If I gotta choose between a food I rarely get to eat, a tablet or computer, a drumset, etc or clothes when clothes are covered by my uniforms, I'd take the other stuff to be honest.
Why were they always in their Uniforms?
- Thread starter ThatsMrCaptaintoyou
- Start date
Yeah, there was discussion about uniforms in some early episodes, and even much later with one of Seven's holodeck programs (when her holodeck fantasy self requested permission to wear a uniform). The only people on the ship who did not wear uniforms were Neelix, Kes, Seven, and the kids. And I'm fairly sure that at some point Naomi must have asked for a "Captain's Assistant" uniform and was told that "maybe when you grow up, but for now, just be happy you don't have to wear a uniform all the time".
For the most part, everyone was stranded in the Delta Quadrant in the clothes they were standing in, and there weren't many opportunities to get new stuff unless they could barter on some planet or base. Yes, everyone was allotted replicator rations to use as they chose, and I would think that most people chose to use them on their favorite foods - or just edible foods - whenever Neelix got too "creative".
Tom ran an ongoing betting pool that Janeway tried to quell in the first season, but gave up at some point to the extent that even she was participating by the end of the final season (ie. when the Paris' baby would be born). So Tom didn't usually lack for replicator rations and could therefore afford luxuries like Hawaiian shirts, and B'Elanna could replicate the materials to build him an old-fashioned 1950s TV (with a remote control).
It looks like Kes spent her rations on clothing (Neelix as well), and Seven must have had an impressive pile of rations saved up by the end of the show (I think she just replicated a couple of civilian outfits and the occasional mess hall treat along with her nutritional supplements).
It makes sense that the Maquis would have saved their old clothes, because that's literally all some of them owned.
About the only thing I can think of that Harry splurged on was his clarinet (he left his original one on Earth and there wasn't time for his mom to send it to DS9).
I don’t remember his civilian clothes at all. I do remember what Wesley used to wear. Unfortunately. Wish I could forget.
Well, according to Worf the uniforms are designed to be comfortable in every environment. after all.
Does it say it somewhere or it’s a theory of yours?
Thanks 
That they were always in their uniforms Was actually one of the things I didn't like about Voyager. As @Gaith said it gives the impression that they are constantly forced to be "on duty" and since most of the characters on VOY (imo) were already quite bland that didn't help them in my eyes.
On the other shows we at least occasionally saw them in other clothes (and personally I LIKE 24th century fashion) and you could always assume that they spent their off-time somewhere in the civilian parts of the Ent-D and DS9(or even Bajor) with Voyager they were stuck.
And while the Raplicator Rations argument makes sense on paper...well all pretence of scarcity was thrown out of the window whenever they felt like anyway.
On the other shows we at least occasionally saw them in other clothes (and personally I LIKE 24th century fashion) and you could always assume that they spent their off-time somewhere in the civilian parts of the Ent-D and DS9(or even Bajor) with Voyager they were stuck.
And while the Raplicator Rations argument makes sense on paper...well all pretence of scarcity was thrown out of the window whenever they felt like anyway.
Maybe the washing machine and dryer were broken and they never bothered to fix it? 
Speaking of people always being on duty, something I hated in Voyager, especially in the later seasons, was how it seemed that only the main cast were competent to run the ship. Paris seemed to be the only helmsman, to the point that when he was unavailable Chakotai (whose role as first officer was never developed) filled in, if B’elanna was not in engineering the chief defaulted to 7 (who wasn’t even Starfleet!), the only nurse was Paris (even in the early seasons we glimpsed at other medical personal on occasion). Very frustrating and very unrealistic.
Wasn't seven also the head of stellar cartography, with actual starfleet officers, like the Delaney Twins, working under her?
No power for replicators... but let's use the Holodeck, which uses the same basic technology as transporters and replicators. Yeah, sounds about right.
But it gave us such wonderful and interesting "story-lines" such as Janeway's Victorian fantasy, Neelix dancing barefoot and Fair Haven
Yep. But it was kinda her pet-project, which used Borg sensors and didn’t exist before her arrival, so I can kinda justify that.
The holodeck has its own power source, *incompatible* with the other systems. This makes no sense whatsoever but is the official explanation on why they can afford to keep using it.
That happened in every Trek show, besides there is no 2am in space, its always night
In Worf's opinion. On a climate-controlled ship, why do the crew wear an undershirt, uniform, and a jacket?
Voyager is my favorite non-TOS series, and I've seen every episode multiple times. While Mark_Nguyen has provided the link to confirm this, please realize that I am honest enough to say if something actually happened on the show, I think it happened but am not sure, or if it's a theory of mine.
Harry's clarinet was part of his story arc that continued throughout the show, but I guess some people never noticed because they don't like Harry. I always did like him, so I paid attention.
These are my guesses:Maybe the washing machine and dryer were broken and they never bothered to fix it?
1. They may have recycled old, filthy uniforms and replicated clean ones, or:
2. As there were sonic showers to clean themselves, there may have been an equivalent to do the laundry - getting rid of dirt, sweat, food spillage, etc. and generally refreshing the uniform.
Not Trek-related, but related to doing laundry in space: The late Ben Bova wrote a fantastic series of novels called The Grand Tour, in which he chronicled humanity's quest to explore the Moon, set up a base and colony there, mine asteroids (set up a base on Ceres), explore Mars, and send expeditions to study and set up bases on Mercury, in orbit around Jupiter and Titan, and various other places. I can't recommend this series enough.
There are two novels in the series dealing specifically with the Moon, and the question comes up about laundry: How do you do laundry in a place where every drop of water is needed for more important things?
The solution: Take the laundry outside, lay it out on the surface, and let the Sun's UV rays do their thing. Bring the laundry in, and it's done. No water is needed, and the laundry is sterilized of anything that's a contaminant.
Vorik was mentioned as being able to assist on occasion, and who cares if Seven wasn't Starfleet? Neither were Neelix and Kes, and both of them were trusted with important duties. Without the ability to shuffle crew around at the next starbase - something that could have been done in the Alpha Quadrant, if some of them weren't measuring up - Janeway was stuck with the people she had, and couldn't afford to waste anyone's knowledge or abilities.
Kes was trained as a nurse, and we saw her performing those duties fairly frequently in the first three seasons. Paris was training as a backup doctor, having had a whole semester's basic training in Starfleet. As mentioned, Janeway couldn't afford to waste anyone's knowledge if it could be useful.
I'd have to go back to re-read, to see if that was addressed. It's possible the author overlooked that, or didn't know at the time he wrote that particular story.Too bad lunar dust is incredibly toxic. Or do they address how to address that, too?
thanks. I remember well the clarinet, just didn’t remember the bit about it being replicated.
No problem with that.
The officers in the chain of command that see their post as backup chief engineers usurped by a civilian? For example Carey...
No problem with 7 helping out, but she shouldn’t be in charge of the place.
Neelix was cook, self-appointed morale officer and ambassador to the delta quadrant, all posts that didn’t previously exist. He was worried about being useless, so found way to make himself useful and, admiringly, didn’t step on anyone’s shoes doing so.
Kes started as a simple passenger, found interest in medicine and began studying, becoming the only nurse (apart from the few moments others appeared mysteriously). She also worked on growing vegetables, something the ship didn’t need before getting stranded and something that no one else was officially doing, at least initially.
this is a discovery that’s only a couple of years old.Too bad lunar dust is incredibly toxic. Or do they address how to address that, too?
Carey got his nose in a knot because he saw B'Elanna not only as a civilian, but as a criminal civilian. Apparently none of the Starfleet crew had any idea that some of the Maquis actually had Starfleet training.
On a temporary basis? Why not? It's not like she had an actual job title in the Engineering department. Janeway would have been an idiot not to use Seven's knowledge and experience - some of it gained through assimilation of actual Starfleet engineers.
(not to say that it was okay or admirable to assimilate those engineers, but it would have been stupid not to make use of the knowledge)
Tuvok would disagree with you, as he was frequently irritated by Neelix' efforts to acquire and apply what he learned as far as security went. This is one reason why I never liked Tuvok; he rarely gave Neelix even a smidgen of the respect or courtesy he was due.
Strictly speaking, Tom was also a civilian yet was left in charge of Sickbay when the Doctor was either off the ship or having technical difficulties and therefore offline.
B’elanna was not a civilian, she had a provisional rank at that point, as all the maquis, and, contrarily to most of the maquis, had some previous Starfleet experience.
The B’Elanna/Carey issue in early season 1 was IMHO well handled and I don’t have a problem with it.
Exactly: she has no title and shouldn’t run the place. Even Vorik and most definitely Carey outrank her, she shouldn’t be in a position of giving them orders.
Civilian consultant is fine and good, but she is not a part of the command structure (as occasionally pointed out), so she shouldn’t be in command. Especially when there are officers that are entitled to a given position.
Tuvok surely doubted he was qualified for security and his usefulness in general on occasion, but what has this to do with the topic?
Tom was never a civilian: he was Starfleet, fully reinstated by Jane way. That said, ironically, Tom never fills in for the Doctor between Kes taking on nurse’s duties and her leaving the ship.
And the head of navigation becoming nurse/substitute MD is ludicrous after a while: a priority should have been for the doctor to train someone else but they never seem to do that after Kes departing.
Someone must have forgotten to mention that to Carey.
Did you miss the argument between Janeway and Chakotay over who would take over as Chief Engineer? Janeway was prejudiced against B'Elanna due to her Maquis affiliation, her temper, and her unwillingness to look past any of that to understand just how good an engineer B'Elanna actually was.
Oh, FFS. She was "in command" maybe twice in four seasons. The one time was in the episode about the Omega molecule, a highly top-secret thing that only Captains and above are allowed to know about, but which Seven knew due to the Borg having assimilated a number of captains and above.
Seven was put in charge of situations where her knowledge was greater than B'Elanna's or Carey's or Vorik's, and when it was that important that there really wasn't time to go through a chain of command thing where the Starfleet officers would decide whether to take the word of a civilian who knew what the hell she was talking about over an officer who didn't have a clue.
If they'd gone the latter route, they would never have survived to reach the Alpha Quadrant.
We were talking about civilians. Neelix was a civilian who tried to make himself useful in a number of ways, including studying to become a security officer.
Janeway's irregular appointments were provisional and could have been countermanded at any time once they regained contact with Starfleet.
Tom was drafted as a medic-in-training, and don't tell me he never took shifts in Sickbay when the Doctor wasn't there.
Tom was never a nurse. Did you even watch the early episodes?
People cross-trained in a variety of ways. They would have to, since there was no way to take on new Starfleet crew. The more skills people learned, the better the odds of survival. There was an episode in which Tom was teaching Kes to fly a shuttle. Why aren't you citing that as "ludicrous"?
