Why I dont consider Enterprise as part of trek.........

posted on January 4th, 2011, 2:28 pm

Actually, it does because they willing chose to let them die. If they stayed out they wouldn't be guilty, but they didn't; they specifically forced themselves into the position of choosing life or death and playing god, putting them into the position of choosing how life develops there. Willingly choosing death makes them as responsible as the original cause and 'life's choice' is as bogus as their 'evolving to death' justification.

Agreeing to help and developing the cure put them into the exact position the later Prime Directive is supposed to help prevent.

as i said before, regardless of whether they promised to help or not, it doesnt make them responsible. they chose to not interfere. which is the correct choice. they didnt choose to let them die directly, they chose to stay out of things that arent their business, which led to the secondary implication that these fellas all died.

the thing here which the prime directive would protect against is giving that race the false hope when they made the promise. preferably archer would have not promised to help, and wouldnt have made contact with them at all.

[Tyler]

posted on January 4th, 2011, 2:38 pm

Last edited by Tyler on January 4th, 2011, 2:40 pm, edited 1 time in total.

They didn't choose not to interfere originally, they chose to interfere then enforced the death right at the end. Their logic was 'evolution chose for them to die and the Valkians must die for the Menk to procced'. They chose death when they created a cure for the problem and willingly decided to withhold it because they would die without it.

They didn't withhold it and they died as a result, they withheld it because they decided it was neccisary for the Valakians to die. Phlox even said it would be unethical to help only after deciding the Menk couldn't evolve unless their neighbours died.

Genocide is when you willing have a part in the destruction of a race or culture, and they forced themselves into the big chair and made the choice.

posted on January 4th, 2011, 2:46 pm

they chose to interfere partially by making a promise. this was bad yes, they shouldnt have done it. but it doesnt justify later interfering with them.

regardless of phlox's bad science and stupid logic, their actions werent genocide.

they didnt force themselves into a position where its their responsibility. it would only be their responsibility if they had given them the cure.

it was never archer's choice to make to save these people.

genocide is active, you cant do nothing and commit genocide. they didnt play a part in the deaths, the deaths were wholly caused by something else. just because archer chose not to fix them doesnt mean he played a part in it. did the klingons play a part in it? they didnt fix it either. did q play a part in it? he (they) is omnipotent and could have easily cured them. you cant commit genocide by doing nothing.

[Tyler]

posted on January 4th, 2011, 3:00 pm

Last edited by Tyler on January 4th, 2011, 3:01 pm, edited 1 time in total.

They forced them down the path to death. Wether they started it or not, they chose for the Valakians to die. After agreeing to help and developing the cure, they had 2 choices that both effect the future of that world; let nature kill them or overrule nature and save them. Regardless of what they chose, the races future was on their shoulders because of their actions putting them there.

Directly or indirectly, they still had a their own part in the extinction of the species.

posted on January 4th, 2011, 3:07 pm

they never forced them down any path, the virus/genetic crap did.

if you consider indirectly allowing anything to happen then every race in the universe is responsible for every death everywhere. cos they didnt do their utmost to stop the deaths.

lets say enterprise hadnt run into that ship, and had just arrived in orbit and done some scans and found out the problems. are they still responsible if they dont cure it?

the fact that they promised to help doesnt make them responsible, it just makes it extra annoying to the people who died.

[Tyler]

posted on January 4th, 2011, 3:16 pm

Last edited by Tyler on January 4th, 2011, 3:17 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Other races didn't agree, develop a cure and then decide the universe would be better off without them. Enterprise did in this case.

If they ran into the planet and scanned, they wouldn't be involved and no debate would ever start.

I never said promising to help was the problem, it was that last opinion 180 and betrayal at the end where they chose what to do with the cure. That inactivity is different from a simple 'scan and move on'. What Archer and Phlox did was like Picard agreeing to help the girl from Pen Pals, getting everything set up, then flying off and leaving them to die (different causes for death, but both equally natural).

posted on January 4th, 2011, 3:24 pm

Other races didn't agree, develop a cure and then decide the universe would be better off without them. Enterprise did in this case.

they made the right decision for the wrong reasons, its still the right decision though, and no genocide.

yes they promised to fix it, and yes the aliens were probably a bit annoyed and gutted. but it doesnt justify giving them the cure.

just because they made the right choice all the way at the end doesnt mean its not the right choice.

[Tyler]

posted on January 4th, 2011, 3:37 pm

Last edited by Tyler on January 4th, 2011, 3:42 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Whether it was 'right' or not is something we don't know, we don't if if was even a natural development or not. Races around that time are capable of creating bio-weapons. We only have speculation and nothing much about their history or alien contacts.

Not getting involved is right, getting involved and then saying 'screw you' at the end is a little different. It gave them a certain responsibility for it allowing it to happen that simple non-interferrence never would have.

If Phlox is that worried about screwing with gods 'Cosmic plan' (in Rikers words), he shouldn't even be a doctor in the first place. Curing problems like that, playing god by removing natural disease and life-threatening flaws, when people come and ask for help is the entire point being a doctor.

posted on January 4th, 2011, 3:51 pm

Not getting involved is right, getting involved and then saying 'screw you' at the end is a little different.

what they did was wrong, it just wasnt genocide. they shouldnt have made that promise. but 2 wrongs doesnt make a right.

If Phlox is that worried about screwing with gods 'Cosmic plan' (in Rikers words), he shouldn't even be a doctor in the first place. Curing problems like that, playing god by removing natural disease and life-threatening flaws, when people come and ask for help is the entire point being a doctor.

being a doctor is slightly different, its interfering with nature, but usually the patient is responsible for there own stuff since they are going to a doctor and getting the treatment by their own choice. the doctor isnt interfering in a developing society. thats why the prime directive makes the distinction between warp capable and not warp capable, since

posted on January 4th, 2011, 3:58 pm

There's also the long-term implications.  If they somehow survive now, their histories will show the actions of enterprise, thus creating an emnity to the human race.

[Tyler]

posted on January 4th, 2011, 4:03 pm

Last edited by Tyler on January 4th, 2011, 4:06 pm, edited 1 time in total.

being a doctor is slightly different, its interfering with nature, but usually the patient is responsible for there own stuff since they are going to a doctor and getting the treatment by their own choice. the doctor isnt interfering in a developing society. thats why the prime directive makes the distinction between warp capable and not warp capable, since

Phlox wasn't interferring in the social development of their society, he was saving lives which is part of the job description. They knew about warp and advanced off-world life along with making contact willingly with other societies, which should make them viable since the closest version of the directive to their time (No identification of self or mission. No interference with the social development of said planet. No references to space, other worlds, or advanced civilizations) would no longer cover them due to that prior knowledge and effort.

The after effects aren't part of his professional concern, they went out to space of their own choice and specifically asked for medical assistence from any race they found.

posted on January 4th, 2011, 4:39 pm

The after effects aren't part of his professional concern, they went out to space of their own choice and specifically asked for medical assistence from any race they found.

what if they were asking for medical assistance in a war?

they were asking for enterprise to change their entire race. thats way too much for archer to decide.

[Tyler]

posted on January 4th, 2011, 4:51 pm

Last edited by Tyler on January 4th, 2011, 5:12 pm, edited 1 time in total.

It wasn't a war, if it was then the circumstances would have been different. Archer would probably have still gotten involved, though, whether the crew like it or not. He can sometimes be proof that the Vulcans may have be on to something saying Humans aren't ready.

It was a medical emergency, like any other planet-wide catastrophe. Something even TNG-era Starfleet was willing to help with (usually indirectly), the Enterprise-D istelf providing medical supplies to unaligned worlds. The only difference is Phlox and his 'god has decided they must be cleansed' crap.

posted on January 4th, 2011, 5:30 pm

in tng they only helped warp capable races. if this race were warp capable then i would agree archer should definitely have helped them.

in this case they shouldnt.

phlox made the right decision for the wrong reason.

[Tyler]

posted on January 4th, 2011, 5:45 pm

Last edited by Tyler on January 4th, 2011, 5:51 pm, edited 1 time in total.

The Prime Directive preventing assistence to only Warp-Capable races (and sometimes not even those) wouldn't apply to the Valakians. Races already exposed to aliens and superior tech are an exception. Was the species from Pen Pals warp-capable? Once a member of that race made contact with Enterprise, even Picard (reluctantly) considered them viable.

Warp-capable races were only the ones they helped willingly, others had to contact them and ask directly, exposing themselves to aliens exactly as the Valakians had done at least twice already.

How 'right' it was is still debatable, due to lack of understanding of what actually put them in the position they were in when Enterprise condemned them (I don't remember anything concrete proving it was natural). Building them up and willingly condemning them the way they did isn't as morally clear as minding your own business from the start. Especially after getting to the point of holding a cure in their hand and tossing it aside, that isn't simple interferrence, it's playing god.