Stargate: Atlantis (thoughts on ethics and stupidity)

[butterfly]

This is a thing that I've noticed, something of a dividing line in how SGA is viewed -- there are people who see the show as darker than SG-1 and people who see the show as lighter (there are also people who don't watch SG-1, but they're in a different, non-comparison section).

I see SGA not as lighter or darker but as... more confused and less ethical/moral than SG-1.

I mentioned, in my post about the episodes, that both Morpheus and Misbegotten made me think about how much I love Daniel. And that, to me, is the place where I'm not quite in the same place with Atlantis as I am with SG-1. They don't have a Daniel. Not even that they don't have Daniel, but they don't have a Daniel-figure, a non-military, strongly ethical advisor who refuses to back down in the face of military certainty. Daniel Jackson can be pig-headed and self-righteous, but after watching Atlantis for two seasons and change, I am so happy that he is. His stubborness and his conviction in himself are the tools that he's used to stand up against his military commander (who was his friend).

On Atlantis, we appear have a civilian leader. We're told that Elizabeth Weir is a diplomat and a negotiator, that she's used to getting warring factions to agree with each other. On the basis of this, I thought that there was a chance that Atlantis would be more ethically run than the military SGC.

For me, it comes down to this -- both Michael and Misbegotten are the results of unethical stupidity on the parts of the Atlantis crew. Daniel Jackson would have protested (not just looked uncomfortable and stopped complaining when his military commander was unhappy with him).

I agree that the only choice in the end of Misbegotten was to fire on the colony. In fact, it was the first smart thing that the Atlantis people had done the entire episode! They never should have come to that choice.

The retrovirus is a failure. At this moment in time, it is a failure. It doesn't work. You can't rely on prisoners to give themselves daily injections and you can't devote all your resources to making sure that it gets done. As long as the retrovirus is temporary, it is a failure.

In addition to that, it is unethical to perform medical experiments on prisoners. Massively shortening a prisoner's lifespan, making them vulnerable to all kinds of sickness that they weren't prey to before, making them total amnesics and pretty much dependent upon you for survival is all hideously unethical.

More than that, it was the height of stupidity to change Michael on Atlantis itself. How much of their current strife could have been avoided if they'd been intelligent enough to use the Alpha site from the start? Also, and I cannot emphasize this enough, they should not have had Ronon there. No. You do not put 'hunted for years' guy in with someone who is of the type that hunted him. And if you do, then you should remove him the second that he shows himself incapable of rational thought when it comes to your prisoner.

Finally, if they really had to stab Michael in the back, it was criminally stupid of them to do so using a method that Michael had already once overcome. And that's not even touching the ethical issues involved with fucking over someone who has been playing straight with you.

All in all, very badly played by the Atlantis crew.

Comments

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

Is it ethical to turn Wraiths into amnesiac, can't defend themselves temporary humans? No, but it's efficient.

But it isn't efficient. If their solution worked, I would have far fewer issues with it. If they used the Wraiths' weakened states to kill them, as Buffy does with the newly risen, I wouldn't have issues with it. It's the medical experimenting and the imprisoning that I have issues with.

[jgracio.livejournal.com]

But it isn't efficient.

It is if you're trying to capture their technology. :)

The medical experimentating and imprisoning is actually what you'd to sick people with an unknown disease that could be fatal to other people. Which is what the Wraith post retro virus are. Humans with a degenerative disease that will turn them into Wraith.

You lock them up so they won't endanger other people and you try to cure them.

Of course this only works if that's how the SgA people see the ex-Wraith, which is not true for everyone.