doctorsmith

I think if you ask most people, and even consider the way the Pegasus crew talked about him, I believe you'll find them of the opinion that rape was the, ahem, "stick" he used to put his prisoners in a state of compliance. Even you admit that is possible. The notion is the prisoner would freely offer any knowledge in the hopes of escaping further, shall we say, sessions. And, yes, most torturers would probably continue even after gaining information. They would continue until they feel they had every scrap of knowledge or the subject died. Put into that context, your basic assumption (this is all too theoretical to call facts) is now suspect. And I would admit as a method of interrogation it does not seem very effective. Likely a normal human prisoner would be so traumatized as to even make things up. Now someone might say the obvious poor reliability of Thorn’s methods proves he's just in it for the, ahem, "stick" but Admiral Cain seems too strict, militarily speaking, to keep him in that position if he were not producing anything but relief of his own sick pleasure. I don't think you'll find "rape" listed as a tactic in the official handbooks at most military academies. Still I think we can say it happens in war zones all the time. But I don't think you'll find many leaders specifically authorizing it except for situations of ethnic cleansing. In some cultures if a woman is raped by someone from another culture she is rendered impure and untouchable by the men of her village – her child, should it live, is technically one of the “enemy†and she cannot give birth to any more of her own people. But this *likely* doesn't apply to cylons, and likely is not the cylon intention with Helo and other humans. In other real instances rape, usually of a male prisoner by another male, is used as a humiliation tactic. Although this may break a prisoner's spirit it is also highly likely to cause mental breakdown (increasing in chances the more it is applied), so it is not likely to provide very reliable information for very long. As for technological methods one might argue that the Spanish Inquisition did fine with good ol’ fashioned brutality. Though some of their tools were insidiously ingenious. And, no, I am not talking about the comfy chair. More like the chair with the great bit spike sticking out of the seat.

Subjecting an audience to negative stimuli in order to evoke a particular response? Yep, that is exploitative. The word "exploit" suffers from negative connotations, certainly, though it need not automatically be considered that way. You’d be hard pressed to find a show where they writers didn’t say, “How will the audience react to . . .†If you don’t think that this show’s writers and producers were not sitting around, wondering how they can “frakk†with their viewer’s heads, then your naiveté is astounding, and refreshing. I can practically guarantee you they had a long discussion about whether to include the “rape†scene, or how far it should progress; talking over the pros and cons. Especially since a “viewer discretion warning†would be involved. At any rate, most of your post is detailing your opinions (ex. If I wanted that I'd stick to watching TNG . . .) or merely speculation (ex. What Thorn did wasn't motivated by interrogation . . .), so as such I don’t see what the point would be in trying to argue against you (no sense in starting an endless, ego-bruising round of post/counter-posting, right?). True, I stated my own opinions/evaluations/values but there does appear to be a legitimate argument that the show is bypassing obvious logic (especially military logic) in favor of shock tactics in the plot used solely because of its effect on the audience. And there is a fundamental difference, however slight, between stating opinions and pointing out seeming faults in logic. I see no point in responding to your misgivings about TNG, but I do feel there is some merit in looking at missteps and missed opportunities in the show. It’s not like I’m laying any groundwork for charges of “jumping the shark.†Thoughts in the same vein: Baltar appears to be assuming that both the “carrot†and the “stick†will work on cylons based on his observations of cylon onboard the Pegasus. But in truth does he really know if you can torture a cylon? After all, they are artificial beings, designer lifeforms. A cylon’s emotional capacity may merely be simulation, which can be deactivated when necessary. In point of fact, any “trauma†they show may merely be just that: a show. Responding to human expectations. This is not just a judgment I am arbitrarily placing on “artificial beings,†because you must keep in mind that cylons have proven themselves to be tacticians. Would you design a being that can be overwhelmed psychologically? Probably not, especially if you intended for your creation to enter situations where this kind of trauma is not possible but assured if their agents are caught. This “Gina†could merely be playing out expected behavioral patterns, all the while bidding time until the humans drop their guard. If that is the case then rape or any form of brutality, physical or mental, would be ineffective. Post-mortem analysis would help to provide clues and insights, regardless of how much technobabble is employed. Yet despite any logical argument, who can say what the writers of the show will do? Most likely they will make the cylons human enough, in keeping with this as an allegory of “human vs. human†violence; terrorism, sleeper agents, war crimes, and thinking of the enemy in lesser degrees than you do your own race. This also helps illustrate why the humans continually dehumanize their adversaries: they may look like us, behave like us, and bleed or cry, but they are still just “toasters.†Ultimately you can believe what you will and I will continue to do the same. And ultimately the people behind the show will do whatever they want to do. But still I wonder at what could have been. Which would be more powerful: the dubious “interrogative rape†the show employed, or a more Mengele-like approach where you have a still functioning human cylon hooked to a machine with humans saying, “lets see what happens if we run a charge through THIS area of the brain.†Not only would the later be more disturbing (in my humble opinion), but it would also be in keeping with the logic of information gathering and assessment of the enemy. That’s all. I apologize for being long-winded.

Well, another problem entirely is a matter of logical approach. There are other ways, even beyond physical brutality, to torture someone. I believe I wrote in this discussion threat that I was uncertain why they didn't merely try to access whatever mechanical systems are in her brain. Obviously she has some kind of interface, which is how she accessed the Galactica's systems to purge the virus. Albeit with a fiber optic cable stuck up her wrist. Instead they have the official "ride 'em, cowboy" approach. Hardly seems well thought out. You might expect the guards to pull something like that, for fun, once they feel they've gotten all the info out of her, but as a primary method it seems . . . dodgy. To say the least. Truth serum? Hook her up to an EEG? On face value it's easy to scoff at these suggestions. I mean, would these things even work on a clyon? And that, actually, is my point. We don't know. Hell, the people in the show don’t know. We're in the second season, and they don't even know how much of the human looking cylons is machine and how much is biological. And they haven't even tried to figure out. At best Baltar was fiddling with a "cylon detector" which we’ve rarely seen or even heard mentioned since. Yet on a more practical front, the first human cylon they captured was tortured by repeatedly dunking his head in a bucket of water. Then they flushed him out an airlock. "To know thy enemy." Basic military strategy; information is essential for proper planning and devising counter-measures. They should have dissected the first prisoner. Ripped out wires, guts, and all. Found out what the hell he was, how he works. Everything. But instead they tortured and then executed him, losing the body in the process. And the Galactica's Sharon? Apparently her corpse is still sitting in a morgue freezer unit, for all practical purposes forgotten in all but memory. And the Pegasus people? Having apparently broken their prisoner, they’ve now got her chained in the middle of a huge cell with large glass windows – apparently everything but a viewing balcony and storage station for opera glasses. As if the "tortured cylon show" has replaced movie night for the crew of the Pegasus. Torture. Rape. Execution. Is it "edgy?" Sure. Is it smart sci-fi? Eh, not really. Is it a smart plot device. Not exactly, at least if you really want to consider the Galactica as run by military trained men and women sworn to do everything it takes to save their people. Exploiting the emotions of your viewers is not only smart, it’s wise, but best achieved if it compliments the show. Let’s face it, even Hogan’s Heroes probably would have figured out how to hotwire a Centurion and have it take out Schultz by now. Sigh. At least things like this haven’t made the series unwatchable. In fact, I’m still more than happy to watch it, as I’m sure the majority of viewers are. But this will get ridiculous if by the third or fourth season they still haven’t gotten their act together. For now, it’s at least worth pointing out.

And why not? Let's face it, Bigfoot, Nessie, even ET - all caught WILD on tape. But the Tooth Fairy? Not to mention Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny! Forget those penny-anty players, because they're just posers. Its the ones we have NO evidence, regardless of how remote, that we should really be worrying about. I mean the Easter Bunny? Hell, he created that whole Jesus bit just to cover his fluffy tailed ass. That's more power than the Illuminati, the Majestic 12, the Mob, AND the Girl Scouts combined. You don't want to mess with that dude. Ever wonder what Peeps candies are made of? Ground up Jimmy Hoffa. * * * I might as well slow this down bit for some of the members of the home viewing audience. If somebody wants to say something, say aliens, does not exist, then that is an opinion. Keep aliens as the example, if someone can take into account the videos and pictures and "eyewitness" accounts, he may dismiss it all. Or he might agree with some of it. Or he may even dismiss the evidence but still say he agrees with the possibility. REGARDLESS . . . it all comes down to an opinion. Everyone has a right to an opinion, and can even state it, and good on for speaking your mind and all that. However, if you dismiss something that has at least some shred of producible evidence over something, say the tooth fairy, that nobody would credibly argue for or even bother producing evidence for, this moves from opinion to a logical fallacy. And you don't want somebody waving their logical fallacy all over the place. It's indecent.

That would be the Coriolis effect, though it is more commonly referenced to which direction the water spins in your toilet when you flush.

Although the quote you've provided takes into account time (seemingly used by the writer to doubt him/herself), it makes the mistake of neglecting the hurricane's spatial component. Hurricane Rita was, at the height of her power, over four hundred miles long. That is quite a diffusion of energy. And, at any rate, if you are talking about using a weapon (or series of weapons) to try to COUNTERACT every spare iota of energy within a hurricane . . . what would be the point? That is like the petulant schoolyard bully that kicks over another child's construction of building blocks, then proceeds to smash said blocks with a rock in the vain attempt to obliterate the offending things from the very face of reality. The more practical consideration would be to try to disrupt the storm. Hurricanes, after all, require very specific atmospheric conditions to form, and once one gets going it is sustained largely by the sheer force of its spin. Disrupt that, and you could possibly cripple the storm. This was the driving notion behind the US efforts to seed hurricanes with silver iodide crystals. The crystals bond with supercooled water to form new clouds, in the attempt to form a new eye. The hope was that this would create a new storm that was weaker than the previous. Unfortunately the natural ebb and flow of a hurricane’s strength made it impossible to prove the effort was doing any good, so the idea was abandoned. Now if you really wanted to obliterate the hurricane from the face of the Earth, why not have the Pentagon use their HAARP electromagnetic WMD to create a new hurricane (check the web and you’ll find people who actually claim this was done to create Katrina), one equal in power but with the winds spinning in the opposite direction. Then they’ll just cancel each other out! Sure, why not? I mean, screw the Coriolis effect! We’ll kick it in the nads too, while we’re at it! American God Squad, away! . .. ... Yeah, I couldn't resist. Sorry.

A not altogether unexpected question. Considering how much energy a hurricane packs, stopping one would require a substantial application of force. Or a way to alter the state of physics local to the hurricane (not breaking the laws of physics, but changing the conditions). In the Sixties the US tried seeding hurricanes with silver iodide crystals. Never could prove it was doing any damn good, though, so those efforts have since stopped.

It is, yet it isn't. While the episodes we have seen and the episodes that will be aired next year will ultimately be packaged as "Season 2" on DVDs, many networks use these engineered finales in their programming. This allows the channel to stretch out their product. Although you think it would be easy to get people in front of the TV during the winter, this allows them to build up anticipation for months (via their "coming in January" commercials with all the lovely teaser footage that sends us to our forums and endless rounds of speculation). It stretchs out the story and helps rebuild viewer frenzy for the second half of the season - there are merits to this business strategy. Technically you could call this a "half-season finale" but the network "mind-control specialists" pointed out that "season finale" has a more poignant psychological effect on the viewer, and "season finales" traditionally draw in larger crowds. Heh, sorry. Just had to play the conspiracy angle on why they'd confuse people like this. Anyway it's also why these shows start airing in July while episodes of, say, Lost start with a more traditional airing schedule; in the fall rather than the summer. Yet there are, as already pointed out, distribution licenses (as with the UK) which do not account for this. The U.S. airs the first half first, but overseas they get the entire package first. Thus, as you can expect, the Torrents have a fieldday with this arrangement.

Huh. I thought the torture was exploitative, well obviously, but I mean towards the audience. As a practical torture technique, when was he expecting her to spill her secrets? Pillow talk hardly seemed plausible. At most he'd likely drive her as mad as the other Six. Plus the previous ep showed her sticking a fiber optic cable in her wrist to access the ship's computer. She had download (accessed the virus) and upload (sent the virus back at the enemy) capabilities. Tactically speaking, it'd make more sense to try to access her "hardware" in a completely different fashion and copy her memories into a seperate computer system (so she cannot try to access the ship's systems again while you work). Basically a "mind frell," if I remember my Farscape correctly - no less brutal or scarring than physical abuse, but ultimately more effective. Uhg. I almost made myself weep. Yeah, it's useless to pick the stuff apart. Especially when it's clear the writer's were going for "shock and skin crawl." Plus they get to make a psychological statement about some of the Pegasus people. Hence why I think it's rather exploitatitive. Still, interesting to note Six freaking at the treatment of a cylon. Were their "farms" any less creepy? Programmed for hypocrisy - and more human than I'm sure they'd like to admit. My opinion of the admiral . . . I think it telling that she was only giving relief supplies to Galactica. Sure, they promised to share with the other ships later, and although it makes sense that they would focus on military assets first . . . I suspect she'll later declare the other ships a liability. She wants to fight, not babysit, and try to claim back what they lost, not run to a mythical lost colony. She won't attack them (unless attacked first) but something in her hard demeanor leads me to suspect she'd easily tell them they are on their own. That's, at least, the most plausible high-drama conflict, in my opinion. If I wanted a minor clue I suppose I could check the IMDB and see how many more episodes she's listed as being in. I like the suggestion of the president making Adama an admiral. Makes logical sense. She could demote the other woman, too, but that would automatically make her an enemy. Plus it would be idiotic to think Cain would meekly comply. But if Roslin puts the two leaders on equal footing . . . That leaves Adama's military people to more comfortably resist Cain and it would also give the Pegasus crew reason to pause (never underestimate the effect of chain-of-command on a military trained mind).

Thank you for being so kind! And, honestly, I don't always agree with myself after I write my opinion. I try to limit my posts as much as possible. Even I realize my opinions are a tad, ahem, long-winded.

Regardless of the level of damage there must have been something worth nabbing - especially if children, regardless of their Borg nature, were able to hold Voyager at bay for so long. Since Borg tech is regenerative they could have merely stolen all of the components to the trans warp device (it must be small enough since Voyager had tried to steal one before) and they always have Seven as an expert on Borg tech. Surely they could have jury-rigged something! This is one of the many instances where the Voyager series pushed past the limits of Suspension of Disbelief, and the show became practically unwatchable (for at least enough fans that we are still arguing the merits of Voyager today). This is akin to the episode after the initial fight with Speces 8472 (The Gift, if I remember correctly), Torres is fretting over removing the Borg upgrades to Voyager. Not only were those upgrades supposed to allow Voyager to survive an encounter with a species that kicked the Borg where it hurts (variable, depending on the Borged species), but Torres was upset because the components kept REPAIRING THEMSELVES. The greatest advantage of the Borg, the cube’s systems regenerate and the ship just keep coming, was considered "crap" by Voyager's chief engineer. This is also akin to how Voyager would go toe-to-toe with a Borg cube or with Species 8472 (at least sustaining multiple hits from these badass aliens) and in other episodes they can't handle a couple Kazon raiders or even tiny Vaadwaur ships which had tech that was 500 years old (ep. Dragon's Teeth). While these can surely be called "script issues" I completely agree with the statement:

I know that's it for me, subconsciously seeing Janeway as a lesser Hepburn. Kate Mulgrew has actually been doing a Hepburn show on stage called Tea at Five (you can google it for more details). I'm sure Paramount was aware of the similarites between the actresses, and I believe she was actually supposed to inact the spirit/flavor of Hepburn. Especially in the early seasons, which you can also see in some of the hairstyles they gave her. So this isn't just confusion or a coincidence, the similarities were intentionally drawn out. Unfortunately, from some of the reviews I've read she, eh, doesn't do a good Hepburn on stage, either. Ahem. Yeah. Personal edit: There were good reviews, too, as well as staunch fans. Sorry if I made it seem as if there were none.

• Quote: The examples you're pointing out are storylines. Exactly. Just as how I wouldn’t judge an actual person without referring to their history. That which a character does defines her, regardless of her fictitious nature. • Quote: You can look at that, again, as being the writers. Mulgrew doesn't write the actions and words her character portrays The way I see it, a good actor can save a bad script (or at least make a bad show watchable if only for to see that actor) just as a bad actor can ruin a good script. I suppose you can say that Kate Mulgrew just didn’t “do it for me.†Which might be causing some confusion in this post. As I understood it, we were asked why we though Janeway was a bad captain, not anything about the actor. Though certainly the actor played a part (pun not intended). • Quote: A good captain? Are you serious? Every time the ship made it's way home after a conflict that might have destroyed it, she was a good captain. Hmm. That to me is like saying, “Every time Gomer Pyle didn’t accidentally frag Sarge he was a good soldier.†Here is an instance where you are using a necessity of the scripts to DEFEND her character, something you would appear to deny a person who thinks the scripts are a large part of what ruined her. If Voyager had been destroyed at any point, it would have ended the series (almost 100% certainly). Even in the last episode I would not fathom Berman and Co. deciding to “Blake 7†the crew and ship. Their survival was not merely a feat of luck or even skill, it was going to happen regardless of who was captain and who was playing that role. What I prefer to dwell on is HOW it ended, and how believable she was in pulling it off. I grade her a D minus: good hustle, bad form. • Quote: If you don't like the show and the captain, we're not going to be able to convince you. My intention was not to “convert†people to my way of thinking, and never would I hope to do so in such a contentious matter as this. Conversely I doubt even citing specific evidence of her efficacious captaincy would dissuade me in my dislike for her. Personal preferences are, after all, personal matters. I merely wished to relay my point of view in answer to c4’s topic request. I apologize if this is a mischaracterization of your behavior, as I only have written words to go on, but there seems to be a strong sense of indignity from you. Understandable, given the personal nature of the cases being stated. Because it is too easy to ruffle feathers in such a topic, I will bow out, as graciously as possible. There is no loss or gain to be had here, as the vast majority of posters will continue to believe whatever they wish to. I don’t think it could ever be doubted that was the case. Thank you for taking the time to read my entire arguement. Very appreciated!

Janeway. She changed her portrayals as often as she changed hairstyles. First she behaves like her crew’s mother figure, maybe even as a governess (like she’s living out her wretched gothic holonovels). Later she becomes an Ellen Ripley-style action figure, slicing macrovirus apart with a combat knife. And in one of the many time travel episodes when she is warned that her actions are threatening the universe she actually says something along the lines of “screw causality, my crew are my first priority,†which is, I suppose, a nice sentiment until you ponder that since her crew has to exist in this universe she might not want to implode it, at the very least. And yet I agree that even though her portrayals kept shifting her character never really grew past her initial design. How often in series did we witness Janeway fall back on her cardinal sin: that she alone decided to blow up the Caretaker’s array and strand her crew. No matter how many times the issue came up and was subsequently resolved by that episodes end it kept coming back. Even when confronted by a Captain Ransom of the Equinox who bucks ethics to get his crew back quicker. Even after Voyager discovers a vortex that was polluting the inhabitants of a dark matter nebula and the crew refused to let her sacrifice herself, in essence vindicating her decision to destroy the Caretaker array by them making a similar choice. Then in the final episodes of the series we are shown Admiral Janeway essentially taking it upon herself to frick with time once again, apparently because she lost so many crew. This is while ignoring all of the crew Voyager lost in those previous seven seasons. In essence she erased every trouble, trial, and even triumph we would have seen if Voyager had an eighth season or more. Surely Voyager must have done good in those years we wouldn’t see, making invaluable impressions on the destinies of entire civilizations! And she even ignores how in that one episode she briefly saw a mature Naomi Wildman as well as that one ex-Borg 7 o’ 9 adopted – so I guess she and Chakotay saw temporal ghosts in that ep. I guess even Admiral Janeway knew that seven seasons was just too much to continue. Sorry for the diatribe but I wanted to be as specific as possible. Could somebody offer specific evidence of where she was a really good captain? Without saying at least she wasn’t like captain in the ep where she was falsely portrayed as a Nazi-like figure (Season 4, Episode 23, “Living Witnessâ€ÂÂ). Oh crap, does this initiate Godwin’s Law?