I now officially hate Weir, Sheppard, Dex and McKay. The sanctioned torture.

Well, at least I'm not the only one who got a headache over that episode.

Stooping to torture makes you less than human. It turns you into a monster.

LOL, actually, I think it's very *human* (though still *wrong*). It's just a question if you believe that --- grmf.. okay, no clue what the translation for "der Zweck heiligt die Mittel" is.

thanks : )
(and damn, I actually knew that expression *g*)

I wouldn't normally comment except it breaks my heart to see you so twisted out of shape by this. You're right, but if you subscribe to any type of t.v show the values they espouse sooner rather than later are going to make you feel sick to your stomach. You either take a step back and say: so this is how other people see the world, interesting. Or let it make you crazy.

You know, even though some of us did not have as strong a reaction as you I truly believe that most of us saw the issues, saw the way they were handled and were not impressed. But to me it doesn't really change my view of Sheppard and McKay at least. This is how I see it: I have an idea of who these people are and just because one writer (or a whole raft of writers) tries to sell me a line about what they would or would not do, I don't have to buy it. Personally I think we allow ourselves to be sold too, too, many times by the media and I am now at the point where I simply refuse to play. It didn't bother me as much as it did you because I don't buy into their view of the world. You know it's not just the slash - it only starts there. If you don't buy into the heterocentricity of their world what keeps you buying into the morality(or lack thereof) of their world? If they stop me liking the characters then somehow they've managed to get inside my head and impose their worldview on me. I refuse to let anyone do that. Especially a bunch of guys on the other side of the world whom I've never met and possibly wouldn't care to spend more than a few minutes with if I did. Think about it: they're controlling your reactions and that is never a good thing. If you liked them before, despite the very human flaws they embodied, why allow someone else to change that? This 'canon' is just fanfic made by conventional ficcers. It's just someone's version of reality which I can either accept or...not.

And the fic idea is exactly what I'd love to read. Come on, don't let anyone get to you like that. I've had my moments when I absolutely detested John Sheppard, but I always get over it, because he lives in my head, but not the version brought to an unsuspecting, hypnotised public every week in the conventional ficcers version of 'reality'. Take control of your reality, don't let it be dictated to you.

You don't know me but I used to haunt your rec pages back in the day. You introduced me to JAG slash which I loved and I always read your comments with interest, so do forgive my presumption.

Here via sga_newsletter.

Can I just say "thank you" for pointing out what's bugging me about this episode? I really wanted to scream at the end (and couldn't believe my ears when they first mentioned torture as a way to get information). My dislike for Weir is now almost to great to describe and if I read any more posts how it was Kavanaghs own fault I'll scream. Really.

"Guilty until proven innocent", indeed. But at least it shows that the show mirrors reality. [/sarcasm]

Der Zweck heiligt die Mittel - es stimmt wirklich. *sigh*

Here via the sga_newsletter. I'll qualify this by saying I haven't seen the episode yet but I've read all the spoilers in relation to the "torture" scene and I'm not as nearly upset as a lot of folks are. I think by writing it that way it delves quite nicely into the pot of human frailities. Since John, Elizabeth etc. are the official "heroes" of the show we want them to be above all that. But, in war (and in the show they're lives are definitely on the line) the lines tend to get blurred and even stomped upon. How much would a person be willing to do if it mean't saving lives? I'm not so sure I have any answers because I'm not sure I *wouldn't* do what they did in the same situation. Just another thought.

I dunno how I feel about th' torture issue other than that Rodney was against it, you could see that plain as day, but he kept quiet because he saw he was the minority. And despite how he may seem, Rodney still wants to be accepted by the "cooler" kids in the sandbox. He saw John's not and caved. If you watch, he almost protests but when John shows his support all the fire goes outta him.

And, yeah, Kavanagh did good in his Liz-bashin' this ep. I never thought about it like that before, but I guess in "38 Minutes" and "The Gift" he was looking out for everyone. His convern for the city was obvious in "Critical Mass". I never used to like Kavanagh, but this ep might'a jus' changed that.

But thanks for this view on it. Kinda does bring the ep closer to home, when put like this. Makes you wonder if any reprecussions'll fall upon the main guys for their behavior or if it'll be swept under the rug cause "Oh, they saved Caldwell!"

Also? Pretty please write that Kavanagh fic? Sounds interesting.

here via sga_newsletter :)

Stooping to torture makes you less than human. It turns you into a monster.

i can't agree with this, tho it would be nice if i could. enjoying torture makes you less than human, but using torture, as someone else pointed out, is actually quite human. it's not an admirable human trait, but it is human. i'd also like to say that in the real world, i'd be the first to condemn torture, however SGA is not the real world.

there are a lot of things that have happened in this show that i would never consider acceptable in RL - imo, Weir and Sheppard's actions in Conviction are far worse their actions in Critical Mass. however, i accept that this is fiction and that fiction can be used to present scenarios which examine ethical dilemmas. i may not always agree with the conclusions (if there are any) that the writers come to, but then if i agreed with everything, that would be boring.

and for that matter, who says that Weir et al have to be perfect? how boring would that be? if anything, this ep is showing how decent people under incredible stress make decisions that nobody would ever want to make.

I wish the fucking city had blown up.

and killed how many people? why is this better than one man being tortured? i'm not saying that the torture option is better either. they're both incredibly lousy options.

and why not take it further? why not condemn Sheppard for killing upwards of 60 Geni in The Storm/The Eye? because really, all he needed to do was to cooperate with Kolya. they would have lost the city, but nobody would have died. you could say he was only defending the city, but then you could argue that about the decision to torture Kavanaugh too.

or what about Beckett collaborating with the Hoffan and killing 50% of the population? or Rodney destroying 5/6 of a solar system? these characters have all fucked up at one point or another, and not in a small way. i don't want a show that has a black and white moralistic code (something i think happened in Conviction, which is mainly why i object to it). i want a show with people who fuck up and have areas of moral ambiguity that i can agree with, or grind my teeth over, and then have ridiculously intense discussions about them on LJ.

Perhaps. But so is rape, pillaging, murder and forced marriage.

all of those things are usually carried out to further the interests of the person committing the crime. i don't see this (in the case of CM) as being the same thing. yes, torture is morally repugnant, however it is used in times of war to get information that could potentially save lives. it's a small distinction, but not insignificant. like the difference you draw between murder and killing in battle.

think about it in the context of today's world. if torturing 1 or 3 or 10 people could have prevented the 911 attacks would it be justifable? i don't have an answer. i am aware however that it's easy for me to make a judgement secure in the knowledge that i'll never have to make that kind of decision.

And I don't want any kids out there to shrug and look confused when they read about torture in the papers, and go all "Hey, dude, it's not all that bad. I guess the tortured guys deserved it.".

that's an argument i will never accept. the writers of SGA are *not* responsible for how people behave or think. if anyone watching the show is morally bankrupt enough not to know the difference between wrong and right, then 1 hour of tv is not going to change that.

The general statement of "Critical Mass" was wishy-washy in the extreme, and made me doubt the political views of its writers/producers.

see, i don't think they were wishy washy. if you look at the progression of events, you can see how they came to that decision. ironically, Kavanaugh was the first person to suggest that they torture him. not, obviously, that he ever imagined that they would.

the first time the idea is seriously suggested, Weir refuses to consider it, stating that there is a chance he's innocent. it's only at the point where the ZPM is 24 minutes away from overload that she agrees. finally, she acknowledges afterwards that it was a line she shouldn't have crossed. Sheppard doesn't agree, obviously, but then his opinion was firmly on the side of "doing whatever is necessary" and in fact, he has always been of that opinion. in terms of the show, i believe the viewer is expected to take Weir's position. of course, that's a matter of interpretation. ymmv.

Well, perhaps not far worse, but more than morally questionable, yes. Still, they were asked to chose between a bad and a worse solution

which is exactly how i see this ep, except that in Conviction it was pretty clear to me that the audience was not supposed to question the morality of that decision. that is why i found the ep so annoying.

The situation wasn't comparable. It wasn't war, and there was never any talk about alternate solutions. Weir and Sheppard simply took the easiest way out, morals, laws or human rights be damned.

how is an act of sabotage and the approach of 2 Wraith cruisers not war? Atlantis *is* at war, and has been since the pilot. and it's not a war that they can afford to lose. they won't be captured or turned into a colony of the Wraith. they will have the life literally sucked out of them.

the fact that Kavanaugh isn't a soldier also doesn't apply. if he *had* been the guilty party, then he would have been no different than a soldier. if you're drawing a distinction between war and peacetime, then Kavanaugh's innocence was the only important factor. and full marks to the writers for making him the innocent one. the fact that they wrote about an innocent person being tortured (or nearly tortured - in terms of drama, it would have been better if they *had* tortured an innocent man) seems to me to point to them being fundamentally against torture.

lastly, what other solutions (apart from those below) were there to consider? if Kavanaugh had given them the encryption codes, they would have seen that the transmissions which seemed so suspicious were in fact harmless. just the fact that he was stonewalling makes him automatically suspect - watch any police drama - and if he wasn't going to talk voluntarily, then the only way they would get information out of him was by torture.

and since i got a bit wordy, there'll be a part 2 :)

hey :) i'm not getting any e-mails from LJ, so i only know you've replied when i check the thread and somehow i missed this post of yours.

btw, by CM i mean Critical Mass

So torture is okay if the torturer has good intentions?

no, just that it differentiates torture from murder, rape, etc. as i said, not a huge distinction, however.

They're impressionable, though, and especially in the US, they are often left alone with only a tv as company. Instead of always quoting Star Trek, perhaps the makers of SG:A should have tried copying the way it subtly (and sometimes not so subtly) tried to entertain while at the same time attempting to convey a measure of right and wrong. Or else they'll simply have to accept that certain viewers see their show as morally questionable.

i don't think the writers or the networks are - or should be - responsible for parents not bothering to check their children's viewing habits. to take that argument to the limit, there would't be *anything* on tv that wasn't suitable for children. i once worked with a woman who used to let her 3 year old stay up to 11 at night so he could watch WWF wrestling. tv has to cater for all ages otherwise there wouldn't be many people watching tv at all. i'm an adult, and i *want* to watch shows that deal with moral ambiguities and adult themes (not necessarily sex). why should i be denied that, and the writers/actors/producers be denied the freedom to create according to their vision because some parents are lazy or just don't care?

wrt Star Trek - i loved the original show because it pushed the boundaries of the then social norms. all the later ST shows failed in that, imo, choosing only to wax moral about issues that were already generally accepted. and yes, i'd love more shows that were willing to take those risks. but i don't want *every* show to be deep and meaningful. SG:A, to me, is about having fun, so i would actually prefer that the writers *didn't* try to add deeper meaning.

as i have already said, i agree it was done badly and i now doubt that the writer intended to convey that torture was a bad idea. i still think there is a place *in fiction* to examine the issue of torture, and i don't think you can do that by simply saying 'it's bad and should never happen'. that way, you're only preaching to the choir. if you want to convince people that believe torture is (or may be) justifiable, then you need to start from that viewpoint and work towards the argument you want to propose. having an obvious agenda usually works against what you're trying to achieve. leaving it open to the viewer to decide may be a more effective means of getting your point across. people generally don't like being preached at.

...and how casually she tossed out that line. Heartfelt regret? Far from it.

well, i didn't see it that way. i think she did regret it, and was disturbed by the implications of her actions. of course, being episodic tv, we're unlikely to ever see any fallout from it.

what i would have *liked* to see is a delegation of scientists coming to Weir to voice their disquiet that she was willing to torture one of them and telling her that she'd need to regain their trust. the problem with the ep was that it only focussed on the security issue of getting information by any means necessary without looking at the wider consequences.

See, there you're taking the USA's stand after 9-11. It was wrong then, and it is wrong now. War means a) a declaration of war, and b) a definite enemy, which until now meant a country. Declaring war on a political view and a world-wide group of not easily identifiable people is controversial in the extreme.

war can be declared unilaterally, as Britain did in WW2. i don't think (tho i'm no historian) that Germany ever declared war on Britain. i'm not sure it declared war on any country. it just kept invading country after country. nor did the Japanese declare war on the USA. i agree that there are problems involved in declaring a 'War on Terror', and i don't think the US was justified in invading Iraq, for all the obvious reasons. Afghanistan was a little more problematic, since there was convincing evidence that the Taliban government was supporting the terrorists.

but getting back to the SGA universe... the declaration of war is an Earth convention worked out by agreement between countries and by long tradition. the Goa'uld and the Wraith don't know or adhere to that tradition, nor are either group a country by any definition of the word. where that leaves any human collaborators has never really been established.

If I bomb a military institution, I am -- and will always remain -- a civilian.

i don't know the exact legal situation, however isn't a spy considered on the same level as a soldier? it was clear that the 'agent' was working for the Goa'uld (and again, i think it's appropriate to say that humans are at war with them), so that would make the agent an enemy spy, rather than a terrorist.

And Kavanagh was not obliged to explain his actions. Sure, it would have been helpful, but as someone arrested on shaky grounds by some kind of military police under a dictator, I totally understand why he stonewalled them.

legally, you're right. he wasn't obliged to explain his actions. morally, i think he was. this wasn't just a case of the authorities thinking he'd done something he shouldn't. it was a case of trying to find someone who was trying to destroy Atlantis and everybody in it. including, i'd assume, the friends that Kavanaugh was so worried about. so, imo, he should have done everything in his power to assist with the enquiry - even if that only meant removing himself as a possible suspect. especially if he believed that they weren't seriously looking for any other suspect, which is clearly what he did believe. that he didn't makes him just as culpable as Weir. i don't mean that he deserved to be tortured for not cooperating, just to make it clear, but that what he did was morally just as wrong as what Weir did.

Furthermore, in my head I always see Kavanagh as in a relationship with a member of the US military

since that's not part of the show (and i'd be surprised if it ever was), then that isn't relevant to the writing of the ep. even if it was, would it be better for his boyfriend to be blown to smithereens than outed?

the thing that has puzzled me most about the reactions to this ep has been the number of people who have defended Kavanaugh's actions. the response to the torture issue is understandable, but just because Kavanaugh was the victim, it doesn't automatically mean we have to exonerate him from his petty and self serving behaviour. to put it bluntly, he behaved like a jackass. he knew that Atlantis and everyone in it was under threat, but all he thought about was how badly Weir had treated him in the past - some of which i agree with and some i don't - and attacking her as a leader. whether you believe any or all of those comments were deserved, this was *not* the time to make them. later, yes, definitely.

please don't say it's because he was badly written. of course he was - he's never been shown as having even one redeeming feature. but if we're going to excuse Kavanaugh on the grounds of bad writing, then why draw the line at him? you could say that about any of the characters. and that would make any discussion of motive, action or ethics irrelevant, because every dubious action could be explained away as bad writing.

seeing your comments below, the points you raise were actually addressed in the ep.

Well, they could have evacuated. They could have started a real investigation instead of concentrating solely on Weir's pet suspect. McKay could have pulled a rabbit out of his hat and shut down all of Atlantis' systems until the manipulations were found and corrected, or somehow disconnected the 'gate from the main computers so they could gate out without running the risk of triggering an explosion.

1. they *were* evacuating, but not everybody got out in time.

2. there is no evidence that the investigation was targeting Kavanaugh, except for his own statement that they were, and he's hardly unbiased. *he* believes Weir's out to get him. that doesn't make it true. Weir stated to Kovak that *everyone on the Daedalus* was being questioned, and Caldwell said the same thing to Weir. true, we didn't see anyone else being questioned, but there's only 42 minutes to fit everything in, and showing other interviews wouldn't add anything to the drama of the ep.

3. Rodney couldn't shut down the system, because the Wraith would have found and destroyed or captured the city. he *did* disconnect the gate, but then the city's inertial dampeners came online and he couldn't shut them down without the access codes. which is why Weir agreed to torture Kavanaugh.

and i ask again - how is destroying the city and killing a lot of people a *better* outcome than torturing one man? because that is the key point. it's the only possible justification for torturing Kavanaugh at all.

As for Beckett -- ever since Hoffan and later the retrovirus I have thought of him as a man not suited for his profession and the position he occupies, especially since he never seemed to have any problems with the results of his Dr.-Mengele-like actions.

well, to be fair, he was pretty horrified by the Hoffan's gungo ho attitude to experimental drug testing. still, it was his responsibility to take more care about how his work was used. i wouldn't go so far as to compare him to Mengele, but he's done some rather suspect stuff since then too.

What I don't see -- and never hear referred to -- didn't happen in canon.

you can't have it both ways. if you have issues with the writing, as i do, then that's fine. the ep wasn't well written. but if what you didn't see isn't canon (tho i don't understand why Caldwell would lie to Weir, or Weir to Novak, about who was being questioned - and *that* was canon) then what you did see *is* canon.

so, it's canon that the city couldn't be completely evacuated, that Rodney couldn't stop the system from melting down and that the city couldn't be defended from the cruisers by the Daedalus.

within that canon, Weir's actions become more debatable. i wouldn't argue about the fact that she made a bad decision. i *would* say that her decision was only made when she was backed into a corner by circumstances (unlike Sheppard, Ronan and Caldwell who were for it almost from the start). that's not evil, that's necessity, as she saw it.

The Daedalus was able to destroy how many Hive Ships in "The Siege Part 3"?

actually, just one. by beaming a nuclear bomb on board. when they tried to do the same to the other ship, they couldn't, and haven't since found a way to destroy a hive ship using their own weapons. that's why they faked the destruction of Atlantis. in Aurora they blew up the Aurora to take out a hive ship and in The Hive, Sheppard got the two hive ships to destroy each other. i don't think the Daedalus has gone up against a cruiser, so whether they'd be able to beat one, i don't know.

So, how many people is Weir allowed to torture for the sake of the expedition? Two? Twenty? A hundred? As many as it takes as long as it's less than 50 % of the total populace and therefore the gains outweigh the losses?

well, since the situation never arose, it's a pointless question. i'm not talking about the use of torture in general, but in this particular episode, where there was only one person threatened with torture. and i'm not saying she was justified. but i'm not going to demonise her for making the choice she did.

it's obvious that the writer wanted to bring up the issue of torture and this was the way it was done. earlier i said that i thought the writer(s) - it turns out there was only one - were trying to raise some kind of ethical debate. however, having found out that the writer is the same guy who butchered Condemned with his heavy handed "morality", i'm not going to give him the benefit of the doubt here. i really hope he doesn't get to write any more SGA eps.

This is still you, cross_stitchery, right?

yep. sorry, i didn't realise i hadn't logged in.

I said and meant that so-called "missing scenes" we never saw (and that were, to my knowledge, never filmed) cannot be canon.

okay, we're approaching this from different directions. i was basing my view that other people were being interviewed on the scene where Caldwell told Weir he was going to interview everyone on the Daedalus and she told him *she'd* do the interviews, and on the scene where Weir told Novak that everyone was being interviewed. since i don't see anything in those two scenes to indicate that they were lying, then i accept as canon that everyone *was* interviewed.

also, it would be incredibly negligent for Weir to only interview Kavanaugh, even if he was her prime suspect from the start (again, something that doesn't come across to me). and i mean so negligent/incompetent that it would be grounds for Caldwell or Sheppard to take over command. so, even tho we don't see any interviews other than Kavanaugh and Novak, i don't have any problem believing that the interviews took place.

Bates, btw, according to the commentaries on the DVDs was sent back to earth after Seige 3 and hasn't returned. the casting directors only know why...

and if Bates had been there, i suspect there would have been strong arm stuff a *lot* sooner than actually happened in the ep.

But we have no canon proof that the Daedalus attacking the Wraith cruisers wouldn't have been successful -- they didn't even try.

it just occurred to me why they might not have considered it. at this point the Wraith are still supposed to believe that Atlantis was destroyed in Seige 3. i know that Rodney makes some comment about dropping some debris and the transmitter that's attracting the Wraith cruisers onto a beach somewhere. so maybe they couldn't attack with the Daedalus because that would give away the fact that Atlantis still exists? i dunno. will probably have to watch it again.

We'll simply have to agree to disagree.

i guess we will. in RL, not so much. but in fiction i'm prepared to accept things i wouldn't accept in RL, simply because it challenges ideas and raises questions in people's minds.

Haven't watched the episode yet, so I can't comment on that (although from what I've read, you're not the only person that feels this way, particularly about Elizabeth) but I just wanted to say a massive 'WORD' to this -

I always felt that when she tore into him during that jumper-stuck-in-the-gate fiasco, she was needlessly cruel, dismissive, unreasonable and just plain old wrong.

Kavanagh was totally right, Weir was totally wrong. I think that scene solidified in my mind that she has no fecking idea of what she's doing.

I honestly didn't feel that the episode really presented them as evil people, in situations like this its more grey than black and white and wanting the city to blow up with all those innocent people makes no sense whatsoever.

btw, if you're sick of this discussion just tell me to shut up and go away. i won't mind. promise.

i've always had a fascination for how people make ethical decisions, particularly in situations where the potential outcomes are all impossibly bad. which is how i see this ep. so i could probably continue this discussion into the next millenium...

Huh? It was his idea that saved not only the four people aboard the 'jumper, but everyone else on Atlantis at the end of "38 Minutes". If he hadn't thought of the extra impulse given to the 'jumper by the decompression, they all would have died.

okay, there's that <g> i'd forgotten, but when you reminded me, i remembered feeling pleased that he'd been given that much in the ep. for the record, i *know* he's been set up to be that 'guy that nobody likes' by the writers, and that kind of manipulation always annoys me, so i look for good things. but honestly? i'm not finding much.

He's competent, he's a critic, he's treated badly (undeservedly!) by everyone. What's not to like?

well, you asked <g>

he's annoying, self centered and in the first interview in Critical Mass seemed to me to be enjoying attacking Weir just a bit too much. he didn't appear to give 2 hoots about the danger of the situation as long as he could get his rocks off insulting her. and maybe if *everyone* treats him badly (and we don't know that, only that he's *disliked* by nearly everyone - according to Rodney) it's for a reason.

btw, if you haven't seen this, go have a look. absolutely luscious photo (http://imdb.com/gallery/hh/0970805/HH/0970805/iid_989403.jpg?path=pgallery&path_key=Cotton,%20Ben%20(I)) of the actor.

I have to admit that I think we've really covered all relevant points now, also, I am at my parents' and therefore only rarely online.

i'm heading off in a couple of days too, but by all means reply if you want to. i'll have intermittent internet access.

If war had been declared and martial law as a result, then Kavanagh -- as a suspected spy of the enemy war had been declared on -- would have fallen under the protection of the Geneva convention which forbids torture.

yep, that's pretty much the situation i was thinking of. and yes, there's no doubt that the Geneva convention *should* have applied.

Are symphatisants automatically spies?

one who tries to destroy a city under orders from higher up certainly would be, i'd think.

I think I'm used to the government taking my human and civil rights more seriously than that. Plus, even if Kavanagh had disclosed the contents of his e-mail -- do you seriously think that that would have removed him from place #1 of Weir's list of suspects? I don't believe so. She had it in for him since "38 Minutes".

i'm not sure what you mean by that first sentence. the point i was making is that there is a big difference between legal obligations and moral obligations. Kavanaugh was under no legal obligation to cooperate, but imo, he *was* under a moral obligation to do so.

as to not being believed - well, we'll never know. and in any case, it doesn't matter in terms of that moral obligation. if he's done everything he can, then his moral obligation is fulfilled.

i don't think it's self evident that Weir wouldn't have believed him. the *only* hard evidence against Kavanaugh was the "unauthorised, encrypted transmission" which coincided with the system trying to automatically dial out on the stargate. if he'd provided the codes and they'd seen that the transmission consisted of a few e-mails, then there would have been no evidence against him at all.

i also don't agree that Weir had it in for him. or at least that there's nothing in canon to suggest that. i've recently been rewatching season 1 (pimping to a friend) and the only other time we see them interact is in The Gift (in Letters From Pegasus they don't share any screen time). in that ep, Kavanaugh says they can't fight the Wraith and should be evacuating. Weir agrees, but says they have some time left and should explore all possible means. it's a perfectly polite and reasonable exchange on both sides.

actually, in Seige 2, they are on the point of evacuating when Everett comes though the gate and orders them to stay in Atlantis. so when Kavanaugh accuses Weir in Critical Mass of not getting them out of Atlantis, he's actually wrong. that was Everett's decision. overall, i'd say there's as much if not more evidence that Kavanaugh has it in for Weir than vice versa.

Why shouldn't he be defended by the fans? He's done nothing wrong. He simply defended his civil rights as attributed to him by the Constitution against a fascist leadership that saw fit to torture him! Being socially challenged isn't a crime. Yet. Here.

see my comments above about moral obligations. it's more than being socially challenged to stonewall an investigation when other people's lives are in danger.

You're trotting out the party line of the US government here. "In times of crisis it does not befit the people to criticize the actions of their betters leaders."

in 38 Minutes, it's a different situation that the current American political scene. i'm not talking about something that would be stretching on indefinitely, but a situation which - one way or another - was going to end in a very finite time. he couldn't have waited 38 minutes to complain about Weir's behaviour?

also, this was a personal issue he had with Weir - she treated him badly and he was understandably pissed. but it was personal, and should have taken a back seat to the immediate crisis.

i believe that in a time of war it's essential that government actions *should* be challenged and under scrutiny. i just don't equate the events in 38 Minutes with that situation.