Is morally acceptable to kill an infant Goa'uld?

[g.o.d]

So if it could be argued that all males are driven by a biological imperative to mate, could be rapists, which results in physical and mental damage, and potentially the death of their victims, so all males should be killed to prevent them from ever raping?

ends justifies the means?

are you serious? I am male and I have no need to rape someone. This is argument is absurd

[IV]

are you serious? I am male and I have no need to rape someone. This is argument is absurd

Apply that to the goa'uld though - they are what they are, symbiotes that are required to take a host. I think Skydiver meant that you made just as much of a blanket statement as she did concerning males.

Personally, I think it's both moral and not. Lives will be saved, but a sentient life-form that has a 'right' to live by having near-human/human intelligence is also killed in the process. The lesser of two evils is to destroy them from a human perspective, even if the Jaffa who don't have access to tretonin require the prim'tah in order to survive.

[Jeffala]

Think about this:

In "Cure" (SG-1 6x10), Egeria was cranking out mindless symbiotes. They had nothing. They were shells with no knowledge and they operated on instinct alone.

Their number one instinct was to take a host when one was available.

This shows us that even without the genetic memory, even coming from a benevolent queen, the Goa'uld are a threat to humans and other species that can be taken as hosts.

[Sealurk]

The natural state of the Goa'uld species is clearly parasitic, using other being's bodies for their own benefit exclusively. The Tok'ra are the exception, because they lack the damaging genetic memory that warps a Goa'uld's mind even in the pouch. Goa'uld are not 'evil' because of the sarcophagus, they are already sadistic, predatory, parasitic and power-hungry when they leave the pouch - even while still in it going by Tannith's deception and Junior showing Teal'c images of his father being executed. I doubt the larval Goa'uld in that tank would have been any different.

Regardless of their morality, animals that pose a very significant risk to human health, lives or livelihood are controlled on Earth. Man-eating predators are hunted down and destroyed, pests are destroyed...why should the Goa'uld be exempted from that? Because they're self aware and intelligent? That just makes them an even bigger threat!

I wouldn't advocate their extinction, but until a means of inhibiting a Goa'uld's harmful genetic memory and reducing dependence on the sarcophagus are written into the story, the Goa'uld will always be a grave threat.

[Blencathra]

I'm curious. I wonder how many people feel it would be easier to kill Goa'uld because they are horrible wormy snake like creatures? If they were cute and fluffy, how many people would feel the same way? Are we prejudiced because of their looks?

[Spimman]

The Tok'ra are the exception, because they lack the damaging genetic memory that warps a Goa'uld's mind even in the pouch.

Is this true? I thought it was up to the queen as to what genetic memories she passed on? I thought the Tok-ra were different because they only took hosts that agree to the relationship and lived more or less in a symbiotic relationship.

That being said, Goa'uld pass on genetic memories and therefor really never have a stage of innocence that we associate with infants. Killing infants is wrong because they are innocent, pure, blameless, helpless (on & on)...Goa'uld "infants" are similar to human infants in age only!

[Steelbox]

has to be millions. There have to be millions of jaffa incubating baby goa'uld, thousands of them that take hosts and rise to any sort of power, dozens of system lords....thus, it can be argued that it's only a very small minority of the population that ever reaches the level of being a real threat to anyone

A BIG chunk of these millions would have died along with their jaffa host combating another System Lord army. Manny of these simbiots will never even get near to posses a host even less becoming an System Lord. Thought i agree that in the sense of species they are surelly in the millions.

[Skydiver]

Killing them all, genocide, is not only morally wrong, it can be environmentally wrong.

There's a tree in Madagascar i think, that is dying. A whole species of tree. and why? because they have found out that the Dodo birds used to eat it. (yes, i may have the wrong island). but since mankind killed all the dodo birds, there are none to eat the seeds of the tree, and so the seeds, in the form of fruit, falls and falls and falls to the forest floor, but none ever germinates, because there are no dodo's to eat it. And, apparently, what wasn't known or understood a century ago was that the dodo birds, in eating the seeds, altered them somehow allowing them to sprout.

mankind killing one species has doomed another to death.

In california, in the redwood forest, we had a policy of 'fire is bad, extinguish it all'. and we did, for a century we extinguished all fires in the redwood forest...then they noticed, wow, no baby redwoods. Then tehy realized that the pinecones of the redwood tree NEEDED the heat of a fire to open them, releasing their seed.

We, in our desire to control and manipulate, almost doomed another species to extinction.

The web of life is very complex and you can't go removing part of it without damaging something else.

yeah,t he goa'uld home world isn't ours. however, if we kill off every single goa'uld, everywhere...what kind of an effect will that have? what other species coudl we be dooming?

[mirdin1992]

Killing them all, genocide, is not only morally wrong, it can be environmentally wrong.

There's a tree in Madagascar i think, that is dying. A whole species of tree. and why? because they have found out that the Dodo birds used to eat it. (yes, i may have the wrong island). but since mankind killed all the dodo birds, there are none to eat the seeds of the tree, and so the seeds, in the form of fruit, falls and falls and falls to the forest floor, but none ever germinates, because there are no dodo's to eat it. And, apparently, what wasn't known or understood a century ago was that the dodo birds, in eating the seeds, altered them somehow allowing them to sprout.

mankind killing one species has doomed another to death.

In california, in the redwood forest, we had a policy of 'fire is bad, extinguish it all'. and we did, for a century we extinguished all fires in the redwood forest...then they noticed, wow, no baby redwoods. Then tehy realized that the pinecones of the redwood tree NEEDED the heat of a fire to open them, releasing their seed.

We, in our desire to control and manipulate, almost doomed another species to extinction.

The web of life is very complex and you can't go removing part of it without damaging something else.

yeah,t he goa'uld home world isn't ours. however, if we kill off every single goa'uld, everywhere...what kind of an effect will that have? what other species coudl we be dooming?

Yes this is doing bad things through negligence or simply the people saying "I don't care".

Advocating the extermination of a species because its a threat to you and everything it touches is a perfectly reasonable course of action.

Now exterminating the Goa'uld you are not killing the species. There are the Tok'ra that can continue the race. So eliminating the Goa'uld is more like defeating a nation than racial genocide.

Also if humans can practice total war on themselfs why not on a sadistic, megalomaniacal snake that would as much put you to the 'pain stick' as speak to you.

[Ben 'Teal'c would WIN!!' Noble]

By morally wrong by who's though because by mine I see no problem with killing them at all.

We were at war at the time, they are born evil and they wouldn't hesitate killing us with half the chance and have.

Frankly I don't give a S**T!!

[aretood2]

I know what you mean, but think of this, would it better if Daniel just didn't do it? Think that then once they took a host, he would be killing a human that had nothing to do with the situation he was into and that would be worst.

I think that what Daniel did was right.

He was right, but was it moral? That's the question here me thinks.

Yes this is doing bad things through negligence or simply the people saying "I don't care".

Advocating the extermination of a species because its a threat to you and everything it touches is a perfectly reasonable course of action.

Now exterminating the Goa'uld you are not killing the species. There are the Tok'ra that can continue the race. So eliminating the Goa'uld is more like defeating a nation than racial genocide.

Also if humans can practice total war on themselfs why not on a sadistic, megalomaniacal snake that would as much put you to the 'pain stick' as speak to you.

True, but Total war does not involve killing the enemy's young
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For me at least, if the only argument someone has to do something is "The ends justify the means" Then it is not good. All too many times in history this flawed line of logic has been done to justify crimes such as mass murder, infanticide, Murder, Genocide, and so on.

[mirdin1992]

True, but Total war does not involve killing the enemy's young

What is a young being when it has the memories of being in power, killing, maiming, torturing people and the memories that it liked doing these things for thousands of years. Doesn't the experience make the man and in these case experience is the genetic memory that all Goa'uld inherite.

If so then there are no 'young', innocent Goa'uld. Only ones that later redeemed themselves for the sins of their parents.

Speaking of which doesn't the phrase "The sins of the father are the sins of the son." apply here. Especially when the son is a copy down to the personality and memories of its parents.

[aretood2]

What is a young being when it has the memories of being in power, killing, maiming, torturing people and the memories that it liked doing these things for thousands of years. Doesn't the experience make the man and in these case experience is the genetic memory that all Goa'uld inherite.

If so then there are no 'young', innocent Goa'uld. Only ones that later redeemed themselves for the sins of their parents.

Speaking of which doesn't the phrase "The sins of the father are the sins of the son." apply here. Especially when the son is a copy down to the personality and memories of its parents.

But what of the Jaffa that needed those Goa'uld then?

[maylet]

the thing is, the goa'uld aren't just tape worms they're sentient. They're self aware and intelligent life forms.

as to the lives that daniel saved....sure, in a few years those goa'uld would have taken hosts....but how about the Jaffa those goa'uld would have gone into and kept alive? He may have saved people from being hosts 7 ish years in the future, but in the meantime there's some jaffa that won't get a replacement 'junior' and will die.

so are the lives of the potential future hosts more important than the lives of the jaffa?

His destroying of that tank potentially condemned a half dozen or so jaffa (helpless slaves held by the goa'uld) to a slow and lingering death.

I didn't think of the Jaffa, in there you are right.

And going back to the original question of this thread, and reading Everything we have been posting, I don't think what Daniel did was morally acceptable. The Goa'uld are Evil, that's true, he could have taken the little Goa'uld and kill them once they were mature. But we all know he didn't have the time to take them, and it was the anger and the pain in him that make him do that. I don't think that in his right mind he would have done it.

(Spimman congratulations for the boys)

[Skydiver]

the tok'ra are a dying race without a queen. so, if there is a concern about preserving the species, the tok'ra aren't a viable replacement.