I'm on season three of this show so far and I'm legit pissed at you guys. Why did no one tell me how great this show is! I've never watched star trek before but my whole life all I've ever heard is Kirk vs picard. I didn't even know there was a black man in charge of the ship running things.I haven't watched the of series or new generation but I'm gonna assume DS9 is way better than any other star trek series. benjamin Sisko is the best captain, and anyone who thinks different is a lib. Also the way they build on stuff is great. Like what the hell is going on with the dominion. They already seem way more advanced than anything the federation has. I have no idea how Sisko and company can beat them, it's really interesting. I had low expectations for a 90s show but damn it's hype as all hell. Like I said I'm only on season 3 but I can't wait to see how they deal with all the shit they got going on.
Edit: I just saw there's a star trek Sunday here but fuck it I'm inspired to post now. If you gotta remove this post I get it.
For all the good that is in DS9, especially in some episodes like Past Tense (1 and 2), there is an underlying problem with DS9 that's always sit badly with me and that is how it approaches war ideologically. That by war existing as a current event, it creates a persmisivness of actions that would in peace time be seen as inhumane. But more than that, it ultimately in presentation presents a neoliberal conclusion to the presentation of how that permisivness of inhumane actions is approached: They get results, therefore they are allowed, and overlooked in favor of those results. This is the whole conclusion of In the Pale Moonlight. Ignore the presentation and style, look at the presented conclusion. "The ends justify the means".
Now this is even addressed, in some part, in "Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges". Bashir is disgusted with Admiral Ross and the Federation and that they'd do such things...and that's where it all stops. You get Sloan appearing to Bashir at the end of the episode saying how the Federation needs men like him. Basically who "Get things done." This is the end messeage of any episode in relation to the Dominion War "The ends justify the means." No matter how unethical, how abhorrent.
This 90s attitued is what got so many of us 80s/90s kids embracing that idea. And applyign it to real life. The rest of us Bashirs who were appaled at what the former group would do, just ended up blackpilled.