I forget where but they were discussing one episode and Rich says something like “This episode is proof why the prime directive is important, because our hero’s almost commit genocide.”
All of the prime directive episodes of TNG are my favorites. The one that you mentioned with the Mintakans, the one where Data loses his memory and accidentally gives medieval people a bunch of
radioactive rocks, the one where Riker is the alien in a society roughly analogous to our own. So good.
There's a neat episode of Enterprise, maybe a two parter, about a few vulcans getting stranded in 19...50s? small town America and having to adapt and build a life. Not explicitly a prime directive episode but has a very similar vibe and is one of my favorite takes on the material.
Came back here to say thanks. Just watched the Riker ep. I think I never watched this one before because I had heard it wasn’t one of the best. But I absolutely loved it. Essentially a stage play about diplomacy, politics, science, and technology. The ep is firing on all cylinders. This is everything Star Trek was created for.
Think I’m learning that the Prime Directive eps might be the most underrated ones and maybe what I need in my life most right now.
Gonna check out the Data ep soon. So yeah, just wanted to say thanks for mentioning it. :)
Like u/SirSullymore said, Rich did mention in the STD season 2 review why it's important to follow it.
However I don't think it "matters". Not to discredit your question at all, but after watching TNG, I feel that the "prime directive" isn't so much a point of discussion as it is the "premise" of the show.
They do question it within the show of course, but it seems to me that it's just a building block of the writing. As in, it's an hypothesis you make to explore theorical ideas.
From a narrative point of view, saying wether you approve or not of the "prime directive" would be like questioning if the empire is worth overthrowing in Star Wars. It's more something that the writers have to convince you of through good story-telling, rather than something that you have to believe in personally.
Which is maybe why old Star Trek feels more philosophical than political? But I haven't watched the new stuff, so I'm just guessing based on Mike and Rich's reactions to it.
The prime directive would be interesting if they followed it rigorously, but usually it just pops up as lip service, IMO. Or some episodes they really care about it and it's important and in the next episode (from a different writer) they're just like "eh, let's give these cavemen some laser rifles I guess".
I like/hate the prime directive. IMO it should be 'don't give tech, don't get involved in wars'
but in STD, stopping a volcano to prevent the death of a pre industrial society is exactly what the federation should do, and be. They have the tech to do that while hidden. Same with a supernova. The population had no decision about any natural disasters and certainly isn't there fault they live there.
The volcano thing would make more sense as a religious "Prime Directive". It's like saying "we can't help them stop the volcano because God/Zeus/Heaven has clearly decided to make this happen." As a science-based atheistic idea, that seems silly. As you say: "don't give tech, don't get involved in their political affairs" makes sense.
Maybe I am making things up but I understood for things like the volcano, it was about the fact that if given the chance the civilization might be able to come up with a solution or way around the problem which pushed them forward as a species. Saving them takes away that chance for self-progression, no matter how unlikely. Again, that might just be my head canon
right, but are you saying we couldn't stop the volcano because of their religion or the religion of the ship stopping it? I think it would be immoral to let a civilization die because they thought jobu was making the volcano explode. Because then you could pull what TOS did and stop a huge asteroid that the populace would have no idea was coming.
I'm talking about the Prime Directive, not about whatever the volcano people believe.
The "we can't save them from the volcano" only works if the Prime Directive was based on some kind of religious principal of Fate or Heaven's Will or something, \*that\* is why we shouldn't interfere with the less advanced races.
But it isn't, it's based on rational thinking, so there is no real reason to avoid saving them from the volcano if it can be done reasonably discretely.
>it's arrogant to think that some starship captain passing through the system "knows better" than the biosphere of the planet
The biosphere of the planet knows nothing, it's not making a decision, (unless it's that planet from Avatar I suppose), it's just a unthinking process that's happening because of physics. Saying the planet is making a decision is a pretty religious interpretation of a volcanic eruption or an earthquake.
There are numerous episodes of Star Trek that demonstrate the danger of cultural contamination (Homeward, Who Watches the Watchers, Blink of an Eye, even Into Darkness). Different interpretations of Starfleet's nature could be enough to INSTIGATE war, even if they didn't pick a side.
Your limitations put no restrictions on political involvement. There would be no restriction from the Federation manipulating a planet's political atmosphere, or even sponsoring a coup. It's an invitation to colonialism.
Should Phlox have treated Valakians even though it would have resulted in the continued oppression of the Menk? Maybe Starfleet should have tried to free the Menk by refusing to treat the Valakians unless they liberated the Menk. Or, maybe the Prime Directive was written precisely because infinite permutations of that scenario are going to be encountered by ships spanning the quadrant.
What if you don't think you're getting involved in a war because you're being lied to, like Harry Kim in Nightengale.
The Prime Directive is both brilliant and moral. The alternative is a hubristic, imperialist mindset that Starfleet knows what's best for other cultures, planets, and the galaxy itself.
>There are numerous episodes of Star Trek that demonstrate the danger of cultural contamination (Homeward
In Homeward Picard was willing to let every member of that species die for the sake of the PD. That's a horrible attitude that's been rightly criticised for decades now. Preventing 'cultural contamination' really shouldn't be considered if the alternative is extinction.
>Should Phlox have treated Valakians even though it would have resulted in the continued oppression of the Menk?
Were the Menk oppressed? Phlox goes out of his way to observe that the Menk *are* less intelligent than the Valakians and that it's actually something special that the Valakians hadn't wiped them out, similar to how humans did with Neanderthals. The ep would've been better if the Menk were being abused, but they weren't. The writers accidently created a situation were there was a natural, biological reason for the Menk being 2nd class citizens who were only really suited to performing simple tasks and it is actually to the Valakians credit that they treated them so well.
> The Prime Directive is both brilliant and moral. The alternative is a hubristic, imperialist mindset that Starfleet knows what's best for other cultures, planets, and the galaxy itself.
I see the PD more as a pragmatic rule for Sf personnel to abide by in most circumstances because they aren't actually elected officials or appointed diplomats, they are essentially naval personnel. Sf captains have been granted the authority to approach and interact with warp capable species on behalf of the UFP without having to clear it with the civilian govt first, if the aliens say bugger of the captain is obliged to obey. With pre warp civs it is essentially assumed that they are incapable of giving consent to first contact because intellectually they might not be ready for the news that life exists beyond their planet or solar system. However, if the civilian government deems it ok then first contact can be made with pre-warp civilisations, as we saw in TOS a few times.
Personally I think that emergency first contacts with species that have suffered serious, planetwide natural disasters should be a thing that Sf captains are mandated to do. Plus, if a species has been monitored and their culture has developed in a way were it's deemed that they can handle FC then I think the UFP should be able to authorise a First Contact mission, though I would say it was morally obliged to.
In Homeward you now have a species that believes they were given their homeland by whatever god sent them a vision of lines appearing and disappearing in water. Can you think of any places in the real world where a religious conviction that a god gave a people land lead to ongoing conflict?
The consequences of that belief could have enormous consequences in the future. We don't know. That's why the Prime Directive forbids involvement in these situations. The universe isn't static, and there are other potential repercussions beyond one community's extinction.
Yes, the Menk were oppressed. They had been relocated from their agricultural homeland by the Valakians who insisted they could farm it better. The Menk already a stronger aptitude for learning than the Valakians were willing to acknowledge, as demonstrated by their spontaneous organizing of samples by family. Menk were having their ability to develop even further dampened by the Valakians, which is oppression.
The episode would have been worse if the Valakians had been brutal and abusive. It would have been a boring story where we wouldn't care that the Valakians would die out. The way it was written made it a more interesting moral question to wrestle with.
First contact taking place after warp development has nothing to do with a consent principle. The reasoning is that once warp is developed, contact with other spacefaring civilizations is natural. It is no longer a question of internal development.
>In Homeward you now have a species that believes they were given their homeland by whatever god sent them a vision of lines appearing and disappearing in water. Can you think of any places in the real world where a religious conviction that a god gave a people land lead to ongoing conflict?
>
>The consequences of that belief could have enormous consequences in the future. We don't know. That's why the Prime Directive forbids involvement in these situations. The universe isn't static, and there are other potential repercussions beyond one community's extinction.
That's a philosophy for not helping anyone ever because they or their descendants might one day do great harm to others. It's a kindness killer and targeting it specifically at pre warp civs is borderline bigoted. Sorry you didn't attain warp drive before your sun blew up or an asteroid hit your planet, I guess your primitive species doesn't deserve to be helped after all, I'ma just gonna fly away in my massive ass space ship that could've saved a couple of thousand members of you species, if only you'd achieved warp one...
>Menk were having their ability to develop even further dampened by the Valakians, which is oppression.
How do you know that? Is it not possible that the Menk were learning from the Valakians presence, the Menk were probably tens of thousands of years away from being a comparable civ to the Valakians, and that's even assuming their evolution as a species goes the 'right' way. Primitive pattern seeking behaviour like sorting samples by family isn't worth condemning a whole species to death, it's not that special.
>The episode would have been worse if the Valakians had been brutal and abusive. It would have been a boring story where we wouldn't care that the Valakians would die out. The way it was written made it a more interesting moral question to wrestle with.
Yeah, instead of leaving bad people to die because they were bad our heroes left good people to die because they were being slightly less than perfect. If the Valakians had been more like humans and exterminated the Menk like most superior species do there wouldn't be a moral dilemma and Phlox probably would've helped them. The Valakians were damned by their own kindness.
>First contact taking place after warp development has nothing to do with a consent principle.
Consent still matters if the Sf crew want to spend time getting to know the new race. If the new race refuses contact or access to their planets and facilities a Sf captain is obliged to respect that. Respecting other species boundaries is a part of the PD that applies even to warp capable species.
>but in STD, stopping a volcano to prevent the death of a pre industrial society is exactly what the federation should do
I assume you mean Star Trek Into Darkness not Star Trek Discovery?
Well, the prime directive is the entire basis of the show. You've got an intentionally pseudo-military (Gene Rodenberry's admonition of, "If it wouldn't happen on a US Warship then it wouldn't happen on the USS Enterprise) construct involved in exploration not exploitation.
The prime directive is what defines star trek as a show. It is explicitly post-colonialist. Many Americans believed that WW2 was an end to European colonialism and didn't care to (or need to) indulge in it themselves. Believing that it forces the question... well, if not that... what then? Star Trek takes that as a premise.
Given all that it would be difficult for any fan of the show to disapprove of the Prime Directive. All it means is that you want it to fundamentally be a different show which means you would not be a fan.
The cases where it is broken are interesting because there are indeed situations where interference is not exploitative, but those situations are still worth some ethical and purposeful consideration. The long term harm may outweigh the short term good... that sort of thing. Hard choices do exist.
>Given all that it would be difficult for any fan of the show to disapprove of the Prime Directive. All it means is that you want it to fundamentally be a different show which means you would not be a fan.
I think a lot of the disapproval comes from the TNG version rather than the TOS version. In TOS it was understood if a species was going to die from a natural disaster then intervention was ok even if doing so changed the civilisation. A captain would still have to justify it in a report though. However by TNG it had morphed into a quasi religious dogma that held that any intervention, even to save a species from almost certain doom, was prohibited, and captains like Picard had to jump through hoops just to do the right thing.
If you take an ethical directive like the PD but let it morph slowly over time so that it doesn't really reflect the values it originally stood for then I don't think it's fair to suggest that people who disagree with it are no longer fans. It's like saying if you don't like the new trek shows you aren't and were never a true fan even though the tone and values of the new shows are fundamentally different than the old ones.
I disagree that the idea itself has evolved. The writers just didn't like the idea and picked a different one. I mean you are allowed to do that when you're writing. DS9 did that and did it effectively. Voyager did it less effectively. The audience is likewise allowed to reject the attempt.
NuTrek doesn't even interact with the idea of the prime directive anymore unless it's to call it antiquated and stupid. It's all about confrontations between established Empires, or internal threats, or convenient existential threats like The Borg. That was always a component of Star Trek but it was never the core of it. Well... its the core of it now I guess and I guess they're still calling it Star Trek.
I think they may have mentioned that the Prime Directive was invented to bring in tension and conflict to a setting where Roddenberry refused to allow any interpersonal drama. I wouldn't know where to ever start with finding that clip, if it does exist at all.
Having grown up with Star Trek, I always took the Prime Directive at face value. Then [this video essay](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17knGMdX4cU) made me gave me a lot to think about. It's worth a watch, but if you don't want to spend the 30 minutes, the big takeaways are:
1. It's kinda arrogant (and maybe borderline racist) to think that evolution only occurs on a single track, and anyone who hasn't reached your level is simply "primitive".
2. If the equivalent of Kirk and Spock showed up here tomorrow, our society wouldn't fatally implode. If they left tech behind, that's a whole other thing, but simply knowing they and the Federation are out there doesn't seem like a real issue.
But at the end of the day, it's too valuable as an engine for story and debate, and it's fun to see the writers find new ways of testing it.
I forget where but they were discussing one episode and Rich says something like “This episode is proof why the prime directive is important, because our hero’s almost commit genocide.”
I thiiiink it’s the one where the pre-warp civilization starts seeing Picard as God?
All of the prime directive episodes of TNG are my favorites. The one that you mentioned with the Mintakans, the one where Data loses his memory and accidentally gives medieval people a bunch of radioactive rocks, the one where Riker is the alien in a society roughly analogous to our own. So good.
There's a neat episode of Enterprise, maybe a two parter, about a few vulcans getting stranded in 19...50s? small town America and having to adapt and build a life. Not explicitly a prime directive episode but has a very similar vibe and is one of my favorite takes on the material.
What episodes are the Data and Riker ones?
The Riker one is called *First Contact* and the Data one is called *Thine Own Self*.
Awesome. Thanks! I remember those being boring when I was a kid. But as an adult, the most boring ones tend to be my favorite ones now.
Came back here to say thanks. Just watched the Riker ep. I think I never watched this one before because I had heard it wasn’t one of the best. But I absolutely loved it. Essentially a stage play about diplomacy, politics, science, and technology. The ep is firing on all cylinders. This is everything Star Trek was created for. Think I’m learning that the Prime Directive eps might be the most underrated ones and maybe what I need in my life most right now. Gonna check out the Data ep soon. So yeah, just wanted to say thanks for mentioning it. :)
I knew Rich Evans was a man of culture when he named *Who Watches the Watchers?* his favorite
Like u/SirSullymore said, Rich did mention in the STD season 2 review why it's important to follow it. However I don't think it "matters". Not to discredit your question at all, but after watching TNG, I feel that the "prime directive" isn't so much a point of discussion as it is the "premise" of the show. They do question it within the show of course, but it seems to me that it's just a building block of the writing. As in, it's an hypothesis you make to explore theorical ideas. From a narrative point of view, saying wether you approve or not of the "prime directive" would be like questioning if the empire is worth overthrowing in Star Wars. It's more something that the writers have to convince you of through good story-telling, rather than something that you have to believe in personally. Which is maybe why old Star Trek feels more philosophical than political? But I haven't watched the new stuff, so I'm just guessing based on Mike and Rich's reactions to it.
Nu trek hasn’t really been all that political (or philosophical, really), except for maybe S2 of Picard, from what I’ve heard.
You're right, that's probably what I was thinking of when mentioning Nu trek. That whole season seemed very on the nose about its messaging.
The prime directive would be interesting if they followed it rigorously, but usually it just pops up as lip service, IMO. Or some episodes they really care about it and it's important and in the next episode (from a different writer) they're just like "eh, let's give these cavemen some laser rifles I guess".
I like/hate the prime directive. IMO it should be 'don't give tech, don't get involved in wars' but in STD, stopping a volcano to prevent the death of a pre industrial society is exactly what the federation should do, and be. They have the tech to do that while hidden. Same with a supernova. The population had no decision about any natural disasters and certainly isn't there fault they live there.
The volcano thing would make more sense as a religious "Prime Directive". It's like saying "we can't help them stop the volcano because God/Zeus/Heaven has clearly decided to make this happen." As a science-based atheistic idea, that seems silly. As you say: "don't give tech, don't get involved in their political affairs" makes sense.
Maybe I am making things up but I understood for things like the volcano, it was about the fact that if given the chance the civilization might be able to come up with a solution or way around the problem which pushed them forward as a species. Saving them takes away that chance for self-progression, no matter how unlikely. Again, that might just be my head canon
right, but are you saying we couldn't stop the volcano because of their religion or the religion of the ship stopping it? I think it would be immoral to let a civilization die because they thought jobu was making the volcano explode. Because then you could pull what TOS did and stop a huge asteroid that the populace would have no idea was coming.
I'm talking about the Prime Directive, not about whatever the volcano people believe. The "we can't save them from the volcano" only works if the Prime Directive was based on some kind of religious principal of Fate or Heaven's Will or something, \*that\* is why we shouldn't interfere with the less advanced races. But it isn't, it's based on rational thinking, so there is no real reason to avoid saving them from the volcano if it can be done reasonably discretely.
[удалено]
>it's arrogant to think that some starship captain passing through the system "knows better" than the biosphere of the planet The biosphere of the planet knows nothing, it's not making a decision, (unless it's that planet from Avatar I suppose), it's just a unthinking process that's happening because of physics. Saying the planet is making a decision is a pretty religious interpretation of a volcanic eruption or an earthquake.
gotcha, and I agree.
There are numerous episodes of Star Trek that demonstrate the danger of cultural contamination (Homeward, Who Watches the Watchers, Blink of an Eye, even Into Darkness). Different interpretations of Starfleet's nature could be enough to INSTIGATE war, even if they didn't pick a side. Your limitations put no restrictions on political involvement. There would be no restriction from the Federation manipulating a planet's political atmosphere, or even sponsoring a coup. It's an invitation to colonialism. Should Phlox have treated Valakians even though it would have resulted in the continued oppression of the Menk? Maybe Starfleet should have tried to free the Menk by refusing to treat the Valakians unless they liberated the Menk. Or, maybe the Prime Directive was written precisely because infinite permutations of that scenario are going to be encountered by ships spanning the quadrant. What if you don't think you're getting involved in a war because you're being lied to, like Harry Kim in Nightengale. The Prime Directive is both brilliant and moral. The alternative is a hubristic, imperialist mindset that Starfleet knows what's best for other cultures, planets, and the galaxy itself.
>There are numerous episodes of Star Trek that demonstrate the danger of cultural contamination (Homeward In Homeward Picard was willing to let every member of that species die for the sake of the PD. That's a horrible attitude that's been rightly criticised for decades now. Preventing 'cultural contamination' really shouldn't be considered if the alternative is extinction. >Should Phlox have treated Valakians even though it would have resulted in the continued oppression of the Menk? Were the Menk oppressed? Phlox goes out of his way to observe that the Menk *are* less intelligent than the Valakians and that it's actually something special that the Valakians hadn't wiped them out, similar to how humans did with Neanderthals. The ep would've been better if the Menk were being abused, but they weren't. The writers accidently created a situation were there was a natural, biological reason for the Menk being 2nd class citizens who were only really suited to performing simple tasks and it is actually to the Valakians credit that they treated them so well. > The Prime Directive is both brilliant and moral. The alternative is a hubristic, imperialist mindset that Starfleet knows what's best for other cultures, planets, and the galaxy itself. I see the PD more as a pragmatic rule for Sf personnel to abide by in most circumstances because they aren't actually elected officials or appointed diplomats, they are essentially naval personnel. Sf captains have been granted the authority to approach and interact with warp capable species on behalf of the UFP without having to clear it with the civilian govt first, if the aliens say bugger of the captain is obliged to obey. With pre warp civs it is essentially assumed that they are incapable of giving consent to first contact because intellectually they might not be ready for the news that life exists beyond their planet or solar system. However, if the civilian government deems it ok then first contact can be made with pre-warp civilisations, as we saw in TOS a few times. Personally I think that emergency first contacts with species that have suffered serious, planetwide natural disasters should be a thing that Sf captains are mandated to do. Plus, if a species has been monitored and their culture has developed in a way were it's deemed that they can handle FC then I think the UFP should be able to authorise a First Contact mission, though I would say it was morally obliged to.
In Homeward you now have a species that believes they were given their homeland by whatever god sent them a vision of lines appearing and disappearing in water. Can you think of any places in the real world where a religious conviction that a god gave a people land lead to ongoing conflict? The consequences of that belief could have enormous consequences in the future. We don't know. That's why the Prime Directive forbids involvement in these situations. The universe isn't static, and there are other potential repercussions beyond one community's extinction. Yes, the Menk were oppressed. They had been relocated from their agricultural homeland by the Valakians who insisted they could farm it better. The Menk already a stronger aptitude for learning than the Valakians were willing to acknowledge, as demonstrated by their spontaneous organizing of samples by family. Menk were having their ability to develop even further dampened by the Valakians, which is oppression. The episode would have been worse if the Valakians had been brutal and abusive. It would have been a boring story where we wouldn't care that the Valakians would die out. The way it was written made it a more interesting moral question to wrestle with. First contact taking place after warp development has nothing to do with a consent principle. The reasoning is that once warp is developed, contact with other spacefaring civilizations is natural. It is no longer a question of internal development.
>In Homeward you now have a species that believes they were given their homeland by whatever god sent them a vision of lines appearing and disappearing in water. Can you think of any places in the real world where a religious conviction that a god gave a people land lead to ongoing conflict? > >The consequences of that belief could have enormous consequences in the future. We don't know. That's why the Prime Directive forbids involvement in these situations. The universe isn't static, and there are other potential repercussions beyond one community's extinction. That's a philosophy for not helping anyone ever because they or their descendants might one day do great harm to others. It's a kindness killer and targeting it specifically at pre warp civs is borderline bigoted. Sorry you didn't attain warp drive before your sun blew up or an asteroid hit your planet, I guess your primitive species doesn't deserve to be helped after all, I'ma just gonna fly away in my massive ass space ship that could've saved a couple of thousand members of you species, if only you'd achieved warp one... >Menk were having their ability to develop even further dampened by the Valakians, which is oppression. How do you know that? Is it not possible that the Menk were learning from the Valakians presence, the Menk were probably tens of thousands of years away from being a comparable civ to the Valakians, and that's even assuming their evolution as a species goes the 'right' way. Primitive pattern seeking behaviour like sorting samples by family isn't worth condemning a whole species to death, it's not that special. >The episode would have been worse if the Valakians had been brutal and abusive. It would have been a boring story where we wouldn't care that the Valakians would die out. The way it was written made it a more interesting moral question to wrestle with. Yeah, instead of leaving bad people to die because they were bad our heroes left good people to die because they were being slightly less than perfect. If the Valakians had been more like humans and exterminated the Menk like most superior species do there wouldn't be a moral dilemma and Phlox probably would've helped them. The Valakians were damned by their own kindness. >First contact taking place after warp development has nothing to do with a consent principle. Consent still matters if the Sf crew want to spend time getting to know the new race. If the new race refuses contact or access to their planets and facilities a Sf captain is obliged to respect that. Respecting other species boundaries is a part of the PD that applies even to warp capable species.
>but in STD, stopping a volcano to prevent the death of a pre industrial society is exactly what the federation should do I assume you mean Star Trek Into Darkness not Star Trek Discovery?
right. too many stds in the franchise :)
I only remember them professing their love for the Robocop: Prime Directives TV show.
Well, the prime directive is the entire basis of the show. You've got an intentionally pseudo-military (Gene Rodenberry's admonition of, "If it wouldn't happen on a US Warship then it wouldn't happen on the USS Enterprise) construct involved in exploration not exploitation. The prime directive is what defines star trek as a show. It is explicitly post-colonialist. Many Americans believed that WW2 was an end to European colonialism and didn't care to (or need to) indulge in it themselves. Believing that it forces the question... well, if not that... what then? Star Trek takes that as a premise. Given all that it would be difficult for any fan of the show to disapprove of the Prime Directive. All it means is that you want it to fundamentally be a different show which means you would not be a fan. The cases where it is broken are interesting because there are indeed situations where interference is not exploitative, but those situations are still worth some ethical and purposeful consideration. The long term harm may outweigh the short term good... that sort of thing. Hard choices do exist.
>Given all that it would be difficult for any fan of the show to disapprove of the Prime Directive. All it means is that you want it to fundamentally be a different show which means you would not be a fan. I think a lot of the disapproval comes from the TNG version rather than the TOS version. In TOS it was understood if a species was going to die from a natural disaster then intervention was ok even if doing so changed the civilisation. A captain would still have to justify it in a report though. However by TNG it had morphed into a quasi religious dogma that held that any intervention, even to save a species from almost certain doom, was prohibited, and captains like Picard had to jump through hoops just to do the right thing. If you take an ethical directive like the PD but let it morph slowly over time so that it doesn't really reflect the values it originally stood for then I don't think it's fair to suggest that people who disagree with it are no longer fans. It's like saying if you don't like the new trek shows you aren't and were never a true fan even though the tone and values of the new shows are fundamentally different than the old ones.
I disagree that the idea itself has evolved. The writers just didn't like the idea and picked a different one. I mean you are allowed to do that when you're writing. DS9 did that and did it effectively. Voyager did it less effectively. The audience is likewise allowed to reject the attempt. NuTrek doesn't even interact with the idea of the prime directive anymore unless it's to call it antiquated and stupid. It's all about confrontations between established Empires, or internal threats, or convenient existential threats like The Borg. That was always a component of Star Trek but it was never the core of it. Well... its the core of it now I guess and I guess they're still calling it Star Trek.
I think they may have mentioned that the Prime Directive was invented to bring in tension and conflict to a setting where Roddenberry refused to allow any interpersonal drama. I wouldn't know where to ever start with finding that clip, if it does exist at all.
Having grown up with Star Trek, I always took the Prime Directive at face value. Then [this video essay](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17knGMdX4cU) made me gave me a lot to think about. It's worth a watch, but if you don't want to spend the 30 minutes, the big takeaways are: 1. It's kinda arrogant (and maybe borderline racist) to think that evolution only occurs on a single track, and anyone who hasn't reached your level is simply "primitive". 2. If the equivalent of Kirk and Spock showed up here tomorrow, our society wouldn't fatally implode. If they left tech behind, that's a whole other thing, but simply knowing they and the Federation are out there doesn't seem like a real issue. But at the end of the day, it's too valuable as an engine for story and debate, and it's fun to see the writers find new ways of testing it.