Starfleet's daycare is closed

FaxModem1 · Post by **FaxModem1** » 2002-12-17 05:17pm

While there were children on the Enterprise-D and others at that time, it appears that they have gotten rid of that idiotic idea.

Evidence:

DS9:
Defiant has no civilians

VOY:
Voyager has no children or civilians, and if you say Naomi Wildman, her mother was pregnant when they got stranded.

The movies:

From First Contact on, all we see on the Enterprise are people in uniforms, civilians are not here.

Please show me where I am wrong.

Shinova · Post by **Shinova** » 2002-12-17 05:27pm

My take on this is that E-D was probably a general purpose ship.

For example, the Culture has civillians who lives on their ships by the millions.

E-E is supposed to be the flagship of Starfleet, I think, and thus is more military-minded.

Master of Ossus · Post by **Master of Ossus** » 2002-12-17 05:28pm

To be fair, the E-D was also referred to numerous times as the "flagship," but it is clear that the E-E is designed more with combat in mind, and thus lacks the children present on previous incarnations of the ship.

FaxModem1 · Post by **FaxModem1** » 2002-12-17 05:33pm

So, Starfleet has learned that it is a military now? or that children on Battleships is not a good idea?

Or both?

Master of Ossus · Post by **Master of Ossus** » 2002-12-17 05:40pm

FaxModem1 wrote:So, Starfleet has learned that it is a military now? or that children on Battleships is not a good idea?

Or both?

I don't think we have enough evidence of either to draw a conclusive comparison. From comparing BoBW with "First Contact," I think that SF has learned in many ways to be more serious about their military role, which is confirmed further by the DS9 Dominion War. On the other hand, they seem to have relaxed considerably by "Nemesis." I think that it is safe to conclude that, at least on their warships, they have stopped allowing children and families. It is unclear whether this applies only to ships at high-risk of combat, or to the entire fleet, but I would think that it would be difficult to implement such a fleet-wide ultimatum within the time-frame that they had.

TheDarkling · Post by **TheDarkling** » 2002-12-17 05:47pm

The families probably still inhabit the exploration arm of SF but the case is now the Feds seem to be actually reinstating the military arm that was shut down with ST 6 instead of having the exploration arm covering defense.
Notice the introduction of warships (or much closer than early TNG ships anyway), the fleet being modernised, new weapons tech, bigger fleets, shorter response times etc - all of this was instigated by the rising threat to the Federation (Romulans reappearing, Klingons becoming unstable, Borg showing up all in a very short space of time then the Dominion war pushing this into overdrive (along with the second Borg attack)).

If starfleet still maintains dual class ships its possible civilians have been removed from them and the ships been given a slant more towards combat (war GCS) but thats only a guess.

Jason von Evil · Post by **Jason von Evil** » 2002-12-17 05:57pm

The Defiant is a small warship, they only have room for like a crew of 88.

BenRG · Post by **BenRG** » 2002-12-17 06:28pm

The original justification in ST-TNG for having families aboard Exploration Command starships was that these would be on long-haul surveys so far from Federation space and for so long that it would completely disrupt, if not destroy, the crewmembers' families if they didn't come along for the ride. Think of it as being a bit like the Hansens' sojourn in Borg space, years from home and sufficiently far out that even subspace communications have a noticable time lag.

This all fell apart when it became clear that the Enterprise-D was never further than a few weeks from the nearest starbase. So, the justification for non-crew passengers and saucer seperation is lost. Should Starfleet actually decide to have some 10 - 20 year missions, of which a large portion of the time is getting there, then the social and logistical reasons for having dependent familes aboard exploration starships will return.

However, as the current TNG-era starships are not explorers, I doubt that we will see it much on the screen. The Enterprise-E is a battlecruiser, the Voyager is a general-purpose cruiser and the Defiant is a destroyer.

Post by **Vympel** » 2002-12-19 04:57am

The Defiant has a crew of 88? That actually seems like way too much.

Jason von Evil · Post by **Jason von Evil** » 2002-12-19 05:05am

Vympel wrote:The Defiant has a crew of 88? That actually seems like way too much.

That was just a guess, I knew it couldn't carry anything in the triple digits.

Lord Pounder · Post by **Lord Pounder** » 2002-12-19 06:38am

What about Jake Sisko? He regularily hops aboard the defioant, as does Odo and Quark. Yes i know i am nit picking.

TheDarkling · Post by **TheDarkling** » 2002-12-19 07:24am

I would hardly call that nit picking its just plain irrelevant, when Quark has been on the Defiant he's there for a reason (think civilian mission specialist), Jake is onboard as a reporter and Odo fits into the same sort of area as Kira (since technically neither of them are SF yet Sisko allows them to serve aboard the ship).

Nnow of them are children and none of them live on the Defiant full time there is very little point in bringing them up.

Grand Admiral Thrawn · Post by **Grand Admiral Thrawn** » 2002-12-19 08:01am

1 The Defiant is a warship.
2. Voyager was one a short range mission and didn't even have a concilour. And it was a small ship.

Alyeska · Post by **Alyeska** » 2002-12-19 10:28am

A while back I heard a theory as to civilians being on ships being an OK idea and not a threat during war. Even today the US military will send civilian familes to many forward deployed installations. If at war, they would be at risk, but during more peaceful times, there is no problem. However during time of war of possible conflict, the Civilians are removed from the bases leading just the combat personel. It is entirely possible that is what Starfleet intended. Since we last saw the E-D the Federation was in near crisis or conflict the entire time, and thus would not have had civilians on their ships.

I think that it is possible that Civilians may have returned after the conflict, then again they may not have. The E-E seems to be devoid of civilians, not even a Ten-Forward section for the crew. We also see the USS Galaxy is leading Battle Group Omega, and that is a GCS in a combat role. So its possible the civilians finally got the boot from the military wing of Starfleet.