Comfortable slavery is not any less slavery.
Star Trek morality test - best and worst episodes
- Thread starter Charles Phipps
- Start date
Comfortable slavery is not any less slavery.
Starfleet says that Picard was strategically wrong, not morally wrong. In contemporary foreign policy, national interest is separate from and superior to personal morality. Arguably, national interest is beholden to a higher standard in the ST universe, but there are still things governments will do that individuals cannot. Indeed, that was part of the moral test that was being explored by I, Borg.
I'd argue the opposite. Strategically, if this doesn't work, the Borg now know you're attempting genocide against them. All that protects the Alpha Quadrant is the Borg's semi-disinterest.
Of course it is. Ask any Bajoran on the occupied DS9 if they'd rather stay out of the way of grumpy Jem'Hadar....or work in a Cardassian dilithium refinery 14 hours a day.
The main issue is the one faced by the Cardassians is it's not that slavery is okay when it's good, it's just it can turn bad at any minute. The Cardassians got nothing but benefits from the Dominion right up until they didn't....and it became clear they were nothing but cannon fodder.
I don't know about that. Tuvix certainly thought he was dying.
If he was simply a composite of two live beings who were aware, he should have begged to be separated. He did not.
He expressed individuality, consciousness, and a very clear will to live.
Yeah, I stick with it being triage. A situation many people would disagree with but I view it less as necromancy than the fact that two people lived where one couldn't. Were there a way for Tuvix to live with then, I'm sure Janeway would have taken it.
If I'm not mistaken, only one person objected to the plan on its face: Crusher. Picard and Laforge objected only because they observed evidence of emerging individual consciousness in Hugh, and felt that using him in a particular capacity was amoral. And Admiral Nechayev expressed, in the name of Starfleet, her disapproval of Picard's choice, regardless of Hugh's transformation. That was Starfleet's values: one voice of complete dissent. Moreover, they disregarded it as an immoral action because it would bring an end to the war in which Federation citizens suffered and in which the Borg, for whom there was no difference between soldier and citizen, were the only aggressor. Whether or not it would have been effective is not a moral question.
of course it is
if your definition of slavery is simply " being under the power of another," then most of us already are anyway. What do you think happens if you don't obey a law that you think is silly or unjust, or don't want to pay a certain tax?
the only issue is whether that power is mostly tolerant, just, and benevolent or not
Okay, let's switch this around a bit.
If it was Spock and McCoy fused together and there was a chance we'd never get either character back would folks complain as much over it?
Let's not forget that folks didn't really like Tuvok or Neelix and would've been happy to see them gone out of the equation here. Audience bias.
I don't want you to think that I'm saying the Tuvok and Neelix were individually conscious of what was going on while a composite, there was a single combined awareness. My position is that they apparently remember events. There was no surpirse when they materialize in sick bay, and Neelix didn't question Kes's "welcome back."
It of note that neither Tuvok nor Neelix seem to subsequently make any effort to become re-combined.
So, if somebody kidnapped you and locked you in a room for ten years, you wouldn't mind so long as it had enough pillows and they gave you pizza and beer?
The only time a government is justified in exercising power over you is to prevent you from harming somebody else's right to life, liberty and property. It's established in the early seasons that you can't even make a significant trade deal in the GQ without getting approval from the Dominion. You certainly can't criticize the government, or interact with anyone the government doesn't like. On Cardassia, citizens had to carry papers around with them at all times.
You kill a man in the US, it takes an expensive trial just to punish you, and you might even get out in 20 years. You kill a man on a Dominion planet they execute 50 of your friends. You can't even make a comparison.
Maybe those blue guys from Alliances would prefer comfortable imprisonment, but Romulans surely would not.
Nor can YOU! There are several countries you can't trade with without getting government permission. And the ones you can, the government has already given you permission to do so.
Jake criticized the Dominion, on an occupied station...as an enemy alien!
But you're right about one thing, the Dominion doesn't play when it comes to people not playing by the rules.
Didn't German citizens have to carry papers also during WW2? And from the little we've seen, the common Romulan citizen is already fairly oppressed. As I said, they probably wouldn't even notice a change in government. ...isn't there a line from a Who song...?
Again, you can't compare an occupying force such as The Dominion to one such as Cardassians, or Romulans or Nazis...etc...What are the driving forces behind the last three? Power. Founders don't get off on power. They want things controlled, and personally to be left alone and left in The Link.
What's the most dangerous thing about being a citizen in occupied territory? The arbitrariness of an occupying troop, yes? Getting randomly raped or beaten or robbed by a soldier. Jem'hadar don't give a **** about that. Neither do Vorta. As occupiers, Cardassians are a billion times more dangerous.
Now...yes. If you resist. You are ****ed. And your descendants are ****ed.
But yes, as I said earlier, the Romulans might have had there entire population exposed to plague because of the actions earlier in the season...but I'll bet The Breen were going to be sitting pretty if they had won!
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Not only that, but there was little dilemma to begin with: one guy on your crew, or two ? Given Voyager's situation, there was no real choice to make. And the trailer promised that it would tear me apart !
At least I learned that clothes can be merged by the transporter.
So the Cardassians are more dangerous if you are compliant, and the Dominion is more dangerous if you are not ? What a comfortable choice this is.
I'll stick with the Federation, thanks.
Under the Dominion, you would be oppressed. Under the Cardassians, you would be enslaved and oppressed.(Slavery and oppression are not the same thing.) It's a huge difference, until you consider that the Dominion would seek out government's like Cardassia's to police the Alpha Quadrant in the Founders' interests.
For the sake of argument, what would have been the effect if the Federation, Klingons or the Romulans had decided to join the Dominion? I suspect that the Founders would have been satisfied so long a order was maintained. However, it would be left to the collaborating governments to maintain order with the methods they have at hand. Those societies might only become more repressive by a matter of degrees; there might be no substantial change. Romulans, who are accustomed to be spied on by the state, might feel little change. The Klingon warrior class might feel empowered. However, Weyoun specifically picked Earth as a center of future resistance and recommended eradicating the population. What does that mean? Perhaps he would have no faith in the Federation's ability to control th population.
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You think they would've let them keep their fleets ?
^Not a chance. Starfleet would have been disbanded and its ships destroyed or put in mothballs. There would not have been a UFP had the Dominion won the war.
--Sran
--Sran
Did the Dominion dismantle Cardassia's ship?
No, but Cardassia joined the Dominion by choice. The Federation would not have had that option had they lost the war.
--Sran
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