STDS9: A Man Alone

[Steve]

For all that I've agreed with criticisms of the UFP's handling of things in that respect, when it comes down to it I think that statement's a bit unfair. In equal, non-victory peace treaties like that, stuff gets swapped. If there were any issue, it was that the Federation didn't just draw the line with established colonies, but then again there might have been strategic reasons not to (for instance, a UFP colony that posed a threat to Cardassian space, or vice versa, that the threatened side simply wouldn't tolerate leaving in the other side's hands). I'd say the real problem was that the Federation let the Cardassian colonists remain on worlds the UFP got, or otherwise didn't ensure colonists would get re-settled there. Sure, the UFP is nice and enlightened to let the individuals remain and not ban them for speciest reasons. but sometimes you can't be the nice enlightened type in these kinds of things. The UFP should have insisted on reciprocation; every Cardassian rule or law against the UFP colonists should have been countered with fines and expulsions or something of the effect from Cardassian colonies in the UFP zone.

[CrypticMirror]

There are options for capitalism, we've seen that, unfettered and for homesteading on remote colonies. The Federation will let you do that.

Better hope you don't end up in one of the Federation boarder colonies that get handed over to the Cardassians. Interesting that people that have frontier mindsets with potential capitalistic tendencies end up in those places, and the Federation does not seem to care about their safety all that much.

You mean a Cardassian world that was illegally settled. Yeah, that sounds like the sort of place a carpetbagger would end up on.

[SotF]

The bit with Rom showing up to drop Nog off and the comment about the human boy kind of comes off that it's more of him trying to keep his kid out of trouble...this is more due to me seeing it as a progression from Nog and Jake creating chaos that started the mess in the first place.

Basically, he's seeing it as his son's association with that particular human boy being what caused the issue, so the simple solution is to order his son to stay away from the "bad influence"

[Beastro]

The irony to me is all that coming from Roddenberry, the creator of the Federation and the contradictions within the man, how he loved the spirit of American style liberty, and yet was obsessed with people doing things the way he felt they should that led the Federation to be both a nation of liberty and a socialist command state.

Within the Federation you can be the macho manly man living in abject poverty to prove you are a manly man. There are options for capitalism, we've seen that, unfettered and for homesteading on remote colonies. The Federation will let you do that. It will also provide for the people that don't want that and want to live in communities where scraping for existence prevents them living happier and more comfortable lives too. Where, since they have all the energy to supply basic needs, there is no need to maintain an artificial scarcity. The Federation will allow people to choose that too. What the Federation will not do is force people into either mould, if someone living on a frontier homestead says "yeah, I don't want to do this anymore; then the Federation will come pick them up and help them find something else to do too. I think that is what peeves Radical-Libertarians off, that their lifestyle only works if everyone is compelled to be part of it. As soon as there is an element of choice, people start choosing to not be part of it. And that is far more controlling and top down in its directive than anything else. Still, if you were in the Federation, you'd be allowed to be a capitalist frontiersman, forswearing all aid, until you grew tired of it.

Much (or all) of that came into TNG after Roddenberry was out of the way.

There was a massive contradiction within Roddenberry where he very much was a by the numbers stereotypical American and what they're known to love, but was also very Left and Socialist leaning that only got more pronounced as he got older. It frankly brings to mind some silly situation the Soviet collectivist farms or Objectivists creating their own society (or your Radical-Lib example) and saying it would work perfectly because by then Mankind had evolved to eliminate all the parts of human nature that had previously prevented it from working. That or a domineering parent who has their child's future all laid out and what career they'll eventually get into that would answer all questions with "They're my child, of course they'll want everything I want for them!". It's clear he knew enough to know that human nature wouldn't allow the two to be compatible to the degree he sought within the Federation and so found the idea of Mankind "evolving" and overcoming it's nature in the areas he didn't like was the only solution, but a naive, immature one that evoked what I think is the pain behind all his wish-fulfillment within Star Trek.

I wonder where it came from and I have a feeling much of it was the result of serving in WWII, not so much from the experiences of war he faced (I honestly don't know what degree of combat he saw, just that he was Airmen, and glancing at wikipedia, was involved in a crash in the South Pacific as a pilot that effectively ended his career, unless he was behind being sent back to the States to be a crash investigator but I doubt that), but from having to fit himself into the military, and one way or another, grew to resent much of it, which is where I've always thought his "Starfleet a military that isn't a military" mind games came from from the moment I first discovered that he served in WWII.

You point about Radical-Libs is applicable to the Federation as the Fed presented by Roddenberry at the height of his creative control over the franchise (Early TNG) has Picard ranting on about how the Federation has allowed everyone the freedom to do devote themselves to those high minded, but not high earning, things like being a full time artist and such. It's clear from such episodes like the Neutral Zone that if you laid out that the Federation would allow the things you described he'd curl his nose and say "No, Mankind wouldn't, we're beyond want and need for such petty tings, no one would want to live like that.".

All of that ended when he became too sick to continue and others came in to save the franchise and allow for a more balanced, pluralistic view of what Federation freedom would be in much the same way it's clear that Roddenberry was restrained during TOS with the more militaristic, level headed feeling to the show had that went out the door once Roddenberry had a full gasp that led to The Motion Picture (I will concede I'm probably going overboard in many ways here and the fact that a lot can change in a person within the ten years between something like TOS and TMP).

[Sir Will]

The bit with Rom showing up to drop Nog off and the comment about the human boy kind of comes off that it's more of him trying to keep his kid out of trouble...this is more due to me seeing it as a progression from Nog and Jake creating chaos that started the mess in the first place.

Basically, he's seeing it as his son's association with that particular human boy being what caused the issue, so the simple solution is to order his son to stay away from the "bad influence"

Except Nog was in trouble in the very first episode. I know, parents are blind and stupid when it comes to their kids. Rom was still much different in season 1 than he was later on.

[Robovski]

The bit with Rom showing up to drop Nog off and the comment about the human boy kind of comes off that it's more of him trying to keep his kid out of trouble...this is more due to me seeing it as a progression from Nog and Jake creating chaos that started the mess in the first place.

Basically, he's seeing it as his son's association with that particular human boy being what caused the issue, so the simple solution is to order his son to stay away from the "bad influence"

Except Nog was in trouble in the very first episode. I know, parents are blind and stupid when it comes to their kids. Rom was still much different in season 1 than he was later on.

For Ferengi there is trouble and then there is official Trouble where a person in authority who may impact business has been involved. And early Rom wants to be a classic Frenegi, make money by any means and not get caught but he's terrible at it. And this in particular is Jake and Nog's fault so as Nog's parent is laying the "bad influence" on Jake just like Sisko lays that on Rom.

[G-Man]

The problem for Star Trek and the Ferengi essentially comes down to:

Does human society eschew the use of money because there is so much wealth that anyone can get anything they would reasonably want, or because people have all sublimated excessive desires? In other words, can every human being who wants a mansion able to get one, or does no one want mansions?

Because the real issue is whether the Ferengi for their greed have more luxurious lifestyles than human beings, or whether they artificially enforce a scarcity in order to make money a way of getting status? Because if the latter is the case, then the Ferengi really do not exactly make a very relevant commentary to the modern world, because greed as we know it largely comes as a result of limited resources. Unless there are clearly shown limits to what a Federation human has access to in terms of living quarters, food, etc., then greed is really going to be an aritificial vice. But then again, the Ferengi were never that well-thought out in the first place.

[Deledrius]

Because the real issue is whether the Ferengi for their greed have more luxurious lifestyles than human beings, or whether they artificially enforce a scarcity in order to make money a way of getting status? Because if the latter is the case, then the Ferengi really do not exactly make a very relevant commentary to the modern world, because greed as we know it largely comes as a result of limited resources.

I think that actually makes the commentary very relevant today in a way which I know the writers did not intend, as we have corporations now abusing intellectual property laws to create artificial scarcity in that ever-worsening race to be the greediest example of capitalism. I could easily see the Ferengi having a runaway version of this problem. I'm sure every Ferengi contract has a clause limiting the victim to binding third-party arbitration, too.

[Durandal_1707]

The bit with Rom showing up to drop Nog off and the comment about the human boy kind of comes off that it's more of him trying to keep his kid out of trouble...this is more due to me seeing it as a progression from Nog and Jake creating chaos that started the mess in the first place.

Basically, he's seeing it as his son's association with that particular human boy being what caused the issue, so the simple solution is to order his son to stay away from the "bad influence"

Except Nog was in trouble in the very first episode. I know, parents are blind and stupid when it comes to their kids. Rom was still much different in season 1 than he was later on.

While that's true, later Rom is more annoying than Neelix. Give me the "early installment weirdness" anyday, at least as far as he's concerned.

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

The problem for Star Trek and the Ferengi essentially comes down to:

Does human society eschew the use of money because there is so much wealth that anyone can get anything they would reasonably want, or because people have all sublimated excessive desires? In other words, can every human being who wants a mansion able to get one, or does no one want mansions?

Because the real issue is whether the Ferengi for their greed have more luxurious lifestyles than human beings, or whether they artificially enforce a scarcity in order to make money a way of getting status? Because if the latter is the case, then the Ferengi really do not exactly make a very relevant commentary to the modern world, because greed as we know it largely comes as a result of limited resources. Unless there are clearly shown limits to what a Federation human has access to in terms of living quarters, food, etc., then greed is really going to be an aritificial vice. But then again, the Ferengi were never that well-thought out in the first place.

Most shortages in modern society ARE artificial. Grocery stores and restaurants force employees to throw away perfectly good food and sometimes to pour bleach on it so dumpster-divers can't get it. We have a massive amount of homeless people and a massive amount of empty, unsold homes.