What job do you try to get?

I think I'd go for some kind of science officer. I'm watching a scene right now where one is melting stuff and then holding the fumes under glass for whatever reason. Seems up my alley

  • Tofu_Lewis [he/him]
    ·
    3 years ago

    It always seemed weird to me that there weren't any JAG officers, or Federation lawyers, permanently assigned to ships - they always have to get random officers to fill those roles. I understand that the writers wouldn't want that for plot reasons, but why don't they have somebody on board whose sole purpose is to interpret the Prime Directive and shit? Again, for the purposes of television it wouldn't be fun for a space lawyer to pop out and tell Picard, "Uhm, actually, the most recent decision passed down from the Federation Judicial Branch says you shouldn't let your android send letters to an alien girl on a dying planet," but still, it seems like it would be really necessary to have a legal scholar handy. Anyways, that space lawyer from TOS was a cool guy, can I be him?

    • GalaxyBrain [they/them]
      ·
      3 years ago

      There are JAG officers the jerk lady in The Drumhead was one and I think there was one in the TOS episode Court Martial. Everything is logged by computer so they show up when they need to do a thing. Also writers forget they exist most of the time so they can use the main cast.

      • Tofu_Lewis [he/him]
        ·
        3 years ago

        I mean I know they exist - but it seems from the functional aspect, you'd want one on the ship all the time. Their exclusion from the universe does seem like a willful ignorance on the part of the writers for sure.

        • GalaxyBrain [they/them]
          ·
          3 years ago

          Actually I was just watching the commentary track for Measure of a Man earlier today and Malinda Snodgrass, who wrote the episode, has a law degree and was a lawyer before she started writing.

          • Tofu_Lewis [he/him]
            ·
            3 years ago

            There is the argument that Picard or whoever the commanding officer is would have sufficient training to deal with most low level legal issues (marriages, division of property, punitive measures), what about the other stuff? There are legal specialists, do we imagine that most command officers have rudimentary legal training?

            • GalaxyBrain [they/them]
              ·
              3 years ago

              Considering how often they act as legal agents they must have some training in that field.

              • Tofu_Lewis [he/him]
                ·
                3 years ago

                I actually think it would be cool to have all legal issues dealt with by a massive cadre of command officers, but there are legal specialists, and there are judges, and when Sisko is taking Dukat to the grand jury we learn there are Federation courts (at least dealing with war criminals). I suppose the best rationalization is that starships are islands of the law and the commanding officer is the judge, jury, and executioner (RIP Tuvix).