Athene Watches Star Trek Enterprise: How To Get Away With Franchise Murder

By all things seen and unseen this episode, this one episode that forever will paint Phlox as a eugenics, genocidal-enabler no matter how many excuses, logic-twisting or mental gymnastics anyone makes.

Phlox is a murderer and that's the Red Truth.

Phlox is basically saying "because Evolutionary method wills it" and you know what? He sounds like a religious fanatic who refuses aid and says "because God wills it."

Realistically if the decimation of the Valakians continued, the planet would devolve into societal upheaval looking for someone to blame... which unfortunately would be the Menk. RL history has shown that scapegoating is actually thing. Just ask the medieval Jews.

Wait till you get to the Mirror Universe episodes... because MU!Phlox is real face of Prime!Phlox stripped of his fig leaves of moral pretenses.

Dr Franklin on several occasions becomes blinded by his own brilliance and moral superiority and does the wrong thing
And he's morally better than Phlox because he's willing to do the right thing even if he fails.

I'll take Chronic Heroic Syndrome over Apathetic Moral Pretenses anytime.
 
Phlox is basically saying "because Evolutionary method wills it" and you know what? He sounds like a religious fanatic who refuses aid and says "because God wills it."
That was basically the attitude towards the Prime Directive that Gene Roddenberry established in early TNG. It went from being a rule to not do colonialism in TOS to a quasi-religious belief in there being a "cosmic plan" that certain people were "fated to die" and interfering would be "the height of hubris." (Those are all quotes from the TNG Season 2 episode "Pen Pals" in case you're wondering.) Even after Roddenberry was kicked upstairs, the interpretation that "letting whole species die is better than doing anything to help because raisens" stuck around through the rest of TNG, Voyager and Enterprise.
 
That was basically the attitude towards the Prime Directive that Gene Roddenberry established in early TNG. It went from being a rule to not do colonialism in TOS to a quasi-religious belief in there being a "cosmic plan" that certain people were "fated to die" and interfering would be "the height of hubris."
Oh the irony of a supposedly atheistic, enlightened society. One cannot escape the adoration impulses of one's nature as mortal.

Even atheists would agree that "X wills it" or "its fate" reasons or more accurately excuses are stupid.
 
Oh the irony of a supposedly atheistic, enlightened society. One cannot escape the adoration impulses of one's nature as mortal.

Even atheists would agree that "X wills it" or "its fate" reasons or more accurately excuses are stupid.
That's a strange way to put it. By definition, an atheist would not believe in any sort of higher power that could make anything "fated" or "will it." That's why the exchange in "Pen Pals" is so bizarre: it's a meaningless argument from the point of view of an atheist like the Enterprise crew are supposed to be, on par with telling an adult in all seriousness, "Don't embezzle that money because Santa will give you coal for Christmas."

But, if we're going to try to armchair-psychoanalyze a complete stranger who's been dead since I was nine, perhaps it made sense in the head of Gene Roddenberry because by 1988 his egotism and hypocrisy were astounding, and he was no longer thinking of it in terms of "the Federation always does the right thing because it is the right thing to do" but in terms of "whatever the Federation does is always the right thing because the Federation is axiomatically always right, because I have created it to be so." There was a reason that he had to have control of the franchise taken away from him, twice.
 
Star Trek seems to view Evolution as though Pokemon is an accurate study of it, like the episode where Janeway turns into a Salamander. Basically acting like if you somehow "speed up" evolution to a point where one person can evolve they would evolve in a set way. Ignoring that Evolution is a reaction to the Environment and environmental factors. In Star Trek's weird version of evolution, if you took a population of lions and stranded them in Canada and another Population of lions and stranded them in Southern China, the resulting animals millions of years later would be the same.

It's weird how series that distinctly tries to be non-religious at times can be so weirdly religious about certain topics.
 
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Motherfucker you have like 30 pets, what the fuck is this shit?

I find myself thinking that in a different context, a little light hypocrisy like this could have been an amusing character beat.

But, Archer here at least means well and T'Pol says that the number of warp capable races they've already met means this doesn't really violate any Vulcan protocols so they go to try to help them.

PHLOX [VO]: The Captain has committed all our resources to helping people he didn't even know existed two days ago. Once again, I am struck by your species' desire to help others.

Seriously, he has emotions but zero empathy, its incredible.

So what I found myself thinking is "Why is this guy a doctor?"

Even without chronic hero syndrome as Lord Chimera put it, it kinda seems like the sort of job that would draw people who themselves have some desire to help others. Because isn't that more or less the job?

Like, my previous exposure to Phlox was when he shows up in Undocumented Features, where he's distant and standoffish with the crew of the ship he's on, but it's because he thinks that results in better doctoring, not because he just doesn't give a shit.

ARCHER: I'm going down to the Valakian hospital.

Er, I'm confused. What was he going down to the hospital to do again?

You have to love the "we have no right to play god"bullshit. You are playing god right now! You are deciding the fate of 2 species! You could not be playing god harder if you named yourself Jesus Christ the third!

Not understanding that inaction is also a choice seems to be the problem with a lot of prime directive stuff. It's one thing if it's a situation where the situation is vague enough that intervening could actually be worse, but that doesn't usually seem to be the case.

Still, there's something that struck me as off-kilter about this episode. And I don't mean in the "also, Genocide!" sense. Something about how it's presented. But I think maybe I've got it nailed down.

It's that it's the Valakians who are dying.

If this was the ISO standard Terrible Eugenics Message story, it'd be the Menk who were dying, right? Because in that kind of narrative, superior social position means greater right to live. But here, it's turned on it's head. It feels a bit like it's trying to present the whole thing as "Do you support the exploitation of the Menk, yes or no?" And then you say no, that's awful, and so what the crew did was correct. Except doesn't actually work, because enormous numbers of people are dying and the injustice of collective punishment and did we mention the plague killing everyone because that part's important?

So it's kind of like it's trying to be subversive of it's subject matter, but actually ends up failing pretty hard at it? Or something like that. Maybe.

-Morgan.
 
Come to think of it, how exactly are the Menk treated? I don't recall the Valakians using scorpions to make them work or doing chattel slavery. I mean the Menk's situation is questionable, but how bad is it that Archer has a very adverse reaction to it?

That's a strange way to put it. By definition, an atheist would not believe in any sort of higher power that could make anything "fated" or "will it."
Well there's this conversation between Sisko and Kilana a Vorta:
"Do you have any gods, Captain Sisko?"

"There are things I believe in."

"Duty? Starfleet? The Federation? You must be pleased with yourself. You have the ship to take back to them. I hope it was worth it."

"So do I."
Belief isn't limited to deities. Philosophies and Concepts are valid things to "believe in."
 
Come to think of it, how exactly are the Menk treated?
We only see them interact with each other once.

ESAAK: No, he's Menk. They're not as evolved as Valakians but they're very hard workers.

That's it. We then hear that they're forced to live on unsustainable lands by the Valakians and are completely dependent on the Valakians. One Menk says they're treated well but he's just the one guy from the hospital, which would be a cozier job. The humans absolutely believe that they're being mistreated from what they see off camera even if Phlox thinks they are being treated well, but he also slots people into a Great Chain of Being.

The long and short of it is that they didn't put in enough time to develop these relationships because the actual plot of the episode is a smaller portion of its runtime. We can infer a lot based on what we do know. As soon as they say that they're controlling where the Menk live and giving them the useless land, alarm bells are wringing, along with them being called "Hard Workers".
 
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Not only that, but in the episode A Night In Sickbay, Tucker says that Archer is "a trained diplomat."

Keep in mind that this is in the context of an episode where Archer has caused an international incident by bringing his dog with him to meet with alien dignitaries and said dog then peed on their sacred trees, and Archer is blaming the aliens for the fact that his dog got sick on their planet and threatening to pee on their trees himself.

"Trained diplomat."

Uh have you read how some trained diplomats behaved during the Age of Sail Enterprise is supposed to be the space version of? If anything Archer is painfully average in the trained diplomat department for what he is supposed to be. Not that the writers actually intended him to be that way mind you.
 
Belief isn't limited to deities. Philosophies and Concepts are valid things to "believe in."
Belief is a word with broad meaning. There's a difference between belief in the validity of an ideal or devotion to a cause and belief in supernatural concepts like deities and fate. Sisko believes in duty and the Federation, but he doesn't think that he can pray to duty for miracles or that the Federation is a force of cosmic fate the controls the future.

(Ironically, unique among the Starfleet captains, Sisko does believe in supernatural deities that can see and guide the future... because he's met them. And had to give them a stern talking to at times. And that's not even counting Q, who Sisko punched in the face.)



Uh have you read how some trained diplomats behaved during the Age of Sail Enterprise is supposed to be the space version of? If anything Archer is painfully average in the trained diplomat department for what he is supposed to be. Not that the writers actually intended him to be that way mind you.
I don't know if we can count those as "trained" since I don't think there were a lot of formal education programs offering degrees in International Relations during the Age of Sail. Presumably Tucker meant that Archer is a trained diplomat by 22nd century standards, which hopefully has higher standards than the likes of Ferdinand Magellan and Captain Cook.
 
When I began to read your account of the episode, I thought that the twist would be that the Menk are already much smarter than they let on (maybe even on par with the Valakians) and are behind the genetic plague in a bid to free themselves from their slavers. And that would had opened a real moral dilemma for the Enterprise: what the Valakians do to the Menks is wrong at every level, and the Menks have the right to fight for their freedom, but are they going too far in their fight for freedom?
But on the other hand, the Valakians are in such a great position of advantage (between their technology and forcing the Menk to live in unsustainable wastelands) that maybe this is the only way to "even the field"?
But if the crew let them go with their plan, that would mean letting an entire sapient species dies while they could had done something, and with cultural pressure (since they already contacted Warp-using species), the Valakians could be convinced to change their ways one day, what would be the consequences, both for the Menks and the galaxy at large, to have a situation where genocide is the best solution to a problem?
But is it right to prolong the suffering of the Menks for the possibility that one days the Valakians will change? And what if the Valakians refuse to change their ways even after giving them a cure and trying to integrate it to the interstellar community?
Also, what happens if the crew give the Valakians the cure and tell them who created it, in a bid to try to make them change by seeing that the Menks are as smart as them and desperate? What if instead the Valakians decide to retaliate with extreme prejudice, "culling" their numbers until they won't be able to rebels for centuries to come? What if the Menks' plan being foiled instead push them to go to even more extreme lenghts and use even stronger strains of biological weapons, even if it means risking the life of everyone in their planet?

Now here you have a really difficult situation where things could go worse no matter what you chose.


Or another proposition: keep the plot mostly the same, but use it as a surprise villain reveal: until now Phlox looked like your typical aloof but well-meaning doctor, and then this episode comes, give us his POV on the week's situation and life in general, and you realize how fucking wrong this guy is in his head, and have him lie to Archer about the fact that he can make a cure, and worse, have him instead cook up a medicine to help the symptoms (as "the best" he can do) that will actually strengthen the plague so even another warp-capable race will have a hard time developing a cure, so that Phlox's twisted vision of evolution can carry on unimpeded.
Then have the rest of the series continue as normal, except that now you'll always second guess Phlox's true intentions: when he says that he can't find a solution to this week's problem, is he genuine or lying for the sake of his Space Mengele twisted belief? When he treat a patient and give him medicine, is it just what's written in the label, or did he add some extra ingredients?

Of course, it'll all come together in a future episode where his villainy is revealed to the crew, at which point they either stop him or he escapes and continue his dark works. (selling his services to the highest bidder to fund his researches)
 
That was basically the attitude towards the Prime Directive that Gene Roddenberry established in early TNG.
Damn, you beat me to making this point. But yeah, Pen Pals kind of suggests "God Fate intends for the civilization to die via plate tectonics, so who are we to interfere?" This has fewer real life implications, since no political movement is advocating against helping victims of natural disaster, which doesn't unfortunately apply to Eugenics. And it is somewhat easier to overlook the behavior, since the Enterprise crew aren't talking to most of the people involved, only one individual. But purely from the utilitarian, in universe view, the non-intervention decision in Pen Pals is on par.

To odd thing is: Even if you accept the premises laid out by the show (the Menk will only evolve if the Valakians aren't around and we should help the Menk to evolve) there is still no reason for genocide. Given the star trek universe has a great number of uninhabitable planets who could be settled by any species, you could simply demand that the Menk get to relocate to their own planet, to develop their own civilization in return for your cure. I'm reasonably sure the Vulcans have sufficient transport capacity for such a thing. So even according to Phlox own reasoning, he is still choosing genocide over a better solution. I think this resolution would have it's own troubling implications, since it could be misused as support for colonization if the ethnic group doing it is oppressed, but it's better than a open endorsement of eugenics.

What also really annoys me is Archers hypocrisy. He gets to have his little "We don't want to play god" speech, when he visited a pre-warp civilization personally in Civilization and broke people out off an internment camp in Detained. (Good, even the episode titles suck.) Curing a disease, which can only have positive outcomes for a vast portion of society involve is off the table, but fucking around on a renaissance era planet for your amusement isn't. Archer is not just inconsistent, he is incredibly myopic.
 
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Also I don't think I need to say that the disease does not match its symptoms do I? Its declared to be a protein binding issue in chromosomes but they talk about it like a viral or bacterial infection.
<Tobi>

In theory, it could be a combination of a genetic condition (which causes a protein binding issue, is widespread in the population, but harmless on it's own), and a bacterial or viral infectious agent which turns said genetic condition into a lethal one.
But in that case, it is just an infection with extra steps. Said extra steps can mean that some part of the population are more vulnerable or immune, or it could mean that there's an easy fix, but really it is an infection with extra steps.

It's needless to speculate, because the episode utterly butchers biology and medicine.
"Genetic degradation" is not a thing.
A species doesn't evolve into dying out, unless there's sudden changes in the environment. The above infectious agent could be such a change, but then the episode goes and says it's entirely genetic, so who the fuck knows? You can interpret this episode as being something like that infectious agent meeting something like sickle cell anemia - genetic traits that are beneficial unless you get two copies of it are absolutely a thing. But why would you?
What most viewers will get out of this episode is a butchered version of evolution where it has some intent or destiny you can interfere with - for one species to get some place, while the other doesn't.

What Phlox never considered is that maybe, the one species that was being oppressed, but was getting smarter etc., did so because of their current conditions. Maybe, just maybe, their evolution happens as a response to their environment? Maybe they get smarter because in their environment, they have access to more calories, and being smart is a beneficial trait (for a variety of reasons, such as avoiding punishment or otherwise outsmarting their oppressors)?
But you wouldn't get this basic understanding of evolution from this episode, now would you?
 
What's worse is, there was a better plot hidden inside this one. The Enterprise runs into an apartheid state where the main race is dying off. The Enterprise can cure it but they're uncomfortable with the treatment of another race by the ones dying. What are the terms of them giving them the cure? Do they try to demand social change? How do they mean to enforce that? Do they just give them the cure with no strings attached? What is the morality and ethics of the situation? Obviously they don't want to let a race die out but what if the aliens call their bluff if they do demand change? Do they enforce it at the barrel of a gun? There are many more interesting stories that can be done here. Maybe they can pick the wrong choice and the situation absolutely collapses and they leave the place worse than when it starts and they lament having made the wrong choice? That would require Archer to ever be wrong of course, but Babylon 5 wasn't afraid to have characters fail. Dr Franklin on several occasions becomes blinded by his own brilliance and moral superiority and does the wrong thing.
<Tobi>

As far as I know, Torchship (an RPG) by @open_sketch will indeed be about plots like that, basically being Star Trek but with different sensibilities in a lot of ways. It certainly throws out the Prime Directive, and the notion that there is one perfect answer to anything.
 
A species doesn't evolve into dying out, unless there's sudden changes in the environment. The above infectious agent could be such a change, but then the episode goes and says it's entirely genetic, so who the fuck knows? You can interpret this episode as being something like that infectious agent meeting something like sickle cell anemia - genetic traits that are beneficial unless you get two copies of it are absolutely a thing. But why would you?
What most viewers will get out of this episode is a butchered version of evolution where it has some intent or destiny you can interfere with - for one species to get some place, while the other doesn't.
Well, we are talking about two individuals who made Treshold, a vision of the evolution of humankind, triggered by a knockoff of the infinity drive in Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. Their vision of evolution isn't even as nonsensical as Larmarckism, where individuals of a species change in response to the environment, there vision involves complete "evolutionary" pre-destination. When time passes, a species changes according to changes already programmed into them by "evolution". I'm reminded of the episode of Voyager where they construct the sapient ancestors of dinosaurs who fled into the delta quadrant with their holo-chamber, and perfectly recreate them, despite knowing next to nothing about the environment.

I think there is also an argument to be had that sapient, tool-using species don't really evolve, since we can to tailor our environment to our needs quite a lot faster than genetic variation and adaption happens, thus basically suspending the pressures encouraging adaptation.
As far as I know, Torchship (an RPG) by @open_sketch will indeed be about plots like that, basically being Star Trek but with different sensibilities in a lot of ways. It certainly throws out the Prime Directive, and the notion that there is one perfect answer to anything.
Sounds quite interesting!
 
I think there is also an argument to be had that sapient, tool-using species don't really evolve,
Genus Homo has been deliberately fire-processing its food (at first opportunistically, then by fire-keeping, and finally by fire-starting) for 120 kiloyears, and it shows in the dentition of H. sapiens.
 
Genus Homo has been deliberately fire-processing its food (at first opportunistically, then by fire-keeping, and finally by fire-starting) for 120 kiloyears, and it shows in the dentition of H. sapiens.
I was more talking species past the development of agriculture. Sorry if I didn't make it clear.
 
Damn, you beat me to making this point. But yeah, Pen Pals kind of suggests "God Fate intends for the civilization to die via plate tectonics, so who are we to interfere?" This has fewer real life implications, since no political movement is advocating against helping victims of natural disaster, which doesn't unfortunately apply to Eugenics. And it is somewhat easier to overlook the behavior, since the Enterprise crew aren't talking to most of the people involved, only one individual. But purely from the utilitarian, in universe view, the non-intervention decision in Pen Pals is on par.
Also, in "Pen Pals" they don't actually let the people on the planet die. After all the talk about how letting whole sapient species be wiped out is enlightened (that's the other thing about how Roddenberry changed the Prime Directive for TNG: not only were they supposed to let people die, but they had to be insufferably smug about it), it only lasts until Picard actually hears the voice of a child who is going to die, at which point he finds an excuse to save them anyway. Which is generally how the Prime Directive was used in TOS: any time it got mentioned, it was right before they decided that this was an exception. (And it was also about not screwing with pre-warp civilizations so as to prevent colonialism, not about messing with the "cosmic plan" by preventing natural disasters.)

There is a later episode, "Homeward" where they actually do let everyone on a planet die to a natural disaster. Because saving even a small part of the population would "damage their culture." The culture that will not exist anyway if they're all dead. :facepalm:



Well, we are talking about two individuals who made Treshold, a vision of the evolution of humankind, triggered by a knockoff of the infinity drive in Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. Their vision of evolution isn't even as nonsensical as Larmarckism, where individuals of a species change in response to the environment, there vision involves complete "evolutionary" pre-destination. When time passes, a species changes according to changes already programmed into them by "evolution". I'm reminded of the episode of Voyager where they construct the sapient ancestors of dinosaurs who fled into the delta quadrant with their holo-chamber, and perfectly recreate them, despite knowing next to nothing about the environment.
Not only that, but the vision of humanity's future evolution in "Threshold" is that humans will become non-sapient salamander creatures with no tool-using appendages that can only crawl while dragging their back halves, who are allergic to water and can't breathe oxygen. Because this is somehow an improvement?
 
Sedentary agriculture is just another source of selection pressure. H. sapiens today has a more gracile facial structure than H. sapiens 10kya.
Interesting, but I'm not sure this is an example of evolution. We were capable of breeding crops that required far less effort to chew, and in response, the need for a robust facial structure went away. I'm not arguing humans no longer change in response to environmental factors (increased height due to greater food availability in the last 100 years is an example of this), but that we don't really adapt to overcome environmental pressures, but instead change the environment to suit us.
 
In Rodenberry-era Star Trek, it was well established that the natural evolutionary course for future humanity was to become energy-based lifeforms akin to Q. This was the next rung in the great chain of being and was the inevitable fate of any intelligent species unless they "stopped evolving" or worse.
 
This week on T'pol is right...

ARCHER: The Valakians want our warp technology.
T'POL: What did you tell them?
ARCHER: That I'd think about it.
T'POL: And?
ARCHER: Safe to say I know where you stand on the subject.
T'POL: Even if you give them our reactor schematics they don't have the technical expertise to build a warp engine.
ARCHER: They have no experience working with antimatter. I doubt they even realize how dangerous it is. They're not ready.
T'POL: Then your decision shouldn't be difficult.
ARCHER: We could stay and help them.
T'POL: The Vulcans stayed to help Earth ninety years ago. We're still there.
ARCHER: I never thought I'd say this, but I'm beginning to understand how the Vulcans must have felt.

Essentially, does Earth want to spend the next century rebuilding the Valakian homeworld the same way the Vulcans are doing with Earth? How much does Archer want to get bogged down in every planet he encounters politics and development?

Pity that concept isn't the main concept of the episode, with Archer's good intentions blowing up in his face as he has to deal with resistance to his help, customs he dislikes, wondering if he'll be making their civilization worse somehow, and trying to navigate not being an invading colonizer.

Instead, we have Phlox,. apathetic proponent of genocide. Part of this is also exacerbated by the production. The first segment of Phlox dictating his letter to Dr. Lucas is Phlox slowly leaving the turbolift and wandering to Engineering to help an engineer with first degree burns from an accident. Due to either the actor's not willing to run and looking bad, the actor's blocking because they need the narration to end before he enters the room with the injured person in it, or the direction because they want to keep a whimsical tone as he narrates his letter to his pen pal, the doctor is taking the walk very slowly, smiling the whole way, as if he's just taking a stroll.

But, as mentioned, he's going to Engineering to help a crew member with burns from an accident in Engineering. It's only when Phlox looks at the crew member that they know it's nothing to worry about and easily fixed, but Phlox didn't know while going to Engineering. Imagine if the burns had been worse, and the doctor was slowly walking to him. This is because the script knows it's nothing to worry about, just part of Phlox's routine, but they chose burns in an Engineering accident as his daily routine, and Phlox can't be bothered to hurry. Imagine if the burns were third degree and Phlox was still having time to narrate the letter, His patient could have died because he was taking his time getting there.

There's a reason EMTs aren't supposed to stop for coffee on the way to helping out burn victims.

TNG did this on accident too, with Dr. Crusher and Worf walking very slowly towards a room to deal with fire injuries because they'd run out of set otherwise while the camera crew is ahead of them not trying to run into each other. But they still treated it as somewhat of a medical emergency, not a walk through the park.

The other reason this doesn't work is that this episode is going for a similar tone that TNG had with Data's Day, in which Data is reacting to the more human characters from his more android perspective, only with Phlox instead of Data. The main difference is that Data was dealing with mostly mundane stuff and his having issues navigating human social interactions. Miles and Keiko arguing before their wedding, picking out a wedding gift with Worf, learning to dance with Beverly, etc. NOT having to deal with Data's rushing to solve whether or not the Enterprise will be destroyed until the climax. Phlox is dealing with people being injured in life threatening accidents and a pandemic, interspersed with more mundane stuff like movie night. You can't do lighthearted whimsical interpersonal flubs while dealing with an ER situation or a pandemic killing millions annually. Data also had the attitude of well meaning outsider who didn't quite get social interactions, and this made mistakes because he didn't understand human interactions, but wanting to get it right. Phlox, throughout this episode, is coming off as a judgemental elitist prick finding fault with every single person he meets and how worse than they are than Denobuleans.

Data assumes the fault is his, while Phlox assumes the fault is everyone else's.
 
There's a lot I didn't get to cover in this one since the plot is small but objectionable. Mainly more details like this:

PHLOX [OC]: Sub-commander T'Pol has a very pragmatic feel of the universe. I admire her logic although she lacks the instinctiveness that a more emotional response can provide. Somehow, I find this unsettling.
Buddy, who on this ship don't you feel superior to?
 
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