LET MY PEOPLE GO

 Major Kira Asks The Emissary of The Prophets for Help

[Captain's office] 
 SISKO: 
A transmission from Dukat? 
This is the first I've heard of it. 

[Captain's office]

SISKO: A transmission from Dukat? This is the first I've heard of it.
KIRA: That's because I didn't report it.
SISKO: Why not?
KIRA: It was of a personal nature. I tried to trace the signal, but
SISKO: What did he want?
KIRA: He said he knew my mother, that they were lovers.
SISKO: You don't believe him, do you?
KIRA: He knew certain things about her. Personal things.
SISKO: Well, Gul Dukat is a very resourceful man. I'm sure he knows a lot about your family, about all of our families.
KIRA: I keep trying to tell myself that, but I need to know.
SISKO: That may not be possible. Major.
KIRA: There is a way. I can visit the Temple of Iponu on Bajor and consult the Orb of Time.
SISKO: Excuse me?
KIRA: I need to know the truth.
SISKO: Let me get this straight. You want to travel back in time to see if Dukat and your mother were lovers?
KIRA: That's right.
SISKO: Major, the Federation has very strict regulations
KIRA: This has nothing to do with the Federation. I need your help as the Emissary, not as Starfleet captain. The Emissary can see to it that I am allowed access to the orb. After that, it's up to the Prophets. If they feel that my request is worthy, they'll send me where I need to go. If not, I've made a trip to Bajor for nothing.
SISKO: And if they do send you back, what then? What makes you so sure you won't interfere with the timeline?
KIRA: The Prophets will be guiding me. Nothing will happen without their blessings. Please, Emissary, please, let me seek the will of the Prophets.

[Temple of Iponu]

(Kira is escorted to a small, dimly lit chapel where the orb box sits on an altar. She opens it.) 

JAKE: What do you mean you're not going to let Doctor Bashir operate on you? You have to.
SISKO: Don't you see? These visions are gifts. I can't refuse them.
KASIDY: I cannot believe what I'm hearing. Listen to yourself, Ben. Sitting there, telling us that this mystical journey of yours is more important than watching your son grow up.
JAKE: Dad, please think about what you're doing. These visions, they're not worth dying for.
SISKO: I remember the first time I held you in my hands. You were only a few minutes old and when I looked down at your face, it was almost as if I could see your whole life stretched out in front of you. All the joys it would bring, and the bruises. It was all there, hidden in that scrunched up little face. The baby that I'm holding in my hands now is the universe itself. And I need time to study its face.
KASIDY: Look at the face of your son now and then tell me you're doing the right thing.
(Doorbell)
SISKO: Come in.
WINN: It's time, Emissary, if you're ready.
SISKO: I am.
KASIDY: Ready for what?
WINN: The Emissary has asked for help in his journey. I'm providing it.
JAKE: And you trust her? Since when?
SISKO: Jake, it'll be all right. I love you. Both of you.

[Ops]

KIRA: I've never seen the Temple so crowded. Seemed like every Bajoran on the station was there to pray for the Emissary.
DAX: Glad to hear it. He going to need all the help he can get if he's going to survive this.
KIRA: The Captain is not going to die. He is the Emissary. The Prophets will take care of him.
O'BRIEN: With all due respect, Major, I'd rather see Julian take care of him.
KIRA: Chief, I know you're worried, but the Prophets are leading the Emissary on this path for a reason.
WORF: Do not attempt to convince them, Major. They cannot understand.
DAX: Since when did you believe in the Prophets?
WORF: What I believe in is faith. Without it there can be no victory. If the Captain's faith is strong, he will prevail.
DAX: That's not much to bet his life on.
KIRA: You're wrong. It's everything.
O'BRIEN: I hope you're right, Major. I hope you're right.

[Guest quarters]

(Sisko is in front of an Orb, and Winn is praying in front of a shrine.)
WINN: He asks for your guidance. Let him see with your eyes. Lift the veil of darkness that obscures his path. Emissary?
SISKO: I'm ready.
(A vicious headache hits him.)
WINN: The Orb of Prophecy is very powerful. It taxes even the healthy. Are you sure you want to go through with this?
SISKO: I have to. I need to bring the visions into focus, tie them together. I can't do it alone.
WINN: But you're very weak. Perhaps it would be better to wait until after the signing.
SISKO: I may not have time. I need to do this now.
WINN: As you wish. May the Prophets reveal their wisdom to you, Emissary.
(Kai Winn leaves and Sisko opens the doors of the Orb case)

[Wardroom]

(It's a proper signing with pens and paper.)
WHATLEY: He's already an hour late.
WINN: He's still consulting the Orb of Prophecy.
WHATLEY: How long do these Orb experiences last?
WINN: Minutes. Hours. Sometimes days.
WHATLEY: Then maybe we shouldn't wait for him. Do you have any objections to proceeding without Captain Sisko?
WINN: I'm sure the Emissary would want to be here, but under the circumstances.
WHATLEY: May I have your attention. I've been looking forward to this day for many years, as I'm sure all of you have. Welcoming a new planet to the Federation is the happiest assignment an Admiral could hope for. The Federation is not just a union of planets, it's much more.
(An exhausted Sisko stumbles)
WINN: Emissary!
WHATLEY: Get him to the Infirmary.
SISKO: No! I have to tell them.
WINN: What is it, Emissary? Have the Prophets revealed something to you?
SISKO: Locusts. They'll destroy Bajor unless it stands alone.
WHATLEY: Ben, what the hell are you talking about?
SISKO: It's too soon! Bajor must not join the Federation. If it does, it will be destroyed.
(And he collapses, having a fit.) 

(Inside the wormhole.) 

SISKO: 

Full stop. Chief, divert all power to forward shields and weapons. 

DAX: 

Captain, I'm reading multiple warp signatures ahead. 

SISKO: 

On screen. Maximum magnification. 

(Here comes the enemy fleet, but no more than three abreast in the narrow tunnel.) 

SISKO: 

Lock phasers. Prepare to launch quantum torpedoes.  

[Limbo] 

 SISKO: 

Why have you brought me here? 

Show yourselves. What do you want? 

 [Promenade] 

 ODO: 

The Sisko has returned to us. 

 [Quark's] 

 JAKE: 

He arrives with questions. 

 [Ops] 

 KIRA: 

There are always questions. 

SISKO: 

I didn't ask to come here. 

 [Captain's office] 

 DUKAT: 

You desire to end The Game. 

SISKO: 

What game? I don't understand. 

 [Wardroom] 

 WEYOUN: 

You seek to shed your corporeal existence. 

 [Bridge] 

 DAMAR: 

That cannot be allowed. 

 [Promenade] 

 ODO: 

The Game must not end. 

SISKO: 

The Game? You mean my life? 

Is that what this is about? You don't want me to die? 

 [Captain's office] 

 DUKAT: The Game must continue. 

 [Wardroom] 

 WEYOUN: You are The Sisko. 

SISKO: 

Believe me, I don't want to die, but I have to do everything I can to prevent the Dominion from conquering the Alpha Quadrant. 

If that means sacrificing my life and the life of my crew, so be it. 

[Quark's] 

 JAKE: 

We do not agree. 

KIRA: 

We find your reasoning flawed. 

ODO: 

Insufficient. 

SISKO: 

I'm flattered you feel that way, but it doesn't change anything. 

Now send me back to my ship. 

 [Bridge] 

 SISKO: 

This isn't what I meant. 

I want to return to my reality. 

DAMAR: 

You are The Sisko. 

SISKO: 

I am also a Starfleet captain. 

I have a job to do and I intend to do it. 

WEYOUN: 

The Sisko is belligerent. 

DUKAT: 

Aggressive. 

DAMAR: 

Adversarial. 

SISKO: 

You're damn right I'm adversarial. 

You have no right to interfere with my life. 

 [Ops] 

 KIRA: 

We have every right. 

SISKO: 

Fine. You want to interfere, then interfere. 

Do something about those Dominion reinforcements. 

ODO: 

That is a corporeal matter. 

DUKAT: 
Corporeal matters do not concern us.

SISKO: 
The hell they don't. 
What about Bajor? 
You can't tell me Bajor doesn't concern you. 
You've sent the Bajorans orbs and Emissaries. 
You've even encouraged them to create an entire religion around you. 

You even told me once that you were Of Bajor. 
So don't you tell me you're not concerned with corporeal matters. 

I don't want to see Bajor destroyed. 
Neither do you. 

But we all know that's exactly what's going to happen if the Dominion takes over the Alpha Quadrant. 

You say you don't want me to sacrifice my life? 
Well, fine, neither do I. 

You want to be gods, then be gods. 
I need a miracle. Bajor needs a miracle. 

Stop those ships.

WEYOUN: 
We are of Bajor.

DAMAR: 
But what of the Sisko?

ODO: He is intrusive.

DUKAT: 
He tries to control The Game.

JAKE: 
A penance must be exacted.

WEYOUN: 

It is agreed. 

DUKAT: 

The Sisko is of Bajor, but he will find no rest there. 

KIRA: 
(touches Sisko's left ear) 
His pagh will follow another path.

SISKO: What path is that?

[Bridge]

(Back to reality.)
O'BRIEN: 
Phaser banks fully charged.
NOG: Forward shields at a hundred percent.
O'BRIEN: Torpedoes ready. Targets locked.
DAX: Here they come.
SISKO: Fire on my command.
NOG: There must be thousands of them.
GARAK: And half of them have locked targets on us.
SISKO: Steady, people. Make every shot count.
DAX: Benjamin.
(Energy crackles in the wormhole and the Dominion fleet vanishes.)
O'BRIEN: They've cloaked.
DAX: I'm not picking up any neutrino emissions.
GARAK: Then where did they go?
SISKO: Wherever they went, I don't think they're coming back.
(The ultimate Deus ex Machina cop-out.)

[Ops]

DAMAR: Sir, the wormhole is opening.
(WHOOSH)
DAMAR: The Defiant.
DUKAT: Our reinforcements must be right behind.
(The wormhole closes.)
DAMAR: No, sir. There's no sign of them.
WEYOUN: That's impossible. Check our listening posts in the Gamma Quadrant.
DAMAR: They're not there either.
DUKAT: But they entered the wormhole. Where are they?
DAMAR: I don't know.
(BOOM)
DAMAR: The Defiant has opened fire on us.
WEYOUN: Obviously.
DUKAT: Can you get our weapons back online?
DAMAR: Not for a while. Sir, two hundred enemy ships have broken through our lines. They're headed this way.
WEYOUN: Time to start packing.
FOUNDER: Contact our forces in the Alpha Quadrant. Tell them to fall back to Cardassian territory. It appears this war is going to take longer than expected.
WEYOUN: We'll meet you at airlock five.
(The Founder and Weyoun leave. Dukat's jaw is still on the floor.)
DAMAR: Sir?
DUKAT: Victory was within our grasp.
DAMAR: We have to evacuate the station, sir.
DUKAT: Bajor, the Federation, the Alpha Quadrant, all lost.
DAMAR: We have to go now, sir.
DUKAT: Go?
DAMAR: The Federation ships, they'll be here soon. We have to get back to Cardassia.
DUKAT: I have to find my daughter.
DAMAR: I'll send someone for her.
DUKAT: That won't be necessary.
DAMAR: You're wasting your time.
DUKAT: Promenade.
DAMAR: She won't go with you.

[Bridge]

O'BRIEN: 
Sir, the Dominion forces are leaving the station.

SISKO: 
Let them go. We're in no shape to stop them.

BASHIR: 
Captain, we're getting a message from the Cortez. 
The Dominion fleet has broken off the fight. They're in retreat.

SISKO: 
Tell the Cortez and the rest of our fleet to rendezvous at Deep Space Nine.

Tammy-1

Parks and Recreation - Ron Sans Mustache (Episode Highlight)

Alternative Character Interpretation: 

This Cracked article goes into the Fridge Horror of Ron's relationship with his first wife Tammy One, positing that she is most likely the reason behind his anti-government and isolationist mentality. 

Ron has been taken advantage of by an authority figure in his life which included Wife Husbandry and Double Standard: Abuse, Female on Male, yet no one, not his family or his teachers or law enforcement, helped him (though in some fairness, just about everyone was frightened of her). 

https://www.cracked.com/blog/the-tragic-parks-rec-storyline-nobody-talks-about/

Sheer Lunacy

JANEWAY: 

Maybe we can't out-think them. 

CHAKOTAY: 

Captain? 

JANEWAY: 

We have to assume they've planned for every contingency, including anything we could come up with to undermine their plan. 

This thing has been driving me crazy. 

You said you knew the solution. 

Prove it. 

(Janeway hands the Sheer Lunacy to Seven, who presses a few buttons and all the lights go out. She has solved it.)

JANEWAY: 

Seven, how'd you do that? 

SEVEN: 

I scanned the device. Its mechanism operates on a simple fractal regression. 

PARIS: 

You scanned it? That's cheating. 

SEVEN: 

Cheating is often more efficient. 

JANEWAY: 

If you can't solve a puzzle, cheat. 

If you can't out-think a Think Tank, don't try. 

GHOSTS

“Whenever you meet a Ghost - don’t run away....

Because The Ghost will catch on to your fear and materialise itself out of your own substance.”

The Cops Don't Do Nothin'. You Know That.

Iris: 

So what makes you so high and mighty. 

Will you tell me that? 

Didn't you ever try lookin' in your own eyeballs in the mirror?

Travis: 

So what are you gonna do about Sport, that ol' bastard?

Iris: 

When?

Travis: 

When you leave?

Iris: 

I don't know. 

I just leave him, I guess.

Travis: 

You just gonna leave?

Iris: 

Yeah, they got plenty of other girls.

Travis: 

Yeah, but you just can't do that. What are you gonna do?

Iris: 

What do you want me to do? Call the cops?

Travis: 

What? The cops don't do nothin'. You know that.

Iris: 

Hey look. Sport never treated me bad. 

I mean he didn't beat me up or anything like that once.

Travis:

But you can't allow him to do the same to other girls. 

You can't allow him to do that. 

He is the lowest kind of person in the world. 

Somebody's got to do something to him. 

He's the scum of the earth. 

He's the worst s-s-sucking scum I have ever, ever seen. 

You know what he told me about you? 

He called you names. 

He called you a little piece of chicken.

QUISLING

“Archie” is clearly evil - he’s advocating violence and intimidation of people who won’t use His Words.

“Zombies weren’t the only problem we had to deal with back then.

 There were looters, not so much hardened criminals as just people who needed stuff to survive. 

Same with squatters; both cases usually ended well. We’d just invite them home, give them what they needed, take care of them until the housing folks could step in. 

There were some real looters, though, professional bad guys. That was the only time I got hurt.

[He pulls down his shirt, exposing a circular scar the size of a prewar dime.] 

Nine millimeter, right through the shoulder. 

My team chased him out of the house. 

I ordered him to halt. That was the only time I ever killed someone, thank God. 

When the new laws came in, conventional crime pretty much dried up altogether. 

Then there were the ferals, you know, the homeless kids who’d lost their parents. We’d find them curled up in basements, in closets, under beds. 

A lot of them had walked from as far away as back east. They were in bad shape, all malnourished and sickly. A lot of times they’d run.

 Those were the only times I felt bad, you know, that I couldn’t chase them. Someone else would go, a lot of times they’d catch up, but not always. 

The biggest problem were quislings. 

Quislings? 

Yeah, you know, the people that went nutballs and started acting like zombies. 

Could you elaborate? 

Well, I’m not a shrink, so I don’t know all the tech terms. 

That’s all right. 

Well, as I understand it, there’s a type of person who just can’t deal with a fight-or-die situation. 

They’re always drawn to what they’re afraid of.

Instead of resisting it, they want to please it, join it, try to be like it. 

I guess that happens in kidnap situations, you know, like a Patty Hearst/ Stockholm Syndrome–type, or, like in regular war, when people who are invaded sign up for the enemy’s army. 

Collaborators, sometimes even more die-hard than the people they’re trying to mimic, like those French fascists who were some of Hitler’s last troops. 

Maybe that’s why we call them quislings, like it’s a French word or something.2 

But you couldn’t do it in this war. You couldn’t just throw up your hands and say, “Hey, don’t kill me, I’m on your side.” 

There was no gray area in this fight, no in between. 

I guess some people just couldn’t accept that. It put them right over the edge. 

They started moving like zombies, sounding like them, even attacking and trying to eat other people. 

That’s how we found our first one. He was a male adult, midthirties. Dirty, dazed, shuffling down the sidewalk. We thought he was just in Z-shock, until he bit one of our guys in the arm. That was a horrible few seconds. 

I dropped the Q with a head shot then turned to check on my buddy. He was crumpled on the curb, swearing, crying, staring at the gash in his forearm. 

This was a death sentence and he knew it. 

He was ready to do himself until we discovered that the guy I shot had bright red blood pouring from his head. When we checked his flesh we found he was still warm! 

You should have seen our buddy lose it. It’s not every day you get a reprieve from the big governor in the sky. Ironically, he almost died anyway. The bastard had so much bacteria in his mouth that it caused a near fatal staph infection. 

We thought maybe we stumbled onto some new discovery but it turned out it’d been happening for a while.

The CDC was just about to go public. They even sent an expert up from Oakland to brief us on what to do if we encountered more of them. It blew our minds. 

Did you know that quislings were the reason some people used to think they were immune? They were also the reason all those bullshit wonder drugs got so much hype. Think about it. Someone’s on Phalanx, gets bit but survives. What else is he going to think? 

He probably wouldn’t know there was even such a thing as quislings. They’re just as hostile as regular zombies and in some cases even more dangerous. 

How so? 

Well, for one thing, they didn’t freeze. I mean, yeah, they would if they were exposed over time, but in moderate cold, if they’d gone under while wearing warm clothes, they’d be fine. They also got stronger from the people they ate. Not like zombies. They could maintain over time. 

But you could kill them more easily. 

Yes and no. 

You didn’t have to hit them in head; you could take out the lungs, the heart, hit them anywhere, and eventually they’d bleed to death. But if you didn’t stop them with one shot, they’d just keep coming until they died. 

They don’t feel pain? 

Hell no. It’s that whole mind-over-matter thing, being so focused you’re able to suppress relays to the brain and all that. You should really talk to an expert. 

Please continue. 

Okay, well, that’s why we could never talk them down. There was nothing left to talk to. These people were zombies, maybe not physically, but mentally you could not tell the difference. 

Even physically it might be hard, if they were dirty enough, bloody enough, diseased enough. Zombies don’t really smell that bad, not individually and not if they’re fresh. 

How do you tell one of these from a mimic with a whopping dose of gangrene? You couldn’t. It’s not like the military would let us have sniffer dogs or anything. 

You had to use the eye test. Ghouls don’t blink, I don’t know why. Maybe because they use their senses equally, their brains don’t value sight as much. Maybe because they don’t have as much bodily fluid they can’t keep using it to coat the eyes. 

Who knows, but they don’t blink and quislings do. That’s how you spotted them; back up a few paces, and wait a few seconds. 

Darkness was easier, you just shone a beam in their faces. If they didn’t blink, you took them down. 

And if they did? 

Well, our orders were to capture quislings if possible, and use deadly force only in self-defense. It sounded crazy, still does, but we rounded up a few, hog-tied them, turned them over to police or National Guard. I’m not sure what they did with them. 

I’ve heard stories about Walla Walla, you know, the prison where hundreds of them were fed and clothed and even medically cared for. 

[His eyes flick to the ceiling.] 

You don’t agree. 

Hey, I’m not going there. You want to open that can of worms, read the papers. Every year some lawyer or priest or politician tries to stoke that fire for whatever side best suits them. 

Personally, I don’t care. I don’t have any feelings toward them one way or the other. I think the saddest thing about them is that they gave up so much and in the end lost anyway. 

Why is that? 

’Cause even though we can’t tell the difference between them, the real zombies can. 

Remember early in the war, when everybody was trying to work on a way to turn the living dead against one another? There was all this “documented proof ” about infighting—eyewitness accounts and even footage of one zombie attacking another. Stupid. It was zombies attacking quislings, but you never would have known that to look at it. 

Quislings don’t scream. They just lie there, not even trying to fight, writhing in that slow, robotic way, eaten alive by the very creatures they’re trying to be. 

I Can't Imagine Just Watching The Story and Not Being a Part of It

“I can remember, still, the life of The Agrarian Era - which was for most of human history - The Agrarian Era, where there was The World of Men and The World of Women.

And the sexes had very little to do with each other. Each had power and status in its own realm. 

And they laughed at each other, in essence. 

The Women had Enormous Power. 

In fact, The Old Women ruled, not the young beautiful women like today. 

But the older you were the more you had control over everyone, including the mating and marriage. 

There were no Doctors, so The Old Women were like midwives and knew all the ins and outs and [had] inherited knowledge about pregnancy and all these other things.

I can remember this. 

And The Joy that women had with each other all day long. 

Cooking with each other, being companions to each other, talking, conversing. 

My Mother remembered, as a small child in Italy, when it was time to do The Laundry they would take The Laundry up The Hill to The Fountain and do it by hand. 

They would sing, they would picnic, and so on.

We get a glimpse of that in The Odyssey when Odysseus is thrown up naked on the shores of Phaeacia and he hears The Sound of Women, young women, laughing and singing. 

And it’s Nausicaa, The Princess, bringing The Women to do The Laundry. 

It’s exactly The Same Thing. 

So there was. . . Each gender had its own hierarchy, its own values, its own way of talking. 

And the sexes rarely intersected.”

Operations Officer's log, supplemental. 

We've been on full sensor alert looking for signs that anyone else has detected Voyager. 

As a precaution, I've also asked Neelix and Kes to monitor all media broadcasts.

[Mess hall]

(A wall screen has six displays constantly changing.) 

KES: 

We've set up a computer algorithm to search for key words and phrases. 

Anything that might indicate Voyager. 

KIM: 

Anything so far? 

NEELIX: 

Not yet, although we have come across some very intriguing televised broadcasts. 

Take a look at this : —

It's a Form of Entertainment called a 'soap opera'.

The exploration of Human Relationships is fascinating. 

KIM: 

I can't imagine just Watching The Story and not Being a Part of It. 

KES: 

That's because you've been spoiled by The Holodeck. 

There's Something to Be Said for non-interactive stories like this, being swept away in The Narrative. 

NEELIX : 

Oh, I can't wait to see if Blaine's Twin Brother is The Father of Jessica's Baby. 

KIM :

Good Work. 

Keep me informed, and don't get too swept away. 

NEELIX :

Er, aye, sir. 

SHARON 

[on monitor] : 

Nobody'll know the difference. 

JACK 

[on monitor]: 

I'll know, Sharon. He's My Brother. 

How can I face him knowing that Our Son is His Son? 

SHARON 

[on monitor]:

 All you need to know, Jack, is that I love you!

Peterson:

Well the first thing is that the agreeableness trait that divides men and women most. . . 

There’s three things that divide women and men most particularly from the psychometric perspective.

One is that women are more agreeable than men, and so that seems to be the primary maternal dimension as far as I can tell. 

It’s associated with a desire to avoid conflict.

But it’s associated with interpersonal closeness, compassion, politeness. 

Women are reliably higher than men, especially in the Scandinavian countries and in the countries

where egalitarianism has progressed the farthest.

So that’s where the difference is maximized, which is one of the things James

Damore pointed out quite correctly in his infamous Google Memo. Women are

higher in negative emotion. So that’s anxiety and emotional pain. That difference is

approximately the same size. And again that maximizes in egalitarian societies, which

is extremely interesting. And then the biggest difference is the difference in interest

between people and things. And so women are more interested in people, and men

are more interested in things, which goes along quite nicely with your car anecdote.

But the thing about men interacting with men again is that it isn’t that they respect each

other’s viewpoints. That’s not exactly right. What happens with a man. . . I know a lot

of men that I would regard as remarkably tough people for one reason or another. And

everything you do with them is a form of combat. Like if you want your viewpoint taken

seriously, often you have to yell them down. They’re not going to stop talking unless

you start talking over them.

It’s not like men are automatically giving respect to other men, because that just

doesn’t happen. It’s that the combat is there, and it’s expected. And one of the

problems. . . And so, this is one of the reasons I think men are bailing out of so much of

academia and maybe the academic world in general. And maybe the world in general.

Men actually don’t have any idea how to compete with women.

Because the problem is that if you unleash yourself completely, then you’re an

absolute bully. And there’s no doubt about that, because if men unleash themselves

on other men, that can be pretty goddamn brutal, especially for the men that really

tough. And so that just doesn’t happen with women ever. So you can’t unleash yourself

completely. If you win, you’re a bully. If you lose, well you’re just bloody pathetic. So

how the hell are you supposed to play a game like that?

I’ve worked with lots of women in law firms in Canada, for example. And high achieving

women, like really remarkable people I would say. And they’re often nonplussed, I

would say, by the attitude of the men in the law firm, because they would like to see

everyone pulling together because they’re all part of the same team. Whereas the men

are like at each other’s throats in a cooperative way because they want the law firm to

succeed, but they want to be the person who is at the top of the success hierarchy.

And that doesn’t jive well with the more cooperative ethos that’s part and parcel of

agreeableness. So we don’t really have any idea how to integrate male and female

dominance hierarchies.

17

Paglia: Exactly. Exactly. That’s exactly right. This is why I love this show Real

Housewives, which is [inaudible]. And just last night I was watching an episode where

the women were at each other at a party and recounting. ‘But I said this to you, but

you said this to me.’ And the men got together there and said ‘Well this is the way they

communicate with each other. And we men just will have a fist fight, and ten minutes

later we’re going to have a beer at the bar next to each other.’ I have observed that my

entire life.

Peterson: My daughter used to be really irritated about that because she, like most

people, was the target of feminine conspiratorial bullying at one. . . She’s no pushover,

my daughter. So it wasn’t like this was a continual thing or that she didn’t know what to

do about it.

But she had observed these girls conspiring against her and blackening her name on

Facebook, which is part and parcel of the typical female bullying routine, which is often

reputation demolition. There’s a good literature on that. And then she’d watch what

would happen if my son would have a dispute with his friends. And maybe they were

drinking, and there was a dispute. They’d have a fight, and the next day they were

friends again.

That’s another thing that’s strange is that men have a way of bringing a conflict to a

head and resolving it. And it isn’t obvious to me that women have that same, perhaps

you might call it, luxury. But it’s also the case that men don’t know what to do when

they get into a conflict with a woman. Because what the hell are you supposed to do?

Mostly what you’re supposed to do is avoid it.

Paglia: Well I’ve seen - I don’t know if this crosses into other countries - that there’s

a certain kind of taunting and teasing that men, that boys do with each other that

toughens them, where they don’t take things seriously. But a girl’s feelings become

extremely hurt if she hears something that’s very tough, sarcastic against her.

So I do feel that there are profound differences between the sexes in terms of

emotions, in terms of communication patterns. My father used to say that he could

never follow women’s conversations. He said women don’t even finish sentences, that

women understand immediately what the other woman is saying. And women tend to

be more interested in - or have been traditionally more interested in - soap operas. It’s

not just that the women were home without jobs. It’s that honestly, I believe that soap

opera does reflect, does mirror, the way women talk to each other.

These communication patterns have been built up through women - the world of

women, which. . . It made sense that there was a division of labor. It wasn’t sexism

against women that there was a division of labor. The men went off to hunt and did the

dangerous things. The women stayed around the hearth because you had pregnant

women, nursing women, older women, that were cooking and so on.

18

So I feel that these communication patterns that we’re talking about have been built

up over the centuries. Men had to toughen each other to go out. The hunting parties

of Native Americans. . . They could be gone for two weeks when the temperature was

below zero. Many of them died. The idea that somehow. . . ‘Oh, any kind of separation

of the sexes, or different spheres of the sexes, is inherently sexist’. . . That is wrong.

Peterson: And inherently driven by a power dynamic.

Paglia: The answer to all of this, everything that we’re talking about, is education into

early history. Until people understand the Stone Age, the nomadic period, the agrarian

era, and how culture, how civilization built up. . .

In Mesopotamia - the great irrigation projects. Or in Egypt where you had. . .

Centralized government authority became necessary to master these. . . You had a

situation, an environmentally difficult situation like the deserts Mesopotamia, or the

peculiar character of Egyptian geography where you can only have a little tiny fertile

line along the edges of the Nile. Otherwise, desert landscape. So [understanding]

civilization and authority as not necessarily about power grabbing but about

organization to achieve something for the good of the people as a whole.

Peterson: That’s exactly the great symbolism of the Great Father.

Paglia: By reducing all hierarchy to power, and selfish power, is utterly naive. It’s

ignorant. I say education has to be totally reconstituted, including public education,

to begin in the most distant past so our young people today, who know nothing about

how the world was created that they inhabit, can understand what a marvelous

technological paradise they live in.

And it’s the product of capitalism, it’s the product of individual innovation. Most of it’s

the product of a Western tradition that everyone wants to trash now. If you begin in the

past and show. . . And also talk about war, because war is the one thing that wakes

people up, as we see.

Peterson: And as we may see.

Paglia: Yes, war is the reality principle. My father and five of my uncles went to World

War II. My father was part of the force that landed in Japan. He was a paratrooper at

the time of the Japanese surrender. And a couple of uncles got shot up and so on.

When you have the reality of war, when people see the reality, the horrors of war -

Berlin burned to a crisp and so on. Starvation and all. . . Then you understand this

marvelous mechanism that brings water to the kitchen. And you flip on a light and the

electricity turns on.

Peterson: I know, for me, and I suppose it’s because I have somewhat of a

19

depressive temperament. . . I mean one thing that staggers me on a consistent basis is

the fact that anything ever works. Because it’s so unlikely, you know, to be in a situation

where our electronic communications work, where our electric grid works. And it works

all the time, it works one hundred percent of the time. And the reason for that is there

are mostly men out there who are breaking themselves into pieces, repairing this thing

which just falls apart all the time.

Paglia: Absolutely. I said this in the Munk Debate in Toronto several years ago. All

these elitists and professors sneering at men. It’s men who are maintaining everything

around us. This invisible army which feminists don’t notice. Nothing would work if it

weren’t for the men.

Peterson: A professor is someone who’s standing on a hill surrounded by a wall,

which is surrounded by another wall, which is surrounded by another wall - it’s walls

all the way down - who stands up there and says I’m brave and independent. It’s like,

you’ve got this protected area that’s so unlikely - it’s so absolutely unlikely - and the

fact that people aren’t on their knees in gratitude all the time for the fact that we have

central heating and air conditioning and pure water and reliable food. . . It’s absolutely

unbelievable.

Paglia: Yes, I mean people used to die. . . The water supply was contaminated with

cholera for heaven’s sake. People don’t understand. To have clean water, fresh milk,

fresh orange juice. All of these things. These are marvels.

Peterson: And all of the time.

Paglia: All of the time. Western culture is heading - because we are so dependent on

this invisible infrastructure - we’re heading for an absolute catastrophe when jihadists

figure out how to paralyze the power grid. The entire culture will be chaotic. You’ll have

mobs in the street within three days when suddenly the food supply is interrupted and

there’s no way to communicate. That is the way Western culture is going to collapse.

And it won’t take much.

Peterson: Single points of failure.

Paglia: Because we are so interconnected, and now we’re so dependent on

communications and computers. . . I used to predict for years it’ll be an asteroid hitting

the earth, and then we’ll have another ice age.

Peterson: Do you know how the solar flares work? This happens about once every

century. So back about 1880 - I don’t remember the exact year - there was a significant

enough solar flare. . . So that produces an electromagnetic pulse like a hydrogen bomb

because the sun is a hydrogen bomb. An electromagnetic pulse will emerge from the

sun and wave across the earth, and it produces huge spikes in electrical current along

anything that’s electronic, and it will burn them out.

20

It lit telegraph operators on fire in the 1800s. One of those things took out the Quebec

power grid in 1985 and knocked out the whole Northeast Corridor. So they figure those

things are about one in a century event.

My brother-in-law, who’s a very smart guy. . . He designed the chip in the iPhone. We

were talking about political issues the last time I went and saw him in San Francisco,

and his notion was that all that the government should be doing right now is stress-

testing our infrastructure the same way they stress-test the banks. Because we’re so full

of these single points of failure.

And I think you’re absolutely right. Luckily we’ve been, what would you call, invaded

by stupid terrorists instead of smart terrorists, because a smart terrorist could do an

unbelievable amount of damage in a very short period of time. And it’s just God’s good

graces that that hasn’t happened yet.

Paglia: What will happen is that it’s the men. . . The men will reconstruct civilization

while the women cower in the houses and have the men go out and do all the dirty

work. That’s what’s going to happen again. Only men will bring civilization back again.

CAREGIVERS

WHO Guidance on Masks :

Masks should only be used by healthcare workers, caretakers or by people who are sick with symptoms like fever and cough

God is a Class Enemy

A struggle session was a form of public humiliation and torture that was used by the Communist Party of China (CPC) at various times in the Mao era, particularly years immediately before and after the establishment of the People’s Republic of China and during the Cultural Revolution. 

The aim of a struggle session was to shape public opinion and humiliate, persecute, or execute political rivals and those deemed class enemies.

Sisko is a Builder

The reason writer Joe Menosky had Sisko making a clock was to try to convey to the audience that he had become "an obsessive quirky Emperor Rudolph-type" who fussed about with mechanical bits and pieces.

" The next real literary "rebels" in this country might well emerge as some weird bunch of anti-rebels, born oglers who dare somehow to back away from ironic watching, who have the childish gall actually to endorse and instantiate single-entendre principles. Who treat of plain old untrendy human troubles and emotions in U.S. life with reverence and conviction. Who eschew self-consciousness and hip fatigue. 

These anti-rebels would be outdated, of course, before they even started. Dead on the page. Too sincere. Clearly repressed. Backward, quaint, naive, anachronistic. 

Maybe that'll be the point. Maybe that's why they'll be the next real rebels. Real rebels, as far as I can see, risk disapproval. 

The old postmodern insurgents risked the gasp and squeal: shock, disgust, outrage, censorship, accusations of socialism, anarchism, nihilism. 

Today's risks are different. The new rebels might be artists willing to risk the yawn, the rolled eyes, the cool smile, the nudged ribs, the parody of gifted ironists, the "Oh how banal". 

To risk accusations of sentimentality, melodrama. 

Of overcredulity. 

Of softness. 

Of willingness to be suckered by a world of lurkers and starers who fear gaze and ridicule above imprisonment without law. 

Who knows. "

David Foster Wallace, 1993,

"E Unibus Pluram: Television and U.S. Fiction"

Ronald D. Moore mentioned the story of Moses as an inspiration for the developments in Sisko's life. (AOL chat, 1997)

In the script for "Emissary", Benjamin Sisko was described as "a rugged, charismatic man in his late thirties," as of 2366. [2]

The original Writer's Bible for Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, created in 1992, [3] gave this biography for the character:

Benjamin Sisko, human Starfleet commander with a twelve year-old son, whose gentle, strong, soft spoken demeanor belies the temper that he is constantly trying to control. And when he loses it, he gets furious with himself. He's a man of action who gets impatient with too much talk, but as he has become more mature, he's learned to stop and think twice about losing control. He has a weakness for baseball, a sport that died out in the 22nd century and he frequently goes to a holo-suite to have a chat and a catch with one [of] his legendary ballplayer heroes. Sisko was on a starship with his wife and son at the famous encounter with the Borg led by the Borgified Picard, and his wife was killed. That leads to bitterness toward Picard. Picard: Have we met before? Sisko: Yes, we met in battle. Since that tragedy, he has been assigned to shore duty on Mars where he was on the team reconstructing the fleet at Utopia Planitia Yards. Sisko objected to being assigned to DS9. He told Starfleet he had a son to raise and had been asking for an Earth assignment, not this. His important work on DS9 gives him a new direction, but his is still very much a life framed by tragedy.


Casting
When Avery Brooks' agent first rang him to tell him that there was a role available in a new Star Trek show, Brooks laughed, because he instinctively felt he was going to be offered a role requiring heavy prosthetics, which he wasn't interested in doing (though he ended up doing so anyway, in "Apocalypse Rising"). After finding out the role was that of a Human, Brooks was still unconvinced, and of his pursuit of the role he said, "This will never work." 

Indeed, on his way to his audition for the part, the transmission in his car began to slip, so he called the producers and nonchalantly told them he couldn't make it; he was surprised when they rearranged his audition. It was ultimately the quality of the script for "Emissary" which convinced Brooks of the value of the show. ("Crew Dossier: Benjamin Sisko", DS9 Season 7 DVD special features)

Speaking in 1992, shortly after filming had begun on "Emissary", Avery Brooks said of Sisko, "He is very, very human. He shows what he feels, wears what he feels. He is a quick thinker, but yet a deep thinker. He is a single parent, and thus is worried about raising his son. In this case, of course, he is a widower, so that part of his history is there, especially every time he looks at his son, he is seeing that part of his life, indeed, seeing his wife, and we have to assume that he loved her very deeply. So there are indeed conflicts, Human conflicts, which make it a wonderful experience because you can play everything." (Hidden File 01, DS9 Season 1 DVD special features)

In 2012, Brooks recalled his role as Sisko: "When I read the pilot script, it was the presentation of a man dealing with loss and raising a son, and how he handled those situations, that really got my attention. Certainly the fact you have a black man in a command position is very important. That is something that goes far beyond just having black people working on a show, which itself is also very important. It goes to children being able to see themselves on screen and visualize that in the future they will be doing something of importance to the world at large. It addresses the situation of having all kinds of people interacting and cooperating for the mutual survival of the planet. The writing was exceptional, and the funny thing is I initially said no to Star Trek. My wife convinced me to go to the audition. She was the one who said, 'You can't say no to this'." [4]

Characterization
According to Michael Piller, "It was harder to define Sisko as a character than perhaps any of the others, and ultimately it took us probably a season and a half to reach the conclusion that Sisko was a builder, a man who built things, stayed with projects, as opposed to the driver, the captain of a starship who went off and moved from place to place." (New Frontiers: The Story of Deep Space Nine, DS9 Season 2 DVD special features) Piller also talks about this aspect of Sisko's character, the builder in contrast to Picard's explorer, numerous times in the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion.

Hans Beimler also saw Sisko as a builder. Beimler commented, "Captain Sisko is a complicated man. He's a family man. He's a builder, a man who has come to this place and is trying to do something – he's not some kind of transient. Picard and Kirk were both captains who were 'passing through, ma'am', but Sisko is here to stay, to build something more lasting. I certainly can relate to that situation and that kind of man; he's a different kind of hero, more complex in a way." (The Official Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Magazine issue 15)

Speaking in 1999, just after filming on "What You Leave Behind" had finished, Ira Steven Behr said, "Sisko's arc is pretty clear. He came to the station, it was an assignment he did not want, he was not happy to be there, and he became a man who talks about living on Bajor for the rest of his life. So, I think it was a healing process for Sisko. I think he's a wonderful leader, and he's a great family man. And he came to the show a wounded man, who had just lost his wife, was somewhat bitter, and he became a religious icon." ("Crew Dossier: Benjamin Sisko", DS9 Season 7 DVD special features)

Avery Brooks has stated of Sisko, "The relationship with his son was critically important, aside from the fact that I have children, but knowing how tenuous, how fragile, how fleeting, ultimately, the moment, or moments that you have with your children, how important and critical the time that you spend early on in sowing these seeds that you hope will help your child survive and then pray that you've done the right thing." ("Crew Dossier: Benjamin Sisko", DS9 Season 7 DVD special features) 

Cirroc Lofton also says, "With Jake's character, he brought out the human-ness in the captain because otherwise you would just see the captain as an authoritative figure, you'd see him as just being someone who just gives orders, and someone who's really firm and aggressive, with Jake he can be playful, and you see the father side and the Human side of this icon, this character, this person who you respect, but there's another side to him, the loving, caring side, the playful side." ("Crew Dossier: Jake Sisko", DS9 Season 7 DVD special features)

Brooks has also commented, "The investigation of self, or the discovery of self, is an internal journey. The investigation of the unknown is not outer, ultimately, but inner. So, the idea of this man reluctantly wrestling with this idea of being the chosen one, to make this journey, this internal journey, towards the discovery of self, something that human-kind does, until they leave the planet I'm sure, certainly that's what I'm doing." ("Crew Dossier: Benjamin Sisko", DS9 Season 7 DVD special features)

Brooks commented: "When people come up to me and ask what being Benjamin Sisko meant, I understand why they are asking me that," Brooks said. "I don't get mad or upset. I just let them know he was one aspect of my life, one role that was good to me, but not one that defines who or what I am. But I'm happy so many people remember it and remember me, and I hope the full message of Star Trek, that humanity must interact and evolve and survive in all its different experiences and embodiments, is what they really remember". [5]

One of the plans for a six-episode arc which started season six was to promote Sisko to admiral, even if only temporarily. This was vetoed after extensive discussion involving Ira Steven Behr, who "felt it took the lead character out of the Star Trek pantheon." He did, however, briefly serve as adjutant to Admiral Ross, temporarily turning over his command to Dax. (Star Trek Monthly issue 38) Around the same time, Ron D. Moore in an unrelated matter described Sisko as having evolved since the start of the series in that he had "grown accustomed to the idea that he may never get admiral's stars" and preferring to remain a captain on the frontier. (AOL chat, 1997) (AOL chat, 1997)

In Black and Brown Planets: The Politics of Race in Science Fiction, the authors write: "Perhaps after watching black actor Avery Brooks play Captain Sisko on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1993–99), Americans no longer were alienated by the idea of electing a black man as the U.S. President".

Sisko underwent a major change of appearance between Seasons 3 and 4, shaving his head and growing a beard. This coincided with Avery Brooks reprising the role of Hawk in a Spenser: For Hire TV movie in which Hawk sported the same look.

Other actors who auditioned for the role of Sisko were Robert Gwilym, Keith Allen, Pip Torrens, Ralph Brown, Anthony Head, Jolyon Baker, Peter Firth, Nick Brimble, Stefan Kalipha and Peter Capaldi (who later became the Twelfth Doctor in Doctor Who). [6]