A while ago, I was talking to a certain friend of mine, who is somewhat into both Trek and Wars. I was explaining to him how much more powerful SW ships were, when he interrupted to tell me, "Yeah, but SW ships are more powerful because the Federation is peaceful and doesn't need powerful weapons" or something to that effect. I was so amazed by his stupidity and refusal to acknowledge my point that I abandoned that part of the argument shortly after. I then explained SW's speed advantage with hyperdrive. He told me that no, warp drive is faster. I attempted to continue arguing both points for a little while longer, but his Wall of Ignorance was so strong that I ended up giving up and directing him to this site. After reading through it (which I did not expect him to do), his Wall of Ignorance was, surprisingly, broken, and he has come to the correct conclusion that the Empire would, in fact, beat the Federation.

I'm not sure which part is more unbelievable, his stupidity or that someone that stupid could manage to come around to our side.

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Well, he had an idea on both universes, and had based his idea on what he knew. When he saw this, he saw that he was wrong, and changed his idea.

Its alot better than some people, who wont budge one bit at all. Even in the face of overwhelming evidence.

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You do have a point, but that isn't the thing that really made his argument dumb. The dumbness came primarily from his statement that the federation has no need to develop powerful weapons. While they are peaceful for the most part, they have one of the best militaries in the galaxy, and are threatened by a number of hostile powers. Any deficiencies in firepower are because they haven't advanced as far, not because they don't need or want them.

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That is true, when he said that, did you counter with "Then they let the Borg and Dominion kill some of their people because they didnt want powerful weapons?"

In which case, if he says yes, then he is admittting that the Feds wouldn't fight back agains the Empire, and had he said no, well the he just admits that they cant build better weapons.

Either way, he admits SW wins now, so its not like he is stupid or anything. Maybe he was just slightly stubborn?

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"I don't believe in man made global warming because God promised to never again destroy the earth with water. He sent the rainbow as a sign."
- Sean Hannity Forums user Avi

"And BTW the concept of carbon based life is only a hypothesis based on the abiogensis theory, and there is no clear evidence for it."
-Mazen707 informing me about the facts on carbon-based life.

Something similar to that, yes. He sort of ignored it and said something else dumb that I don't remember specifically, although I do remember that it was basically 'the Federation still doesn't need those weapons', then the conversation shifted to hyperdrive vs. warp drive. I think he was being stubborn. He isn't the kind of person to give in easily.

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When in trouble, use the SHIT method:
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Well, if he shifted it, then it shows that he knows you are right, and tried to get you to focus on something else.

Either way, he knows better now.

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"I don't believe in man made global warming because God promised to never again destroy the earth with water. He sent the rainbow as a sign."
- Sean Hannity Forums user Avi

"And BTW the concept of carbon based life is only a hypothesis based on the abiogensis theory, and there is no clear evidence for it."
-Mazen707 informing me about the facts on carbon-based life.

It's not that he's stupid, it's that he hasn't thought the argument through. I can only speak for myself, but I know that I felt much the same way he did and had the same vibe from watching both shows. Namely, that the federation was not primarily a military organization whereas the Empire was. It wasn't that I was stupid or lacking in intelligence; nor that I was stubborn - simply that I hadn't spent the time to actually systematically work through the full corpus of data. Seeing this website changed my mind in a way that seeing Darkstar's website could not. Even though I saw the St-v-sw.net site before I saw this one (though I didn't realize it was Darkstar's at the time, being more interested in the content.)

-AHMAD

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"Wallahu a'lam"

It's incredible that your friend would say the Federation doesn't need powerful weapons, considering how many episodes in TOS, TAS, TNG, DS9, VOY, ENT, portray military actions or deal with their consequences, not to mention ALL of the movies. (STI had the Klingons firing weapons at V'Ger. STIV had Kirk & Co. travelling in a Klingon bird-of-prey because the Enterprise blew up in STIII.) If anything, that should prove beyond a doubt that the Federation needed lots and lots of powerful weapons, because its many enemies have deleted "overkill" from its dictionary.

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Please do not make Americans fight giant monsters.

Those gun nuts do not understand the meaning of "overkill," and will simply use weapon after weapon of mass destruction (WMD) until the monster is dead, or until they run out of weapons.

They have more WMD than there are monsters for us to fight. (More insanity here.)

His "the Feds could do it all but they're holding back" argument is actually very common among Trekkies. My favourites are the guys who say that the Feds could easily build a Death Star if they wanted to. And yes, I've heard this many times, not just once.

The fact is that 90% of the population is stupid. We see this every time we drive cars or make the mistake of listening to "man on the street" political commentary. These kinds of arguments are not surprising in that context.

This is nothing. One Trektard I debated suggested the Empire would crumble and grind to a halt in the Alpha Quadrant because, and I shit you not, she said this, "Darth Vader is emo". Read it again if you have to.

There is no phrase or word int he tongue of Men, Elves, Dwarves, or Ewoks fit to describe that level of idiocy. Seriously, my stupid meter just blew up in my hand.

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"Impossible! Lasers can't even harm out deflector dish! Clearly these foes are masters of illusion!' 'But sir, my console says we-' 'MASTERS OF ILLUSION! - General Schatten

A language is built upon the experience of its speakers. Inuit (eskimoes) have fifty words for snow because they see all fifty kinds of snow on a daily friggin' basis.

In order for a language to have a word or even multiple words to encompass the staggering depths of stupidity involved here, the people who speak this language would have to be so incredibly stupid themselves that they wouldn't even HAVE a language. They would instead be naked and sitting in caves grunting to themselves and trying to decide if rocks are edible. In other words, it is impossible to accurately describe such stupidity in a few words.

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Your ad here.

I think the medical term for this level of stupidity is 'vegetable'. Or maybe 'dead vegetable'.

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I always refer to such idiocy as a "neutron star of stupid," which I may have stolen subconsciously from someone on this website.

Not necessarily. They could have bordered such a society, though the usage of the word would most likely fall into desuetude quite quickly, as the stupidians quickly eliminated their entire clan via the established stupidity.

Here in Italy we sometime say that "The Mother of the Morons is pregnant all the time": these words won't be desuete so quickly...

Just so you know, that's an urban legend. Eskimos/Inuits have roughly as many words for snow as English.

I love how "Federation is peaceful" advocates seem to ignore that the Federation is surrounded by warmongering alien empires bent on it's destruction, and would have to maintain the most advanced military they can even if they don't like saying they do.

Last time I checked, emo people did NOT personally enter battles against multiple opponents (see Vader PWNing multiple Jedi in the last issue of the 'Clone Wars' comics), did NOT pilot fighters into battle against multiple enemy aerospacecraft, and did NOT casually kill people who pissed them off. If anything, it could be argued that Kirk, Picard, Sisko, Janeway, and Archer were emo, considering how many times they preached to various peoples, "You're wrong, we're right," in 'Star Trek'.

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Please do not make Americans fight giant monsters.

Those gun nuts do not understand the meaning of "overkill," and will simply use weapon after weapon of mass destruction (WMD) until the monster is dead, or until they run out of weapons.

They have more WMD than there are monsters for us to fight. (More insanity here.)

Emo is for little overprivilaged whiny shits who like to pretend they have it tough. Vader actually had it tough. Emo kids like to hurt themselves. Vader tortures and kills others. Emo kids think they are unloved and betrayed. Vader was actually betrayed by his master who saw him as the fulfillment of a prophesy, not as a person.

Vader is no emo. He's hardcore.

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People throw the word emo around without even knowing what it means. Any character who's suffered, or been angry, or sad have been branded as emo.

Of course, the bigger joke is that Vader's character flaws would somehow destroy an entire miitary campaign.

VADER is Hardcore. Prequel Anankin WAS emo.
And since the Feds can't be arsed to break out those uber weapons of theirs against enemies that threaten the very existence of the UFP (like V'Ger, the Whale Probe, the Borg, the Q...) even if they EXISTED (which we know they don't, hence the continuous lack of the Feds using them) why would they use them against the Empire which while generally probably being an unwelcome change of government DOESN'T threaten their physical existence (barring on the individual level in a number of cases)?

B-b-b-but the Whale probe deactivated their ships, the borg adapt to everything, Q is omnipotent, V'Ger obviously wasn't threated by their weapons, excuses ad-nauseum.

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"everytime a person is born the Earth weighs just a little more."--DMJ on StarTrek.com
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What's their excuse for the Dominion?
And for that matter the Breen bombing Earth? Pathetic as it was, world war II bombers could do more damage than that.

Well, that just shows how tough Federation construction is!!!

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"everytime a person is born the Earth weighs just a little more."--DMJ on StarTrek.com
"You see now you are using your thinking and that is not a good thing!" DMJay on StarTrek.com

"Watching Sarli argue with Vympel, Stas, Schatten and the others is as bizarre as the idea of the 40-year-old Virgin telling Hugh Hefner that Hef knows nothing about pussy, and that he is the expert."--Elfdart