TNG - Best of Both Worlds

[Beastro]

And also, early European colonisation absolutely consisted of slave raiding- that was one of the key ventures Columbus undertook when he arrived in the Caribbean.

I was speaking more of when the triangle trade was established when they for the most part simply bought slaves at the local markets of the coast African chiefs. Only the Portuguese tried to slave raid themselves in Africa, and they didn't too well at it to keep trying.

Early in the Age of Discovery is a muddled area. Not simply for what they tried with the local Caribbeans that you describe, but that it was also looked into enslaving and importing fellow Christian Europeans given that slavery hadn't been abolished there, but was near nonexistent by the 15th Century. The Church made trouble for that asap and then it was dropped once it became well know how short Europeans typically lasted in the tropics from disease.

Where slave raiding fails as an analogy itself is that the Borg don't consider those they assimilate to be slaves but as part of their Collective, so I suppose Marxist-Leninism is closer still.

That gets into the muddled territory of what the Collective is supposed to be. You'd think it would be, well, a collective, a gestalt of all the minds of the Borg, but there's that subordinating element that's always made a big deal of, especially when someone is free.

I think it ignores the appeal that collectivism has, of having the whole take on the burden of responsibility while you can be a seemingly passive or more facet of it ignoring your part in it. And I don't even mean the actions done, as shown with Seven of Nine, almost as a passive participant having things done against their will, but surrendering most of that will to be able to seemingly be free of responsibility while possibly allowing you to revel in your own prejudices.

That last bit in mind of the the Borg could explain some of their more arbitrary, callous actions have as the multitude enjoy enforcing their own bit of will upon others through the Collective while being free from the full repercussions, similar to a minor bureaucrat hating being irreverent in the large span of things, but enjoying the machine they're a part of because of the power it allows them over others.

Long story short, I think Trek's always ignored or underplayed the psychological aspects of the Borg even when they've touched on them.

[Jonathan101]

Since they are assimilated through force, I don't think it really fits to assume that the Borg are or ever could somehow playing on the prejudices and conformist desires of it's individual members.

The Borg are, consistently, portrayed as something closer to mind control and slavery, and for all their talk about improving the lives of those they assimilate or acting on a collective will, it really does seem to be more accurate to say that the majority are simply glorified resources to be used and abused by a callous minority, whether that is the Queen(s) or something else (because this was the case even before the concept of a Queen was introduced).

[Robovski]

What real use are mass quantities of assimilated living beings to the Borg as originally presented? To add minds to a gestalt? Are only hominid species useful or would there be assimilated space whales if the Borg got the chance?

[Jonathan101]

Well, they attempted to assimilate Species 8472, so possibly.

The main reason they assimilate people is to harvest their knowledge and use them as drones- they seem to be suffering from a "collective" lack of imagination, which is the price of stripping people of their individuality. So they primarily assimilate people or races that they find useful or interesting, and ignore or destroy those that they think are culturally or technologically primitive.

So, I guess it depends on whether they thought that the space whales were deep thinkers or not.

[Artabax]

#1 Space Whales eat Space Stuff
#2 Some stars emit Space Whale food; other stars emit wrong stuff.
#3 Space Whales who swim towards correct stars have more babies.
#4 Either SpW can survive the zillion years to get from one Star to the next OR SpW can do FtL drive
#5 Either way Borg want to assimilate Power and astrometric data.

[Beastro]

The Borg are, consistently, portrayed as something closer to mind control and slavery, and for all their talk about improving the lives of those they assimilate or acting on a collective will, it really does seem to be more accurate to say that the majority are simply glorified resources to be used and abused by a callous minority, whether that is the Queen(s) or something else (because this was the case even before the concept of a Queen was introduced).

That then goes into what exactly the Borg are at their fundamental level, so a small isolated group can continue with the same level of control and direction as if the whole Collective is exerting its control over them.

Either the Borg are a literal Collective or the Borg are something like a ideology started by a race that believed all sentient lives should be united in slavery and so started what we call the Borg by creating a program that would carry out the subordination of all to accomplish that end.

The Borg became too much of a mishmash of different, though similar ideas and the evolution from one to the other hasn't been clean.

It leaves me thinking that if they're ever revisited it might require actually unveiling the origins of them to show how the tyranny got started.

I'd rather much go with the psychological one if only for it to allow for a route through which to break up the Borg superpower while keeping them as a threat that can explain why they have effectively been twiddling their thumbs since First Contact.

The Collective could break apart into separate supra-personalities with drones aligning based on their individual affinity that are then rivals seeking to defeat each other and reunite the Collective. That way they remain a threat, while also being their own worst enemy, at least until they reunite. One could then actually have variations in Borg and their outlook based upon what kind of supra-personality controls them.

The main reason they assimilate people is to harvest their knowledge and use them as drones- they seem to be suffering from a "collective" lack of imagination, which is the price of stripping people of their individuality. So they primarily assimilate people or races that they find useful or interesting, and ignore or destroy those that they think are culturally or technologically primitive.

I can see that being the reason why they haven't attacked the AQ in any significant force. The idea some have had is that the Borg are deliberately provoking the AQ, especially the Fed, in order to stimulate technological development to assimilate them at a later time.

In effect, they are growing a crop of new technology to harvest.

[Jonathan101]

The main reason they assimilate people is to harvest their knowledge and use them as drones- they seem to be suffering from a "collective" lack of imagination, which is the price of stripping people of their individuality. So they primarily assimilate people or races that they find useful or interesting, and ignore or destroy those that they think are culturally or technologically primitive.

I can see that being the reason why they haven't attacked the AQ in any significant force. The idea some have had is that the Borg are deliberately provoking the AQ, especially the Fed, in order to stimulate technological development to assimilate them at a later time.

In effect, they are growing a crop of new technology to harvest.

Well, the Borg never deliberately provoked the AQ, since it was Q who formally introduced the two and then they made two efforts to conquer the Federation that were deadly serious by all appearances, to the point that one involved time-travel.

I agree that they might see the Federation as something like a new harvest, but I think they believe it is time to reap already. The main reason they don't attack in force is that they don't think they need to since one ship can wipe the floor with an entire fleet, and shortly after the second attempt fails they end up fighting a war with Species 8472 that goes very badly for them and they spend the next several years trying to recover and regroup. I'd say that lack of imagination is the problem for that as well- if they could think of creative ways to assimilate the Federation, they wouldn't be trying to assimilate them in the first place.

[Beastro]

I agree that they might see the Federation as something like a new harvest, but I think they believe it is time to reap already. The main reason they don't attack in force is that they don't think they need to since one ship can wipe the floor with an entire fleet, and shortly after the second attempt fails they end up fighting a war with Species 8472 that goes very badly for them and they spend the next several years trying to recover and regroup. I'd say that lack of imagination is the problem for that as well- if they could think of creative ways to assimilate the Federation, they wouldn't be trying to assimilate them in the first place.

That then leaves things open as to what would happen post-Dominion War as the inevitable can't be delayed forever.

Another issue is that the Borg aren't stupid. While they will sent a cube to polish off a system or small space power unable to resist it, the Federation has shown itself capable of doing a lot of damage to them (Thanks Voyager). They cannot defeat the Fed cube by cube, they would thus send a larger force and save on losses through overwhelming force, especially since attacking the Fed would result in the majority of the AQ aligning against them similar to how things went in the Dominion War (especially since the rough idea of most maps of the AQ have major nations in between with the Fed roughly in the center).

[Madner Kami]

Well, the Borg never deliberately provoked the AQ, since it was Q who formally introduced the two and then they made two efforts to conquer the Federation that were deadly serious by all appearances, to the point that one involved time-travel.

Actually the Borg are aware of the Federation and the powers of the Alpha Quadrant since way before Q introduced Enterprise to the Borg. Remember the destroyed outposts in "The Neutral Zone"? The episode that reintroduced the Romulans in a, for the time and even today pretty memorable moment (forever praised be Saint Ron Jones)? The renewed activity of the Romulans towards the Federation is caused by the destruction of their outposts on their side of the Neutral Zone. And now take a guess who destroyed both the Federation and Romulan outposts...

Word of God has it, that this was planned as the entry-point of a trilogy of episodes of which the next step was the introduction of the Borg themselves and the end-point was envisioned to be an alliance between The Romulan Star Empire and the Federation in an effort to combat the Borg-threat that was too big for each individual one to defeat on their own. It all got ruined by the 1988 Writer's Guild strike. Enterprise does a call-back to that, because the message the past-future Borg send in that episode would arrive right at about the time this episode happens.

[Beastro]

That sucks it happened. The Romulans have always been way too underplayed.