The absolutely worst part of "Star Trek"
I just watched what I think is probably the worst episode of "Star Trek" ever produced. It's from "Enterprise" and is called "Cogenitor." From a moral perspective, I found it absolutely unacceptable and outrageous. It actually offended me at the very end, though I kept hoping for some wonderful twist that would turn everything on its head. The episode was a great example of how "Star Trek"'s "Prime Directive" of non-interference in alien cultures is the antithesis to Christ's parable of the good Samaritan. Any episode that truly espouses it, as episodes of "Enterprise" seem to like to do, inevitably becomes a moral disaster as it advocates indifference towards the suffeing of others simply because they're others. Actually, it's worse than indifference since it brands "interference" in another person's culture as the one unforgivable sin.
In this particular episode, "Cogenitor," Trip receives a severe moral attack from the captain for doing something good to an alien, because as a result he "interfered" with her culture, and the alien ended up killing herself because she knew she would never again experience the kindness and respect that Trip had showed her, because of the extreme sexism of her culture. Trip is somehow persuaded that her suicide is his fault and thus comes to embrace the amoral Prime-Directive philosophy, which, at its heart, is truly tyrranical since it sets up one's culture as the highest good which should be preserved even at the expense of allowing tremendous suffering. It's the ultimate firewall against revolutionaries and prophets, who have a vision of a more equitable society. It's a good illustration, I think, of how truly evil moral relativism can become.
In fairness to "Star Trek," in a lot of pre-"Enterprise" episode, often when the crew faces a situation in which the Prime Directive would result in extreme suffering on the part of a large group of people, the crew decides to break the Prime Directive in order to do the right thing. Take, for instance, the "TNG" episode "Pen Pals," in which, barely, the captain is convinced to save a dying planet because Data made radio contact with a frightened little girl. This is usually accompanied by a speech about the true meaning of the Prime Directive. "Enterprise," however, seems to have absolutized the Directive in a way rarely seen before, and it's truly horrifying to behold. Of course, given how often the Prime Directive is broken in the previous series, one begins to wonder why Starfleet doesn't seriously consider modifying the Directive to be a little less awful. Like, say, perhaps you could allow for interference when huge parts of societies are going to be severely oppressed or destroyed. There's actually one or two episodes of "TNG" in which the crew lets a whole civilization go extinct, although the point is not driven home so fiercely and cruelly as in "Cogenitor." It of course makes no sense whatsoever to allow a whole species to die, as only a lunatic would argue that its better to let their whole society die than to interfere with it. I don't know about you, but if the sun were about to explode, and some technologically advanced aliens were watching, I would really appreciate it if they would rescue us, or help us, even if encountering them caused all sorts of problems on Earth (like mass panic, etc). I mean, panic is better than death, right? I'm not saying that Starfleet should run around trying to help everybody everywhere, but it sure would be nice if they didn't turn their backs on the most severe instances of injustice in the galaxy simply because they're taking place on alien worlds, given that when it comes down to it all the alien species in "Star Trek" are really just human beings with a little plastic on their faces. It's not like we've ever seen a species so totally alien that it doesn't make perfect sense to believe that they are subject to the same moral code as all human beings.
In this particular episode, "Cogenitor," Trip receives a severe moral attack from the captain for doing something good to an alien, because as a result he "interfered" with her culture, and the alien ended up killing herself because she knew she would never again experience the kindness and respect that Trip had showed her, because of the extreme sexism of her culture. Trip is somehow persuaded that her suicide is his fault and thus comes to embrace the amoral Prime-Directive philosophy, which, at its heart, is truly tyrranical since it sets up one's culture as the highest good which should be preserved even at the expense of allowing tremendous suffering. It's the ultimate firewall against revolutionaries and prophets, who have a vision of a more equitable society. It's a good illustration, I think, of how truly evil moral relativism can become.
In fairness to "Star Trek," in a lot of pre-"Enterprise" episode, often when the crew faces a situation in which the Prime Directive would result in extreme suffering on the part of a large group of people, the crew decides to break the Prime Directive in order to do the right thing. Take, for instance, the "TNG" episode "Pen Pals," in which, barely, the captain is convinced to save a dying planet because Data made radio contact with a frightened little girl. This is usually accompanied by a speech about the true meaning of the Prime Directive. "Enterprise," however, seems to have absolutized the Directive in a way rarely seen before, and it's truly horrifying to behold. Of course, given how often the Prime Directive is broken in the previous series, one begins to wonder why Starfleet doesn't seriously consider modifying the Directive to be a little less awful. Like, say, perhaps you could allow for interference when huge parts of societies are going to be severely oppressed or destroyed. There's actually one or two episodes of "TNG" in which the crew lets a whole civilization go extinct, although the point is not driven home so fiercely and cruelly as in "Cogenitor." It of course makes no sense whatsoever to allow a whole species to die, as only a lunatic would argue that its better to let their whole society die than to interfere with it. I don't know about you, but if the sun were about to explode, and some technologically advanced aliens were watching, I would really appreciate it if they would rescue us, or help us, even if encountering them caused all sorts of problems on Earth (like mass panic, etc). I mean, panic is better than death, right? I'm not saying that Starfleet should run around trying to help everybody everywhere, but it sure would be nice if they didn't turn their backs on the most severe instances of injustice in the galaxy simply because they're taking place on alien worlds, given that when it comes down to it all the alien species in "Star Trek" are really just human beings with a little plastic on their faces. It's not like we've ever seen a species so totally alien that it doesn't make perfect sense to believe that they are subject to the same moral code as all human beings.