this post was submitted on 16 Jun 2023
6 points (100.0% liked)

Star Trek Social Club

10675 readers
38 users here now

r/startrek: The Next Generation

Star Trek news and discussion. No slash fic...

Maybe a little slash fic.

New to Star Trek and wondering where to start?

Rules

1 Be constructiveAll posts/comments must be thoughtful and balanced.

2 Be welcomingIt is important that everyone from newbies to OG Trekkers feel welcome, no matter their gender, sexual orientation, religion or race.

3 Be truthfulAll posts/comments must be factually accurate and verifiable. We are not a place for gossip, rumors, or manipulative or misleading content.

4 Be niceIf a polite way cannot be found to phrase what it is you want to say, don't say anything at all. Insulting or disparaging remarks about any human being are expressly not allowed.

5 SpoilersUtilize the spoiler system for any and all spoilers relating to the most recently-aired episode. There is no formal spoiler protection for episodes/films after they have been available for approximately one week.

6 Keep on-topicAll busmittions must be directly about the Star Trek franchise (the shows, movies, books, etc.). Off-topic discussions are welcome at c/Quarks.

7 MetaQuestions and concerns about moderator actions should be brought forward via DM.

Upcoming Episodes

Date Episode Title
11-28 LD 5x07 "Fully Dilated"
12-05 LD 5x08 "Upper Decks"
12-12 LD 5x09 "Fissure Quest"
12-19 LD 5x10 "The New Next Generation"
01-24 Film "Section 31"

Episode Discussion Archive

In Production

Strange New Worlds (TBA)

Section 31 (2025-01-24)

Starfleet Academy (TBA)

In Development

Untitled theatrical film

Untitled comedy series

Wondering where to stream a series? Check here.

Allied Discord Server

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
6
Prime Directive Opinions (startrek.website)
submitted 2 years ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
21 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

For those of you here who think the prime directive is flawed, or could be adjusted.

What do you agree with, how would you change what you disagree with, and why?

top 21 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I think the original Prime Directive from TOS was fairly straightforward. A statement about the U. S.' involvement in the Vietnam war. Another, "In the future, we don't do that kind of stuff anymore." Storytelling in Star Trek evolved and expanded over the years. I think this has left the Prime Directive still valid, but vague.

Vague in the what ifs of not intervening to prevent the destruction of a civilization that isn't brought on by that society's (or societies) decisions. I get if the Federation sits out on stopping a society its own self-destruction. Even if new to warp technology, a planet with societies bent on self-destructing means about all the Federation could do is become the planetary police force. I think SNW's s1e1 planet Kiley 279 is an outlier. Kiley 279 being on the precipice of warp-backed absolute destruction was Starfleet's fault. Unintentional, but still their fault. I think violating the Prime Directive in that situation was warranted.

The Prime Directive is like the rule to stop at red lights. Not an extensive treatise, but important. Violating that rule can lead to very bad things. Still, sometimes following the Prime Directive can lead to very bad things, like in the Terran universe. I wonder what would happen if that scenario was repeated in the regular Star Trek universe. I think the First Contact Protocol is a lot more extensive and comprehensive. There's a lot of possible first contact scenarios, from "hey, cool, welcome!" to panic and attacking the landing party.

The Prime Directive is important. However, I think it isn't comprehensive.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago (1 children)

@Nmyownworld @anasepho

More rules=more opportunities to let criminals through without consequence. If you have rules A,B,C,D,E,G,H,I.. Someone could reasonably say "You were so thorough, the omission of "F" had to be intentional".

A B&W guideline, with the understanding that the letter can be violated at the cost of a thorough investigation afterward is a reasonable approach if everyone acts in good faith.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

That's an interesting perspective. I agree that "this is a set law" can be perceived as anything not covered being construed as legal (although not necessarily moral). Which could lead to the creation of a new law, or the change in an existing law, to cover the new territory. I also agree that with a guideline a lot depends on acting in good faith. I think the Prime Directive is vague when the situation is the destruction of a civilization due to a natural cause, not from the actions of the civilization.

Say a natural event -- a meteor or asteroid or solar flare or something -- will cause an extinction level event on the planet with a pre-warp civilization. And, Starfleet has the means to prevent such a thing. As long as the pre-warp civilization never knows that their destruction was prevented by Starfleet, whether choosing to save the civilization or to doing nothing and allow it to be destroyed, are both following the Prime Directive. For me, that's where the Prime Directive is vague. Or, quite likely, I'm unsuccessfully trying to process two vastly different outcomes having the same value, i.e. not violating the Prime Directive.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago (1 children)

@Nmyownworld

It is vague, and I would consider that positive. In your asteroid example, neither approach would lead to hard disciplinary action, but perhaps leadership could stress that moving the asteroid was the better approach, and that would propagate through channels, so the next time, a captain will act accordingly.

Pike's interference is a little less clearcut. I think he did the right thing, and leadership seems to agree.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

@Nmyownworld

The debriefing can propagate through channels, and others can use it as a guideline to compare with their situation when it occurs.

The outcomes for what a captain does can range from a hand wavy "Good job", to a week's long tribunal that ends with the captain stripped of rank and sent to a prison camp.

It's imperfect, as everything is, but it's a good workable system when used by elite professionals, and will result in a positive outcome more times than not.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago (1 children)

@Nmyownworld

Precedent will make it better over time.

Sorry for the multipost. I'm on Mastodon, and have a character limit. I'm trying to limit my accounts, and working within restrictions, but I'm not sure the Mastodon-Lemmy is working out.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago

No worries about the multi-post. Of course, you must do what works best for you. Hopefully, that decision will keep you posting here on Star Trek. Your views and opinions are interesting and welcomed.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago (1 children)

My biggest (only real) gripe with it is the "sit by and watch a civilisation die from something we could prevent inside five minutes without ever being noticed" shtick.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago

Bonus points when they try to bring fate into it

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago (2 children)

The Prime Directive is not a bad idea when it exists to minimise harm. When it gets turned into a pseudo-religious dogma, where it is considered better to allow a culture to be extinguished than to risk contaminating it, that's when there are problems for me.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Zero tolerance policies ensure injustice in outlier cases. Yes, it’s unethical to interfere in a civilization’s development 99.9% of the time, but there are always exceptions. Ignoring outliers is pretending your system is above the fundamental laws of the universe.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

@NVariable @Albert_Newton

First, and just to make crystal clear that I agree, I agree.

Second, I'm not sure Starfleet Command is, in any century, quite up to really comprehending this.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)

A thought experiment occurred to me. What is the absolute best subject for a zero tolerance policy? Genocide is the first thought. The most horrific evil that could ever be inflicted.

But let’s say hypothetically, there was a virus that was highly-transmissible and has a 100% fatality rate. A virus killing all of mankind. And let’s say somehow this virus is sentient. We have no idea how it works, but we can confirm that it thinks, feels, etc. The virus is provably sentient for our hypothetical purposes.

If someone develops an absolute cure to the disease, it will save everyone, but it will also wipe out the sentient virus. That is technically genocide, but it saves all life from death. Should a zero tolerance policy govern? Or can we at least have a conversation about wiping out the sentient virus?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago (1 children)

@NVariable @Benfell isn’t this an ‘us vs them’ choice for mutual genocide?

My hot take: we either (a) persuade the virus to stop our genocide or (b) kill it because we could have coexisted if only they’d been able to.

But that has a Corollary: If one deems ‘us vs them’ must be decided in favor of the organism able to coexist without annihilating another (something the virus can’t prevent itself from doing): is human-caused mass-extinction an indictment against us? Seems so.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)

@cascheranno @NVariable

For a precedent, consider how we treat nonhuman animals.

We would shamelessly obliterate the virus.

And yes, of course we're hypocrites with a human-caused mass extinction event.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago

@Benfell @NVariable to be precise, we archive a sampling of our nonsentient murderous virii.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago

Basically exactly what I was going to say. Like what is the harm in contaminating them when the alternative is non-existence?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

My theory -- based on us seeing numerous violations of the Prime Directive from main characters -- is that the interpretation of the rule is "you better be willing to risk your career if you break this," not "your career is 100% over if you break this."

It's a heuristic, and a good one, but there seems to be in-universe exceptions for exceptional cases.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I'm not familiar with Star Trek, but I believe the series show examples in which not respecting the prime directive has grave consequences. This serves as proof that the prime directive is relevant. These points are present in Stargate about which I'm more familiar.

But these examples are fictional. I wonder if the prime directive would be the way to go in real situations. Wouldn't there be a way to share technology safely? Does it make sense to talk about "maturity" and "readiness" of a civilization?

Maybe you have to live a catadtrophe to grasp its gravity and swear to never let it happen again. But couldn't the "inferior" civilizations be taught these trauma second-hand?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago

@thedarkfly In Star Trek, the Prime Directive plays a dual role as something which is critical but also something that you do not obey blindly. Some of the best outcomes stem from disobeying the D’ because there was an even higher, unwritten truth about to be violated.

I’d also suggest that the D’ doesn’t say we can never share technology; instead that we mustn’t share it openly with people who are sufficiently behind in development, and that is an important distinction.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 2 years ago

I think it really just boils down to that notion that it's better to let a civilization die in a preventable natural disaster than interfere with their "natural development".

Aside from that absolutist take, there seem to be plenty of exceptions to the PD - Starfleet is free to respond to distress calls, consider individual requests for asylum, offer assistance when a planets government asks for it, etc.