Introduction
There are many myths about Captain
Kirk, which is an odd thing considering he is a fictional character. Nevertheless, there are a number of common
misconceptions with the character’s popular image that don’t exist as part of
the source material. One example is what
is typically dubbed “Shatner speak.”
This is explained as the act of talking as if there is a period after
the end of every word. This is most
famous satirized by Jim Carrey during his time with Saturday Night Live. Another myth is that he is frequent rule
breaker, who does whatever he feels is right regardless of orders. This is even popularized by the show itself
most recently in the series Lower Decks where frequent rule-breaker
Beckett Mariner calls herself a “Kirk-type” to justify her actions. Then there of course the classical claim that
he is a crazy womanizer as popularized most recently by the pregnant “Kirk was here” cosplayers.
One of
interesting things about the Star Trek franchise is it is so large that
many fans, if not most, come into it sideways.
They don’t start at the beginning they start at whatever series was on when they begin watching. When they come across
the original series it is basically history for them. It is not at all unusual to see on Star
Trek fan forums this question posted, “So I just started watching the
original series, pretty good so far, when does the whole Shatner-speak
start? I am almost through the first
season and I haven’t seen it yet.” There are a few scenes where Kirk does talk
slowly however these are normally in situations where the Captain has to be
careful with his words. He is in
diplomatic situation or something similar.
The best example I think of is Kirk’s first scene with Khan in “The
Wrath of Khan.”
Over the years there have been many
articles debunking these many myths. Larry
Womack of the Huffington Post wrote a great article in 2013 titled, In Defense of (the Original) James T. Kirk, where he tackles Kirk’s reputation
of being a rule breaker and womanizer in the aftermath of the Kelvin Universe Star
Trek films’ version of Captain Kirk, and John E Price of Medium wrote a similar
piece called You Either Believe in Yourself or You Don’t: Star Trek Discovery, James T. Kirk, and the Power of Traditional Memory. Internet
essayist and Star Trek enthusiast Steve Shives created a great video in
2018 titled Is Captain Kirk Actually a Womanizer to which he takes down
that myth flat.
The myth that I want to tackle is
the one that states Captain Kirk is not only a rule breaker but that he
repeatedly violates Starfleet’s General Order Number One: The Prime
Directive. (As if you couldn’t tell that
by the title.) As all fans know, the Prime Directive states that Starfleet will
not interfere in the internal development of a foreign society, and if said
society has not yet developed warp drive Starfleet is not even allowed to let
that society know that Starfleet and the Federation exist. The reason the Prime Directive exists is the
Federation does not want the exploration of the universe to have the same
devastating effect on alien societies that European exploration and
colonization did to the many aboriginal societies of Earth. However, it has it has its drawbacks and some
would argue that Prime Directive itself is immoral. For if a Starfleet vessel were to discover a
world that was like 1930s Earth where fascist regimes were engaged in genocide
of persecuted peoples. Then that vessel
would not do a thing to stop it.
"No identification of self or mission. No interference with the social development of said planet. No references to space, or the fact that there are other worlds, or more advanced civilizations." Dr. McCoy in "Bread and Circuses"
Kirk’s reputation of ignoring the Prime
Directive is a recognized trait of his character and is mentioned both within Star
Trek (Remember Janeway’s quote about 23rd century officers being
quick to draw their phasers and slow to invoke the Prime Directive?) and
without. There was an episode of JAG
where the character Bud Roberts was able to get information from a terrorist by
going over Star Trek trivia. The
incident is initiated by an argument over Kirk’s violation of the Prime Directive
to which Bud says Kirk did “all the time.”
This is a myth. Kirk only violated the Prime Directive
once. Yes, that is right I said it. He only did it once, and it was under an
extreme situation. Now I know what you
are thinking: “I have seen Star Trek X-number of times and I saw him violate
the Prime Directive X-number of times much higher than 1.” I know but you’re wrong and with that let’s
go over Kirk’s relationship with the Prime Directive.
When
the Captain is Clearly Obeying
People are so caught up calling out
Kirk for allegedly violating the Prime Directive that they forget how much he
is a defender of it. A good example of
Kirk obeying is the episode “Bread and Circuses.” In this episode the Enterprise travels
to one of the many fake Earths that they encounter during Star Trek’s classical
run. On this fake Earth they find that
the Roman Empire has survived until the 20th century and they now
have their gladiator games on TV. A
Federation merchant ship was stranded on the planet and Kirk is looking to
retrieve them. While they are there,
they find some underground rebels. After
hanging out with the rebels they are captured by Roman authorities and taken to
the Proconsul. It turns out the Merchant
Captain told the Proconsul everything about Starfleet and the Federation,
including the Prime Directive. In this
episode Kirk has the means and the motive to overwhelm the Romans of Fake Earth
with fire power and take the Federation citizens there by force. However, Captain Kirk is restrained the by
the Prime Directive, understanding that he and his crew will have to come up
with a less direct way of getting the actions that they desire accomplished. Which they do, they manage to remove the
Federation elements from the Fake Earth with no one from the general population
being the wiser.
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| Kirk is trying to find a way out of this mess without violating the Prime Directive |
Another example is the episode “The Paradise Syndrome.” In this episode Kirk loses his memory and for a while is
living with a Native American tribe whose ancestors were placed on this planet by
the ancient Preservers. There Kirk falls
in love with a local woman named Miramanee and marries her. When Kirk fails the tribe in a major way,
they turn on him and stone him as a fraud, Miramanee tries to save him and is
killed as a result. Once Kirk’s memory
is restored, he does not go back to the tribe and explain to them why they were
wrong and blame them for killing Miramanee.
He recognizes the Prime Directive and ceases all contact with those
people. He doesn’t even bother to explain to them how to turn on the Preserver
device.
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| He interferes here but stops when his memory returns |
Someone
Else Already Interfered
The first batch of Captain Kirk’s
so-called “violations” are actually already covered in an established portion
of Starfleet law. That if interference
on an alien culture has already happened then a Starfleet crew is allowed to
correct the imbalance, try to expunge the interference, or cut the losses and
make the best out of a bad situation. The first of these can be seen in the episode
“A Private Little War” here Captain Kirk returns to a planet named Neural that
he once visited as a young lieutenant, I am assuming before he ran into the vampire cloud, only to discover that the Klingons have shown up and armed the
villagers with advanced weaponry and sent them to attack the hill people. Upon
confirming the Klingons involvement Kirk arms and trains the hill people with
the same weapons that Klingons provided the villagers. Kirk isn’t breaking the Prime Directive here;
he is giving the planet a course correction due to Klingon interference.
 |
| Looks like we already have interference |
The next example of this is “A Piece of the Action.” In this episode the Enterprise travels
to the planet Sigma Iotia II. The planet
was last visited by the Horizon over a century ago. At the time the
Prime Directive had yet to be established and the crew thought nothing about
leaving behind a book called The Chicago Mobs of the Twenties, along
with some manuals about early twentieth century technology. Now the entire population of the planet is
living a world based of the gang culture of Prohibition-era Chicago. Instead of leaving Kirk decides to undo some
of the damage done by the accidental interference. He gathers all the gangs, impresses them with
his technology and fire power of his ship, and informs them that the Federation
is “taking over” as “the prime operator.”
All the gangs will now have to get in line, Kirk then reorganizes their
entire government for them.
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| Not good! |
The third case of this is one not
caused by a slight error but one caused by extreme stupidity. In the episode “Patterns of Force” a
historian named John Gill travels the planet Ekos and finds it divided by war
and chaos. Amid this chaos the
award-winning historian decided what this planet truly needs is some
Nazism. Nope, not kidding that is what
he did. Naturally, when the Enterprise
arrives, they are shocked to say the least.
So, as such Captain Kirk and Spock go to the planet and after some great
difficulty find Gill, who was no a prisoner and puppet figurehead by his
deputy, they have him give a public confession and turn on his party. The leave the planet in the hands of two
allies they feel they can trust and leave.
 |
| Exposing the Nazis |
Finally, we have the episode “Omega Glory” where Captain Ronald Tracey of the Exter goes to Omega IV. Omega IV is another one of those Fake Earth, this
one where the Cold War got hot the world was destroyed and the survivors are
still fighting each other even though they don’t remember why. Tracey becomes convinced he can become
immortal on this planet so he tried to aid one side by helping them fight their
war by using phasers. Kirk having
discovered this moves to stop him and then helps the people of Omega IV
correctly interpret their own “holy words.” With Tracey now their prisoner,
Kirk and crew leave.
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| Its the captain with the phaser who is breaking the rules. |
That Depends What
Your Definition of “Developing” is
In other cases where Kirk appears
to violate the Prime Directive, he doesn’t due to some creative reading of the
text. The Prime Directive states that they
shall not interfere with the internal development of another
culture. Kirk reasons if the culture
isn’t doing any developing then all bets are off. I am also convinced that by the TNG era this
interpretation has been eliminated via legislation. Kind of like how Kirk led his own away
missions but by the TNG era the regulations forbade a captain from doing that.
First example of this is in the
episode “Miri.” This episode is also
famous for giving us our first-of-many Fake Earths. The Enterprise arrives at this fake
Earth only to discover that they took a dramatic turn from the real Earth in
their version of the 1960s. Trying to
extend their natural lives into the centuries, they failed miserably and caused
every adult on the planet to turn into a rabid monster that would tear things
apart then quickly die. The children did
get the life extension but when they reached a point where their biological age
leads them into puberty and they turn into monsters too. Captain Kirk not only has McCoy discover away
to save the landing party from the virus but he gives it to the kids and
Starfleet sends teams to help the children rebuild their society. Fake Earth culture was a frozen corpse so
Kirk decided to interfere.
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| This culture clearly stopped working |
The second of example of this is
the classic episode “The Return of the Archons.” Here Captain Kirk and his crew travel to the
planet Beta III and encounter a society that is ruled and managed by a
computer. Most people are kept in an
altered mental state where they came to be part of “the body.” Those who are
not are quickly made that way upon discovery.
There is evidence that this society was more advanced until a ruler
named Landru created the “the body” to prevent war and bloodshed. Kirk decides that this society is stagnant
under the rule of a machine and decided to break the people free. He leaves
behind some advisors to help that now free Betans to take control once again.
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| Weird state! |
This is repeated in the second
season episode “The Apple.” One on hand the episode is a clone of the pervious
one discussed a society has come under the rule of computer who keeps the
people in a primitive state. There are
some key differences however. Where Landru kept his people trapped in a 19th
century type society where Vaal keeps them in a Garden of Eden state. Like before Kirk determines that this society
is stagnant and not developing. Kirk
ends up destroying Vaal freeing the people to control their own destiny.
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| Explaining orders from Vaal! |
When
Starfleet Command Decides to Ignore the Prime Directive
Then there are times where
Starfleet Command and the Federation decide to override the Prime Directive in
certain situations. The first example of
this is the episode “Errand of Mercy.”
This is the episode that was the first appearance of the Klingons. War has been declared between the two
powers. Starfleet recognizes the
strategic location of Organian system.
As such we no longer care if they are a bunch of pre-warp primitives. It’s not our fault the Klingons are coming
anyway so Organians aren’t going to be allowed to develop naturally so this is
a primitive planet is going to get a sudden upgrade. Call it a preemptive. It turns out the reverse happened far from the
Federation and Klingon Empire dictating to the Organians, the Organians revel
themselves to be gods and dictate to the two space powers. Treaty is forced upon them and peace is
saved.
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| When you realize they are the ones doing the telling! |
The second time we see this is in
the episode “Friday’s Child.” In this
case contact has been made with the natives of Capella IV in a mission that did
not involve the Enterprise but one that Dr. McCoy participated in. The reason Starfleet authorized such contact
is the planet is bursting with dilithium crystals. When the Federation sees a planet that
produces dilithium crystals like this they get the same feeling that the United
States does when they find an oil rich nation: that is a nation that can use
some “freedom.” Starfleet looks at
Capella IV as one that can use some “advancement.” To be fair Starfleet wants
this to be a voluntary transaction and they are not conquering them. In the end with the new leader, Leonard James Akaar, enthroned Starfleet will probably have an easier time.
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| Yes, we have your crystals |
Speaking of involuntary we have the
episode “Spretre of the Gun.” Starfleet wants
contact with the Melkotians so bad that they won’t let Kirk take “no” for an
answer. The Enterprise heads to
Melkos and when the Melkotians demand they leave, Kirk’s orders tell him he
must proceed anyway. This ends up with
the landing party stuck in a Western.
It’s a strange episode.
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| Go Away! |
The
One Time Kirk Did Violate the Prime Directive
There was this one time that
Captain Kirk did out right violate the Prime Directive. That was in the episode “A Taste of Armageddon.”
In this episode the Enterprise is on a diplomatic mission to the planets
Eminiar VII and Vendikar. The two worlds
claim to have been at war over centuries although there is no evidence of any
such thing on the surface. It turns out
they fight their war in a computer simulation.
This gives them all the casualties with none of the destruction of
infrastructure. This also means that the
war where people die not only doesn’t stop it never slows down. When the simulation is made all of those
reported “killed” must report to disintegration chamber to have their vaporized
and recorded as such. They also tell the
Captain that his ship was one of the casualties and therefore his entire crew
must submit to be killed. Now at this
point Kirk could just escape, return to the Enterprise, and get the hell
out of there. However, he has another
plan in mind. He decides to destroy
their machines and force them to fight their war for real. Panicking at the thought of all the coming
destruction the leaders of Eminiar VII agree to have Ambassador Fox agree to
open negotiations with Vendikar.
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| "I'm going to teach you to fight your war for real" |
Now let’s be clear, there was no
outside interference from either aliens, such as Klingons, or stupid humans who
messed up something that Kirk had to correct.
The society was not failing to develop, in fact the whole purpose for
this set-up was to allow for the society to continue to grow despite the
war. There was no command from Starfleet
to ignore the Prime Directive. Kirk just
decided that he didn’t like what these people were doing so he was going to end
it. Why did Starfleet get away with
it? A novel I once read—that I can’t
recall the name of—stated that the Federation was so horrified at what was
being described that they chose to look the other way on the matter.
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| "Planning their break out!" |
Conclusion
In conclusion
I hope I have convinced you that far from being a rebel, Captain Kirk was in
fact a defender of Starfleet highest command. The exceptions are just that,
exceptions, the reason there happens be so much is because writers need drama
to have characters go through in order to give us a story.
