Why is the Trek community so negative about Voyager?

[AuntKate]

I think what this attitude does is inoculate against any criticism. If anyone dislikes Janeway, or criticizes her characterization, then you can just say "Oh, they're prejudiced because Janeway is a woman."

I disagree. There's a difference between saying "I hate Janeway because she's a know-it-all" (omg, the nerve of the woman!) vs "she was inconsistently written".

Back to Janeway I'm not saying people think "Since Janeway is a woman I'm going to criticize her." It's more like the same behaviors that are okay with Picard or Kirk are not okay with Janeway. An example of this is the often discussed "Equinox" scene where Chakotay prevented Janeway from allowing an alien to attack a member of the Equinox crew. There was much discussion when a similar incident with Archer (don't know the episode, stopped watching when I realized Porthos was my favorite character) drew little criticism.

Anomaly.

To be honest, the two situations aren't comparable for various reasons. Archer did torture a man by putting him in an airlock and slowly dropping the atmosphere, but Archer's motivation and subsequent character arc were different from Janeway's. Archer was desperate, 7 million people had been killed on Earth and the rest of the human race was about to be killed if he couldn't find the weapon, so he tortured a guy to get the information he needed. Later in the season, Archer decided to sacrifice himself because of the remorse he felt for that action, and the others he took in order to find the weapon. He didn't forget about the torture, he felt that he had to die because of it. And when he got back to Earth and people labelled him as a hero, he had trouble reconciling people's opinions of him with the actions he knew he took.

Archer crossed a line that he felt he had to cross and he struggled to live with that guilt for a long time.

In comparison, Janeway tortured a man, relieved her first officer for stopping her, pursued a vendetta against a captain that crossed the line... all of which I don't have a major problem with. What I have a problem with is how she was left off the hook by Chakotay at the end of the episode; rather than acknowledging that she crossed a line in order to find Ransom, Chakotay backs down and claims that he was the one that crossed the line by challenging her.

Janeway never had to deal with what she did, it wasn't followed up on in future episodes, which is insane when you consider that the guy she tortured is now a member of her crew! How must she feel when she walks past him in the corridor? We don't know because the writers decided to ignore this fascinating scenario they had set up in order to do Irish holodeck episodes.

Well I think we all know continuity is not one of Voyager's strong suits. Shown repercussions or not I find it interesting that what Janeway did is called "torture" when some may say it's just a threat. Would she have gone thru with it? Hard to say since Chakotay stopped her. Also, this crewman had participated in a genocide. If you're going to go for continuity it would have been interesting to see how the Equinoz crew deal with the aftermath of that. However, the whole episode was never referred to again.

So it's okay to torture someone because seven million people died, but not because they are a traitor of their own kind and a murderer of aliens? And, as KimC said, what really happened to Lessing? He was tied to a chair and a rift ALMOST opened. Wow. Is that really torture?

Janeway did realize that she'd gone too far and told Chakotay so. I thought the comparisons between herself and Ransom were wonderful. She was focused on bringing the Equinox crew to justice and put aside some of her taboos to do so. That is what Ranson did; he was focused on his crew's survival and put aside the prime directive to "harvest" the aliens. She was willing to threaten Lessing's life in order to complete her "mission." Ransom was willing to disassemble Seven of Nine to complete his. The difference was that Janeway's crew was able to reach her and keep her from crossing the line, whereas Ransom's crew, including Lessing, aided and abetted his crimes. Janeway saw that and expressed regret for her actions and appreciation for the crew that stopped her.

What more was she to do? Thanks to the giant reset button that was in play during Voyager, we don't see evidence of this decision in her behavior, but does that mean she doesn't carry the weight of it? It's a matter of choice, but I like to think she did--and that she also carried the weight of the Tuvix decision with her for the rest of her life. That's the way life is for us flawed people, and Janeway was delightfully flawed imho.

There were some lame Voyager episodes, but Equinox wasn't one of them imho.

 

[Admiral Shran]

So it's okay to torture someone because seven million people died, but not because they are a traitor of their own kind and a murderer of aliens?

No, neither Janeway nor Archer was justified in torturing people. The only difference is that we see that Archer feels bad about it - to the point of being willing to die because of it.

And, as KimC said, what really happened to Lessing? He was tied to a chair and a rift ALMOST opened. Wow. Is that really torture?

So I guess waterboarding isn't torture either. After all, it's just a little water up the nose.

 

[vas2009]

Only the people who are blind Voyager cheerleaders stop listening. The rest of us acknowledge the truth when it is told and move on.

The rest of you acknowledge the comment without caring if there is a good reason for it or not, because of your own blind hate and move on.

When you've already made up your mind about something why defend your ideas... after all opinions are like a$$ holes... Since there are so many you should have some sensible argument to back it up. Otherwise, your just bitching and whining.

We've presented our reasons for disliking what we dislike, some of them many times over. You just don't want to accept it because it's more comfortable for you to assume that all Voyager "hate" is "baseless ranting".

Furthermore you refuse to accept what we say when we say point blank that it IS the portrayal of the characters that is at fault, and not the gender thereof. How much more clearly do you want us to make that point?

There is some serious misunderstandings with all of this. You think that I think you:
have no right to an opinion
are not allowed to hate or dislike voyager
and are sexist because you don't like Janeway

And you accuse me of turning to comfort and assumption instead of reading all the reasons given and taking them in to concideration.

Reasons? Yes there have been reasons.
Sorry, those are great reasons and I understand your reasoning...of course, duh, she's a hypocrite and a murder, why didn't I realize that? It's a wonder anyone likes her.
Seriously, I was looking for a little more something to think about because I am very open minded and willing to have a constructive discussion here.

I don't think just cuz you don't like her is cuz she's a women. I was only saying it could be possible of some people. It was ment for discussion not as an attack on anyone in particular. How much clearer do you need that?!

This thread is ment for dicussion is it not? There was an OP around here. Something along the lines of why is the ST commun. so Neg. toward VOY?

It turned into VOY sux because I said so and I have a right to an opinion and don't call me sexist.

I guess this was the sort of question that would prompt all the VOY Haters to put in their two cents. I except that.

There's your answer ReadyAndWilling. ST community is neg. toward voyager because the show had bad writting, it was inconsistent, Janeway was a cold blooded murderer, there was no character development, the premise was terrible, they didn't bring up Tuvix again, Janeway wasn't Hung for her crimes and two people were turned into lizards.
Don't forget these are all just opinions you are free to have your own.
P.S. There is no possible way someone doesn't like VOY because the captian was a women... that idea was shot down. Take that off the list.

 

[AuntKate]

So it's okay to torture someone because seven million people died, but not because they are a traitor of their own kind and a murderer of aliens?

No, neither Janeway nor Archer was justified in torturing people. The only difference is that we see that Archer feels bad about it - to the point of being willing to die because of it.

And, as KimC said, what really happened to Lessing? He was tied to a chair and a rift ALMOST opened. Wow. Is that really torture?

So I guess waterboarding isn't torture either. After all, it's just a little water up the nose.

Just because we didn't see Janeway's anguish over her actions doesn't mean she didn't feel bad about threatening Lessing--which is all she did. What happened to Lessing was much, much less than water boarding. There was no physical damage done to him whatsoever, just psychological duress, and even that is questionable. Lessing was sure they were playing good cop/bad cop. He didn't see the confrontation between KJ and Chakotay in the hallway, so it's quite possible that he assumed that the captain never intended to let things go very far--and, sure enough, in comes Chakotay before anything bad happens.

 

[vas2009]

With all the things they should have shown maybe VOY should have been 2 hours long.

She did think about her actions.
She spoke with Chakotay about her behavior afterwards and it was settled. She brought the croutons.

 

[darkwing_duck1]

^Because everything is magically all ok once Janeway brings the croutons...

 

[PsychoPere]

What happened to Lessing was much, much less than water boarding. There was no physical damage done to him whatsoever, just psychological duress, and even that is questionable.

It's been a long time since I've seen the Equinox two-parter, so I'm not going to comment on the specifics of the episode, but I had to respond to this.

Psychological duress can be torture just as much as physical injury can be. I'd say it can be even more important than physical acts considering psychological damage can be more lasting than physical injury.

I'll quote from the UN Convention Against Torture:

[...] any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him, or a third person, information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity. [...]

(emphasis added by me)

 

[vas2009]

@ darkwing_duck1

You do understand!

 

[You_Will_Fail]

I've been dealing with anti-VOY complainers for 15 years. I understand the complaints quite well.

No you don't, shown by how you constantly resort to exaggeration, hyperbole and putting words in other people's mouths in an attempt to defend aspects of Voyager. That means I can't have a normal, intelligent argument with you and it appears much of the forum have already realized this, this will be my last comment on the subject.

 

[Anwar]

It's not my fault if the basic argument against VOY always comes down to "I wanted to see every last little moment of every single repair/resupply action and I wanted every single character on the show, including the 50 million recurring characters I also wanted, to ruminate on every single last little thing that happens to them." As well as "I wanted the Borg to be utterly invincible, unable to be defeated and unable to escape from" which would have ended the show in a nanosecond.

Drop those arguments, argue about something else, then you qualify for a "normal, intelligent" argument.

 

[RyuRoots]

It's not my fault if the basic argument against VOY always comes down to "I wanted to see every last little moment of every single repair/resupply action and I wanted every single character on the show, including the 50 million recurring characters I also wanted, to ruminate on every single last little thing that happens to them." As well as "I wanted the Borg to be utterly invincible, unable to be defeated and unable to escape from" which would have ended the show in a nanosecond.

Drop those arguments, argue about something else, then you qualify for a "normal, intelligent" argument.

No. You are wrong. I have never seen any of these things said except by you.

 

[kimc]

Lessing was sure they were playing good cop/bad cop. He didn't see the confrontation between KJ and Chakotay in the hallway, so it's quite possible that he assumed that the captain never intended to let things go very far--and, sure enough, in comes Chakotay before anything bad happens.

This is a good point. Either the actor playing Lessing wasn't very good or he didn't believe Janeway was going to unleash the aliens on him - or so it appeared to me at the time. In fact, Chakotay was emoting more than Lessing at that point which is fairly ironic.

 

[InklingStar]

If the Voyager writers did not plan to address the issues of replacing shuttlecraft and photon torpedoes, resupplying, meeting alien races and then quickly leaving them behind, and other things associated with the premise, then why did they bother stranding the ship in the first place? Why not just leave it in Federation space and make it TNG-lite?

 

[vas2009]

If the Voyager writers did not plan to address the issues of replacing shuttlecraft and photon torpedoes, resupplying, meeting alien races and then quickly leaving them behind, and other things associated with the premise, then why did they bother stranding the ship in the first place? Why not just leave it in Federation space and make it TNG-lite?

They did resupply. They talked about reasources to make repairs in general and on shuttlecraft, there were episodes like Blood fever where they were mining something for some purpose that had to do with resupplying...just one example. They also traded for supplies.

They left alien races behind because they were going home

 

[Galileo7]

If the Voyager writers did not plan to address the issues of replacing shuttlecraft and photon torpedoes, resupplying, meeting alien races and then quickly leaving them behind, and other things associated with the premise, then why did they bother stranding the ship in the first place? Why not just leave it in Federation space and make it TNG-lite?

This is a constant problem when the viewer knows that your resources are limited, I always thought the should have had something new on the Intrepid class a room that was the Replicator Deck that could replicate anything that could fit in the room, of course it would be located adjacent to the hangar deck for shuttles specific. Just a thought.

 

[TheGodBen]

So it's okay to torture someone because seven million people died, but not because they are a traitor of their own kind and a murderer of aliens?

7,000,000 died, and the rest of the human race was about to die with them if Archer didn't find the weapon.

But no, I never said Archer's actions were right, just necessary. There is a difference.

And, as KimC said, what really happened to Lessing? He was tied to a chair and a rift ALMOST opened. Wow. Is that really torture?

How about we tie you to a chair and release a bear into a room and see how you feel?

Janeway did realize that she'd gone too far and told Chakotay so.

No, she said this:

JANEWAY: Chakotay. You know, you may have had good reason to stage a little mutiny of your own.
CHAKOTAY: The thought had occurred to me, but that would have been crossing the line.

She never said she was wrong, and then Chakotay left her off the hook even though Chakotay has a history of betraying authority when he thinks he's right. You can almost hear the writers saying "Let's just pretend none of this happened."

I thought the comparisons between herself and Ransom were wonderful. She was focused on bringing the Equinox crew to justice and put aside some of her taboos to do so. That is what Ranson did; he was focused on his crew's survival and put aside the prime directive to "harvest" the aliens. She was willing to threaten Lessing's life in order to complete her "mission." Ransom was willing to disassemble Seven of Nine to complete his. The difference was that Janeway's crew was able to reach her and keep her from crossing the line, whereas Ransom's crew, including Lessing, aided and abetted his crimes. Janeway saw that and expressed regret for her actions and appreciation for the crew that stopped her.

That's not what happened.

Janeway tortured Simon, Chakotay rebelled, Janeway relieved him of command. Janeway made a pact with the aliens to kill the Equinox crew, Tuvok objected, she warned him that she'd relieve him of command too. Janeway only realised how she was turning to the dark side after Ransom contacted her and told her that he was trying to do the right thing.

Janeway's crew didn't get her to back down at all, she pretty much ignored them.

What more was she to do? Thanks to the giant reset button that was in play during Voyager, we don't see evidence of this decision in her behavior, but does that mean she doesn't carry the weight of it? It's a matter of choice, but I like to think she did--and that she also carried the weight of the Tuvix decision with her for the rest of her life.

Okay, but that works both ways; if you want to imagine that Janeway dealt with the guilt of torturing a man off-screen, then I'm allowed to imagine that she didn't and that the reason we never saw the Equinox characters again is because she went crazy and shot them. And she killed the Borg baby and ate it in a sandwich. And the reason why we never saw Samantha Wildman again is because Janeway has her chained up in her bathroom and every morning she pees down her throat. Oh, and Harry rapes pandas.

There's no actual evidence for any of this, but if we're allowed to make up our own stories about the characters then don't be upset if people come online and complain about the character based on something that didn't actually happen.

There were some lame Voyager episodes, but Equinox wasn't one of them imho.

You're right, it's not, there's a lot of great ideas in that episode and Janeway turning bad is one of them. The problem is the way it was executed left some things to be desired, and there didn't seem to be a clear idea behind her character arc. It is a good episode, but it could have been a great episode.

Just because we didn't see Janeway's anguish over her actions doesn't mean she didn't feel bad about threatening Lessing--which is all she did.

That's all Archer did, it's still torture in both cases.

What happened to Lessing was much, much less than water boarding. There was no physical damage done to him whatsoever, just psychological duress, and even that is questionable.

There's no physical damage from water-boarding either, which is why the US military was insistent for so long that it wasn't torture when it is by every other definition. With water-boarding, the person only thinks that they're drowning, they're never in any real danger because their head can be pulled out at any moment.

Lessing was sure they were playing good cop/bad cop. He didn't see the confrontation between KJ and Chakotay in the hallway, so it's quite possible that he assumed that the captain never intended to let things go very far--and, sure enough, in comes Chakotay before anything bad happens.

So because nothing bad happened, it's okay that Janeway very nearly let something bad happen? If I go out onto a busy street and shoot a gun wildly, but I don't hit anybody, does that make it okay for me to put all those people's lives in danger?

 

[JonnyQuest037]

VOY is absolutely my least favorite of the Treks. I stopped watching it on a regular basis after the Sulu episode, and I never regretting that decision. Let me try, in as polite as way as possible, to explain what I found so disappointing/infuriating about it:

-It had a flawed premise to begin with. Like LOST IN SPACE and GILLIGAN'S ISLAND, you knew they were never really going to get home, because if they did, the show would be over.

-It failed to live up to the potential character conflict between Starfleet and the Maquis. They melded together as one unit WAY too easily & quickly.

-It never really felt like actions had consequences. I never felt the desperation or potential compromises the crew would probably go through in that situation.

-A lot of the characters seemed like retreads. Tuvok was like Spock without the compelling internal conflict. Belanna Torres seemed like a low-rent Worf. Neelix was the funny-looking comic relief alien like Quark, etc.

-Janeway was written in a very erratic and unsympathetic manner, and I was not a fan of Kate Mulgrew's acting. I never bought her as a charismatic leader who could bring people together.

-The sheer desperation of adding a big-breasted Borg as a regular character in hopes of increasing viewership I just found sad.

-And lastly, the whole "Kirk & his crew would be thrown into the brig today" scene in the Sulu episode I found REALLY insulting and disrespectful to TOS.

I just never felt like the show developed enough of its own identity. It always felt like a 3rd generation of TNG.

 

[Brit]

So because nothing bad happened, it's okay that Janeway very nearly let something bad happen? If I go out onto a busy street and shoot a gun wildly, but I don't hit anybody, does that make it okay for me to put all those people's lives in danger?

The charges you would face would certainly be a lot less than if you had killed or hurt someone. And frankly I see no difference in 7,000,000 endangered people and one endangered person. Endangered is endangered, there are no differences just because the numbers were greater. I've not seen the Enterprise episode, but from the description here I don't see one bit of difference between what he did and what she did. So why the difference in your reaction to it, why is one excusable and the other not? The acts are comparable so it looks like a double standard from my POV.

Brit.

 

[Galileo7]

-It had a flawed premise to begin with. Like LOST IN SPACE and GILLIGAN'S ISLAND, you knew they were never really going to get home, because if they did, the show would be over.

I was thinking the same thing, including those series dealing with dwindling supplies too.

 

[vas2009]

That's not what happened.

Janeway tortured Simon, Chakotay rebelled, Janeway relieved him of command. Janeway made a pact with the aliens to kill the Equinox crew, Tuvok objected, she warned him that she'd relieve him of command too. Janeway only realised how she was turning to the dark side after Ransom contacted her and told her that he was trying to do the right thing.

Okay, but that works both ways; if you want to imagine that Janeway dealt with the guilt of torturing a man off-screen, then I'm allowed to imagine that she didn't and that the reason we never saw the Equinox characters again is because she went crazy and shot them. And she killed the Borg baby and ate it in a sandwich. And the reason why we never saw Samantha Wildman again is because Janeway has her chained up in her bathroom and every morning she pees down her throat. Oh, and Harry rapes pandas.

There's no actual evidence for any of this, but if we're allowed to make up our own stories about the characters then don't be upset if people come online and complain about the character based on something that didn't actually happen.

She told Tuvok she had a plan. Turned out she didn't need the plan in the end.

I trusted her and so did Tuvok.

It's an assumption you make because you know the type of person the character is. Janeway to the writers and the people who "love" her she is warm and caring also a very good judge of character. As a viewer I don't think it was completely necessary for the character to have to SPELL it out everytime. I don't understand why there needs to be so much explaination all the time.

The episode in my opinion was fine the way it was. I don't need to see every detail, a little less talk is fine with me.