Dirty Hands (316)

[huntress]

Ooops. Gonna correct that right away...why did I write Baltarwith an h....mmmh

[SoulReaver]

a good episode, despite certain inconsistencies

Baltar self-proclaimed speaker for the lower classes, yet the same guy who threatened to round up & throw the unionists in jail back on NC, during his heydays as president

but the best part was Tyrol
seriously - it's like between New Caprica & Galactica the guy underwent a complete memory wipe & personality reformat : on NC he was leader of the workers' union, yet after the exodus he so abruptly reversed himself & forgot about his former life, even when his own wife reminded him about it he simply dismissed it by saying that life was "gone". sure he did come to his senses but that was only toward the end of the episode
the contrast between his virulent speeches in favor of workers' rights back on NC and the total detachment & incomprehension he displayed towards the exact same issues on Galactica doesn't have much in the way of credibility does it ? a bit too convenient for the plot

[Huginn]

a good episode, despite certain inconsistencies

Baltar self-proclaimed speaker for the lower classes, yet the same guy who threatened to round up & throw the unionists in jail back on NC, during his heydays as president

I think that's part of the point. The man will say or do anything. That said, it doesn't make him any more or less right or wrong in what he says.

but the best part was Tyrol
seriously - it's like between New Caprica & Galactica the guy underwent a complete memory wipe & personality reformat : on NC he was leader of the workers' union, yet after the exodus he so abruptly reversed himself & forgot about his former life, even when his own wife reminded him about it he simply dismissed it by saying that life was "gone". sure he did come to his senses but that was only toward the end of the episode
the contrast between his virulent speeches in favor of workers' rights back on NC and the total detachment & incomprehension he displayed towards the exact same issues on Galactica doesn't have much in the way of credibility does it ? a bit too convenient for the plot

I think you forget what happened between his impassioned union leader speech and now: the New Caprican Resistance, making him leader of a guerrilla movement. It's not easy to just go back.

Besides that, the very livelihood of humanity did not rest on the workers who went on strike on New Caprica (yes, on some level, it must have, but not as absolutely so as in this episode). Making sure the fleet has fuel to jump is pretty much life and death.


On the whole, I think this was one of the best episodes since "Rapture." It was sufficiently big compared to all the episodes since: while racism is always a pertinent theme, "The Woman King" followed a predictable formula. "A Day in the Life" was a much more personal episode, simply of a different flavor from this one. "Dirty Hands," however, rings true, to me at least, as a real demonstration of how humanity copes with dire situations and how much it should hang on to the vestiges of a different society.

[Back40]

Without the cues of some uplifting music, I wouldn't have guessed this episode ended with a positive outcome at all.

The patriarchal militaristic hierarchy effectively crushed the strike entirely by threatening the life of Calley. This is the kind of approach that would seem entirely in character for Admiral Caine, but wears very thin on Admiral Adama. The ending sop about "I thought you intended to speak to the President" was specious and condescending. What's to keep Roslyn from taking measures just as Draconian as Adama ? If we are to be guided by recent history, Adama has been the voice of moderation more than Roslyn. Clearly the role the Chief is allowed to play is entirely limited by the will and whim of Adama and Roslyn. The limits have been defined with deadly precision. The arguments raised by Baltar were, in fact, substantiated by Adama's actions. The result is a muddle of ethics and rules of conduct made palatable only by our long engendered sympathy for Adama and Roslyn.

Exactly how practical are some of the suggestions Tyrol made ? What if a crisis developed when Roslyn was on her "rotation" of floor cleaning ? Wouldn't she be drop everything and be called back to resume her leadership position ? Are the rotations truly "leveling" or merely cosmetic ?

Clearly absolute authority was exercised by Adama in a way we've not seen before. His excuse is patently absurd "Suppose someone refuses an order that I give that he/she doesn't want to obey". Isn't that precisely what Adama did when he was subjected to the discipline of Admiral Caine? Isn't that what Lee Adama did when ordered to arrest Roslyn ? Isn't that what Kara Thrace did when she jumped the Raider to Caprica ? Seems like there are, as Baltar asserted, two sets of rules. Whatever happened to the concept that "context matters" ?

A valid question implicit in the conflict but never raised is "is a democracy the best way for the small remnant of humanity to organize itself when involved in a conflict for the survival of the species" ? The US certainly has a track record of surrendering individual Civil Liberties in time of war, or threat of war.

The concept floated in this episode that societies divided by class are inherently unstable is arguable too. Feudal division's lasted more or less unchanged for hundreds of years in the Middle Ages. Institutions develop not in a vacuum, no pun intended, but to prop up the existing power centers in a way to minimize internal conflicts and maximize stability: so wealth can accumulate, so power can be centralized, so progress can be made, so wars can be won. How are we to state positively that a democratic model is the best one to follow in this circumstance ? Forced conscription appears to be an acceptable (and even a "fair and balanced") alternative in the Colonial dystopia to the alternative of class stratification. What's so different about "drafting farmers" to work in the tillium vessel and the tactics used by Caine to conscript the Viper engineer to work on the flight deck ? Both are occasions of coercion of the individual for the "good of the fleet".

It is far from clear that democracy triumphed in this episode. If anything was proved, it was that the power holders are ready and willing to be ruthless in exercising their will when threatened. Dissent is tolerated only when its contours can be defined and limted.

Really interesting post to read. I have to admit I disagreed with most of it, largely because I interpreted the actions/statements of individuals very differently, but a well thought-out point of view nonetheless.

[SoulReaver]

I think that's part of the point. The man will say or do anything. That said, it doesn't make him any more or less right or wrong in what he says.

yeah the guy's a demagogue - one whose top priority atm is to stay alive at all costs - nevertheless he himself seemed pretty much convinced of the cogency of his proclaimed standpoint, especially when he switched to "aerelon mode" on-the-fly...

I think you forget what happened between his impassioned union leader speech and now: the New Caprican Resistance, making him leader of a guerrilla movement. It's not easy to just go back.

well unless the occupation traumatized the poor chap to such an extent that it basically blanked out his "pre-occupation" memories - which is unlikely, after all he is a grown-up man and not amongst those to have endured the worst in the "snake pit" anyway - I'd say yes it is. his & cally's experience on NC may have hardened him to the vicissitudes of war & further fueled his hatred towards the cylons but this would be of little relevance to a labor-rights issue concerning his former comrades. if anything this should have only further sensitized him to their cause in the present context : the fact that the "livelihood of humanity" rested on them, in conjunction with the incident that brought the issue into light (impossible working conditions resulting in potentially fatal consequences - to humanity - if the cylons attacked), should've served as further incentive to take their side outright without him having to go down there & see things for himself

[SoulReaver]

btw

"Dirty Hands," however, rings true, to me at least, as a real demonstration of how humanity copes with dire situations and how much it should hang on to the vestiges of a different society.

I agree - especially since bsg is primarily a human venture - however after this relatively long (albeit commendable) string of "psychological" episodes I wouldn't mind a bit of action for a change. it's been a while :|

[dec55]

Actually check your history. This happens all the time. Germany, in WW2, was able to fight England, France, Poland, Russia, and the US for six years. Most of their heavy equipment was pulled by *horses* (the US was the first mostly mechanized army when they invaded Europe).

Japan, also in WW2, had gone from an agrarian society to an industrial power capable of taking on the US (for a short while). Yet most of their industry was hand-made. For example, the aerospace industry in Japan at the time consisted of thousands of small outfits making parts by hand. This is one reason why the firebombings of the urban centers was more effective against the Japanese vs the Germans, the Japanese industry was based more on hand-labor widely distributed in the urban areas, and very vulnerable to population-based attacks like the US firebombings of their cities.

Also, watch "Dirty Jobs" on the Discovery channel. Even our supposedly "advanced" society has many of its less desirable jobs done in ways that this episode reflects.

Technological advances definitely are not uniform, nor do they need to be in many ways. I can easily see a cheapskate Tilyum refining company in the colonies employing cost-cutting schemes on their refinining ships to save some money. Why invest in expensive machinery, when a bunch of low-paid workers from the non-noble colonies can do the job just as well but at a fraction of the cost?

Well....granted high technological societies do still employ primitive basic measures to do things is true....on earth.

But we are talking a advanced spacefaring society which has had robot technology for generations. When one sees a few hand held buckets of ore thown on a rickety moving belt held together by overworked teens and children...with their parents....responsible for the supplying a massive number of starships...with fuel.....that appears to be a bit comedic...to me.

The company these folks work for should have been put out of business by the free market
automated competition years ago...

in a way it makes sense. their last attempt at mechanization? they create thier arch enemies. gonna make anyone think twice before creating somethng similar that might come back and bite them in the bootie

You bring up a good point for how it would have made this eppy more different...having the colonials
too scared to use their machines because of what happend to the colonies...

We had the same thought when we watched it as well. Why the frak don't they have machines doing most of the grunt work? Sure, Galactica's antiquated, but from what we've seen, the rest of the RTF isn't. I didn't really buy this premise, but the message of the episode probably wouldn't have come across as well if we had been watching guys (and by "guys" I mean "women") clean toilets for 43 minutes.

Excellent point....the Colonies won't survive if they do things too slow....like not using automated
systems...... Cylons are fully automated...which gives them a huge advantage..

[TheBigFlush]

A valid question implicit in the conflict but never raised is "is a democracy the best way for the small remnant of humanity to organize itself when involved in a conflict for the survival of the species" ?

I think this is touched on (not directly, but implicitly) with Tyrol's "does my son get to choose his own life" argument. What they're really dancing around is: Yes, we're on the run for our lives, and probably the survival of our species. But who knows how long we'll be running? In the meantime, what kind of society do we really want to have? It's very easy for the people at the top, living in relative luxury to say "just keep working, because the species depends on it" when they're not the ones actually doing all the work. And finally, if and when we finally find Earth, what kind of a society to we want to show them?

The concept floated in this episode that societies divided by class are inherently unstable is arguable too. Feudal division's lasted more or less unchanged for hundreds of years in the Middle Ages.

Is that good? Just because a system works, does that make it right? Obviously they can't have the same kind of government they had before the cylon attack, but the argument here is How much are we willing to give up?

It is far from clear that democracy triumphed in this episode. If anything was proved, it was that the power holders are ready and willing to be ruthless in exercising their will when threatened. Dissent is tolerated only when its contours can be defined and limted.

In this case, with the people that are currently in control, this does ring true.

[SoulReaver]

Well....granted high technological societies do still employ primitive basic measures to do things is true....on earth.

But we are talking a advanced spacefaring society which has had robot technology for generations. When one sees a few hand held buckets of ore thown on a rickety moving belt held together by overworked teens and children...with their parents....responsible for the supplying a massive number of starships...with fuel.....that appears to be a bit comedic...to me.

I especially liked the part where one malfunctioning conveyor belt could blow up an entire battlestar
lol - I bet even 20th century earth could do better than that

[BubblingOverWithIdeas]

It's quite simple. Robots are illegal. The Colonials downgraded their own technology after the First Cylon War and were only beginning to advance again when the attack came. Not only that, but the tylium refinery wasn't designed to be the only hope of a ragtag fleet to keep going in. If it were, it might have automated machinery of some kind. But it doesn't, and none can be manufactured because there's nothing to manufacture it with. I think it's easy to forget that this is not a fully functional society we're talking about, it's the remnants of one.

No one any time said that the conveyor belt malfunction would blow up the Galactica. They said it would blow up the tylium refinery, the ship it's actually on. Which makes perfect sense because of the volatility of tylium and the way the ship is constructed. Any damage to other ships would have to be caused by the flaming wreckage of the refinery.

[SoulReaver]

yeah it would blow up the tylium refinery. somehow I doubt this would've been good for the ship it was on -)

[BubblingOverWithIdeas]

So you knew that the refinery is a ship of its own, not part of a battlestar, and simply miswrote? Okay. Just checking.

[SoulReaver]

damn - I'd forgotten it was a separate ship (a battleship could have its own refinery)

oh well it wasn't the galactica so I'll rephrase that :

I especially liked the part where one malfunctioning conveyor belt could blow up an entire spaceship
lol - I bet even 20th century earth could do better than that

[dec55]

It's quite simple. Robots are illegal. The Colonials downgraded their own technology after the First Cylon War and were only beginning to advance again when the attack came. Not only that, but the tylium refinery wasn't designed to be the only hope of a ragtag fleet to keep going in. If it were, it might have automated machinery of some kind. But it doesn't, and none can be manufactured because there's nothing to manufacture it with. I think it's easy to forget that this is not a fully functional society we're talking about, it's the remnants of one.

No one any time said that the conveyor belt malfunction would blow up the Galactica. They said it would blow up the tylium refinery, the ship it's actually on. Which makes perfect sense because of the volatility of tylium and the way the ship is constructed. Any damage to other ships would have to be caused by the flaming wreckage of the refinery.

That's one of my points.....they were sorting the stuff with buckets...:lol
The Colonials still have automated systems as far as weapons....and lifesupport.... If they have to sort unstable ore with their hands...,at the slow rate they are working and the hazards to folks who don't seem too skilled in production of fuel...,this will pose bigger problems than just not enough vacation time for the workers and child labor laws......:lol

[Lady Snow]

It's quite simple. Robots are illegal.

I remember that research into artificial intelligence was illegal pre-genocide (Baltar's whole interview topic in the mini), but robots were too? I don't recall that issue being brought up. Maybe I missed it.

The Colonials still have automated systems as far as weapons....and lifesupport

*Points to dec55's post* Word, my friend. I forget exactly the details of "Epiphanies," but we saw the munitions-making process, and not all of that was done by hand. Automated machinery was certainly in use - and on Galactica, of all places. I wish we had seen the algae-making process; I wonder what sort of machinery is used for that...

...unless it's like a grape-stomping party. But that begs a whole slew of other questions.