What are your controversial Star Trek opinions?

And . . . what happened? Was there any fallout? If not in "DS9", in any other Trek show in the Alpha Quadrant?

 

Nothing at all, which is horrible and/or stupid.

It's horrible because genocide, and the vaunted Federation is supposed to be above something like genocide.

If they were aware of it (as I said, I might be misremembering that aspect) it's stupid of them to be aware of it because the whole point of Section 31 and going to such lengths to compartmentalize its activities is that the dirty work gets done and the Council gets to be morally outraged while holding their hands up and, "We just didn't know."

Forgetting the rest of it:

"We didn't know because we didn't want to know, and we created those men in black so we didn't HAVE to know.

 

Unless it violates the Prime Directive.

 

While I'm not prepared to condone S31's actions, the simple fact is that the Founders are of a level of evil second only to that of the Borg. From the unprovoked annihilation of the New Bajor colony to the slaughter of nearly a billion Cardassians, they left a long trail of terror, torture, mass murder, and other atrocities. If S31's plan had wiped them out... I wouldn't have shed any tears.

 

The Federation Council debated about giving the cure to the Founders, but they ultimately rejected the idea. That's what you were thinking of.

While I don't think genocide is the answer, I can't really blame the council for that decision. The Dominion was proven to be a ruthless organization that has not only committed genocide themselves multiple times, but have also done even worse. (The Blight to the Teplans in "THE QUICKENING", for instance.) They were about to kill every Cardassian left alive, and indeed already killed a billion of them right before Odo's linking. They would have killed every single human without a second thought, per Weyoun's dialogue in "SACRIFICE OF ANGELS".

When faced with an enemy that was not willing to negotiate, even when they were facing certain defeat (the Female Changeling's dialogue in the finale about 'your victory will taste as bitter as defeat', because the Dominion would fight to the very last man, particularly suicide attacks like the Jem'Hadar did to Klingon ships), I don't see they had a choice. It was a matter of survival.

It's hard to be a moral civilization if your civilization is wiped out by an enemy like that. The rules of war change when one side does not fear death. (This was highlighted in season 1's "BATTLE LINES". In that case, both sides ceased to fear death.)

But despite all that happening, we still got the solution that was in the spirit of the franchise... Odo linking with her and an understanding happened that ended the war. Additionally, we get the scene with Sisko, Martok, and Ross where Martok toasts over the fallen ruins, but Sisko and Ross don't.

We got to keep the spirit alive while showing how ugly war really is. And DS9 never glorified war... they showed us how horrible it is and why it should be avoided.

 

I'll argue that the unhappy ending in "A Private Little War" has the spirit of Star Trek.*

In pretty much every Star Trek series, it's an essential part of the premise that the Federation coexists with certain other antagonist superpowers under conditions analogous to the Cold War. Under that aspect of the premise comes the occasional unhappy ending, as in this episode and in TNG "The Defector," to name another.

The unhappiness is there because Federation values are in conflict with the pragmatic reality of the situation, yet the drive of the characters to make the universe a better place, without which the conflict would not exist in the first place, is an essential element of the spirit of Star Trek.*

* - To the degree that the spirit exists.

 

Who says there has to even BE any consequences?

Like I said, the Romulans really have no cause to complain here. Everything Sisko did, was totally within their wheelhouse as well. If the shoe was on the other foot, you know damn well they would have done ALL of that shit, and probably stooped to levels even Sisko would never have dreamed of. The simple fact is, Sisko's actions were very Romulan.

And obviously the Romulans would have found out sooner or later that the Dominion would have come for them as well. Even though the actual invasion plans detailed in the episode were fake...everybody knows the Dominion would have gotten around to it sooner or later, since the Dominion are obviously untrustworthy and would turn on their so-called "allies" whenever it suited them (and also would never respect any "nonaggression" pact). So in the end, it all worked out for the best. The greater good was served.

Also I think it's rather telling that not even Section 31 managed to think of a plan like that. Sisko was effective in a way that they never were.

 

If by "effective" you mean "roped into keeping Garak's murder a secret", then sure...

 

Which made it weirder. Sisko was a shipbuilder, a station administrator, and a part time religious icon. Section 31 were elite professional spooks.

 

But Sisko was also one of the few Starfleet captains who was not above getting his hands dirty to serve a greater good. In that respect, he is very much Kirk.

And Sisko did try to convince Vreenak that Dominion was going to after the Romulans at some point.

Whether Garak's entire plan was to blow up his ship from the jump or it was a backup in case the rod was discovered to be a fake, we may never know.



Regarding the plan being a construct of Section 31, I actually don't think they would have been able to do it simply because of Sisko. I say this because it seemed clear that Vreenak would be open to talk an extremely few amount of Starfleet officers. Given his breakdown of Sisko at the airlock, I think he was one of those elite few Vreenak would bother to give the time of day. Basically, the entire plan hinged on whether or not Vreenak would come to the station, and Garak knew enough about the man to realize Sisko was the draw. I don't think Section 31 has anyone on their staff or in their pocket that would have been as effective a draw.

 

While definitely a human thing, many countries have employed concentration camps. And the Nazis weren't even the first to use them!
Concentration camps (in their modern sense) were first employed by the British during the Second Boer War (1899-1902). In fact it is highly likely that Hitler took his inspiration from them - there were many elements of the British Empire which he admired.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Boer_War_concentration_camps
https://www2.lib.uct.ac.za/mss/bccd/

 

It wasn't a backup. The bomb clearly had to have been planted while Vreenak was with Sisko, ergo, before anyone knew the fake had been discovered. You could theorize maybe he would only blow it up if the fake were discovered, but if the unexploded bomb were found after Vreenak went home it could've made the Romulans ally with the Dominion instead, so that would've been a terrible plan. Plus Garak made it pretty clear he didn't really expect the fake to pass muster.

 

Many cultures used concentration camps, it's true. Usually, however, their purpose was detainment of enemy personnel. And, I expect others will in the future; they're a cruel reality of war. Hitler used them to kill and cremate 11 million of his own citizens. Let's hope THAT, at least, is a one and done.

 

Great Britain - a democratic society and postwar industrialized power - ran concentration camps in Kenya while it was still a British colony in the 1950s to incarcerate Mau Mau rebels and others deemed in league with or sympathetic to them. Even democracies use concentration camps if it's in their selfish interests.

 

I mean personally I always thought that, for example the Khmer Rouge were pretty similar to what Nazi Germany did, even if it "only" killed 2 million of their own citizens. Or the prison camps in North Korea, that, from what I've read only differ in that they don't have gas chambers.
Really genocide, including of a country's own citizens happened during many parts of history, and is still happening today.

Of course the "Concentration Camps" of Nazi Germany are more correctly called "Death Camps" or "Extermination Camps" since once the 'final solution' was agreed on by the Nazis they were not meant to contain people, they were meant to murder people as efficiently as possible.
I think that is one big factor that makes the Nazis stand out as so monstrous. They ended up not even trying to pretend anymore that their facilities were work or prison camps. They created an industrialized way to kill people they didn't like (one that was extremely agonizing for the victims to boot)
The other reason is probably that both the murderers and the victims were white Europeans living in a place that had been considered "civilized".

To bring that back to the Ferengi. I can totally see them doing, for example, discovering a valuable resource on a plane with a primitive civilization and taking over and working the local population to death mining that resource. I could even see them doing that to a portion of their own population back when they still had nation states. Or exterminating/enslaving a species that interfered with their profit.
As for interstellar wars, considering how long the Ferengi have been in space and how much contact they had with other species (including forming something called the "Ferengi Alliance") I still think it is most likely/realistic that they had interstellar wars. At the very least they would have had proxy wars in situations where they can see a profit for them.

That whole scene remains complete hack writing.

 

There's no way the Ferengi couldn't have had war of some kind. If it breathes, it bleeds. The Ferengi are no different.

I mean, they have those badass military vessels for SOME reason, don't they?

And everyone knows Ferengi women are (or were, pre-Rom and Ishka) slaves. So if Quark says otherwise, he's full of shit. End of discussion.

 

Star Trek under Alex Kurtzman is a different timeline, the Alex Kurtzman timeline.

 

Well. No.

 

I don't know if this is a controversial opinion, but STAR TREK: PICARD would never have happened if NEMESIS wasn't filmed.