I was watching Star Trek: Insurrection last night, and they did that thing again when they shout “Photon torpedo! Brace for impact!”. Everyone leans on a lamp post or lays one hand on the bloke next to them’s shoulder, the torpedo hits and they are all hurled over their consoles and smack themselves into really hard titanium things.
Now there is a simple solution to this: seatbelts. Surely in the 24th Century they can think of that.
One of my friends suggests that this is because in the 24th Century, they consider that seatbelts are for poofs. Only I have never seen any evidence that they still have homosexuality in the future. It seems to have been superseeded by sleeping with alien species, which I suppose is technically beastiality (by the way, are the Cardassians ovuparous?).
Seat belts were planned for the Next Generation series, but Gene Roddenberry became ill directing a scene in which Beverly Chrisher told her son to “buckle up” and they were dropped.
In TOS, they didn’t use seat belts, probably because they weren’t used that often by most drivers. It also would have made things less dramatic and no one really cared back then. After that, the later shows kept up the tradition. The macho image was certainly a part of it.
They referred to this in one of the movies, where Kirk looked at a seat belt in the captains chair with an expression of disdain.
You’d think they would at least design some of those consoles and railings with rounded corners or something. The bridge of Voyager, for instance, always looked to me like a severe head injury waiting to happen.
Every time this subject comes up (and it has come up before), I seem to be one of the few who remembers that the Motion Picture version of the Enterprise did in fact have passenger restraints.
I think the kirk/seatbelt thing was in Star Trek: The Awful Picture, when he took the center seat from the dad in 7th Heaven, then didn’t know how to open the seat up so he could sit in it.
Besides, if they had seat belts, then they wouldn’t fall out of their seats when the ship got hit. See, they want to be thrown clear. Duh.
The same thing happens on movies that take place on current (or past) warships and submarines. I presume they are based on reality? I assumed that the personnel need to move around a lot during combat, and in the unlikely event of a direct hit, they wouldn’t have time to get back to their seats and buckle up.
Well, if you want to get all PRACTICAL, yeah, seatbelts would be a good idea. But it would put a lot of stuntmen out of work.
Here’s a nerd question for you: Why do they even NEED seatbelts? What’s the point of these inertial dampers we keep hearing about, if they can’t keep you from falling over your console?
It makes me sad that so many of the bridge officers have to stand up all the time. Don’t their legs get tired?
Actually Tracer, I did see that episode. I suppose that was a roundabout way of approaching the subject. But it was pretty damned contrived, and it was only partially about that. It was just one of those “What if there was this really weird situation…” scenarios which is one of the luxuries that science fiction enjoys. The thing is that at the end of the day, Dax decided that she wasn’t gay.
Besides, if seatbelts are considered to be only for poofs, this does obviously not extend to women. Maybe I should have said girlies and poofters.
Now the Cardassian question: are they cold-blooded and oviparous? In which case how do the Cardassian/Bajoran hybrids work?
Roddenberry said that differing sexual orientation was so common as to be not worth mentioning in Trek.
The thing Dax and host were violating was a trill taboo on associating with a former host; gender had nothing to do with it.
Obviously the Cardassians are mammilian if they can breed with Bajorans. Of course, inter species breeding is impossible; Vulcans and humans shouldn’t be able to have children, no more than squirrels and chipmunks.
Another question: why don’t the cargo bays have restraint systems?
Remember the episode where Worf was paralysed because the ship moved and a barrel laid the smack down on him?
What about the episode where Geordi turned off the force field and blew everything and Picard’s mother out into space?
The Enterprise moves all the time! Which particular crew member decided that a life size version of Jenga would be the safest way construct the cargo bay? Buckle those suckers down!
It must really suck when someone writes an episode like that; have Worf paralyzed. Heck, have cargo fall on him.
Then forever after there are these wharehouse like cargo bays.
The last thing they would want is Worf paralyzed after being thrown against a rail on the bridge when the * Black Pig* was hit. There’d be complaints about the lack of safety on the bridge and then they would have to wear seatbelts… and crash helmets… and safety glasses.