The Borg?!!?
OOooh! Like the writers think we are all going to pee our Collective pants just thinking about it!
I think back to the tiresome plot in "First Contact" with the stupid Cap'n Ahab analogy. All of the ideas in "First Contact" concerning the Borg - except one - had already been brought up and hashed out in "The Next Generation" television series. That one idea was the idiotic concept of a Borg Queen. A collection of integrated minds should have an emergent property or consciousness. I don't think the consciousness would manifest itself in the form of the Borg Queen. Once again Hollywood gives us the old "Woman = Sex = Evil" mythos. How heroic was Picard conquering his sexual feelings for the Queen? Was this the Great White Whale he was slaying? What is the audience suppose to learn from this?
When I look to my bookshelf with the toy models of the elegant starships; the many classes of "The Enterprise"; the Romulan and Klingon Birds of Prey; and then my gaze falls upon the Borg fearsome battleship. It's just a cube damit! If the Borg are suppose to value function over aesthetics, they would have chosen a sphere as the most efficient shape (or at least a Buckyball) for their starship. The thing looks more like a space borne Cabrini Green than an agent of the Apocalypse.
That got me asking the obvious question, "What is suppose to be so scary about the Borg?"
Are they cruel? No. Cruelty is irrelevant.
Do they seek to rape and kill? No. Death is irrelevant.
Do they seek to plunder riches? No. Wealth is irrelevant.
Do they seek to undermine the prevailing political, philosophical, and social system? YES! YES! YES!
The only conclusion is that the Borg are evil and to be feared because they are a bunch of Damn Zen Buddhist Commies! To see how the Borg are a subversive political movement, just follow this link to see how they stand on the issues.
Zen Buddhists? Well maybe not exactly, but the Borg do represent many ideas present in Eastern philosophy and culture.
The traditional Chinese yin and yang symbol represents the dualism of life. The marriage and balance of opposing forces; good and evil, pain and pleasure, hope and despair; the Chinese recognize and value as necessary to live harmoniously. The Borg have extended this concept to include the organic and machine. If one looks at the face of the Borg, the visage appears to resemble a reversed yin / yang symbol. The pasty white skin of the Borg contrasts with their black mechanical parts. These two opposites are fully integrated in each individual member of the Collective. So integrated, in fact, that it was with extreme difficulty and danger the organic Picard was extracted from the Borg Locutus. The Borg clearly see the value of technology in balance with the organic. Similarly, the Japanese freely embrace technology, yet the prevailing religion in the country is Shinto, which has a strong connection to the natural world. For some reason, the "Star Trek" writers find the thought of augmenting our bodies with technology as evil. This is evidenced in "First Contact" when the Borg Queen is rebuffed by both a man and an android. Not only did Data and Picard have to refuse the Queen when she offered to share her power, they had to utterly destroy her. With all of the techno-babble that goes on in each episode of "Star Trek" one would think the writers would have the crew of a Federation starship look upon the Borg with awe and admiration.
The Zen Buddhists concept of the absence of the soul is paralleled in the Borg. Death is irrelevant. Death is not even a certainty with the Borg. When a Borg is "killed" there is nothing left of the body. Nothing left at all. Like Buddha told his followers, "When I am gone, I am really gone". It is quite possible the consciousness of the individual survives as part of the Collective. Having no individual soul makes Death, and thus Fear, irrelevant for the Borg.
Another Eastern cultural philosophical principle is the identification of one as a member of the group over the identity of one as a separate individual. Rather than a military hierarchy which uses discipline and intimidation to unify the group, the Borg, by all being assimilated into the society, have an input into the Collective. If this were not true, Hugh would not of had his influence on the Collective after his encounter with Picard. The strong group identity that exists in Japanese society is quite evident. Decisions are almost always made as a group consensus. The Buddhist religions recognize no religious authority. There is no blasphemy. The Borg, too, have no recognized central authority. The Federation, on the other hand, survives on a strict code of conduct and military rules.
In the Federation there is supposed to be a respect for other cultures as dictated by "The Prime Directive". The Federation is made of species from many worlds, yet there seems to be one dominate culture. The culture is the culture of the military. Even where other values on the starship collide with the dominate Western values, every crew member, and almost every species the Federation encounters, understands the military culture. This is one of the most irritating aspects of all of the various "Star Trek" incarnations. I keep hoping that the crew of "Voyager" will mutiny and get rid of that useless military chain of command. It is a sad legacy of Roddenberry that should be jettisoned like the bilge it is. The Borg destroy other worlds and cultures, yet through assimilation preserve part of that culture. The Japanese eagerly assimilate things into their culture that they find useful. The culture in Japan has adopted the gift giving of Christmas, English words in pop music, and Western style clothing, while still remaining distinctly Japanese. The Federation cannot boast a good record of diversifying their culture. In fact, the Federation would have to be most discriminating and oppressive to keep cultural influences out the way it has for all of the centuries since the present.
One aspect of the Zen missing in the Borg is the seeming total lack of compassion. This lack is only apparent in their treatment of other species. Inside the Collective, compassion may be unnecessary. All of the Borg are interconnected, so all are One. A person does not need compassion for one's own hand. The hand is part of the body. The body will protect and take care of itself. When a new species is assimilated, it becomes part of the Borg Body. The Borg will protect and take care of itself.
Another aspect of the Borg that has similarities to Eastern philosophies is the meditative state of the Borg while on their ship. Meditation is a part of many Eastern religions. The Borg are also constantly changing and learning. These are main principles of Zen. Everything in the universe is transitory and changing . Education is a life-long endeavor.
When taken as a whole, the Borg don't seem so scary after all. Unless of course you happen to be the person in power over a society. For the lowly enlisted personnel, working the mundane jobs of the maintenance crews of a starship, the Collective might even look attractive. Instead of a menial job with a whole slew of bosses telling you what to do, you could be part of a dynamic group, using the latest technology, masters of all you encounter. No worries of famine or poverty, no pain or fear, no feelings of loss or loneliness. You would be part of a Supreme Consciousness. The Mind of God.
If the Borg come. Welcome them with open minds.
"Resistance is futile".
* Tonto - Chakotay is meant to represent a race similar to Native Americans. In the "Voyager" series, none of the attributes of a proud, charismatic, rebel leader are in evidence. Instead, his character has been emasculated and demoted to a mute side-kick, like Tonto. go back
* Ahab - As much as I enjoyed Patrick Stewart's performance, William Shatner and Ricardo ("Yours is superior") Montalbon had already told that story in "The Wrath of Khan". At least in "Khan" the film had enough respect for the audience to not have to come out and explicitly explain the plot of "Moby Dick". go back
* Cabrini Green -a notorious housing project in Chicago. go back
* Zen - For a great overview of the world's religions, get off the Web, go to the library, and check out "The World's Religions, by Houston Smith, (HarperCollins Publishers, 1991)". go back
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