took the time to actually explain to those people what was really going on, gave them the information as clearly as he could, and left it up to them how to (mis)interpret it on their own. They SEEMED to get it by the end, but who the hell knows what would have happened? In the end, what their civilization does with that knowledge is nobody's business but their own, and Starfleet's efforts to nudge them in a more constructive direction fit the spirit of the prime directive just as well.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

But WHY must the attainment of warp drive be one of, if not the main criteria for admittance into the Federation?

Why does membership hinge on that?

 

[wayoung]

But WHY must the attainment of warp drive be one of, if not the main criteria for admittance into the Federation?

Why does membership hinge on that?

Arbitrary deadline allowing the Federation to wipe it's hands of problems it doesn't want to deal with.

 

[Grendelsbayne]

But WHY must the attainment of warp drive be one of, if not the main criteria for admittance into the Federation?

Why does membership hinge on that?

It's not the main criteria for admittance - it's the main criteria for being considered in the first place. Primarily because the whole point of the idea of the prime directive is to allow civilizations to develop on their own without outside contamination, which is something that becomes plainly impossible as soon as that civilization discovers warp drive. So it's not so much that warp drive makes a civilization worthy of joining the Federation as it is that warp drive forces the Federation to engage with a civilization and determine some kind of interstellar diplomatic relationship (whether that's Federation membership or not).

 

[BillJ]

But WHY must the attainment of warp drive be one of, if not the main criteria for admittance into the Federation?

Because it puts the Federation in a position of having to deal with said civilization, at some point.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

Why can't the Federation deal with planets that don't have warp drive?

 

[wayoung]

Why can't the Federation deal with planets that don't have warp drive?

Because they don't want to and reaaallllyyy like feeling morally superior when they let entire other species go extinct from, say, easily curable diseases all because their professional ethics say they can't help unless the other species figured out faster than light travel.

Of course, when it comes to humanity, all bets are off. No Prime Directive there - go back in time and change their natural course whenever they can to save the Federation.

 

[Paradise City]

Because with warp drive, it's not long before you bump into another planet. Without it, you're isolated with an inflated sense of one's importance in the universe.

Obviously that's a standard that's a general rule of thumb rather than some criteria that's rigorous and exacting. But I don't think it's a bad standard on those terms.