Discovery: Sound of Thunder

[hypocratus]

The examples with Kirk are a little different. In 'A Taste of Armageddon', they target the Enterprise. In 'Return of the Archons' it is a society that is under control of a computer system. There is nothing that Kirk doesn't like more than talking a computer system into self-destructing. Also Sulu was under the control of Landru, aka the controlling computer system. In both there was a personal aspect for Kirk. Do I think that Kirk would have still have done something? Yes, but maybe in a different manner. I do have to admit it has been more than a year since I have seen either of those episodes, so if I have the details wrong I apologize.

[Fianna]

When Kirk caused massive social upheaval, it was usually because the society was either trying to kill the Enterprise crew or holding some of them prisoner, forcing a desperate move to get them off their backs.

That's not to say that those societies didn't need some outside intervention to force change, or that Kirk wouldn't have been all for that. But without being put into those sorts of desperate situations, I don't think he'd unilaterally make the decision to change their whole society after only knowing of it for a day or two, and with no long term planning for the future. That's the sort of thing that really should go back to the Federation government and the diplomatic corps, to make sure we're not running into things half-cocked.

It also helps that, because TOS was so episodic, there was no indication of how much time passed between episodes, or what the characters got up to in the interim. You can imagine that, after Kirk destroyed the computer that was ruling a planet, or ended another planet's simulated warfare/real deaths scheme, he spent a lot of time working with both the planet's locals and the upper echelons of Starfleet and the Federation to create stable conditions for the planet going forward. We just don't see that, because it would be boring, and the next episode only begins once the Enterprise is back to exploring the galaxy.

[Fianna]

Oh, and side note, I'm with Chuck: I honestly wish they'd called the planet Kelpopolis.

[clearspira]

When Kirk caused massive social upheaval, it was usually because the society was either trying to kill the Enterprise crew or holding some of them prisoner, forcing a desperate move to get them off their backs.

That's not to say that those societies didn't need some outside intervention to force change, or that Kirk wouldn't have been all for that. But without being put into those sorts of desperate situations, I don't think he'd unilaterally make the decision to change their whole society after only knowing of it for a day or two, and with no long term planning for the future. That's the sort of thing that really should go back to the Federation government and the diplomatic corps, to make sure we're not running into things half-cocked.

It also helps that, because TOS was so episodic, there was no indication of how much time passed between episodes, or what the characters got up to in the interim. You can imagine that, after Kirk destroyed the computer that was ruling a planet, or ended another planet's simulated warfare/real deaths scheme, he spent a lot of time working with both the planet's locals and the upper echelons of Starfleet and the Federation to create stable conditions for the planet going forward. We just don't see that, because it would be boring, and the next episode only begins once the Enterprise is back to exploring the galaxy.

Khan would like a word with you regarding the idea that Kirk gives two shits about you once the episode is over.

[Thebestoftherest]

I am dreading the next episode, it only reminds us how much of a Mary Sue Micheal is.

[CrypticMirror]

Khan would like a word with you regarding the idea that Kirk gives two shits about you once the episode is over.

Khan was a flaming hypocrite. He didn't want anybody checking up, he wanted to go rule his own little slice of the universe and be left alone. It was only after everything turned to shit that he started caring. If Ceti Alpha whatever turned out to be a paradise and Starfleet had turned up to check then he'd have met them with a snarl and a stab. Besides, Kirk logged everything and sent his logs back to Starfleet HQ so any follow up should have been done through them. It is not his job, even when he became an Admiral himself, to follow up on every mission himself. That is not how institutions work.

[MrL1992]

I wonder if it was incidents like this that pushed the Federation of the 24th Century enforce the Prime Directive to extremes?

Maybe after they deal with their little Romulan problem in PIC, they can figure out a way to get it juuuust right?

[Taurian Patriot]

I wonder if it was incidents like this that pushed the Federation of the 24th Century enforce the Prime Directive to extremes?

Maybe after they deal with their little Romulan problem in PIC, they can figure out a way to get it juuuust right?

Not with the writers and showrunners the franchise has now, it won't.

But in seriousness, the Prime Directive doesn't seem like something that could ever be codified. It's a broad principle that covers a staggering range of possibilities that can't all be accounted for. Not that I doubt anyone would try - I imagine by the TNG era dozens, if not hundreds, of fat tomes had been written to provide exhaustive commentary on the matter.

As for how it's differently applied, I like to imagine a lot of that is simply up to personal interpretation and justification. That way, it would make sense for Picard, having the rather detached demeanor of someone who studies societies rather than be a part of them, to have a more severe view of the matter than Kirk or others.

Maybe I'm forgetting if it was just Picard though. Did the rest of Starfleet seem so strict? I remember he often debated the issue with his senior staff before giving his orders.

[Darth Wedgius]

To be fair, intervention in foreign affairs aren't always consistent. NATO intervened in the Yugoslavian genocide, but the world pretty much stood on the sidelines during the Rawandan genocide. Former Yugoslavia was in the back yard of much of NATO, the U.S. was recoiling from intervening in Somalia, and it's hard to smart-bomb people wielding machetes into submission. And whatever other reasons might have been in play...

[CrypticMirror]

I wonder if it was incidents like this that pushed the Federation of the 24th Century enforce the Prime Directive to extremes?

Maybe after they deal with their little Romulan problem in PIC, they can figure out a way to get it juuuust right?

Not with the writers and showrunners the franchise has now, it won't.

But in seriousness, the Prime Directive doesn't seem like something that could ever be codified. It's a broad principle that covers a staggering range of possibilities that can't all be accounted for. Not that I doubt anyone would try - I imagine by the TNG era dozens, if not hundreds, of fat tomes had been written to provide exhaustive commentary on the matter.

As for how it's differently applied, I like to imagine a lot of that is simply up to personal interpretation and justification. That way, it would make sense for Picard, having the rather detached demeanor of someone who studies societies rather than be a part of them, to have a more severe view of the matter than Kirk or others.

Maybe I'm forgetting if it was just Picard though. Did the rest of Starfleet seem so strict? I remember he often debated the issue with his senior staff before giving his orders.

I think a lot of the problems of PD goes back to the horrific episode Homeward in Season Seven of TNG. The season Chuck calls the "we're out of ideas" season. It is the one where Picard basically one-ups Phlox and is prepared to stand back and let a whole planet's worth of people go extinct due to some weird global environmental collapse and then gets angry with Worf's brother for saving a handful. It is completely out of character, for S7 Picard anyway, and in order to give Worf some minor angst too.

The PD has never been so rigid as it was on that scale. We've never been able to take it seriously again, and if I were scoring TNG then I'd give it the 0 score for actively harming the franchise in a way not even Code of Honour managed. It should be ejected from canon, like Threshold; only worse that Threshold and not even be available for streaming, download or appear on DVD releases.