I don't see how it's dubious, he plainly says Earth is a paradise because of the "nasty stuff". He's further quoted saying this:
"We need to dig deeper and find out what, indeed, life is like in the twenty-fourth century. Is it this paradise, or are there, as Harold Pinter said, 'Weasels under the coffee table.'"
And this:
"Well, without a doubt, the thing I wish we could have used more of was Section 31. We came into that late in the game, and I mean, if we had had an eighth season"
It's also weird you leave out that he was more or less that head guy on this series. You don't have to like it or agree with him, but his words are clear. He does not think the Utopia Roddenbery painted is remotely viable, and that it needs protectors who are willing to ignore it's principles.
You don't even have to look at Section 31 itself to know this, the episode "In the Pale Moonlight" is another example of this very mindset. Sisko turns into a borderline Sloan in that episode, and then there's Garak, who if anything makes Sloan look nice by comparison.
Even Sloan's later defeat was little more than an Excuse Plot to avoid having to kill off Odo.
- When a Cardassian starts killing off Kira's friends from the resistance, their deaths are horrific and tragic. And then we meet the Cardassian who did it, who is mumbling about evil and good, dark and light etc. and he seems insane... And then we find out that he was actually just a butler in the Cardassian occupation who had never hurt a Bajoran, and who was horribly disfigured when Kira bombed the house of a significant Cardassian official in an assassination attempt. In doing so, she killed his family, his children, and 12 others and crippling 23 other Cardassians who were completely uninvolved. In return, the Butler who was killing off her friends had only killed the five who were involved in the attempt and was very careful not to hurt any innocent people. His final speech to Kira is rather damning and casts a lot of doubt on her actions and motives in the Resistance:
Kira: None of you belonged on Bajor. It wasn't your world. For fifty years you raped our planet and you killed our people. You lived on our land and you took the food out of our mouths, and I don't care whether you held a phaser in your hand or ironed shirts for a living. You were all guilty and you were all legitimate targets!Silaran: And that's what makes you a murderer. Indiscriminate killing. No sense of morality. No thought given to the consequences of your actions. That's what makes us different...I am bringing the guilty to justice. And unlike you, I take care to protect the innocent.- Considering the situation she was in how much of what Kira says in this instance is in defiance, not letting Silaran talk down to her, and how much is what she truly believes is still up for debate. However, if that is the case, her choice of words are still consistent with her actions during the Occupation, and she is a very good actor to fake that much hate and venom in her voice.
Yes, Silaran's words have weight. Which is why Kira is obviously shaked at what happened at the end of the episode. Unfortunate Implications and Strawman Has a Point would be if the writers didn't intend him to have a point, when they obviously do. This makes this more Grey-and-Grey Morality, Black-and-Grey Morality, or Jerkass Has a Point, not anything with a YMMV tag, and I have placed it in JHAP.
Edited by 216.99.32.45
I removed an entry with a link to Wall Banger (Wall Banger is supposed to only be referenced on Darth Wiki). The example might be fine if it is reworded to remove the Wall Banger link, so I'm moving it here in case anyone wants to reword and restore it:
"It also edges into Wall Banger territory for those who grew up on Star Trek The Next Generation and suffered through the brief and relatively unimpressive fight scene in Star Trek Generations, where the Enterprise-D was destroyed, when we see that the Galaxy class can KICK. ASS. when it is given the chance."
Can anyone please give a link to the Word of God confirming that Section 31 are Necessary Evil? Only thing found was Ira Steven Behr (their creator) saying: "Why is Earth a paradise in the twenty-fourth century? Well, maybe it's because there's someone watching over it and doing the nasty stuff that no one wants to think about. Of course it's a very complicated issue. Extremely complicated. And those kinds of covert operations usually are wrong!"
The way it is phrased and the fact he was talking specificaly about how he got the idea, I find it rather dubious.
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