According to Wikipedia:
When Katee [Sackhoff, who plays “Starbuck”] decided to quit smoking just before shooting started for Season 3 of Battlestar Galactica, the writers for the show decided to have her character also stop smoking. Both were in response to fan mail from young girls who said they wanted to be just like Starbuck when they grew up.
Oh please. Now it’d be great if these girls grew up to emulate Starbuck’s positive qualities while avoiding her negative ones. 
But as far as the latter go, does anyone think smoking is anywhere near the top of the list of Starbuck’s self-destructive traits? Ahead of the binge-drinking, moody surliness, picking pointless fights, taking needless risks, wrecking all her personal relationships, etc., etc.? Not to mention deliberately crashing her ship in what looked like suicide a couple of episodes ago?
In fact nearly all the characters on Galactica, despite their many virtues, are self-destructive or otherwise seriously screwed-up; that’s part of what makes the drama so compelling. For that matter, the cylons on the show commit suicide as a handy form of transportation (Sharon) or enlightenment (D’Anna)! If the show’s writers were really to suppress all depiction of behaviour whose emulation might be inadvisable, they’d have to wreck the entire show. So why single out smoking, apart from its being politically correct to do so? (I’m reminded of when Marvel Comics decided to make Wolverine give up smoking, lest impressionable youngsters take him as a role model. Wolverine still leaps into fights and slashes away at people with sharp steel claws built into his knucklebones, however.)
In any case, I vaguely recall seeing an interview where Sackhoff said the reason her character gave up smoking cigars (which is the only thing I can recall the character smoking) is that Sackhoff herself has never liked cigars. So I have my doubts about the whole story!
Sometimes giving up a cigar is just giving up a cigar.
Ah, so you’ve noticed the characters are majorly screwed-up as well? I was starting to think that’s a bad thing, but maybe you’re right about the drama element. In any event, I’m sure lots of grim jokes about being executed by “airlocking” have floated around the fleet’s bulletin boards…
Incidentally, what do you think of Baltar’s (admittedly self-serving) argument? Do Adama, Roslin, and co. constitute a “ruling aristocracy” in the ordinary sense? Indeed, can one even have life aboard a spaceship without something of the sort?
Do Adama, Roslin, and co. constitute a “ruling aristocracy” in the ordinary sense?
I guess it depends what the “ordinary sense” is, but sure. They abuse power high-handedly and break their own rules all over the place — well-meaningly, not maliciously, but still egregiously. (I used to say that one of the interesting things about Babylon 5 is that nearly every character absues power from time to time. Well, on Galactica it’s ALL the time!)
Indeed, can one even have life aboard a spaceship without something of the sort?
Why not? Sure, as long as the fleet is accepting Galactica’s protection they’ve sort of agreed to follow the leadership’s decision about what direction to travel, when to make the next spacejump, etc. But as Spencer argues, agreeing to go along with the leadership on those decisions doesn’t amount to a blanket agreement to go along on every point. I was certainly on Tyrol’s side rather than Adama’s in the workers-on-strike episode, for example. (Incidentally, where the hell was Zarek in that episode? Seems like the kind of issue he should be right in the middle of.)
Actually Zarek seems to be the quintessential revolutionary-corrupted-by-politics. The first time we see him he’s a radical and after getting involved in politics he winds up advocating martial law – so his lack of interest in the union seems somehow appropriate. Similarly Baltar comes from a poor, working class family but in the last months on New Caprica was considering stopping the union’s activities.
Well, on Galactica it’s ALL the time!
Indeed! They need some Big Brother-style posters around the ship featuring an open airlock with a caption like “Follow orders; obey the captain”.
Or “Even cylons need to breathe…”
Why not? Sure, as long as the fleet is accepting Galactica’s protection they’ve sort of agreed to follow the leadership’s decision about what direction to travel, when to make the next spacejump, etc. But as Spencer argues, agreeing to go along with the leadership on those decisions doesn’t amount to a blanket agreement to go along on every point.
It is true agreement to follow the Galactica doesn’t mean each individual ship has to obey its every instruction (although witness episodes involving marines sent to seize food stores, etc). However, I actually was alluding to the problems that life aboard a spaceship (or an ordinary ocean-going ship) pose for libertarian rights. These problems are analogous to the problems in Spencer’s scenario where the surface of the earth is all privately owned.
For example, on a planet there are limits to the extent that a ruling class can control the means of life; even if enclosures, anti-union laws, and forced cartelization limit the opportunities of the mass of men, at the very least men can still breathe without asking permission of a higher authority. Yet on a spaceship (ocean-going ship) even this simple right is denied, since anyone who disagrees with the captain can be thrown out an airlock (thrown over the side of the ship). The captain is a sort of ideal Hoppean-type monarch who is the absolute owner of his private property, namely the boat itself, and if anybody opposes this situation then (as in Spencer’s scenario) they literally haven’t a place to stand to say anything. Any attempt to democratize, or have competing private defense agencies, or whatnot would seem to crumble against this iron dictatorial rule, and since I have never heard of elections on a boat (not even in medieval Iceland!) I doubt there ever can or would be.
Is tom zareck a neocon?