By Chris Snellgrove
| Published 19 seconds ago
The android Data is a fan-favorite character in Star Trek: The Next Generation, but he’s also the most dangerous person aboard the Enterprise-D. On more than one occasion, he uses his numerous enhanced abilities to take over the ship, effectively putting over one thousand souls in mortal peril.
After witnessing many years of Data malfunctions, Trekkies frequently ask why his commanding officers don’t have an easy way to shut down their artificial officer when he goes rogue. This question has a simple answer: it would be illegal, and it’s all Captain Picard’s fault.
Data Overload
As an android, Data is smarter, faster, and stronger than anyone aboard the Enterprise-D, which is normally an asset to Picard and his crew. For example, in “Brothers,” Data imitates his captain’s voice and takes control of the Enterprise, forcing the ship off course while a sick child’s life hangs in the balance.
On another occasion, Data joined with his evil brother to lead rogue Borg in a war against the Federation. Speaking of the Borg, he shut down Picard’s self-destruct sequence in First Contact, even though doing so meant saving the Borg Queen’s life.
There were always extenuating circumstances, of course. When he hijacked the ship and joined his brother, Data was under the influence of outside programming. When he saved the Borg Queen’s life, it was because he was engaged in a gambit (an ultimately successful one) to save Picard from that same autodestruct.
Despite these circumstances, many still question why the Enterprise-D didn’t have a way to remotely shut Data down when he turns evil. It’s like remotely disabling your cellphone when it’s stolen.
The Birth of the Lawyer Picard Episode
There’s a reason Data doesn’t have any safeguards. That answer is that Captain Picard successfully argued that Data was a person and not Starfleet property.
It happened in an episode called “The Measure of a Man,” one of the greatest Star Trek episodes ever made. In it, Data refuses an experimental procedure that could kill him. When ordered to comply, he resigns from Starfleet. Starfleet, in turn, attempted to argue that Data was their property, rather than an officer who could think and act independently.
Picard takes on the role of Data’s lawyer. After some soul-searching and a few rousing speeches, Picard successfully argued that Data was a person with the rights and privileges of other living beings.
It’s a genuinely heartwarming episode, but it also implicitly establishes why nobody secretly installed a remote “off button” in an android that can (and often does) go rogue, endangering the entire ship. Because he is legally a person, Starfleet can’t booby trap his body any more than they could ethically booby trap anyone else. Just like with Troi and her empathic abilities and Worf with his prodigious strength, Starfleet cannot take any preemptive measures that treat Data as fundamentally different than the rest of the crew.
That’s how it should be, of course. Data shouldn’t be singled out because countless organic characters get mentally manipulated or outright mind-controlled throughout the duration of the franchise.
Ironically, though, Starfleet may have been able to save some lives, or at least some time, if not for Picard fighting for his android officer’s rights in “The Measure of a Man.” In this way, Picard’s greatest moment nearly doomed the ship on multiple occasions, and once you realize this, you’ll never look at The Next Generation’s first great episode the same way ever again.
