Would You Like Earth To Join A Federation?

[All Seeing Eye]

Just imagine for a moment that we develop warp drive and set off out into the stars and explore strange new worlds and new life and new civilisations and we come across an Organisation called the the United Alliance of Planets , they offer Earth membership but we must conform to their laws and we hand power over to their 'council' with our planet sending a representative, also if we wanna travel on starships we must join their Starfleet. Would you like Earth to join? or would you prefer to go it alone like the Klingons/Romulans and Cardassians in Trek?

Obviously in this scenario Earth isnt a founding world and we are the outsiders being offered membership.
Would we as a people really give up our sovereignty to an organisation like this?

 

[blaXXer]

Never. Give me liberty or give me death!
Filthy aliens are just gonna steal our jobs...

 

[Crewman47]

Was trying to think of a reference and could only come up with GR's Andromeda. In that we have Earth who are the ones that join a space alliance and they accept rather than the other way round of a space alliance joining Earth just like in Star Trek and possibly even Babylon 5.

I think it'd be a great idea for us anyway to join an Alliance of some sort, even if it were becuase we were a young race who were going blindly into the unknown. With an Alliance to join we'd be able to increase our knowledge of the known Universe far greater than what we would if we did it ourselves.

 

[trash80]

I think we would not join because as we were not in the federation we would obviously be ruled by a brutal military fascist regime.

 

[Blueicus]

What about a benign military fascist regime?

 

[misskim86]

Absolutely not. To think Earth would have a non human leader would be horrible

 

[XKin]

Yes of course I would. Just further societal development.

 

[Sito_Jaxa]

Maybe. How much would it increase our taxes?

 

[Anwar]

misskim86 said:
Absolutely not. To think Earth would have a non human leader would be horrible

Right, like every last leader a human nation ever had was some Saint.

 

[Sci]

misskim86 said:
Absolutely not. To think Earth would have a non human leader would be horrible

.... So most of Star Trek is horrible? If the leader is elected and respects human -- or, rather, sentient -- rights, what does it matter his/her/hir/its species?

If this alliance/federation/what-have-you grants its members autonomy and is itself consistent with the principles of constitutional liberal democracy, I don't see what the problem would be.

 

[EnsignJulka]

The federation reminds me of the EU, you can have your national identity but remember that there's a bigger organisation which unites the differences for a bigger cause...

 

[misskim86]

Sci said:

misskim86 said:
Absolutely not. To think Earth would have a non human leader would be horrible

.... So most of Star Trek is horrible? If the leader is elected and respects human -- or, rather, sentient -- rights, what does it matter his/her/hir/its species?

If this alliance/federation/what-have-you grants its members autonomy and is itself consistent with the principles of constitutional liberal democracy, I don't see what the problem would be.

No most of Star Trek is good, just Voyager that really sucks

 

[Sci]

misskim86 said:

Sci said:

misskim86 said:
Absolutely not. To think Earth would have a non human leader would be horrible

.... So most of Star Trek is horrible? If the leader is elected and respects human -- or, rather, sentient -- rights, what does it matter his/her/hir/its species?

If this alliance/federation/what-have-you grants its members autonomy and is itself consistent with the principles of constitutional liberal democracy, I don't see what the problem would be.

No most of Star Trek is good, just Voyager that really sucks

Well, okay. But most of Star Trek presumes that Earth is led, as a member of the Federation, by a non-Human Federation President. The Efrosian President in Star Trek VI, for example, or the Grazerite President in DS9's "Homecoming"/"Paradise Lost." And the novels go even further, establishing a Pandrilite named Amitra to have been present throughout early TNG, and numerous Trill, Vulcan, Bolian, and Andorian presidents to have served throughout Federation history. So -- if Earth being led by a non-human would be horrible, then so would, theoretically, most of Star Trek.

 

[JiNX-01]

If it was structured to operate under the rule of law, yes, I would. As an American, I already belong to one. 13 colonies gave up autonomy to unite under one constitution because their leaders believed there is strength in unity.

The European Union has done the same.

 

[Sci]

JiNX-01 said:
If it was structured to operate under the rule of law, yes, I would. As an American, I already belong to one. 13 colonies gave up autonomy to unite under one constitution because their leaders believed there is strength in unity.

The European Union has done the same.

I don't see why so many are threatened by the idea.

Because people forget -- if we're speaking in terms of general politics -- that the United States is a means to an end (liberty and equality and justice for all), not an end in and of itself.

 

[misskim86]

I'm not sure how you can equate that all of Star Trek is horrible because there is one horrible element.

Star Trek has people killing others but I don't say Star Trek is horrible because of that

 

[Rowan Sjet]

...also if we wanna travel on starships we must join their Starfleet.

Just pointing out that a lot of alien members of the Federation still have their own starships. The Vulcans for example.

Would you like Earth to join? or would you prefer to go it alone like the Klingons/Romulans and Cardassians in Trek?

It all depends on how similar the laws and attitudes of this Alliance are to our own. But I imagine whatever the case, we'd wait a few years to find out more about this Alliance and find our own place in the Universe before we even started thinking of joining.

 

[Red Ranger]

As long as it's not like the alien race in that "Twilight Zone" ep "To Serve Man!"

But seriously, it would depend. If it were like the Federation, that would be OK. If it were like the Dominion, not so good.

Red Ranger

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Sure, a Federation like the one on Star Trek, which is based on American values of liberal democracy and free market communism.

It's never been clear just how much sovereignity any Fed planets give up. It could be that they just join together for mutual defense. More like NATO than the UN. Since Earth dominates Starfleet, it's a slam dunk that Earth calls the shots, so there would be no sovereignity problem. For everyone else, maybe, but that's the price you pay for not doing your own defense.

I've always figured that Earth founded the Federation more out of necessity than anything else. They couldn't defend their planet on their own so they went looking for help. Too bad ENT started to tell this story but didn't have the chance to complete it. Maybe someday.

Which makes we wonder, the Andorians pride themselves on their military prowess, shouldn't they be more heavily represented in Starfleet?

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

ST seems to have it well covered in this area. Federation member worlds appear to be free to govern themselves as they see fit; Earth's own government (United Earth) didn't cease to exist, for example.

The Federation is a win-win situation, really. Entry is voluntary, so no one is forced to join; members come together for common defense and aid, yet each world can run its own (local) government and military*, as long as it doesn't contravene general Federation principles. I have no problem with that.

*As I said, Federation member worlds all have their own governments, as we already know. Indications are that they can each keep their own *military* as well, to deal with purely local matters. The Bajoran Militia, for example, will largely be absorbed into Starfleet when Bajor joins, but it will not completely disappear.